I was in the UK recently and several people who know I live in the US asked me questions about how most Americans feel about Global Warming. The phrasing was usually along the following lines: “Do they believe in global warming yet?” The tone very much suggested that at some point all those stupid Americans would finally believe in what all the rest of the world has long ago accepted to be true.
This is typical of British attitudes about America in general – they believe what they’re fed by the BBC, which is typically a mixture of sceptical reporting of Republican politics, interviews with the most red-necked of Americans they can find and a general sneering tone when covering the US. Unfortunately, most Brits, even those who know real, live Americans, seem to buy into this whole set of stereotypes. Meanwhile, most Americans buy into their own set of stereotypes about Brits – wonderful accents, very articulate, bad teeth but a beautiful country with “so much history” (and of course there’s the rain). I know which set of stereotypes I’d rather have falsely applied to me…
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