I am indebted to Hit and Run for this piece about Europes disdain for America, written by Bruce Bawer, an expatriate living in Norway. It is an exemplary and spot-on appraisal of anti-American attitudes in Europe. Unlike many writers who have attempted, and failed, to explain the Europeans disgust with the United States, Bawer makes a reasoned, albeit a tad overlong, argument for American values while avoiding the jingoistic wordplay that would make most savvy readers (i.e. Europeans living in the U.S., Americans who have lived abroad) roll their eyes.

As an American who has lived in Europe, I found this quote reflective of my own feelings upon coming home:

Living in Europe, I gradually came to appreciate American virtues Id always taken for granted, or even disdainedamong them a lack of self-seriousness, a grasp of irony and self-deprecating humor, a friendly informality with strangers, an unashamed curiosity, an openness to new experience, an innate optimism, a willingness to think for oneself and speak ones mind and question the accepted way of doing things. (One reason why Euro- peans view Americans as ignorant is that when we dont know something, were more likely to admit it freely and ask questions.)

Bawer also makes the argument that many Europeans, often the most vociferous, will denounce the United States for being a land of uneducated dunces while avouching to the words of so-called experts. Critical analysis of what these highly educated, supremely edified people are actually reciting is woefully lacking; this is extremely apparent when it comes to the media, paradoxically believed to be less slanted and more professional in Europe despite strong evidence to the contrary:

[W]ith the exception of Britain, no Western European nation even approaches Americas journalistic diversity. (The British courts recent silencing of royal rumors, moreover, reminded us that press freedom is distinctly more circumscribed in the U.K. than in the U.S.) And yet Western Europeans are regularly told by their media that its Americans who are fed slanted, selective newsa falsehood also given currency by Americans like Hertsgaard.

This entry was posted on Thursday, July 1st, 2004 at 13:07 by Tyler and is filed under World. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.