Americans are fake and the Dutch are rude (2022)

https://behavioralscientist.org/americans-are-fake-and-the-dutch-are-rude/

by Nevin1901 • 3 years ago

57 128 3 years ago

Nevin1901• 3 years ago

As someone who recently moved from The Netherlands to USA, I found this article to be really great at explaining the reason why many Europeans find Americans to be fake. I myself had experienced all of the social experiences the author talked about, and found myself confused as to what a "friend" was in The USA. I also find it very interesting how the author described emotions as cultured - not just something which was the same to everyone.

I'm curious to hear your thoughts and experiences with different cultures.

floxy3• 3 years ago

Cultural differences aren't limited to international interactions either. Here's an interesting thing about exclamation points. Apparently there are (at least) two cultures of exclamation point usage in English. Apparently one culture uses them frequently as a marker of expressing general excitedness. The other culture sees them akin to yelling, which is appropriate only a small fraction of the time.

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38942179

bombcar• 3 years ago

You forgot the exclamationistas, related to the commakazis, who just pour them!!! everywhere!!! whether!!! it makes sense!! or not!!!!

ks17233• 3 years ago

Interestingly I became aware of a similar cultural difference regarding punctuation: I frequently use three dots ‚…‘ in more informal emails at the end of a sentence to indicate that I am not sure about something yet or still wondering about it. Like „I guess we could discuss this tomorrow…“ or „Yeah, I might be able to do this…“

Some month ago an Italian PhD student of mine (I’m from Germany) asked me if I was upset or mad at him. I had no idea why he was asking and was completely taken aback by this suggestion. But turns out, in Italy (at least the northern part of it), the three dots typically indicate that you are upset or at least impatient with the receiver.

I still wonder how many of my Italian collaborators I have sent strange impatient emails in the past…

PaulDavisThe1st8• 3 years ago

I REALLY DON'T KNOW WHAT YOU COULD MEAN BY THAT.

rufus_foreman• 3 years ago

This exactly!

xhevahir3• 3 years ago

This article about Russian's habit of yelling is interesting: https://classical-russian-literature.blogspot.com/2020/07/th...

I haven't been to Russia but some of it reminds me of encounters I've had in Greece.

negus• 3 years ago

As a Russian living among Greeks I can not say that I experienced any unusual rudeness. But yes, permanent smiling may be considered to be deceptive and insincere by some Russians.

But anyway: people tend to express themself in many different ways. It is great to be tolerant to others, while trying to be polite and culture-aware yourself.

technothrasher2• 3 years ago

Here's a cultural question I've been wondering since I visited Amsterdam as an American- I was walking along an up hill street in the evening, and I saw a young lady talking to her friends and smoking, with a baby in a stroller. The stroller started to roll down the hill slightly and she didn't seem to notice. It then picked up a little speed, so I moved to intercept it, and rolled it back up to her. When I delivered her child back to her she just looked at me with a slightly blank look, then gave a very quick barking laugh, and turned back to her friends. We didn't exchange any words. I moved on and went about my business, but to this day I have absolutely zero idea what her reaction meant <shrug>.

mpol4• 3 years ago

We live in a bizarro world.

Not sure if that was what she meant, I wasnt there. But if I responded that way, this would be the meaning.

holoduke• 3 years ago

A bit ashamed probably, but definitely not the reaction you would expect from a Dutch person who almost lost her pram. A normal reaction would include a 'thank you' and maybe a joke to justify the act.

dr_dshiv2• 3 years ago

Hill? In Amsterdam? Suspicious detail!

yread• 3 years ago

Amsterdam
up hill street

Do you mean a highway ramp or a bridge?

christkv• 3 years ago

There is a huge different between a blue collar New Yorker and a Palo Alto techie in culture though. I’ll take the nyc rudeness over the fake politeness in California. As a European I fund New Yorkers much easier to connect and befriend people than people from both the pacific coast.

red-iron-pine• 3 years ago

Same. NYC types will tell you to go fuck yourself on the street for walking on the wrong half of the sidewalk, and will give you the finger for basically any reason. But in private I found most of them to be warm, vibrant people. And, paradoxically, when I slipped on the street, random strangers were immediately jumping to my side to see if I'm okay and helping me up.

To paraphrase an old boss who was from NJ: we respect you enough to stab you in the front, and never in the back.

