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americans

Identity

Non-Americans are sharing the ‘dead giveaway’ someone is American and they are pretty right

The dead giveaway is when they call me "honey" or "sweetie" or "darling."

via Flickr, Flickr, and Flickr

Three American tourists enjoying the sights.

One of the most interesting things about traveling the world is noticing how people from your country are a bit different from the place you’re visiting. In America, you’re mostly around fellow countrymen so it’s hard to notice the things that make us stand out.

But when you travel abroad, you quickly notice that no matter how hard you try to blend in, there are a lot of dead giveaways that show people you’re from the states that go way beyond your accent.

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My husband was working out in our front yard, wearing an N95 mask, when a man driving by gestured to his face and yelled, "Take it off!"

I've seen anti-maskers. I've heard their arguments for not wearing a mask in the middle of a viral pandemic. I know they think they don't work, or that they actually make you sick, or that they're a way for the government to control our behavior, or [fill-in-the-blank conspiracy theory]. But I wish I could bring that guy back and show him what he was actually yelling at.

My husband wasn't wearing a mask for COVID, you see. He was mixing concrete to fix our front steps. He's always worn an N95 mask when he does home improvement projects that involve fine particulate dust, as he values his lung health. In fact, that's why we had a stash of N95s that we were able to donate to medical workers early in the pandemic.

Telling my husband to take off his mask in that case was just flat-out dumb. But honestly, shaming people for wearing a mask for any reason is dumb.

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As all 50 states fulfilled their duty in the Electoral College to officially elect Joe Biden as the next President of the United States on December 14, a sadly beautiful scene unfolded in the Senate chambers of the Washington State Capitol.

Jack Arends is one of Washington's 12 electors whose job it was to cast their vote for Biden, as the former vice president won the state with 58% of the vote. But for Arends, executing that duty held a special significance. The 64-year-old elector arrived at the capital in a wheelchair, wearing a mask and a hat that read "PLAY NICE." And when it came time for him to say a few words about casting his vote, his brief speech cast a solemn, patriotic atmosphere throughout the room.

He began by thanking Washington's Democratic Governor Jay Inslee and Republican Secretary of State Kim Wyman, his fellow electors, and Democratic leaders for the kindness and support they'd shown him in the process of getting there.

"I have noted through this time that the electoral college is not great, but it is the system we have in place," he said. "Knowing that, I was set on being faithful elector, so I cast my ballot today for Joe Biden and Kamala Harris. I did so enthusiastically, of my own choice. I did not need a law to tell me I had to do it. Today is a chance to begin the end of the Trump administration. I was glad to do my duty, to rid our nation of a petty dictator. Had he won a second term, there is no limit to the damage he could have done to the world."

Arends then went on to make a sobering announcement.

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We Americans are an interesting bunch. We cherish our independence. We love our rugged individualism. Despite having pride in our system of government, we really don't like government telling us what to do.

Since rebellion is literally how we were founded, it's sort of baked into our national identity. But it doesn't always serve us well. Especially when we find ourselves in a global pandemic.

Individualism—at least the "I do what I want, when I want" idea—is the antithesis of what is needed to keep contagious disease under control. More than anything in my memory, the coronavirus pandemic has tested our nation's ability to put up a united front, and so far we are failing miserably.

I hear a lot of the same complaints from people who decry government mandates to wear a mask or governors' stay-at-home orders. We don't need a nanny state telling us what we can and can't do! This is tyranny! This is dictatorship! What ever happened to personal responsibility?

I actually have the same question. What did happen to personal responsibility?

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