Quote:
Originally Posted by saffronleaf
Americans are far friendlier and more open with their thoughts -- which, of course, occasionally may be intolerant.
|
This superficial friendliness and "homie culture" is part of what I hate about Americans. Being "open with your thoughts" is invariably a marker of the banal self-importance and entitlement Americans have that grate on people around the world. It's irritating and off-putting.
Quote:
Originally Posted by saffronleaf
edit -- And then, of course, you have downright puritanical policies. Alcohol can only be sold by government stores (—?). Extreme nanny state tobacco regulations. Patios serving alcohol must be like cages so that there is no interaction with the public, thereby destroying a lot of what should be fun street culture. And many more things, I'm sure.
|
Lots of American jurisdictions have draconian laws and attitudes to various substances, too. Not everywhere is Las Vegas. It doesn't get more nanny state than the attempt to ban or limit the size of soft drinks in New York City.
The laws in Ontario (and presumably the rest of Canada outside of Quebec) are the remnants of an earlier puritanical era, and only feel repressive in a comparative sense. They don't really represent the direct sort of oppression that would inspire an uprising because you can still drink as much as you want, even if you're not allowed to stroll down the street with a drink in your hand.
But we're completely secular now, and want more out of our cities than the strictly utilitarian and pragmatic, meaning that we are looking elsewhere to paragons of urban culture to see how they do things differently. So while you're not strictly allowed to drink alcohol in public, it is commonplace in various downtown parks in Toronto anyway, and even in Stratford you can have a bottle of wine with your picnic along the lake without raising any eyebrows, much less arousing the displeasure of the police. Granted, it's a class thing: there's no way a posse of farm boys could pull up in their pickup trucks stacked with cases of Budweiser with the intention of getting hammered in a public park around here (and thank gawd for that--they do it on their farms anyway--rural Ontario's dirty secret is that drinking and driving is still rife out on the farm).
At some point the government monopolies on the sale of alcohol, not to mention the ridiculous monopoly handed by the government to a private consortium in the form of the Beer Store, have to collapse under the weight of their own absurdity. But it will take a while, because it's more an irritation than a true form of oppression. And to be honest, you know you've got it comparatively good in a global sense if, when casting around for things to protest against, you come up with the LCBO.
Prev
Linear Mode
