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Hi!!
I'm a guy from Barcelona (Spain), so, my level of english isnt the best...excuse me for that.
Well, I write here because Im very surprised with most of the mails that you have sended, about the shitty AW!
I explain you why I have this impression.
When I studied at the University, every year existed a colaboration between Universities of all Europe, and USA also. So, every new course you found a lot of people from diverent countries. We (well, I and a lot of men) waited with emotion how many american women were there! Why? For the simple reason that american girls were the easiest to convince to fuck!! Sure! Every girl maybe fucked 5 o more boys during the year (2 of them were my rates). They loved sex, well....maybe to stay with the most number of cool latinos, I dont know, and when they returned to USA, explain it to their friends!
So, thats the reason for my surprise! Maybe AW when they are out of their ultraconservativ country changed their mind, and want to be happy and feel free!!
AW even they were more sexual opened than nordic girls (Sweden, Danmark, for ex.).
Every year whe are fooled looking for american pussy!!!
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It seems that Americans in general fear each other more than many people from European countries fear each other. I notice this in my travels to many countries, and perhaps I am naive in my assumptions since "they" obviously know I am American and perhaps "trust" me more for some unknown reason to me.
When I was travelling by train from Budapest to Romania, I met a woman who was coming back from two months in Italy. She invited me to visit her home several days later to stay with her husband and two small children. I ended up staying with them for a week. Nobody did background checks on each other, etc. It was a nice visit with them driving me around the countryside and stopping to have meals at their parents' places, etc. I have had other experiences like this in Europe and have known many others who have similar stories. Of course, upon telling these stories upon my arrival back in America, I am frequently told I was crazy for doing this. What if... questions of a dangerous nature abound. This stuff just doesn't go on in America like that. I'm sure Europe has its' horror stories, but the fear level of strangers seems so much lower.
You can even see this in something like calling an escort in many places of Europe. The girl arrives and comes into your place, and that's it. There's no - give me your credit card #, Guido will be at the girl's side, etc.
This isn't getting at the core discussion of why America seems so much more aloof, but I'm just trying to make sense of some of my impressions first.
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incaroca -
I think you gave many of the reasons these AW were so sexually free and open.
A part of choosing to study in your country was to have free sexual experiences with "cool Latin males"(many AW like the image of the Latin European male), they were in college (one of the best sex environments I experienced in my life), they were away from their puritanical homeland and fear of the "****" label (similar to the freer behavior I have experienced with AW at vacation resorts - when they know their behavior will be secret and not affect their social or business world back home).
(As always, my opinions are understood to be generalities, and hopefully will not be used as a launching pad for a diatribe of my simplistic or idiotic thinking. Hopefully, they will be used to move in the direction of exploration of the topic on this string of the forum.)
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AW as I explained in a previous post about them in Brazil, do act more freely because they are away from this puritanical environment. American culture ENCOURAGES unopenness by labelling such sexual conversations as "shameful". "Shame" is the curse that infests American culture and unfortunately, our media and some evangelist groups born in America want to spread the disease of "Shame". The Carnival trip opened my eyes to this problem in that now I don't blame the AW themselves but I blame our system of etiquette influenced by the concept of "Shame". This is definitely apparent in big cities and small towns in different scenarios. In big cities in America, no one knows each other so no one talks to one another because ALL Americans were taught not to talk to strangers. In fact it is "shameful" for AW to go home with a stranger the first night they meet and she would be labelled a "****". In a smaller town, although an AW is more willing to meet a new face, she still wouldn't have sex until she gets to know him for several weeks or until marriage because news travels swift in a small ton and she is afraid of being labeled a "*****". In both scenarios, the concept of "shame" is apparent. Also the parents of the AW look at meeting a guy from a nightclub as "shameful".
Place these same AWs in a sexually liberal environment like Brazil or Europe and they will be fucking like rabbits because they figure that no one will know what happened on that trip.
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Jak,
Your impressions that Americans in general fear each other more than many people from European countries fear each other are similar to my impressions.
One of my first jobs was not in the city and I didn’t have car in that time.
