I don’t know what either of you are talking about. This is the logical conclusion of Reagan and the continued hyper-Hollywoodization of what America is in the public consciousness, both in the US and where the rest of us live.
I read American literature. I watch American movies. I listen to American music. I wear blue jeans, I prepare <US City Name>-Chicken, and I speak with a simulated American affect (better than I speak my own language). And I live in a country that (frankly) has suffered a lot more than it has gained from America (and its rabid lapdog for the most part). And yet intellectually, my instinctive understanding of the US is not a graveyard of natives, it’s not a modern prison slave society, it’s not the largest private army in the world, it’s not what’s funded the ongoing terrorism, mass murder, and annexation of my own country (not the biggest crime in the spree but this is evil too), it’s not a christofascist corporate-captured company-town-continent with nothing but a paper-thin porous veneer of progressive values and freedom. It’s a nebulously positive place that every piece of media I have ever seen has urged me to move to. The American Dream has been seeped into my brain since the day I was taught the letter A in nursery. A nice fantasy sure. But pure fiction. All circus, no bread.
This situation is not an indictment of “how far it’s gotten”. This is precisely the world your country has created for itself.
I don’t want to come off as unnecessarily cynical, I have a genuine curiosity and fascination with the American experiment. Some part of me still wants it to work, some part of me still feels compelled by it, by the prospect of being a part of it. But like…. Guys. Come on. Take a good look in the mirror.
To be clear I wasn’t trying to say “how bad it’s gotten” broadly, just that Kimmel specifically is surreal to me because of how I first became acquainted with him as a kid, but you are totally right overall
I don’t know what either of you are talking about. This is the logical conclusion of Reagan and the continued hyper-Hollywoodization of what America is in the public consciousness, both in the US and where the rest of us live.
I read American literature. I watch American movies. I listen to American music. I wear blue jeans, I prepare <US City Name>-Chicken, and I speak with a simulated American affect (better than I speak my own language). And I live in a country that (frankly) has suffered a lot more than it has gained from America (and its rabid lapdog for the most part). And yet intellectually, my instinctive understanding of the US is not a graveyard of natives, it’s not a modern prison slave society, it’s not the largest private army in the world, it’s not what’s funded the ongoing terrorism, mass murder, and annexation of my own country (not the biggest crime in the spree but this is evil too), it’s not a christofascist corporate-captured company-town-continent with nothing but a paper-thin porous veneer of progressive values and freedom. It’s a nebulously positive place that every piece of media I have ever seen has urged me to move to. The American Dream has been seeped into my brain since the day I was taught the letter A in nursery. A nice fantasy sure. But pure fiction. All circus, no bread.
This situation is not an indictment of “how far it’s gotten”. This is precisely the world your country has created for itself.
I don’t want to come off as unnecessarily cynical, I have a genuine curiosity and fascination with the American experiment. Some part of me still wants it to work, some part of me still feels compelled by it, by the prospect of being a part of it. But like…. Guys. Come on. Take a good look in the mirror.
To be clear I wasn’t trying to say “how bad it’s gotten” broadly, just that Kimmel specifically is surreal to me because of how I first became acquainted with him as a kid, but you are totally right overall