this post was submitted on 24 Apr 2026
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If you think Imperial is a better system, you're the perfect example of the American education system at work.
In case those were too many words...
You stupid.
I don't think that freedom units are better, I think they're more fun, and I like having a bit of whimsy in these trying times.
This. There is nothing more immersive in a story set in the past than old-timey measurements. I want my potions in drams, I want my house measured in paces, I want to know how many leagues the city is across. I want cubits and spans for construction and stones, pounds, and smelt for weights.
It makes the world more real, less sterile to have these human-centric measures.
The American education system taught us metric and was quite clear that's the standard. I'm pretty sure it's the only unit we used. It's also the standard within our government, as I'm sure you've heard plenty of times in threads like this.
The thing that entrenches Imperial units in our culture is the familiarity from us steeping in it in everyday usage. And we are exposed to both there, too. It's not about being stupid. It's just about inertia, and that's at least in part because the two systems do have their little trade-offs.
This always appears to come up from people who most likely are at least familiar with multiple languages. Why not just standardize on English? Did your education system just fail you? Was that too many words for you? (Obviously not. All intended rhetorically.)
I know US culture is struggling with a current of anti-intellectualism, but if you indulge in reducing nuanced topics to "America stupid", you're just watering the weeds in your own garden.