this post was submitted on 06 Jun 2024
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The US has an insane portion of foreign workforce with non-native speakers being at the head of many fortune top 100 companies. This is unheard of for Europe.
US is probably the most linguistically and culturally accommodating place on the planet. The heck are you talking about, OP?
I work in a call center where we are all speaking English as a second language. At one point we had a pharmaceutical company as a client. They had employees in different countries but the American employees whined that we didn't speak English correctly or made bad comments about my coworkers. Eventually we lost the contract and they went with an all American call center for their American employees, because apparently they didn't like our English.
In a call center language is your main working tool. It has to be near-perfect. My experience communicating with a such "offshore call-center" was always less than subpar. And I'm not a native speaker either.
And yet you have a foreign web developer who'd be better at waving hands than speaking English, and somehow nobody bats an eye. The web page looks great, so here's a round of applause for our jorgi, who can't even phrase a "thank you" back.
Oh, and to bring the point back. Nowhere in Europe will you have non-native speakers working in a call center. Rare, very rare exceptions. And those all will speak their target language borderline perfect.
Educated Americans, like the ones working in those big companies, know how stupid it is to make fun of someone who is already working in a second or third language... they are not the ones this meme is trying to insult
Proudly uneducated Americans, like the ones who travel to other parts of the world and demand to be spoken to in English.... or the ones who have never left their county and are offended by a different sounding consonant, fit the bill perfectly
I also travel everywhere, speak English to random people in restaurants and services and expect them to understand it. Cuz they can't possibly expect every visitor to their country to speak their language somehow?
I always hear about obnoxious Americans traveling, speaking English to locals and being upset when they're not understood. I've never really seen much of it. Usually it's a polite "excuses me ". Yes, said in English to a someone in a country where English is not the main language. Yet, what else do you expect them to do?
I am still surprised by the "I have never seen this thing (I couldn't possibly have observed by happenstance) therefore it must not exist" argument been thrown around.
Unless you vacation 10 times a year and love to snoop into other tourist conversations, you are very unlikely to have witness much. Ask people in the service industry and they will tell you.
Also, no I am not saying people traveling to Greece should learn Greek... but they should definitely expect to repeat themselves a bit, maybe use simpler language and definitely not expect perfect American English spoken back to them. This is what I was referring to which is likely represented by a loud MINORITY of Americans that give everyone a bad name.
This is just plain wrong. There are plenty such companies in Europe and surely in Asia as well (biontech popped into my mind immediately).
Also the most linguistically accomodating? The US can't hold or defend that title. It's probably Luxembourg or Singapore, let's be honest.
Have you ever been to the US? Even Brits get "corrected" by Yankees there, and I find that as amusing as it is sad.
In my experience, only Brits get corrected, and really that's just a running joke. "Oi cunt, Bo'oh uh wah'ah?"
Edit: actually that's not true, we do it to our own too. Ahem, "pahk the cah in hahvahd yard". See? Funny!
Americans love poking fun at our different dialects.
"Ope let me squeeze right past ya there"
"Y'all just leave that tractor right there"
"So, like, do you, like, have a favorite, um, restaurant here?"
And then there's mobster accents which get even more funny