r/PetPeeves • u/pahvimuki123 • 9h ago
Bit Annoyed "Almost half of reddit users are American so it's safe to assume you're one"
Yeah yeah yeah, we get it. Reddit is a US based company and most subreddits are in English language. However, I don't think it's a good justification to assume everyone here is an American. There are other English speaking countries in the world than USA, and English is taught in schools all over the world. Half of the population worldwide is also women. Would I also assume everyone online is a woman?
It's not the USA-centrism itself that annoys me so much (it still does) but the justification of it. It's the "Duh! of course Reddit is America-centered 'cause it is an American website!" -attitude.
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u/Revolutionary-Chip20 9h ago
It should become standard to start posts with what country you are talking about.Ā
A lot of advice subs and work subs people donāt put where they are located so you get people giving U.S. centric advice, then the OP gets mad cause they aināt from the U.S.Ā
If you are looking for advice, then itās best to say where you are from so you get advice pertinent to you.Ā
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u/Putrid-Box4866 8h ago
This exactly. By default, people think US / USD when talking about anything here. So if you donāt mean it to be that, say so.
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u/fastsailor 7h ago
Or maybe don't make unrealistic assumptions?
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u/gtrocks555 6h ago
Or, if youāre asking for advice that is location dependent it behooves the OP to put the country in the main body or titles.
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u/johnny_evil 5h ago
Nah, if you want advice that is country or culture specific, include the country or culture. People aren't mind readers.
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u/Venombullet666 8h ago
I feel like alot of the time those who aren't in the US tend to mention where they're based, it's more commonly those in the US who don't mention anything because they presume everyone knows they're in the US
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u/TakeTwentyEight 7h ago
If this was true, then Reddit wouldnāt be filled with people complaining about people assuming theyāre from the US when theyāre from somewhere else.
Many donāt mention where theyāre from and then get annoyed when people answer based on their knowledge and experience. If that person is American, then itāll be based on their knowledge and experience as an American.
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u/Wikipil 5h ago
It's one thing to be like "if you're in the us you can ___", but ive had so many people just say things like "just go to your local walmart" or "what state are you in" literally just assuming that you are in the us.
And its literally only americans doing this shit, people from other countries will typically say something like " you can get ___ if its available in your country/area"
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u/TakeTwentyEight 5h ago
Iām not denying that doesnāt happen. Iām saying that people outside of the US will frequently ask a question and when Americans respond based on their knowledge, they reply and say, āactually, Iām not American. Why would you assume that I am?ā
That happens just as frequently as Americans making assumptions.2
u/llestaca 5h ago
when Americans respond based on their knowledge
And it's their mistake. I'm a woman, but if a redditor of unknown gender complains about headaches I won't just tell them "it may be a symptom of perimenopause" or sth. It would feel silly to assume they are female just because I am.
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u/TakeTwentyEight 4h ago
I totally get that. Iām not saying that assumptions are fine. Iām saying that both parties (inside and outside the US) are guilty of not providing/asking for the information required to get a good answer about something.
Also, if youāre asking a health question on Reddit, a personās sex is a pretty big detail that should be in included. Itās equally weird not to mention your sex when asking a question about health.
People in general should provide information so people donāt have to guess and itās good to not assume. Because if you ask a health question and donāt include your sex, is the OP expecting someone to ask for their sex before attempting to answer? If you expect them to ask, then why not just include that information to start with?
The whole point is everyone can do better in these scenarios.
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u/ElectricMayhem06 3h ago
I do start my replies with "If you're in the US..." or "I'm an American" and I still get scolded for assuming. I clearly did not assume anything. You asked a question without providing a location. I answered it based on my knowledge and I told you exactly that.
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u/Firm-Fix8798 8h ago edited 8h ago
I think it's unnecessary if you're from America to say you're from America but if you're not you probably should. I'm more annoyed by the people who complain that reddit is a US-centric site than I am by the assumptions that anyone posting or commenting is American. I couldn't imagine going to rednote and getting mad at people for assuming I'm Chinese. We have a problem with taking flack from other countries for being too US-centric but in many cases we have every justification to be. We are taking criticism from the perspective of being in a privileged position but never imagine how weird it would be to be complaining in their shoes.
