When I say I'm French, I often get the reaction from Americans: "But why do you hate us? "
Well, I'd like to say that the majority of French people don't hate Americans, and that I've met some extremely nice people on this site, and they're Americans.
The funny thing is that many French people also think that Americans despise and hate France.
Long time ago when I was around your sprite age... I went to France and got the 'social challenge'... some did not like our invasion of Iraq, and were offended. Frankly, I agreed with them, I thought it was unnecessary bad idea as well. French can be a little "stuffy" shall we say. But overall, was good experience when I tried to speak French to them.
My wife and I recently traveled to France and enjoyed it, we made good friends there we keep in touch with, dined with... they were our Airbmb hosts, their kids visited us and we hosted. All happy to explore. Their kids of course, want to come to USA... but don't have a solid pathway.
As well we have a French native that married into the family and lives with us at the moment, so I'm getting a dosage of French culture, language and such. Unfortunately, he is not a french chef..."c'est la vie". So I'm doing the cooking.
So I don't see a problem...
But if I was French, I'd probably belch up some terrible looking green stuff (think the Exorcist movie) at the thought of some American culture... e. g. our fast food, our GMO 'products', some of our breads and such, our tasteless cheese from cows raised on corn, rap music, etc.. We do have cool cars and big houses, but so do you in your own way. You have character, so whatever. I can't go for a swim by a 2000 yr old Roman bridge, but you can.
Frankly, I salute all of Europe and have done so before in thanks for your telling America to completely and totally F_____ Off... when we try to poison your food systems with our garbage GMO, roundup ready, scientifically adulterated food products. I wouldn't blame them for putting up a replica of statue of liberty with a flip off finger until such time as America changes their policy.
That said, the new administration literraly said that the other day... they see the issue why Europe doesn't buy our products and maybe... just maybe, they will make some changes! That be amazing, and more healthy for us all.
I do appreciate all the care that went in to maintaining the so many graveyards of americans in Normandie and the some were people still remember the individuals they saw lose their lives (like the ball turret gunner that fell through a roof and survived a few hours), fighting WWII... and France is France because of them... not German. Can you imagine having to eat saurkraut and weiners every day. blech! Eventhough, they are distant relatives (shhhhh)...
Lastly, my relatives went to France enjoyed a beautiful ride but got into a terrible accident. So many French people dropped their lives to come to and comfort them and get them to good help. Went far out of their way to care for them. The French are classy people and need to be honored and preserved.
That said, your chicken pasta dishes need more flavor... just sayin...
I appreciate your analysis, but I'd like to add that there's a bit of hypocrisy on the French side about American culture. I mean, nobody's forcing the French to buy American products, watch American movies or listen to American music.
As for the rest, if Americans have had a bad experience, I'd say it's due to cultural differences and not to the fact that the French are arrogant or rude, even if such people do exist.
Some friends of my wife and mine had a French student stay with them for a semester. I met her and her parents. She was the sweetest thing and her parents were really nice.
I traveled through parts of France with my parents in 1984. My dad had landed in Normandy during WWII and was in every major battle from there to the end of the war.
It wasn't a typical tourist trip. My dad wanted to revisit places he had been through during the war and visit cemeteries where some of his fallen comrades were buried.
The French people treated my dad with the greatest honor and deference. He was extremely moved.
In traveling through countrysides and stopping in small towns, the people were extremely nice. I spoke very little French, but even if they spoke little English, they were hospitable and eager to help.
It was only in larger cities that we encountered a bit of snootiness on occasion. I would expect foreigners visiting large cities in the U. S. to experience similar attitudes from some people.
What I find interesting is that fact that Americans visiting other countries fully expect those people to understand and speak English. And some Americans can be quite pushy and arrogant.
There are Americans who think that the French owes us something for our part in WWII. And there are instances where the U. S. government tried to treat France like a servant, such as when congress changed the term French fries to "freedom fries" when France refused to join the "coalition of willing" in illegally invading Iraq.
I, personally, have great admiration for French history (going all the way back to the Gauls) and culture. I respect it far more than British. France has contributed tremendously to our culture and cultures around the world.
And, it it wasn't for French assistance, the U. S. may not have won independence from Britain.
So I, for one, do not dislike France and I don't have the impression that the French hate America.
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Anonymous
(25-29)
1 y
I don't think most Americans think the French hate them. I just think the French believe they are superior to everyone else, and no one likes people like that.
You yourself are actually a good example of that. You posted the question linked below a few weeks ago using a simple minded French "analysis" and tried to characterize the way the majority of Americans voted in 2024 through that simple minded lens, and then proceeded to tell anyone who disagreed with you that they "haven't understood the text", so essentially they are "too dumb to understand it". How typically French of you.