Almost every day I used to hitchhike on my back from the job.
Mostly immigrants from Europe gave me ride.
I still remember short but warm conversations with Greece, Italy, Spain, and Polish drivers. Very rare when Canadians gave me ride and communication mostly was tense with them.
Your comments that Russians seem to never smile at strangers
right at some extend. If they not smile at you, it’s mean that you not convinced them they can trust you. Fake smile and politeness never were part of Russian culture. Don’t expect it in return.
Best way to communicate with Russians is to show them your true feeling ignoring
any etiquette. If you are too polite they think you are hiding something and they not going to trust you. Probably for Americans it can take time to accustom to this. But once you get it you are going to be like fish in the water and make genuine friends very fast.
I am still convinced that root of problems with AW is that Americans traditionally hide their feeling and as result lose the ability emotionally communicate properly among themselves, become afraid everybody and confused with stranger.
They lost emotional mechanism to evaluate the stranger.
To make things worth, in order to substitute normal emotional communication Americans had to accept sexually repressive models of behavior, which government and religious and other groups happy to promote.
Many nationalities do not need to accept such models because people there are happy with their emotional behavior and trust themselves.
Closest example is Montreal. As result you can find women there with best attitude in North America.
Jak, If your impression about genuine Southern U.S hospitality is correct, then according to my theory it should be no big difference in attitude of AW there in comparison with others states.
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I do agree American men are taught to hide their feelings. I do not agree that Europeans are more open than Americans. In fact I think the opposite based on my experience in mostly northern and western European countries. Spain is an exception in my experience. In countries such as Belgium, The Netherlands, France, Germany, and Austria, I found the locals somewhat suspicious and unwilling to strike up conversations with strangers. This goes for women as well as men. Exceptions have occurred when alcohol was involved.
Tonight I had a conversation with an American female friend and she said she preferred the company of her men friends (such as me). I said I also preferred the company of my women friends (such as her). This is all sex aside. We hypothesized that it was competition among women and their women friends, and competition among men and their men friends, that might be leading to this result. I know I am a very competitive person and over the years this has resulted in some bad blood between me and my male friends, whereas this is not an issue between me and my female friends.
Also I am aggressive and so my approach to women is somewhat aggressive so maybe it works better in countries where the man is supposed to be the aggressor, such as Latin America and Asia. As posters such as Darkseid have remarked, we Americans get such mixed messages about sex that it is hard to know when to push the envelope and when to back off.
I always say, I have a low batting average and I strike out a lot but I take my cuts and I hit my share of home runs. I think maybe American women feel like they need to take fewer swings and make better contact, cuz of that whole ridiculous s l u t thing. Also I don't think American women know how to flirt very well, which might be part of the whole "don't talk to strangers" thing. I didn't get that growing up.
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Dickhead ,
Could be that they (North West European) are more open to each other but less open to foreigners since Europeans had a lot of internationality problems before?
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While I agree the American tendency to be "nice" as a default social veneer also can lead to a kind of fake and insular distance, I think it's a mistake to blame it entirely for lack of communication. The bottom line is that it's part of a social dance like any other, and if one knows how to dance the dance, one does reasonably well. It's simple enough to figure out when someone's giving a nice polite fake response and when there's some genuine warmth involved. That's the way the game is played -- and the mistake non-natives make is going overboard, from the "everyone is friendly" perspective to the "everyone is fake and distant" one. The truth is, as usual, in between.
Let's face it -- this is still basically a country filled with people displaced from somewhere else, where a lot of them have tried to recreate the social structure they lost, and part of what's been recreated is suspicion of people outside your ethnic arena. Here, that has translated not only the neighborhoods where people of similar ethic groups tend to live together in an attempt not only to retain their ethnic identity but to be socially comfortable, and also into direct racism that shifts and becomes more complex depending on who the latest large immigrant group happens to be. It has also created a strange kind of dual sense of nationality, where you're American but you also consider yourself German or Irish or African or whatever in spite of the fact that your ancestors haven't lived in said home country for, say, a hundred and fifty years, and you and your parents were not only born here but really know squat about the father/motherland.
