Piano World Home Page Forums Our Most Popular Forums Piano Forum Way off topic, but...

Yes. However, if you ask a typical American (in the sense of United States citizen) if a Colombian or a Brazilian or an Innuit is an American, the likely answer you will get is: no. Or, perhaps after some prodding, you might get them to admit that they might be considered "Americans".

One speaks of Europe when one discusses the need for all countries to execute to the agreed level of financial discipline.

One speaks of "Europe" when France yet again argues that it should be an exception and not have to be held to previous, current or future promises, agreements and pledges.

I find your comment offensively racist.

J-C.

Well, it clearly backfired.

Actually, framing Europe with any kind of punctuation adornment made Europe stand out. If you wanted to downplay, you should have failed to capitalize it or used a smaller font size than you used in the rest of the text.

When I read the post, I assumed that you wanted Europe to stand out. Since punctuation is for the most part an attempt to approximate the nuances of spoken language, my take was that while it was not surprising that the others in the party might freely and amicably associate in a public place, a prominent Euro in the piano biz might not want to be caught by camera or even by written word selling out brand pedigree, national pride, or even family honor in exchange for cost savings on parts and labor.

Despite any misunderstanding of that small point, I enjoyed your post, your thoughts, and your hope (which I share) that a shrinking world may eventually become a more enlightened world.

It is just an illustration of how real Europeans think based on historical facts of the past behavior of actual EU member states and why this leads to them to discuss "Europe."

Perhaps you should take yourself less seriously and then look up the definition for racist.

Well we've gone this far off track....

There is nothing racist about that statement.
The French are not a "race" anymore than Americans
are a race.

Even if he said something like "French people
smell bad", it would not be considered racist.
Prejudice or stereotyping, yes, but not racist.

Del, I was hoping while I was in the Seattle, WA area last week I might get to drive down and get to meet you. But things on my end just didn't work out, and since you were out I suppose it worked out well.

Maybe next time.

Smell bad? From my year in France, what comes to mind is the aroma wafting from the pâtisseries. Delightful!

Hasn't this gone on long enough?

'the Journey'

I have the feeling that you are dressing up your own rather odd opinions as those of 'real Europeans' If this is not the case perhaps you could enlighten me as to what you mean by the phrase and perhaps explain how I might distinguish a real European from any other kind (presumably false, fake or artificial Europeans)

It would also be interesting to learn how many of the 750,000,000 (approx) Europeans are real and how you have gone about canvassing them for their views.


J-C.

I didn't imply the French smell bad,
I was using a oft used old stereotype
to make a point.

And yes, it had gone on long enough.

Plinky - I completely understood what you were saying. I just pushed it over the top with an attempt of humor.

I agree with you about racism vs. stereotyping.

No worries!

No wonder Orwell was depressed about the future!

Now we have the internet for that.

I would be particularly interested what our Russian friends would have to say to that.

They're the often forgotten, biggest part of "Europe"....
[by far..]

http://geography.about.com/od/europemaps/a/europe-countries-area.htm

Norbert

This thread, which seemed quite fun at first, has got rather out of hand and for my own part I shall make no further contributions to it.

I should like to apologize to Del for hijacking his OT and to Withindale for teasing him about grammar and I would particularly like to thank Marty for his efforts to calm things down.

It is 23.15h in France and because I am now mildly paranoid about being smelly I propose to take a bath before going to bed.

Good night to one and all.

J-C.

Edited for punctuation (!)

I'd be happy for you to stop by for a visit. (Right now, though, that would involve a 14-hour plane ride, each way). Then I could say I'd been visited by an "American."

ddf

No apology needed. I have found the whole discussion quite interesting.

We not only live in interesting times but we live in a rapidly shrinking world. Cultures are brought together and mixing and meshing (or not) in altogether new ways. We can run from this or we can join in. I prefer to join in. As do, I think, most who participate on a forum such as this. I find the differing cultural ideas and approaches to things I have taken for granted from my youth to be quite stimulating.

My thanks to all who have participated. I've learned some stuff....

ddf

You have all misunderstood Europe. From a British point of view (in fact I prefer English) one prefers Continental Europe (with or without quotation marks) to distinguish the big bit from the offshore segment.

Whilst it is allegedly a fact that the United Kingdom is part of "Europe" the reality is that there are "continentals" and there are British.

As it happens I am married to a continental, so I have a foot either side of the water.

Everyone surely knows that Europe, when surrounded by quotation marks, includes the EEC undesirables. Hence it is clear from Del's post that his secret dining companion hails from neither the UK nor the likes of France and Germany. Thus we are dealing with a nouveau "European" I fancy.

LOL - you just did!