If you want to understand why no one likes the French, just pick up a mirror and find a little honesty and humility.
I said indeed that many people had not understood the text I also said that it was certainly the fault of a bad translation, because when the time people are wrong are not had the problem but the translation that I made.
But strangely enough, you didn't see this and preferred to label me as such.
It's a curious stereotype, considering the US has had great relations with France since the American Revolution. (Minus the Quasi-Wars, but I don't think most Americans even know about that.)
There is such a thing, here, in France, called Anti-Americanism, and unlike you @julie4, I would not risk saying what the majority of French thinks. Because you and I can't have access to such data 😏
As said in the comments already, it's not difficult to hate the society that is USA, because of philosophical and cultural differences, which are massive, even more massive than what I suspected before getting to know more about USA, as a society.
As a society, and that's where things can remain polite or get ugly, if separating USA, the immaterial entity, and inhabitants of USA, the people, then Anti-Americanism targets a culture, a philosophy. But it takes a lot of thinking to separate people from their environment, to think of ourselves as people separated from our environment, and to think of others in the same way. Especially when people WANT to incarnate their environment, as illustrated by the concepts of patriotism and/or nationalism. There, it can become ugly, on both sides of the track, because then we're confusing ideas and actual people.
Well let's say that given the success of American culture and given that it is unlikely that a majority of people hate the same nation, you admit that it is unlikely in these conditions that a majority of French hate the USA, except among populists at the political level and their most fervent activists.
Because they are being told by a corrupt political party in America called the "Democrats" that the rest of the world hates America. They use it as a tool to try to manipulate the American people into capitulation with a "One World Government" agenda in which the United States gives up its sovereignty and kowtows to the will of those who would do Americans harm. It's an attempt to weaken the United States originating from our adversaries and enemies abroad.
"If only Americans would stop being so proud of their country and given to the will of this monolithic world government, then the rest of the world would finally like us."
That's the narrative.
Fortunately there are patriots such as myself who couldn't give a crap what the rest of the world thinks and believe that America's strength is in our individualism and our pursuit of American world leadership and American exceptionalism.
I don't think France hates us, but there was a French woman on here trashing Americans pretty hard a couple of years ago. Talking about how we have no class and no culture, etc. because of somebody drinking cheap wine in a plastic cup or coffee mug instead of a wine glass. I told her that there's no reason to drink cheap wine from a wine glass when you're just trying to get drunk, and nobody over here is trying to savor a $3 bottle of shitty wine. Her argument was that there are plenty of good cheap wines in France, but was too stupid to understand that those same wines would cost a lot more over here.
Many times humans think things based on anecdotal findings. They hear one thing, one time, but one person, and that means that millions think the same.
We're not good at really diving deep into our thoughts and rarely do we investigate anything properly. Laziness of the mind is the real reason. It's too difficult to properly investigate anything and much easier to assume things and accept anecdotal findings that can be generalized.
This is why propaganda is so easy to manipulate people.
I don't know. After Trump's first term, I read that only 30% of French people liked us. But there is a perception in America that the French are assholes and nationalistic and hate EVERYONE😂
Most Americans who shit on the French have just heard certain things, or only went to Paris. But from what i read, most of the time it's their own fault if the French are rude to them. Americans have this mentality that everyone should kiss their ass. But a lot of French especially in the service industry treat French people the same way too, so... French just do things their own way, but I guess Americans take it personally and think they're being singled out.
Also, a lot of Americans don't understand French humor and sarcasm.
Actually, Europeans in general seem to hate Americans, so it's natural they would think the French do too. Didn't you say yourself that France has a love-hate relationship with us?
Oh boy, the French! Those sultry, beret-wearing, croissant-loving bastards just make me hard as a baguette. The mere thought of their disdain for us Yanks gets my blood pumping in all the right places. Their snobbish accents and dismissive attitudes towards our fast food and cowboy culture... it's like a forbidden fantasy waiting to be explored.
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Anonymous
(30-35)
1 y
There is a long history of French disdain for America and Americans. You can ask Google about it if you want. I have experienced it myself traveling abroad and meeting French people, and I know enough others who have experienced it to know it's not just me.
But the biggest problem Americans (and the rest of the world, to be clear) have with the French is more about their arrogance, their superiority complex, and their undeserved elitist attitudes toward the rest of the world. No one in the world thinks nearly as highly of the French as the French think of themselves. It's just the way the French have always been.