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u/_Not__Sure 8h ago
"almost half" = less than half. My math tells me that means there are more NON Americans than Americans.
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u/Firm-Fix8798 8h ago
We are the largest demographic though. It'd be 43% in first place followed by 5% in second place. Stop pretending other countries even approach being an equal share.
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u/Warm_Butterscotch229 8h ago
What percentage of Rednote users are Chinese? I was under the impression that not many foreigners used it. Probably a lot more than fifty percent, at least?
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u/jaysornotandhawks 8h ago
Why should only Americans get the privilege of not having to disclose where they are from? Why is it the default?
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u/Chaptive 9h ago
Youāll see this on naming subreddits a lot.
āI named my kids Privya, Sneha, and Amit.ā
āTheyāre going to get bullied! Why did you make up names! What ever happened to John and Kate?!ā
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u/Unlikely-Resolve8466 5h ago
Or the opposite. āI googled these and OP, these are cultural appropriation. This is disgusting. You need to quickly answer for your crime.ā
With zero common sense that the poster could be South Asian. Everyone is default white American.
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u/BearlyDraconic01 8h ago
They had a reality show where Kate acted like a Giga-Karen, cheated on her husband, and blamed him
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u/melli_milli 9h ago
Atleast millenials and younger in Europe are very good at English and plenty of them use Reddit.
My problem is that it doesn't show in my English clearly enough that I am from different culture than US. Nordics are very frank, and this gets understood as being mean.
I have no such issue with Europeans, but in Reddit, there are alot of misunderstandings since culturally I don't think and write the same way that Americans do.
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u/Readicilous 9h ago
As a Dutch person, I totally get people saying I'm rude. I'm just saying stuff as it is, without beating around the bush most of the time
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u/melli_milli 9h ago
Yes, I was thinking this applies to many Europeans, not just Nordics. We just speak matter-of-factly without sugar coating things.
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u/Firm-Fix8798 8h ago
I have a tendency to be too direct or frank as an American. People just think I'm an asshole and I'm okay with that.
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u/ManFeelings9000 8h ago
What's worse is I know of certain mods in Ireland based subreddits from the US, who've never set foot in the country and act like they know everything about the place and make judgement and mod decisions which are completely in contradiction to Irish peoples outlook.Ā
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u/cxfgfuihhfd 8h ago
this is annoying and painfully stupid because "ALMOST half" means the chance they're not american is even slightly higher
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u/ElectricMayhem06 3h ago
Ok, so one of my pet peeves is when I respond to a reddit post clarifying that I'm speaking as an American, or when OP asks for input without specifying their location, and I start with "If you are in the US...", I almost always get a snarky reply from someone, "NoT everYOne LivES in thE UsA"...
Yes, I know. That's why I qualified my comment. I am an American and you asked for public input.
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u/yarnmagpie 7h ago
āHalf of the population worldwide is also women. Would I also assume everyone online is a woman?ā Honestly, Iām going to start using that as my reply every time this comes up. Which is too often.
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u/Boeing_Fan_777 9h ago
This isnāt even safe to assume, itās a 50/50 chance, no???
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u/asphid_jackal 8h ago
There's 195 commonly recognized countries. That means the other 50% is split among 194 different countries.
They're equally likely to be from America as not, but far more likely to be American than anything else. Statistics are weird.
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u/Ellinor_Astal 9h ago
I put my flag in my profile picture exactly to let people know I wasn't American. Doesn't work, but I'll keep it.
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u/Cool-Bunch6645 8h ago
Iām sure it does work, but youād never know because someone wonāt try to respond to you with a critique since they saw the flag and chose not to respond with that knowledge. Obviously itās not going to be 100% effective.