California, by comparison, was just as ruthless as Wall Street corpo raiders, but with a thick veneer of BS smattered all over it.

gustavus• 3 years ago

I'm between a 1/8 and a 1/4 dutch and I emphasize with what the speaker is saying, sounds like the Dutch may be my people.

hiAndrewQuinn2• 3 years ago

As an American in Finland I'm sure plenty of Finnish people think my mannerisms come off as fake. But I just figure the best of them will take my natural bubbliness as a fun treat, something a bit different from the otherwise reserved nature of the culture here. There's very little to be sad about in my life, especially given that I get to live in such a lovely country, and I'm not shy about showing it. :)

willsmith72• 3 years ago

this is a really great attitude, and as someone who's lived in Germany, it can be a really hard thing to do. In the end we are who we are. You can go crazy trying to fit in or try to let it go and stop caring about the stares and disapproving looks.

Beijinger• 3 years ago

Two Finish people are sitting at a bar and drinking beer.

First Fin says "Skoll!" (Cheers)

Second Fin asks "Are we here to drink or to talk?"

wozniacki• 3 years ago

Mind you being nice is not the same thing as being genuine.

The problem is not with advertising ( or over advertising ) that youre happy when your are indeed happy.

The problem is with not doing so when the situation is inversed - that is advertising youre unhappy when you are indeed unhappy - and couching it in good cheer for outward appearances.

People in most cultures value genuineness over fake cheer although no one really is fully immune to fake cheerfulness and often find themselves falling for it - even when they want to fight it. Because in the end after all the cake and watermelon, its a form of deceitful presentation of the self - whether the person intended it or not. It trips you up in your read of the other person and thus leads to a maladjusted state of affairs where you are forever adjusting and hedging your reactions to the others person true emotions. Its a tax on your mental faculties.

joecool1029• 3 years ago

I wonder if the dutch history is why most new yorkers seem to be very direct. There are definitely different regions of America that pull the fake thing more than others (one example I can think of: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bless_your_heart )

hiAndrewQuinn2• 3 years ago

It's opportunity cost. New Yorkers making $300,000 feel the twinge of lost time much more acutely than, say, the average Minnesotan making $30,000.

Indeed, in most countries, you'll notice the dialect of the capital city of the prominent language contains a lot more clipped and shortened words than the rural dialects tend to. This happens here in Finland - Helsinkians speak a much more abbreviation heavy Finnish than the dairy farmers up in Pohjois-Pohjanmaa, which has sort of the equivalent of Finnish southern drawl.

mpol4• 3 years ago

Huh, why is this downvoted?

In the Netherlands, efficiency is part of communicaton, especially in cities. In more rural places people connect a bit more and take time for eachother. These are different rules.

And yes, sometimes Dutch people are rude because they like to be. Different people, different strokes.

bee_rider3• 3 years ago

People in lots of the Northeast are, of course, known to be a bit brusque or direct, including the non-Dutch areas. I think it’s just that it has been a busy, high population area for a long time (by US standards at least). When you and everyone around you has to do lots of little interactions all day, you show care by keeping things short and efficient.

Also “bless your heart” is the dumbest expression in the world. Oh wow look at me I’ve said something that sounds nice, but actually it means something secretly rude, maybe, but only I know how I meant it! That’s just poor communication.

wenc• 3 years ago

These are the stereotypes: (that mostly track my experiences living in different parts of the country)

In the northeast, people are kind but not nice. They'll help you out when you have flat tire but may grumble under their breath that you might need to learn how to change your tires yourself. It takes a long time to get to know them, but once you do, they'll take their shirts off their backs for you.

In the pacific northwest, people are nice but not kind. They'll be super polite to you but when you ask for help or ask to hang out, they'll snub you. They're mostly homebodies and they already have enough friends, no room for more.

In the midwest, people are kind and nice. They'll help you out and they'll invite you to their homes for a meal. But they are somewhat cautious of outsiders.

In the south, people mostly just have a nice façade that is skin deep. They'll be nice and friendly to you and talk to you all day, but they may not care that much for you at all. Their friendliness is more about them wanting to feel that they are nice people, and less about them actually caring about you. Many will talk behind your back ("bless your heart" culture).

Terms like Seattle Freeze, Minnesota Nice, Southern Hospitality are all overgeneralizations and don't apply to each individual, but nevertheless capture a part of the culture that is at least somewhat true.

For instance, a 2008 survey showed WA state ranked 48th out of 50 in trait extraversion. Seattle definitely feels socially different from other places -- it is very palpable.

Here's the paper ranking 50 US states on the Five Factor model (Extraversion, Agreeableness, Conscientiousness, Neuroticism and Openness)

https://pdodds.w3.uvm.edu/research/papers/others/2008/rentfr...