I work in tech in France and whenever we’re trying to deploy a tech solution owned by an American company somebody will point out “the evil Americans” and how we shouldn’t be giving then our data
But of course thats a certain sample size
Im sure even more people have no issues but the stereotype is well in place
I don't hate France, and I've known French people who didn't hate America either. I think the idea largely comes from how our governments are towards each other. Granted, I do think Macron is a priveleged pretty boy with no real world understanding, but I sure as hell don't think of Trump as a hero either.
I think most of the modern discontent and mistrust comes from the unnecessary Iraq war that Bush jr. forced upon the United States and its allies. France - that was heavily committed to the Afghanistan war - said no to that adventure. I still remember the pictures of silly Americans pouring out French wine, stomping on cheese and renaming French fries into freedom fries.
Half the US population are members of a cult that hates everyone outside the US. They run around chanting US first and cheering for wars but also cheer when they cut off US aid to foreign countries. They even hate the people in the USA who haven't joined their cult. Hate is what their cult is based on... hating the others. Same as the Nazis in 1930's Germany.
Everyone who isn't American hates America especially Europe. US was founded to be opposed to us ya know, and you know they didn't get involved with stopping hitler until later because they said EU issues are their own.
But also everyone hates the French so... That's ya know another reason.
I remember a lot of Americans who visited France felt like waiters looked down on them in Paris or judged them for not speaking good French. I’m not sure that was an accurate perception. My impression is that Americans tend to expect much more overt friendliness or warmth in their day to day interactions, or positivity even if it is fake, than a lot of other cultures.
I personally never noticed any dislike towards France or assumption of French people disliking Americans.. I always thought we had a solid relationship.. I mean maybe some Americans have been to French and didn't have the best experience thinking that French people don't like Americans..
Well, there is a kind of "superpower syndrome" towards the US whereby a great deal of people damn them if they do, damn them if they don't. If they interfere in international affairs like the middle east they are called imperialists, if they withdraw they are irresponsible for having power and not using it. I've heard Americans believe Swedes hate them as well. Probably because they usually receieve a great deal of flak internationally.
Even the Swedes, how is this possible? In France, we consider the Swedes to be one of the friendliest people in the world. And it's not uncommon to hear, for example, on the international situation, "oh you know, the Russians will never be Swedes".
There's an expression in Sweden. Being "dumb-kind". As in you do stupid things thinking that's kindness. Examples being uncontrolled immigration, adhering to liberal dogmas and so forth. Hence many Swedes dislike American patriotism and flamboyancy because they do not recognise healthy attitudes and mindsets if it bites their behind. Go back two centuries and we were the best and most aggressive fighters in the world during our empire. Go back to the viking age, same thing. But there's an infectious wimpiness that has prevailed among Swedes in modern days thus our repute for "friendliness".
Problem is, it used to be far better. Globally we still hold up well but our Swedish standard has deteriorated severely. Safety has decreased, just look at the recent school shooting in Örebro. Economically we're still good, but we've also been bumped down in gdp per capita. We used to be among the top 5, now we're not even top 10. We're on 20th place I believe.
If you think France hate Yanks (most do, as do most European countries), wait until Trump f**ks up their economies as well as America's with his inane tariff war. Frankly, were I a Yank (I'm half), I'd never take a European vacation sans armed bodyguards.(I'm black, and they likely know few of us voted Agent Orange, so I may be able visit Europe with few problems).
I think it's human nature to make assumptions if you don't catch yourself, and fall into bad habit of not allowing others wiggle room to have growth and change their minds about things from time to time.
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Anonymous
(30-35)
1 y
Personally, I don’t know if they actually hate us but stereotype we were typed that they do mainly I would think because of education probably how we handle things our taste in fine arts. It’s not as refined so they probably don’t take a serious. These are just steps in the dark.
It’s just like the stereotype that Jamaican African And other culture of color do not like black Americans because we’re deemed as lazy
We can't stand France only because we so often hear how much those smelly people hate us. Why don't people from France take showers? We hear that all the time also.
like in touristy places like paris and ik buying a home in france for an American is really tough. idkk if it's foreigners period or just americans lol
I hope I have been a good example of a nice American. I think people think this because they have met a person from the opposing culture and go by media stereotypes.
I first heard of this in around the early 80s. That the French hate all Americans except for Jerry Lewis. The comedian. Everyone heard of this that I knew. It just stuck.
Cause they do hate us. Maybe not you but in my experience they do. One called me an entitled American for no reason. He was holding the door I thought he was holding it for me I walked through and said thank you and he lost it 🤷♂️🤷♂️🤷♂️🤷♂️
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