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I had a coworker from the Netherlands over recently. I think by the end of the trip he thought I was making stuff up trying to correct this misconceptions. I do know he never believed me about the hot coffee lawsuit.

Sample set of 1, but it was odd for someone not from America, and indeed it was his first time in America, to be as misinformed about things. Not knowing things is fine, but knowing wrong facts, and refusing corrections, was just weird.

It was an eye opener for what I "know" about Europe.



Out of curiosity do you have any particular examples other than the coffee lawsuit?


The things I remember:

Most Americans have guns, support open carry, etc. I was an unfathomable oddity for not owning a firearm.

Most Americans support the current president (whoever that may be at the time), or at least hope he succeeds with his plans.

We only eat fast food, or at the least primarily as a people, prefer "American Food".

And a lot of things that can be boiled down to "America is horribly unsafe, if you go for a walk alone, you WILL get mugged or otherwise hurt"

The Hot Coffee thing was part of a larger thread about the American legal system being a game people play.

There are truths in some of these things, of course, but the scale of them was way off in his head.




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