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Comment by s_dev | Hacker News Reader

>There's a saying in Icelandic - þetta reddast - that means "everything will be alright", and, while many languages have a similar expression, this one is really embedded in Icelandic culture.

Ireland has a "It'll be Grand" culture as well for comparison. It's a trade off with pros and cons and works for some situations and inhibits progress in other situations, things often don't get acted on or resolved quickly but at the same time there is a huge reservoir of tolerance to draw on when things do get shit.

I would consider this the other end of the spectrum to countries like Japan or Germany in the way they respond to certain things. Lots of generalisations of course but that's often the impressions you get from travelling. It's very hard to be precise about big groups of people.

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Give me German/Dutch "this is awful and it should be fixed" any day over "It'll be grand" (we have a similar attitude here just across the Irish sea)

It can be a bit annoying listen to them moan about small things constantly but my impression of the Netherlands is shit just works and things get fixed. They seem to have a very low tolerance for bs and excuses, which is refreshing

In my culture we say "Today is a good day to die… But tomorrow will be better!"

I like to joke that Americans' responses to catastrophe is' "Thanks Obama!".

But it does get at how some folks here deal with adversity.

Are you my parents? The things Obama still get blamed at is insane. I'm not a huge fan of Obama, Trump, or Biden. There are certainly things to blame them on, but every little thing like gas prices is just ridiculous. The office of the President wields a lot of power, but they're not in charge of everything.

Exactly what I was getting at. Does not matter who is in office, they get blamed for everything bad that happens.

ETA: In lieu of acceptance and determination.

I hear it more than anything about Biden. I personally think that it's an easy way to be racist without being pinned down on it because of the out that he was also a President.

and I personally think that such an analysis is the real racism

"X is the real racism" is a talking point racists like to trot out. It is a pretty standard part of their playbook actually, to move the debate away from actual, obviously racist behavior.

What? “They” aren’t a coordinated team with a playbook. Just because you find yourself disagreeing with many people over a contentious topic doesn’t mean the other side is part of some hate-fueled organized conspiracy.

It doesn't have to be a conspiracy for folks of a certain stripe to think the same debate tactic is clever. (And for the record - it is not)

ETA: if you find yourself wanting to argue further on this, I would recommend searching Stormfront for this phrase and then decide if you want to die on this hill.

I’m familiar with Stormfront, and I don’t intend to die on any ideological hill today. I’ll just say that I don’t think these things are as cut and dry as you’re making them out to be.

Where there is smoke, there is usually fire.

If you are repeating talking points or rhetoric common on Stormfront...

Actual, obviously racist behavior like hiring people based on race? Or creating labels like “person of color” that imply being non-white is an important commonality between completely different groups?

I won’t go so far as to say “liberals are the real racists.” But I grew up as a brown kid in a 95% white Virginia town, where people were afraid to talk about or notice race. I never thought that 30 years later I’d be having attention drawn to my race in routine business settings in blue DC. I didn’t think Maryland liberals would be the reason my mixed kids see racial differences between me and my wife.

Urban liberals aren’t as bad as stormfront people, but they’re worse than “where are you really from” Iowa people. It’s not even close.

In my experience this is not how Germany works at all. "This is how we've always done it" is a lot closer to reality. Germans have an incredibly low standard for efficiency. At best they're just very thorough and methodical, but change aversion permeates every later of society.

The insert-everywhere saying in Turkey is “good luck”.

You might say it to a clerk instead of “have a nice day”.

Much less conviction about everything being alright, but hopeful anyway.

İyi şanslar, but also used regularly is kolay gelsin, which means let it come easy, or go easy, there is no direct translation. Then there is also hayırlısı, which means what will be will be, in my experience used sarcastically / raising you shoulders when everything is f*cked, as is common these days in Turkey.

Yup, I was thinking of kolay gelsin. I have heard and seen it everywhere- signing off group texts, saying bye to the neighborhood butcher, even as business names, like “Kolay Gelsin water delivery”.

When it comes to disasters the phrases that come to my mind are "bana bir sey olmaz" (nothing will happen to me) and "teget gececek" (it'll be nothing), which are expressions of denial and minimization.

New Zealand's "she'll be right" attitude is, I believe, why so much just doesn't work here. People tolerate breakage on a small and large scale, to a bigger extent than I've seen anywhere else. Anything from permanent shop signs with spelling mistakes, to letting people rent out unsanitary housing, to "ghost buses" which show up in their IT systems as planned, then as running, and then, when they are about to show up, simply disappear off of their systems as if it was never planned in the first place. People grumble, but it seems like they always assume somehow things will just magically fix themselves.

Ireland is like this too, maybe it's a cultural legacy from the Brits (who are known for this as well).

Similar culture in Australia too. “She’ be right, mate”

I'm always struck by Brits who include a wellness check with their greeting.

[knocks]

[door opens]

"Y'alrite?"

hmm, maybe not so different from American "what's up?" or "how's it going?" as a non-sequitur

British English idioms are often contractions of MUCH longer phrases.

"Y'alrite?" is not, contrary to what you might assume, short for "Are you alright?"

It's short for "Are you alright if I come in and interrupt you? It's fine if you're not, I just wanted to check before barging in. It's really not too much trouble is it? I'll go away and come back later. Or never. Sorry. Sorry, sorry."

Ah, I'd always thought the "you alright" was passively-aggressively suggesting I was somehow not alright.

>It's very hard to be precise about big groups of people.

Literally impossible, by the nature of it.

100% of German citizens have a brain, emotions, and an enduring ineffable soul. That’s a precise AND accurate statement ;)

That's a bold statement to make. German souls need to be re-issued regularly by the BIE (Bundesamt für Immaterielle Essenzen), and it's quite easy to fall behind with how much paperwork this is every year.

It wouldn't be so bad if they didn't take 4+ weeks to do anything. My friend had a child and he got a soul a year later. It's even worse in Berlin.

People are people! Precision at its best!

Aren't tautologies, by definition, the least precise statements possible?

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