Sunday, April 22, 2012

On the Americanization of Europe (and the rest of the world as well)


"It's more than a little cliché to describe how terribly difficult it is to move to a foreign country where they don't speak English all the time. But honestly, this borders on downright silly as virtually everyone in Paris speaks English at some level and most visitors hear almost more English than French on the street. There are McDonald's everywhere. The difficulty isn't finding someone who speaks English; it's trying to escape the expanding American cultural dominance abroad."

Very sad.

http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/books/2018013501_br22paris.html

The big difference one notices between French movies and Quebec movies, besides the accent, is that the latter are so Americanized, with the pumping, adrenalin-filled soundtrack, fast editing, tough talk/explosive action.

* * * * *

We Americans talk big, we ARE big.

And the rest of the world seems compelled to follow suit in our overweening self-importance.

As a middle-aged American woman who used to go to London told me, "When in London, she pretended she was Canadian.  And she avoided Americans--embarrassingly loud, flashy--like the plague.  As I would/do.

Of course, the Chinese are giving the Americans plenty of competition, but I still the latter take the crown for sheer vulgarity, exhibitionism, and narcissism.

No, it is not interesting having to submit to a loud American voice carrying on about the most excruciatingly trivial, banal details of their personal life--plugged into her Ipad-with-microphone walking down the street, oblivious to all but apparently enjoying drawing attention of any kind from strangers.

* * * * *

I think the United States is the epitome of "selling it," i.e., the hyper-capitalism in which people are "sold" from the minute they are born to gleaming grinning toothpaste smiles, Broadway brassiness, Hollywood super-extravaganza, TV commercials, and TV sitcoms.

The charm of this lifestyle, this culture largely escapes me.  Seeing Germans or Chinese, New Zealand-ers or Ethiopians aping cowboys strumming guitars and rasping rap, gospel, or country-and-western is not flattering to them or to "us."

What we have exported in terms values is not only a certain kind of democracy but also a culture where success is measured in terms of sheer bigness:  how much money has the "no. 1" movie made, the size of one's boobs or one's penis, how loud and outrageous one can be (in public), etc.  Something's better because it's bigger, right?

"The Dark Knight" is awesome because there's so much going on, so many buildings and bridges collapsing, it's all about speed and amplitude.  "Lord of the Rings":  WOW, WOW, WOW!!!  All those hobbits and other creatures, millions of them--golly jees--swarming across the screen, all that screaming, all those things and semi-things getting crushed to smithereens!

We didn't invent bad taste but we've taken it to new heights.

I know I am in the minority here, again, but I don't think the exportation of this "model" of humanity is good for the environment, humanistic values...our own souls.

* * * * *

The myths of America are translated world-wide, and the line between myth and reality becomes increasingly fuzzy:   Hollywood; the Cowboy and the Wild West; the Civil Rights movement (much messier and more complicated than what eventually became liberal dogma and story-tale textbook material; the War of Independence (the Boston Massacre resulted in about a dozen or so dead, nowadays a massacre is often much much higher, as at Srebenica, which resulted in 9,000 deaths; only 1/3 of the colonists supported Independence, 1/3 were Tories, 1/3 were neutral, as Richard Hofstadter stated).

* * * * *

Only Americans, Germans, Chinese, Vietnamese, and Mexicans--I know that's probably a lot of humanity--can carry on conversations outside that we can be heard in homes with double-pane glass windows.

My greatest fear is that the French will become Americans.  The Quebecois are already half-American.
Or the Brits become Yanks.

* * * * *

When people of other countries, whether in Europe, the Far East, Russia, etc., give up their own popular cultures (primarily, music, cinema, television, food habits, restaurant chains) for those of the U.S., we are all in trouble.  The "dumbing-down" effect of American television has been shown to have correlation with the declining test scores, mindless consumerism, etc.

It's bad enough that if one goes to Boston or San Francisco, one finds the same stores as one would find in Seattle (Macy's, Target, etc.).  What if one went to Tokyo or Buenos Aires and all one could find were only Target, MacDonald's, Wal-mart, Pottery Barn, etc.?

* * * * *

America's adulation of "tough-guy"-style violence is exported all around the world.  One has only to look at Quebec, where the television serials resemble so totally American ones.  But if one looks further, as in the Far East, gangsters, game shows, variety shows, sitcoms abound.

When one goes to the site of the beautiful, calming Belgian "Jardins et Loisirs" website in order to look at segments from previous broadcasts and selects one, one is bombarded with a typically American 12-second commercial explosion hawking Coca-Cola, the rhythm-and-blues soundtrack at decibels guaranteed "to knock your socks off" (cliche intentional).

http://www.rtbf.be/tv/emission/detail_jardins-loisirs?id=36

* * * * *

The qualities  that American culture brought to the world--the entrepreneurial, optimistic, future-oriented outlook--can also be weaknesses:  They go hand in hand with the inability and/or strong disinclination to look beneath surface appearances, to accept the human condition, the belief in material progress and in undisguised rampant consumerism as a panacea. for all.

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