I have run into some unbelievably tragi-comic misapprehensions about the USA in my travels to the UK. One one occasion, my wife was strolling in downtown Hull, England while I was tied up in a lengthy business meeting. That afternoon, some obviously unbalanced fellow marched into a pub with a shotgun and murdered one of the patrons. This happens rarely in England, so the news spread like wildfire. When my wife returned to the office, one of the secretaries apologized to her for the unfortunate and upsetting event, but then said something along the lines of - “well, you ARE from the US, aren’t you. This sort of stuff must be comonplace to you.”
On another occasion, I had a chat with a restaurant waiter who had a burning desire to see NYC but was terrified by what he believed to be a rampant US AIDS epidemic leaving victims strewn about the streets of our cities.
I propose a hearty round of applause for Hollywood and the US media for their excellent efforts in presenting the best face of our nation to the world.
“I propose a hearty round of applause for Hollywood and the US media for their excellent efforts in presenting the best face of our nation to the world.”
Well, yes they really are to blame! Its everyones media of course. Even if they aren’t politically biased, they are all of them biased to sensation, so you are left with these very odd impressions. People really believe that guns are going off in the US all the time, and that aids and so on are rampant. Even my dad, who is not unintelligent, was really very disappointed when he first visited the States that he never heard any car tires screaching, like happens in every cop show all the time! Actually of course, we soon learnt that Americans are generally very careful drivers.