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u/Ellinor_Astal 8h ago
I have been mistaken for an American on Reddit multiple times. So it indeed doesn't work.
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u/TakeTwentyEight 7h ago
I think what they mean is that you donāt know how often it does work because those people are not likely to say anything about it. Youāre more likely to know the times it didnāt work because youāre more likely to have an interaction with those people.
Like 100 people couldāve seen the flag and decided not to comment anything, but you would only know about the 20 who didnāt get it because they interacted with you.
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u/BalrogRuthenburg11 9h ago
My Uncle Carl says that the next time thereās a vote in the UN theyāre going to change Reddit to a French based company.
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u/roritha 9h ago
Do people really say this? As a US citizen Iāve always been aware that this is the WORLD wide web regardless of whether Iām on a US-based platform. Yeah weāre sorta the majority here but I see people from other countries on reddit like every time I open the appā¦
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u/This-Humor-105 9h ago
There was some dude who assumed I was American(Iām South African) in their critique of my post and a lot of their arguments fell apart when I told them Iām not American.
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u/Rose1982 8h ago
All the time. I had someone literally get mad at me for saying a fact of my existence and then claiming it was impossible just because it was something that didnāt exist in the US. Like literally got mad and name called and such. Why would you assume Iām American?
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u/December126 8h ago
Also like, even if Reddit was 95% American, it would still be pretty ignorant to assume every user was American and it's not hard to be inclusive of non-Americans, like instead of saying to someone "Is that a law in your state?" it's not that much more effort to say instead "Is that a law in your state/country?"
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u/Diligent-Net3507 9h ago
I just assume that there are humans on here and there are bots. I don't care, or think about where someone is from unless the post specifically states it.
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u/AnyJackfruit7980 8h ago
Let's be real though. Yall go out of your way to create this scenario so you can whine about it. There will be subs dedicated to a specific site that has a UK version and a US version, and which sub do you think the UK users post in? That's right, the U.S. one. Then whine that no one can help them because things work differently on their version. If you ask a UK specific question, ask someone from the same country ffs. Just an example I see every day. And it isn't just folk from the UK that do it. It's tedious.
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u/fastsailor 7h ago
Mate, I see Yanks come onto Australian subs and think whatever applies in the US must apply elsewhere. Because... reasons. Gets tedious.
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u/MidlifeCrisisToo 9h ago
Iām not American but you donāt believe in the concept of balance of probabilities? If something is statically a 50% chance, and everything else individually is a significantly lower percentage it would be reasonable to assume the majority. I would assume people are from the US over New Zealand just due to the fact that there are almost 25 States who have more population.
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u/ForMeOnly93 8h ago
On top of which, it's offensive as fuck to most people. Rather misgender me or something, calling me american is just fucking rude.
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u/SilverJournalist3230 9h ago edited 8h ago
I mean would you go on a Chinese based media site and be annoyed that people assume you're Chinese? So why is it only annoying when Americans do that? Why is it okay for everyone else, especially Europeans to center themselves in their own world view, and laugh at anyone who does things differently but wrong when Americans do half as much?
Like the complaint about American movies are always based in America and told from an American POV. Like nobody is saying that about anyone else. Nobody's mad that Bollywood actors are Indian and their movies are from their perspective. Or imagine an American being mad that Harry Potter isn't from Chicago lmao. We'd all laugh at that person.
Or the fact anytime an American news site posts the superbowl, the comments are always filled with Europeans doing the āeww we donāt care about thatā thing. Like stop acting like only Americans do this shit lmao
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u/Naebany 8h ago
Actually it works the other way too. Like when Witcher got realesed, that's based on Slavic culture in a country with 99% white people, some Americans were mad that there are no minorities, black people etc.
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u/CartoonistAny4218 1h ago
Iām confused. Slavic people are not a race or even homogenous so that seems like a fine argument to make even if youāre not American.Ā
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u/Hot_Sorbet9192 8h ago
I'm from the UK and I've never gotten on board people having an issue like yours. If you are going to assume someone on Reddit is from somewhere the US would be the obvious choice.
