Gregg explored an interesting thought on his blog about the way Americans consume information and news (word used loosely to mean anything that’s current). Perhaps because our country offers us everything we want and need — decent education, equal(ish) opportunities, economic abundance, etc. — there’s really no requirement for us to leave our borders.
I have a friend from the Czech Republic who was here for a few years living in Chicago, a city I thought was filled with internationally savvy Americans. She told me that she found many Americans myopic and that people in European and Middle Eastern countries tend to have much more informed world views.
The comment stung a bit (she must not be talking about me…maybe it’s just all the OTHER Americans she’s referring to), but once I got past my offense and really thought about what she had said, I had to admit her remark fit me.
Her comment replayed in my head as I read some of our foreign classmate’s blogs. I laughed at how right my Czech friend was when I read Anne’s blog. When she talked about the history of war, she referred to a war in the 5th Century B.C. and then a more modern one from 1066 A.D. The United States is still so young. Our views of war and experiences with it are immature compared to our world partners.
Then I read Areej’s blog that was talking about some moral and ethical dilemmas that are facing people of Saudi Arabia. As I read, my assumptions of her culture that didn’t fit reality were made apparent to me.
Right after that, I read Gregg’s blog post (okay he’s not an international student, but he raised the question), and I was confronted by the me I thought my Czech friend had saved me from: the U.S.centric one, who gets her watered down international news from U.S. sources that share my shortsightedness.
I started to chastise myself for being a lazy and incurious American, but that was too painful. So I lied and told myself that I do think about life outside my border. I care about the devastating impact of the war in Iraq. I talk about it with my friends when we discuss the rightness or wrongness of continuing the war.
I just can’t shake the feeling that I really have no idea what I’m talking about.
[...] the interesting title “Internationally savvy Americans?” In it she references some of Rosie’s remarks. Rosie was talking about what Greg said about what Garrett said. (If markets are conversations, we [...]