1659447091• 3 years ago

As someone from "Bless your heart" country, there is nothing fake (or secret) about it. It is used in two context and everyone there knows exactly which one is meant when directed at them or others.

A passive aggressive dig, or, a genuine statement of care. However, I can definitely see how people who did not grow up around it may see it as fake or weird or question intent.

Jensson4• 3 years ago

I can definitely see how people who did not grow up around it may see it as fake or weird or question intent.

That is the whole point, what words mean changes from culture to culture, punitiveness is relative. In some culture "great" is the neutral word, in other it is "it is ok" is the neutral one etc, so when a culture who feels "great" must mean you like it a lot come to a culture where it is just the normal thing to say they will feel everyone is fake since they say that things are great even though they aren't particularly excited about those things.

dotnet004• 3 years ago

I don't fully buy the points being made, I agree that emotions are cultured, but as someone from a different culture, I've felt that Americans are more "genuine".

My own culture is all about distrusting others and being very selective about what you reveal about yourself and paying close attention to material balance in social interactions so someone else isn't getting more out of the relationship than you. A point that came up last time I was visiting my home country was that my habit of thanking the cashier after finishing my transaction was a glaring giveaway that I was an outsider, and that I should be careful about it to avoid being taken advantage of.

In comparison, American culture has been very freeing, I can typically trust people to not be trying to stab me in the back, I don't have to worry as much about taking advantage of by friends, I can ask people to be honest about me and they will be, and so on.

There are a lot of little pleasantries with strangers that took time to become fluent at, but people you actually know seem to be just as honest as what the author describes the Dutch as being, just with a lot of initial padding like "please don't take this the wrong way".

The example given of being asked to dinner and responding bluntly with "I'm busy tomorrow" doesn't seem that rude to me, but to be fair, I am in a physics and engineering environment, neither groups of people being known for their social smoothness :)

BrandoElFollito• 3 years ago

Thank you for dinner” felt to me as an act of distancing

Is this really? I am French so we are rather private (in the sense that friendship is something that takes time, and before that there are rather generic interactions). But if my best friend whom I adore and whatnot did a dinner for me I would thank him very much.

I wild be surprised if "thank you" is not used between friends in the Netherlands

mpol4• 3 years ago

Yes, it can be used. Depending on different nuances and intonations, it can be considered polite and distancing, or authentic and meant for connecting.

stcredzero3• 3 years ago

Thank you for dinner” felt to me as an act of distancing

True story. One of the major times I almost broke up (before we got married) with my wife, who grew up in Fujian China, is the first time I told her, "I love you," and she replied, "Thank you." (Now, on our anniversary, I might get her a bouquet with a note saying, "You're welcome.")

First time I almost broke up with her before we married was our very first date, when she was 45 minutes late. She finally called me, telling me that the CEO came in at the last moment with a new idea, and that she would be there as soon as she could. Afterwards, she was an additional 45 minutes late, because just after she got off the phone, the CEO came in with another idea. Where she's from, where she grew up, this kind of thing is just unfortunate but, "understandable."

twiss3• 3 years ago

I think part of the reason was what was missing:

I would have liked my guests to say that they were looking forward to spending more time with me, that they really liked the evening together, or that they felt happy or connected to me.

As a Dutch person, I think saying "Thanks for dinner, was fun!" is fine, but I could see how saying just the first part, or focusing too much on the effort spent on the food, could make me suspicious, as if that was the most positive thing that can be said about the evening.

Also, I think it's quite common to exchange a few words about when one might meet next, either concretely ("See you at X event?") or vaguely ("Let's meet again sometime soon!"). If it's left out, one might suspect the other party doesn't want to meet again, perhaps.

teekert3• 3 years ago

I'm Dutch and I'd also think a "thank you for dinner" feels like: "Thanks for the meal, but not all the other things (like the gezelligheid).". The meal you can get anywhere. But the gezelligheid is the connection, the real thing to be grateful for. If you leave sooner than expected you also need a bit of a good reason. We have this rhyme (my grand parents had in on a tile in the hallway):

"Wie hier als vriend naar binnen gaat, komt nooit te vroeg maar steeds te laat"?

Meaning:

"Who enters here as a friend will never be early but always late."

I have to say, I'm like that, my wife definitely isn't, so it's not really a law of nature. But where I live (in the south) it's common for friends to just walk around the back of the house and walk into the door unannounced, it's a sign of true closeness. Though I also think that is getting less common. Idk, might be the internet diluting all cultures.