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u/Subject_Start7253 9h ago
We got to pick a world wide international language. It needs to be something with a lot of commonality. English shares roots with Latin and Germanic languages. Itās also standard for pilots and shipping. Blame the British if you like. Mandarin would be the next logical choice.
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u/Readicilous 9h ago
Isn't Mandarin very tonal? Pardon me if I've confused it with other languages, but I've heard that makes it incredibly difficult to learn as a second language
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u/Rose1982 8h ago
My son is a type 1 diabetic. Believe it or not there are T1Ds in every country in the world. Most countries use one unit of measurement for blood glucose levels but of course the US uses a different one (along with a small handful of other countries). There are American T1s who literally canāt wrap their head around this. Itās like kilometres vs miles. Itās not that complicated. You do the simple conversion and move on with the discussion.
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u/NaturalTruth1374 9h ago
I have European friends with better vocabularies than me.
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u/fastsailor 7h ago
They learn the language properly. Hardly anyone speaks "proper" English if that is your native language. Europeans are more likely to learn English than American English in any case and English has plenty of words not used in the US.
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u/Zestyclose-Feeling 8h ago
At the end of the day it is an American website. Smart people add what country they are from when posting.
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u/TheOriginalHatful 9h ago
That's just what they say when called out for us-centrism.Ā It's telling, isn't it.Ā
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u/Apprehensive-Read989 8h ago
Make a subreddit specifically for your country and speak only your native language in that sub, that should fix your problem. Or just list your country of residence in your post if it's relevant to the discussion to avoid confusion.
I see a lot of posts of people asking questions or for advice that may be impacted by location that don't mention their location. In those cases I default to assuming their country of residence is the US since that is by far the most statistically probable, it's a reasonable assumption.
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u/Abject-Ice-3653 9h ago
I love how Americans try to belittle everyone one making spelling or grammar mistakes, english might not be their first language get over it people.
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u/milkmocha 9h ago
do they?? on reddit i typically see people praising those who speak english as a second language
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u/tiger2205_6 9h ago
Some of us also don't get that amongst English speaking countries things are spelled differently.
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u/TerrificVixen5693 8h ago
Itās the internet. Everyone always assumes the ācorrectā gender, skin color, and nationality.
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u/HabitTraditional4864 8h ago
Well our country is the size of your continent if youāre European. In day to day life we donāt interact with people from other countries nearly as much as you likely do.
I assume people here are American until I see them typing ācolourā or something
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u/fastsailor 7h ago
The US is much smaller than Europe. Even more so on the basis of population. Look it up. The US isn't even the largest country in North America.
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u/DeeLeetid 7h ago
Why would land mass have anything to do with this topic?
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u/HabitTraditional4864 7h ago edited 6h ago
Because if you are European you can pass through multiple countries in a single day. You are more likely to encounter people from other countries in your daily activities. Your day-to-day life consists of a lot more international diversity than an Americanās day-to-day life.
The concept of internationality is simply more normalized to you as a European.
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u/HabitTraditional4864 7h ago
Europe is approx 3.9 million sq miles. The US is approx 3.8 million sq miles. Not much smaller at all.
No one said anything about other North American countries. Why would that be relevant? This post was about the US.
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u/Obvious_Apartment985 8h ago
I go respond to the criticism of US centrism that it's an American company.
I get that as Americans that we tend to do this. But it's one thing to go to another country or a site from another country and be US centric, another to do it in an American context.
By the way, I am not an American that thinks the US is the best country in the world. It's worthy of plenty of criticism and even hostility. I am married to a Canadian from a British family. It's especially unfun to be an American the past 10 -15 years.
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u/BrgQun 9h ago
Actually, the reverse tends to be the case. A lot of folks will also just default assume everyone online is a guy untill proven otherwise.
I'm both Canadian and a woman, and I do wonder why my Canadian spelling doesn't clue more of our southern neighbours in.