Germany replaces US as country with best international image
dw.com
dw.com
[Edit] There is something quite surreal to see a discussion about Germany’s positive image for people my age and above. I couldn’t have imagined this even ten years ago.
Giving up some freedom is always a consequence of society: your freedom to swim in a lake is at odds with my freedom to dump sewage there.
I'd hope that Germany of all countries understands the importance of sovereign democratic government and the harsh conditions people will endure to preserve it.
In fact the behaviour of Germany (and France) in recent times has seriously worsened my perception of these countries. I wouldn't say they're clearly better in my view than the USA, despite Trump.
This is perhaps easier with Germany's population of ~60M vs. the US population of ~300M. I'm much more comfortable with something like this happening at the state level because, for example, I have almost nothing in common with the people of Alabama.
† source? The CIA :) https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/...
https://www.google.com/publicdata/explore?ds=d5bncppjof8f9_&...
Would it help you people if I said, Germany is 10^2M vs 10^3M? I'm I pedant, but this is ridiculous.
60/300= 20%
80/300= 26%
Not much of a difference, IMO. Make your case if you disagree.
There's no amount of division that can neatly contain a group's interests. Gerrymandered maps are an extreme example. 60m vs 300m is no more meaningful a distinction than 500k (Atlanta) vs 6m (Atlanta MSA).
Another example is marijuana legalization, which seriously benefits people with certain diseases and psychosis. Further, it has shown in Colorado to reduce crime and increase tax revenue. It would have been significantly delayed if the federal government imposed authority of federal law in this case.
So there is a pretty compelling argument to be made that some issues seriously benefit from not being under one bureaucracy.
While technically true, surely there's degrees of 'containing group interests'?
I've been part of various groups with different sizes. Family > friends > Christian denomination (Evangelical) > Class (highly educated but very 'middle-class'), Country (The Netherlands), etc. To me it seems obvious that as the group gets larger, as well as more 'abstract', the group interest becomes vaguer and broader and less cohesive.
While I don't agree that comparisons on a state-level are the right kind of abstraction (perhaps more rural versus urban?), I do think that there's a huge difference in 'contained group interests' on the level of something like 'The Netherlands' versus 'The European Union' (the 'umemployed leeches' are at least my unemployed leeches, and not brown-skinned, etc.). And while I think the USA cannot be directly compared to the EU, I do think the USA is more similar to the EU than to one particular country within it. Or at least enough so that it makes that comparison very shaky.
I often find it difficult to remember this, because from the perspective of a Netflix-guzzling European the USA is a monoculture. But if the differences within the relatively small and relatively (globally speaking) homogeneous eurozone are any indication, the USA might be much less monocultural than it appears.
I never made that claim. It is simply that state level democracies is what we have in the US. I live over 1,000 miles from my nearest relative because that is where I feel most comfortable, even though I know very few people and have no connections.
seriously? you have very much in common with them. you want clean water to drink and air to breath, healthy food to eat, peace, a non-corrupt and efficient government, safety, medical infrastructure and so on ...
This 300M+ logic is the perfect strawman for people who don't want to solve problems, because the population of the US is only comparable to few countries in population and they are not in a good position...
Thank you. I hate when people use this as a former of argument and neglect all the difficult things the country has achieved. It's an excuse for laziness and the status quo.
My point was it is difficult for 300M people to agree on something, and I don't know what you are talking about otherwise.
See: your thread.
Within the US, people are able to move across states at will very easily. It is not a "straw man" in that I did not present it as argument being made by someone else. I simply do not believe in centralized power and large homogeneous populations.
I have been to Alabama, and I often can not understand what they are saying whether you believe it or not.
I guess besides the 'system' and the people that form it, Germany is actually very nice.
(And the US is way worse in all these respects anyway)
We need to solve our biggest issues at a global level because history shows that even if one country goes from strength to strength, sooner or later its surrounding nations can pull it down. Also usually the rise of one country is upon the ruins (or at least exploitation) of another, or others.
living in berlin feels like living in a failed bundesland. the public transport is broken all the time, the bürgerämter are crowded, you can't appointments, the administration is basically clueless, ...
i guess if you don't rely on public services it's not that bad, but still, berlin is a very bad example for a functioning german place.
The biggest surprise to me as an American was that I had this perception that health care is free over here, and it's not. You are mandated to pay your health insurance, which isn't as cheap as you might imagine, but it is of course pretty comprehensive with no co-pays for every service that I've ever had.
Btw, the health care system is a dream of efficiency compared to the US.
The appointment system for the Bürgerämter is a bit of a disaster, but you can go without an appointment, or get appointments further away, which you will have no problem getting to due to the great public transport system.
Have you lived outside of Germany at all?
In Berlin I get home with the underground at night (01:00 - 04:00), last one in Stuttgart comes around 01:00.
In Berlin a 9 minute wait is considered long and in Stuttgart 20 minutes is long.
Almost all people I know, that moved from Stuttgart to Berlin find it horrible to ride by public transport in Stuttgart now.