But I also think there are other aspects that need to be considered. Beneath that so-called openness in Europe, Russia, and elsewhere is also a simmering hostility toward other ethnic groups and a litany of centuries of grievances, and this manifests itself not only in war but in astonishing brutality toward people who yesterday were your "neighbors." Or have we forgotten that the ethnic cleansing activities and conflicts in Bosnia, Serbia, Chechnya, the Middle East, Ireland, Rwanda and Burundi, Sri Lanka, etc. (all of which are recent or ongoing -- I could cite another massive list just by going back a couple of years) are all grounded in very long historical discord between groups, some stretching back a thousand years? Great -- strong personal warmth and then a pitchfork stuck in you as soon as it seems there is an opportunity.
Perhaps, picking up on Lenin's comment about NW Europeans being open to each other but not to foreigners, the problem is that Americans have no idea who is and who is not an outsider, and the cultural truth is that we're all natives and outsiders at the exact same time.
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part of the reason why there is the segregated neighborhoods and racism is the don't talk to strangers concept and "shame". most marriages in a big city like new york with segregated areas only happen within their own little neighborhoods. for example, if i go into spanish harlem, i get stares from the people living in that neighborhood as though i was an alien from another planet. if i hook up with one, news gets around and they would disapprove of it. it seems that inter-racial marriages is a big deal in america and in some cases it is "shameful" because the person involved in it is bringing in an "outsider". we still have this problem in america today and i don't see many interracial couples in public. in fact, this happened with my ex-fiancee in which her friends didn't like me because i was asian so they tried to teach her ways to ditch me.
this form of racism is as jz pointed out apparent in countries with a history of factions and war. the middle eastern countries don't have an mixed marriages with isrealites. such acts are also "shameful" to them. also a women's naked body is "shameful" so they cover them up with from head to toes in burques. whereever "shame" is taught there is intolerance and prudity. no shame is taught in brazil so there is no prejudice nor prudity. some european countries have much less shame than america and i see much more interracial marriages there and a lot less prudity than here in america.
as for the lack of communication within races, "shame" also plays a part because women are looked down upon for being too easy and breaking the rule, "don't talk to strangers". her friends and co-workers immediately spread the word that she would do ayone on 2 legs. it is american nature to gossip and that is why we have such tabloid papers and shows as the upn's i-team or the inquirer which tries to throw dirt on everything they see including amsterdam's rld and thailand's "****d" prostitutes.
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Here is just one fact from Canadian history for discussion.
French men immigrants mixed with native women when they came
in North America hundreds years ago. English men didn’t mix.
Spanish and Portuguese in South America mixed too.
Seems "don't talk to strangers" attitude was not developed here
but originally was brought here from England.
Somebody have any thoughts about it?
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well, given that a portion of the history of the united states (and a lot of prevailing attitude) came from the puritans, who were english, and who left england seeking religious freedom because they wanted to be [i]more[/i] repressive, that shouldn't be all that surprising. (very nice, albeit strange, book on this by william carlos williams called "in the american grain.") to respond to lenin's point, a great deal of that intermingling depended a lot on geography -- there tended to be fewer cities and people in canada, and thus fewer options. in similar situations in the states, such as frontierland out west, you saw a lot more intermarriage with native americans. but i'd agree that the english immigrants, in general, were less likely to mix. perhaps that's because england was the dominant empire of the times, so going outside the nationality was considered a social step down. given the puritans' general intolerance of differences in general i don't think it's very strange that they didn't move outside of their own circles.
my first girlfriend back in junior high in the late 60s was african american, and you'd have thought i was signing up to burn cities (which was going on at the time, so i guess it was in some ways a bit understandable) from the reaction of not only friends but school administration. my family was actually fairly cool about it, probably because i wasn't talking about marrying anyone. the girl got the same reaction, probably more virulently, from her peers and family. (all of which probably kept us together longer, of course.) at that point in time, marrying someone from another race was actually illegal in mroe than a dozen states. (the last such law was removed in alabama three years ago...)
