The Rocket

Issue date: 3/23/07 Section: Opinion

I visited England this past summer, at the same time of the terror scare in August. I was patted down at least three separate times and had to take off my shoes at least twice. Carrying a plastic bag on-board the plane while reading "The Satanic Verses" by Salman Rushdie was weird enough, but what I found even stranger was the fact that I had a harebrained idea to wear a Canadian maple leaf pin on my purse.

I did this for one reason, and one reason only.

Americans are often pegged as big, obnoxious tourists who know nothing about England other than Shakespeare, Monty Python and Buckingham Palace. I didn't want to have people think that I was just another fanny-pack wearing American tourist trooping around the Tower of London and commenting on the "Thaymes" River.

No, my friends, I was a Canadian abroad. If I avoided opening my mouth, I could pass as a Canadian, except for my tell-tale blue passport.

I love America, but sometimes it just doesn't pay to appear to be an American.

Convinced that we live in the "best country on Earth," we as Americans are easily spotted abroad with our T-shirts, white tennis shoes and bravado. Now, we aren't all like that, but that is our stereotype, and it is a sad one.

So, why are Americans portrayed as being stupid, obnoxious and ignorant?

Because some of us do think we live in the best country on Earth. Some of us think that everyone in the world recognizes that and will simply step aside for us.

But we don't know if we're the best country on the face of the Earth because only 27% of Americans currently have passports. We don't venture past Canada or Mexico, so how would we know what other countries are like? They could be giving healthcare away and living in prosperity, but we wouldn't know. Our ignorance of other countries and cultures robs us of the ability to declare ourselves the best country of all.

And with what little we know about other cultures, we judge their worth upon our own culture, and that, my friends, is ethnocentrism. This is another reason why other countries aren't always keen on having us trampling on their national history.

Different cultures, to many Americans, indulge in "weird," "strange" and "primitive" acts. We're not accepting, we're not open-minded and we don't care.

We don't watch foreign films unless they're particularly commercialized, we don't eat at restaurants with foreign foods unless it's part of a corporate chain, and we don't read books that are translated from a tongue other than our own.

In our corporate-run, Oprah-influenced country, we have become so wrapped up in our own culture that other cultures are barely given a second thought.

While this stereotype doesn't represent all of the country, it represents a good portion of America. For every person who considers all cultures to be equal, and all societies to be valid, there is someone who believes America is the best country around, though they have never learned about, or visited other countries to be able to tell.

So until we, as a country, open up our eyes to the world around us, I will be posing as a Canadian abroad. I am embarrassed to be considered an ignorant fool, simply because I am an American. We need to stop being so concerned with being Americans, and focus more on being a member of the global community.

Lisbeth Wells-Pratt is a freshman undeclared major and a regular contributor to The Rocket.

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