SoftTalker2• 3 years ago

American living in America. I've encountered all types of people. Some are taciturn, some are very direct, some dance around the subject for fear of offending, some are excessively friendly. We're a mix of cultures and I don't think you can say that all or even most Americans have the same social/emotional tendencies.

thinkingtoilet• 3 years ago

Our worlds are so different. I live in rural Massachusetts, it's a slower pace of life than New York City. People, on average, in extremely different environments will value different things and act differently. It's not 'rude' for a busy lunch place in NYC to expect you to order and get out of the way. They need to feed 15 million people.

loloquwowndueo• 3 years ago

They “need” as if they were some sort of soup kitchen for the needy and not an expensive-as-fuck posh place. They can fuck right off, I’ll take my time enjoying the food and use of the premises that I paid for, thank you very much.

j7ake2• 3 years ago

Nowhere in American is asking “how are you today” to a cashier abnormal. But the article suggests that it is indeed abnormal from a a Dutch perspective.

There are distinctly American customs and cultures that Europeans would look as stereotypically American.

kazen443• 3 years ago

asking someone how they are in the netherlands is considered a genuine question about someone's wellbeing, and is considered very out of place if you don't know the person. (a cashier for instance).

Also, when asking this, expect a real response back.

SoftTalker2• 3 years ago

I agree it's not abnormal, but it's not abnormal to not ask, either.

I would never initiate a casual conversation with a cashier. If the cashier asks me how I am today, I'll say "fine, thanks." and that's it.

cauch• 3 years ago

While I understand the meaning of this comment and see its value, I wonder how you would know to which extend it weakens the initial thesis, though.

If some people live in an island where some place are around 10 degrees and other around 15 degrees, they may say "our island is very diverse, look, yesterday I went to the south, and it was freezing! 10 degrees! it's 5 degrees less than here!"

I understand you see the differences in people you meet in your same culture. But how do you even see the similarities, if you have no experience of other cultures?

lifestyleguru• 3 years ago

Dutch are so direct and straightforward that one must draw a line when dealing with them.

BiteCode_dev• 3 years ago

As a Frenchman, when I worked in the valley, people told me to tone it down, that I could come off as rude.

On my side, I wanted to slap those people calling others they barely knew "friends", overselling their lunch as "amazing", assuring an outcome with certainty, virtue signaling or refusing to say when something was completely wrong. It's like they were always in a tiny marketing process.

Eventually, I learned to smooth communication, and to appreciate their enthusiasm.

But it did take time.

Also I must confess I have an American filter permanently on, now. If something comes from the US, I just assume most of it is BS until proven otherwise.

jansan2• 3 years ago

People in the valley seem to be quite different from people in the southern states (the only part of the US that I have been to). I wonder if the differences within the USA are actually be as significant as the differences between parts of the US and Europe.

PaulDavisThe1st8• 3 years ago

When I first visited the US in 1981, I was pretty convinced (as a young, naive and somewhat ignorant Brit) that the differences between someone from New Orleans and someone from Portland, Maine were far greater than anything you could find between any two parts of Europe.

Decades later, that's clearly an exaggeration or just plain wrong, but it is certainly true that people do underestimate cultural differences within the US, and overestimate them within Europe.

jackcosgrove• 3 years ago

Reading through the article, I very much sympathized with the author's Dutch attitudes towards American mannerisms. And I'm American.

All of my life I've felt at a distance from others who exhibit typical American social habits, and have actually got along better with people from various other cultures such as eastern Europe. (There are a lot of first and second generation immigrants from eastern Europe where I live in the US.)

I have always been perceived as rude and blunt, and in recent years those with typically American social attitudes have even begun pathologizing behaviors like mine as being "on the spectrum".

As to why I am like this was a mystery to me in childhood. I acted just like my family and extended did! Everything was normal at home, and then I would treat someone at school like I would treat a sibling and it would result in arched eyebrows.

Turns out my family's attitudes towards socializing were strongly influenced by my mother, since she was a stay at home parent. And she came from a part of the US made up of small agricultural communities that were mostly German and Dutch in origin. These small communities had transplanted their national cultures in little bubbles all over the US, and by dint of mostly isolation from the broader culture had maintained those mores for centuries.

It was only when my mother had moved away to the city that this culture shock occurred, about 150 years after immigration.