I spent about a month living in Hamburg, and visited Berlin for a day, and I never had to wait more than a few minutes for a bus or (more often) train. As importantly, they consistently run on time, so I don't need to leave a massive amount of padding if I want to arrive somewhere on time.
I don't know I'm qualified to say whether your public transit is objectively bad, but to me it's subjectively amazing.
FWIW my experience has been that it's surprisingly difficult to compare my 'home', Amsterdam, to Berlin, or The Netherlands to Germany. There's tons of things that I prefer in the latter (cost of education, civil society/engagement), but also plenty of things I prefer in the former (ease of starting a business, relative lack of (monolingual) bureacracy).
But from talking to expats to both Amsterdam and Berlin made me realize that even the shitty parts of my world are much better than where some of them came from. Most of my complaints about Berlin or Amsterdam pale in comparison to the benefits it offers to many people from other places.
(For example, the complaints about DB (Germany) or NS (Holland) are ridiculous in comparison to my experience what almost every other part of the world)
In those unstable times, we all feel the influx of money, ideas, people here. Some don‘t like change, but to me it all feels quite good.
Anyway, still hope to spend some years in the USA when the time is right.
(Can we please adopt Turks and Caicos already?)
There are so many places in the US and you can find a lifestyle that suits you. Most people are very welcoming and would love to have you.
Germans are well thought of in the States. My state, Georgia, even has a Bavarian inspired town in the “mountains”.
Don't believe the media, it's been proven to be working an agenda. See for yourself!
My apologies! But your actual correction is correct...
I once heard a dane say to us (swedes) that they would love it if we came over to work because danes have too many demands when you ask them to do something while a swede will just do it.
Warmer weather, but the economy is worse or the other way around.
If someone can feed 10 people instead of 1 person, the rest has enough time at their hands to do other things.
So the theory goes that Middle East and East Asia basically were the lucky ones to get that bootstrap, and other bordering regions (e.g. Europe) got it from there; while Africa, Australia and the Americas were not so lucky, and by the time they got all those things, they came on ships alongside some technologically advanced and well-armed people who weren't exactly on a humanitarian mission to spread the riches.
Most of them would already went down the drain without all that money.
Not hating the general premise, since I personally feel that Germany and the EU have taken the place of world leadership that the US previously occupied, but still "Germany Marketing Company Declares Germany the Best Country" would be a more accurate headline here.
I’ve thought about moving there, too, but it’d be great to narrow the places in Germany down geographically with some data like this, especially with what I hear about the state of internet infrastructure there.
Congratulations also to Americans, who feel their country is moving in a better direction.
May America be the best America it can be, and the same of Germany, Japan, etc.
The US fell from first to sixth place in their study, since last year.
The cause is a system that's dysfunctional on multiple levels. The US' issues are systemic and some have now become part of US culture and are deeply anchored as such. I don't foresee any quick and meaningful correction. It's going to take many years for the country to become healthy again.
And given US influence all over the World, it's not good news.
It does still have the biggest propaganda machine in the world and now it's online.
Two issues particularly, immigration which yes plays to darker impulses, but also represents law and order to the average conservative. And free trade, endlessly flogged by so called conservatives and was increasingly exposed as more shilling for powerful interests and more benefit to them than the average american.
Even though they lost the election Dems had their shit together much more compared to Republicans, and as much as we say we want disruption in presideantial politics, we see what happens when one half of the system goes completely limp.
And even more interesting US image was first place after ruining so many countries in very recent history. But then again, it is all about the media.
In fact, when looking for household appliances, you'll notice local shops using "originated from Germany" to promote some brands over the other. Especially Telefunken products.
Same thing applies to cars, where the public separates them into two categories: "German" and "shit".
Today Telefunken don't produce any products(they sell only their Brand-Licence to partners), if you buy for example a Telefunken-TV it is produced by Vestel(in Turkey).
http://vestelinternational.com/en/corporate/vestel-group/
https://www.telefunken.com/company/ - Partner Alliance
The irony being that "Made in Germany" was originally forced by the UK government to distinguish "inferior" imports.
Didn't work out as planned...
But recently, with Merkel's immigration policy (or ineptness?), the country is being overrun with North Africa immigrants, who are a drag on rich social care system, taking a lot out while not contributing their equal share back to it.
(Eastern Europe calls this process cultural enrichment, which is a clear sarcasm.)
I'm wondering about contrast between "best international image" and the perceived reality. Good marketing comes to mind.
> Off-Topic: ... Ideological or political battle or talking points.
> Eschew flamebait. Don't introduce flamewar topics unless you have something genuinely new to say. Avoid unrelated controversies and generic tangents.
> Comments should get more civil and substantive, not less, as a topic gets more divisive.
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2017/nov/16/politica...
Germany is getting out of nuclear, under pressure by its populations that is heavily environmental. The irony being that to meet the electricity demand, they need all other sources - one of them being coal.
Germany CAN’T get out of certain energy sources quickly as the Greens have killed nuclear. Damned if you, damned if you don’t.
In my opinion the age of nation states is slowly coming to an end( see Catalonia and related)
So it will be exiting to see what decentralization brings to us. I hope web3 will help with this and along remove some of the negatives of big cooperations influence on society.