in truth, there's far more intermarriage between ethnicities in the states than there were only thirty years ago, and while it can still brings the responses darkseid describes, it's also socially more acceptable than in the past. in 1960 there were about 149,000 mixed-race marriages with one white or black partner, and in 1990 close to ten times that amount, and it's continued to rise. overall, the numbers are far higher, as blacks and whites are least likely to move outside of their races. the stats i've seen on mixed interracial or ethnic marriages and relationships in the us say it's been very much on the rise -- going from about 0.4% in 1960 to about 7% now, with unmarried couples up in the 15% range. (the latest census was the first to really analyze unmarried couple makeup.) most likely to marry outside of their race, to come full circle to lenin's question, are native americans, with some estimates saying only about 25% will marry another.
whether this has anything to do with americans' tendency toward lack of social openness is anyone's guess. interestingly, one study i saw said that the most likely place for mixed-race couples to hook up is at work, which given the workplace situation these days says a lot...
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it's ironic the way america turned out and more repressive we have become. americans tried to fight taxation with the boston tea party by throwing over tea because it is taxed, yet our federal government sets up the irs and is now collecting taxes from us. we were supposed to be able to bear arms to protect ourselves, yet in most states guns are illegal. what ever happened to free speech and press? apparently, it is free for prudes only and us commonfolks cannot show pornography or curse on the air. instead prudes are free to sensor us, that's the kind of freedom america gives us, freedom for all prudes and religious groups. we also get thrown in jail for public nudity, brothel ownership, and our legal age to drink, smoke or see porn is higher than some countries. (the age is 16 in brazil but here it is 21).
i would disagree that we are the leaders of freedom but i would agree we are not the most repressive. the middle east or china is more repressive than this. i would place the usa in the middle ranking when it comes to the most free country in the world. it certainly has less freedom than some third world oreuropean countries. heck, even england or canada can show a nude scene or two without being edited. i saw a few nude senes on public televisoion even on primetime in both these countries. we have got to be the most sexually repressed country second to the middle east on this planet.
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Actually, I don't know of any other countries other than some provinces of Canada that have drinking ages as high as 21. Of course, alcohol is more or less totally illegal in some Islamic countries so it could be worse, I guess.
However, there are no states in which guns are "illegal." There are many states where the ways and places in which you can carry them are restricted.
Yesterday in my state, a 12 year old kid was killed playing with a rifle. He was at his friend's house, the parents were not home, and they apparently left a loaded gun accessible. Bummer.
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Darkseid, DH, etc.,
Do you guys know if anyone in academia has ever actually studied the origin and development of sexual ethics and values in American? I agree that it's a very strange phenomenon.
I read once that many of our backward attitudes towards human sexuality originated in England during the reign of Queen Victoria. Hence, the term "Victorian Ethics." These attitudes then "emigrated" over here in the late 1800's. However, having been to the UK many times I've found women there to be far more mature and liberated than their American cousins in terms of sexual attitudes and acceptance. I don't know. What are your thoughts???
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I enjoyed reading all the great posts that came out of the exploration of the "Americans hide their feelings and emotions" or "AW are suspicious of men in general" or something to this effect discussion.
It seems that most posters agree that America's provincial history probably has a lot to do with the lack of "openness" that Americans seem to present. The puritanical tradition would seem to support a "Christian etiquette" in dealing with others, while at the same time would support restraint in the expression of feelings - especially sexual ones. The history of sex as being only for procreation, as being "dirty" and sinful, would seem to play a part in an AW's mind today. This would seem consistent with the "culture of shame" that Darkseid expressed. It would seem to explain why AW have often been experienced to be open sexually when they are removed from this culture and feel fairly certain that their "sinful behavior" will not be revealed.
It was also an interesting perspective of our American society by JZ when he stated that "Americans have no idea who is and who is not an outsider, and the truth is that we're all natives and outsiders at the same time". I think to the degree that this is a true operating mindset for many Americans, it would have a lot to do with the "suspicious" or "non-open" impressions that many experience in our culture.