So yes, there is a lot of cultural variation in the US, probably not as much as in Europe, but it exists. There are subcultures within the US of various vintages that exist alongside the mainstream culture that have all learned how to be different and coexist at the same time.

stcredzero3• 3 years ago

Over the past 6 years married to a woman who grew up in China, I've become more aware of how often we Americans say the exact opposite of what they mean, but instead convey their actual meaning through context, tone of voice, or whatever.

It took us about 2 years to really learn how to talk to each other.

floxy3• 3 years ago

Could you give us some examples?

Gyrantula2• 3 years ago

a woman who grew up in China

That's an odd way to say what you're saying

epolanski• 3 years ago

Felt the same in Ohio. I'm polish.

Spent 6 months at Ohio State as exchange student and I loved it and hated it.

I remember once being asked how was I and me answering honestly, just for an american friend to reprimend me on actually answering.

I was like, "why the hell you asking how am I if you don't care?".

Got to admit though no place is easier to make friends than US. This excess talking can often lay fertile ground to deeper connection that is harder to find elsewhere.

em-bee2• 3 years ago

ISMO on learning american expressions:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YNV0rMdeW60

Al-Khwarizmi• 3 years ago

I'm an academic from Europe and routinely tell my PhD students to "be more American" or "write like the Americans" to mean don't be shy exaggerating and presenting their work like much more important than it really is (or perceive it to be).

Because indeed, the American academic culture is full of BS (perhaps the most glaring example being that the cornerstore of hiring is the recommendation letter, which to me is essentially overt nepotism - and in a recommendation letter, every candidate is the best ever, Gauss incarnate, the Chosen One to break the frontiers of knowledge, because if you say even the slightest bad or ambiguous think they're not going to get hired. But everything is like that).

The thing is that in academia everything is competitive (grants, conference acceptances, etc.) so we Europeans must be Americans as well if we want to be successful, because it's hard for a paper, proposal, etc. to get chosen if you're being realistic while some of your rivals are exaggerating everything. This is something I realized when I worked in the UK (not America, of course, but more "American" than the rest of Europe) and then even more when I worked with actual Americans, and I consider this realization to have boosted my career considerably.

bananamerica2• 3 years ago

I don't believe Americans are fake, but I do believe that Americans are trained since an early age to display at all times that they're not a threat, and that is kind of sad.

floxy3• 3 years ago

I do believe that Americans are trained since an early age to display at all times that they're not a threat

Interesting. Since I'm the fish who can't see the water, could you provide me with some examples of this?

bananamerica2• 3 years ago

Just look at how some primates use an abundance of facial muscles to establish they're not a threat. Or how having the local accent can show you are not an invader. The sing-songy greetings,the smiles, etc, can be read as demonstrations that you are not a threat. Americans have to do that in almost all times and contexts.

yonaguska• 3 years ago

I would hazard that this is a function of our Wild West/Frontier culture. America had individual gun ownership since inception. Unlike Europe where lethal weapons/training were not available to every level of the social strata. America was a free-for-all for a very long time with very different cultures clashing constantly. You did not want to present as a threat in a world like that. I wonder if this is still common in less developed countries where life is cheap and access to lethality is easy.

More contemporarily, I can speak specifically to black culture- if you're black interacting with white strangers in a foreign environment, you may find yourself being overtly friendly to strangers simply as a means to compensate against any potential stereotypes. I'm sure being a minority in any situation can elicit this reaction though, including being a white minority. And I've also experience d the opposite, where I'm a "white" minority- and I had to simultaneously present myself as not being a threat, but also not an easy victim.

NoZebra120vClip• 3 years ago

I have a long history of trouble with intimacy and long-term relationships, and as a result, I live alone and rather isolated. I have a few friends on FB and others who I email on a regular basis, and I try to cultivate closeness with them as much as electronically possible.

But many of my social interactions are based in commerce. So I'll go to a restaurant to eat, alone. I'll go grocery shopping, alone. And so the clerk/cashier/waitress greets me and serves me and of course they're nice, because their wages are on the line here. And gradually I just felt fake and futile, because all these pleasantries we exchanged had an undercurrent of a business transaction and not the bonds of trust, fraternity, an actual relationship.

Yes, it does feel really hollow when I enter a store and the clerk greets me enthusiastically, because they don't know me, and any concern for one another's feelings, that's merely a business transaction. I tire of this fakery.

sjfjsjdjwvwvc• 3 years ago

As someone who worked a long time in service (not in America, in the anecdotally much more socially cold Germany) I was friendly and welcoming to all customers (unless I had a really bad day for some reason, so about 95% of the time) and I always meant it.

