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Comment by rmc | Hacker News Reader

$MY_COUNTRY Exceptionalism

I don't know of another country that has it quite so bad. I know of nowhere else in the western world where people fly flags or drape themselves in the flag with anything like the regularity of the US.

It really sticks out compared to everywhere else I've been, and I've travelled to/in 30+ countries now.

Oh yeah the USAians really seem to go for flags. In most of Europe, only right wing nationalists and sports fans wave flags.

We Americans suffer from flag inflation. We mostly don't even notice them anymore, so people have to put bigger and bigger flags to prove how patriotic they are. I was at a baseball game last weekend and only noticed midway through how many (and how obnoxiously prominent) the flags were. It's silly.

OTOH, many immigrants fly the flags of their home countries, I guess as a sort of badge of identity. For whatever reason, that's always seemed less ridiculous to me.

Another thing I've noticed from US TV & films (so it might not actually be true), is how it only seems to be the US flag that is flown. Here it's not uncommon to see flags from lots of countries. Only governmental buildings would "only fly the local flag".

What is a "USAian"? Are you really so ridiculous as to believe that "American" is not the correct term?

In my experience, we Canadians fly our national flag and wear flag-themed garb much, much more than Americans. Even more than in Texas, where people usually fly the American flag because they think it'd be rude to fly the Texas flag solo.

I suspect this Canadian flag-waving has more to do with our insecurities than it does with our comparative level of patriotism - we're not all that different from Americans, so we go out of our way to emphasize what differences we do have.

I'll admit I've not spent much time in Canada. Most of the time I did spend was driving along the top of lake Ontario and then back into the US via Niagara. Most of the flags I saw there were British!

Fascinating. I'm Canadian too and have made similar observations, yet was surprised to read what you wrote. Our self-image is so strongly one of not being nationalistic that we're for the most part unconscious of this behaviour. Most Canadians would react to your comparison to Texas as an obvious joke or a weird paradox.

Australia, believe it or not, is actually pretty bad in this regard. The amount of xenophobia disguised as "patriotism" is pretty eye opening (well at least for me). I haven't travelled through the USA though, but Australia definitely was a shock.

I know Aus has more than a few issues surrounding xenophobia and race but... I lived in Perth for two years and spent six months on the road around the country. Despite the fashion for Southern Cross tattoos, it comes nowhere close to the US for sheer number of flags. I never noticed flag poles and flags in people's front gardens (for example) like I saw in Texas.

Further, American Exceptionalism manifests itself entirely differently than other countries'. America sees its own as a right or even mandate to "spread liberty and freedom" to the world. The parent states the following:

>But those other countries do not claim moral high ground in the same way the US does on so many other issues, or claim to lead the world with respect to values such as freedom and democracy

This is effectively the definition of America's brand of Exceptionalism and it is that to which I was referring.

It is a far cry from simple nationalism or "thinking one's country is the best".

Yeah, American exceptionalism, like when you think you can say "I know you are, but what am I" just because you're American. Thanks for the demo.

Danish Exceptionalism? Nah.

Have you tried immigrating to Denmark?

I'm a son of an immigrant. Why?

Tongan Exceptionalism?

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