It just makes your work much more fun and time pass faster than being sullen and distanced. It hs nothing to do with my wages being on the line, I literally had zero obligation to be nice to customers. But every once in a while I had a pleasant interaction and that made it worth the effort.

I would bet it’s the same for your crockery clerks. That kind of work is very boring and repetitive and social interaction is the only respite you get from it. Just something to keep in mind when you are feeling cynical about them greeting you friendly and so on.

j7ake2• 3 years ago

Thank you for sharing.

StreetChief3• 3 years ago

You are not alone.

9dev2• 3 years ago

When my son’s teacher told my mom she was being appreciated as a grandmother, she emphasized that my mom was special to her grandchildren— a domain over which she could claim to have some authority, being the teacher of my son. This is not fake at all: it is just a feeling that comes from a focus on those features or accomplishments that would give the other person reason to feel good about themselves. You are a wonderful grandmother [...]

But here's what I don't understand. The teacher doesn't actually know whether her mother was a wonderful grandmother -- after all, she just got to know her! I get that the intent is to make another person feel good about themselves, but if you praise anything and everyone, how does this praise convey anything special?

Edit: I guess my actual question is this: How do you tell plain courtesy from actual commendation? When do you know someone actually means it?

kazen443• 3 years ago

I get that the intent is to make another person feel good about themselves, but if you praise anything and everyone, how does this praise convey anything special?

i have noticed that the inverse also exists.

Especially in northern/eastern europe.

Calling out the cynical truth and how everything is bad but could also be so much worse seems to be way for people to connect. This often happens in a crisis situation aswell.

dotnet004• 3 years ago

I think it can be reasonably believed that the teacher must've meant it. She doesn't know the grandmother, but she does know the kids, and kids tend to be fairly open about excitedly telling their friends that their grandma is visiting. Eg my niece's teachers know she really enjoys it when I visit despite never having met me because she draws me often.

It can also just be seen as an appreciation towards the grandmother for being there enough for the kids to come to the meeting.

PaulDavisThe1st8• 3 years ago

A couple of questions/observations as someone born in the UK who emigrated to the US at 25.

1. I wonder when this "difference between culture-driven emotions" fades away. I've been in the US for 35 years now, and I still sometimes sense that I'm viewing interactions the way a British person would (less often than I used to)

2. I wonder how the "noise" of differences between individuals compares in "amplitude" to the ability of culture to shape emotion. Any given population of any significant size will likely contain fairly wide variations of introversion, sociability, communication comfort, positivity, etc. etc. To what extent does or can cultural factors create any sort of coherent pattern "on top" of that variation?

3. Some US habits can be seen as having nothing to do with the relationships between individuals, and everything to do with creating certain social moods. The reason that US retail interactions are studded with "Have a nice day" is not, in general, because anyone actually cares that much about whether your day is nice or not, but because having people behaving in that way creates an easy going, affable mood in which people's anger, disappointment and sadness of the moment is not really appropriate to bring to the surface. It can seem grating and "fake" on early encounters with it, but after a while (maybe a long while), you can appreciate it as a communal, non-coercive effort to "make nice" because everyone benefits from that, on average and over time.

4. US English really needs to re-acquaint (no pun intend) itself with the word "acquaintance" as an alternative to "friend". The almost universal use of "friend" to describe anyone you know (even from the most singular and minor of interactions) really robs verbal behavior about the social environment here of so much subtlety.

dr_dshiv2• 3 years ago

4. US English really needs to re-acquaint (no pun intend) itself with the word "acquaintance" as an alternative to "friend". The almost universal use of "friend" to describe anyone you know (even from the most singular and minor of interactions) really robs verbal behavior about the social environment here of so much subtlety

Well, we just call them brothers or sisters if they are that close. Actually…

PaulDavisThe1st8• 3 years ago

You can see the same thing with "neighbor". In the UK that refers to someone who lives in one of the houses adjacent to yours. In the USA it can refer to anyone who lives anywhere in some loosely-defined neighborhood. "My neighbor" can be someone who lives a mile or two away, which by UK standards is absurd.

Lio2• 3 years ago

I'm not sure what it means about me that I can't tell if you're joking or not.

As a Brit I have one friend I've known since childhood I'd call "brother" unironically. Even then I'd probably have to have been drinking.

0823498723498723• 3 years ago

Also useful: "colleague"

Krasnol• 3 years ago

It was always fun seeing new people at the US company I've been working in Germany. The way the Germans fell for all the BS sweet talk in the beginning and just couldn't believe that it actually is BS when you warned them until they actually felt it. It lead to some weird conversations, especially when they tried to clear up a situation which has been created through US BS corporate talk. You had the German speaking the plain facts vs. the American who on one had had to keep their cool, keep the BS running AND somehow deliver the actual message because in the end it was important.

Somehow the Germans learned faster, though.

rafaelero2• 3 years ago

The few Dutch folks I know are indeed kind of rude. One time I (Brazilian) went out to get some drinks with some Dutch friends and, omg, they spent the whole night trashing other people. I am accostumed to do it in a much more delicate way, while they didn't hold it back for a second.

StreetChief3• 3 years ago

Your singular experience may not be representative of all Dutch...

rafaelero2• 3 years ago

Yeah, maybe. I guess what stood out the most was not exactly the trashing part (which we all do some way or another), but how they didn't feel the need to soften the words. Since I was the only one who seemed a bit shocked by that, I thought that was perhaps cultural.

mpol4• 3 years ago

That is considered rude in the Netherlands as well. But yes, many people do it. And you know that if you are out of sight, they will talk that way about you. It's a certain way of lashing out or letting go in an emotional way, some way to survive the complexity of life. It is correct to call it ugly. It can even be correct to talk to people about what they are doing. Ofcourse, if people are old and set in their ways, there is no helping. But young people can still be educated.

There is some idea that you need to be "strong" (whatever that is) or "fit in", which is just wrong to me. If you don't, people judge you and talk bad about you. I know lots of people who do it about many people, even their closest friends.

richliss• 3 years ago

Dutch directness, and as a consequence rudeness, is legendary. They'd be world champions at it. Add in a fair amount of arrogance and you've got a reasonable chance of being on the end of what most would describe as them being rude.

Here's an example, Two middle aged British couples go to a bar in Amsterdam, and quietly sit at a table in the corner having a few drinks. The bar then becomes a Karaoke bar filled with student aged locals who are very raucous, spilling drinks etc. At the end of the night, one of the men from one of the couples goes to the bar and gives the barman a tip equal to about 20% of that tables spend. The barman then proceeds to tell the man "I dislike British women". The Dutch barman thought that was acceptable and that there would be no recourse. If that were said in many parts of the UK there's a chance the barman would have a pint glass thrown at his head for saying such a rude and out of nowhere thing.

As a Brit who has been to many, many European countries, I can say there's only really two countries that are really different and that's France and The Netherlands. Neither of their general population really feels any obligation to be courteous or polite to foreigners. The locals from every other European country I've been to have been polite/not rude as a bare minimum.

twiss3• 3 years ago

when my friend Ann Kring pointedly commented, “Thank you for sharing,” after I had explained in great detail some convoluted story about my emotions

I cannot of course claim to know the intention of this person, but I have heard this phrase said ostensibly genuinely (to me it has the association of group therapy, though that might be due to popular media).

However, to me as a Dutch person, it comes across as devoid of meaning, a phrase that can be said if one didn't bother to listen or care to come up with any thought or more meaningful response. So, it doesn't surprise me that the author read it as sarcastic (although she might've been right, again I can't know).

The social expectation in the Netherlands to always come up with a response and share your opinion or thoughts, rather than just listening silently and nod (or say “Thank you for sharing,” which to me amounts to almost the same thing) can be criticized as well, of course. It can be a bit exhausting, at times. But, it also contributes to the feeling of having a genuine connection and conversation.

FaridIO• 3 years ago

Dutchman living in NYC; this article is spot on. It gets slightly easier with time, but I've been here ~9 years and I still feel it.

fredsmith219• 3 years ago

So which is it? Do you want fake civility or sincere rudeness?

teekert3• 3 years ago

The whole point is is that it’s not fake, it feels fake to us, and we (I’m Dutch) are not rude, it feels rude to Americans. We value different things. They are trying to be nice by making compliments, we try to connect by being brutally honest (orthogonal but both positive?). I can tell you our Dutch waiters can learn a thing or two from their US counterparts about service (well maybe it’s also because we hardly tip, but still).

Germans are already different by the way, my German colleague was a bit shocked when he had a hair cut and one colleague walked in asking if he tried to do it himself followed by another asking if he fell down the stairs. It’s camaraderie, I guess mostly in younger people. Honestly his hair wasn’t bad at all.

kazen443• 3 years ago

tipping in my opinion is rather rude.

as a bussiness, you are basically asking for a handout to make the lives of your waiting staff bearable. In my opinion this mean you should not run a business.

Why would i tip someone when they do their job? Should we do this for all jobs? (the same goes for the military in my opinion).

twiss3• 3 years ago

The author is a cultural psychologist, and trying to explain that people's emotions should be seen in the context of (and I would say are "relative to") the culture they're from. Someone is only fake if they're more fake than their cultural norms, and someone is only rude if they're more rude than their cultural norms. I would argue this also means people aren't objectively fake or rude, it's all relative, and so neither is objectively better or worse.

StreetChief3• 3 years ago

If you want evidence of the success of liars in America, just look at Trump.

ska• 3 years ago

I've suspected Postel's law applies to human communication also, mutatis mutandis.

forinti• 3 years ago

I don't think you know rudeness until you've had to deal with Portuguese bureaucracy.

It's so blunt it actually makes me laugh.

JumpinJack_Cash• 3 years ago

Alcohol will smoothen our cultural differences! /s

renewiltord• 3 years ago

Haha, this is a cluster of things.

- Americans do reduce social distance with phatic conversation. "how are you?" "Good, how about yourself?"

- Americans do have expected formal acknowledgements. There are a few cultures where formality is a sign of adding social distance, but in America it's definitely an acknowledgement. In another culture the emphasis will be on how much you liked the thing, but in the US, it is important to say "thank you"

- There is a lot of fake positivity in the US for sure. For instance, you'll see this online with "I don't know who needs to hear this but YOU ARE LOVED". That's a strange sentiment to express. How could you know?

But ultimately it's mostly just words. The sentiments expressed are the same and the language is just different. It might just be a thing among Anglophones since the British are somehow worse about the word / intention mismatch though without the enthusiasm.

This does remind me of that Reddit thread where an Eastern European asks "Guys, what is a chamicha? My American colleagues always compliment me on it and I thank them and we go on." where it was discovered that it was "Nice to meet you".

jackbravo• 3 years ago

This is a classic case of Ask Culture meets Guess Culture.

From the classic https://ask.metafilter.com/55153/Whats-the-middle-ground-bet... referenced elsewhere like in https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37176703

deafpolygon• 3 years ago

“There's only two things I hate in this world. People who are intolerant of other people's cultures and the Dutch.”

throwaway307053• 3 years ago

As an American living in America, I've had a hard time fitting in to many social situations because it's difficult for me to "be fake", and it feels very awkward when people "act fake" with me. I appreciate some aspects of American social culture, but the forced "niceness" and fake compliments/questions irk me.

My ideal style is somewhere between Dutch directness and American friendliness - mostly direct, but with a generally more "positive" affect than the "neutral"-seeming Dutch approach, and more open to having friendly interactions with strangers without being "fake".

Yodel0914• 3 years ago

A while back we spent 5 weeks in the US, visiting a handful of states (California, Arizona, Nevada etc). The people we met were universally polite and often kind (except for one drunk English guy). A random person on a bus noticed we were tourists and spent ages giving us recommendations for local things to do; retail workers would notice our accent and ask about the bushfires (this was late 2019 when half of Australia was burning).

However, pretty much the whole time it felt a bit like we were being boisterous in church. As polite as everyone was, it felt at least in part fake; like they were a bad actor over-playing a role; like they were tolerating us but wished we'd just shut up and leave. Conversations felt shallow - if I actually responded with anything of substance about the bushfires, for example, they seemed to lose interest immediately. There was a sense of guardedness that meant I could rarely tell when anyone actually thought. Australians are typically rather... open in that respect.

As we were lining up to board our flight home, I heard groups of other Australians talking and instantly let of of a tension I hadn't realized I was carrying. Like I'd walked out of church and was allowed to act normally again.

lmm• 3 years ago

I moved from the UK to Japan four years ago. The biggest culture shock hasn't been interacting with Japanese people, it's been interacting with Americans.

0823498723498723• 3 years ago

So am I alone in being offended that my android mobile addresses me per du (tutoyer/jij zeggen)?

We have only recently made each other's acquaintance; we are not friends (we haven't even shared a meal, let alone a glass); and it can't even presume to practise the same sports I do. What gives?

6R1M0R4CL3• 3 years ago

i hate everyone. every single nationality bores me to death. most humans are a waste of perfectly good atoms. this whole planet is a cosmic turd.

i don't even like myself ! i'm the worst of all humans on this planet.

Americans are fake and the Dutch are rude (2022)

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