We need to get back to being human beings and human doings
this post was submitted on 24 Jun 2026
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I once took an American friend out for a night in Manchester. His first night in the UK.
That dispelled a lot of the narrative of the quaintness of Europe.
There's this thing that Americans have. An old world ideal. Where they picture is all having two hour lunches and generally chilling about the place. It isn't real, just another dream sold to you by capitalism.
Sure, we do some things differently over here, public transport and the ability to walk places being two that I'm particularly fond of, but let's not rose tinted this.
The rise of fascism, or at least nationalism, is coupled with some awful working practices, mainly imported... And some of the levels of outright poverty, both urban and rural more than challenge that in the states.
This is just another reflection of the grass being greener.
You think Europeans are friendly? In my experience people are just people. The folk I've met in North America have been lovely, by and large and we have much, much more in common than this fairy tale suggests. But it swings both ways and we also have plenty of arseholes across Europe that would as soon as shank you as they would invite you for a chat and not ask you what you did.
That is kind of the thing. Americans earn extremely well. So when Americans move to southern Europe, they are either retired or have a great remote job. With cheap houses in the rural parts of those countries and access to public health care, you can actually have a pretty chill lifestyle.
That is to say: Capitalism is great for capitalists.
I do wonder how much this is about moving from urban spaces to rural spaces as opposed to geographic discrepencies.
It depends, but in poor cities like Sevilla the suburbs have some decent apartments or houses for basically a good(like $100k) annual US salary. Those will have light rail access, so living car free is still possible.
I worked in central London for 10 years and generally the American tourists were very polite and friendly. I served Monica Lewinsky once. I only knew it was her because Americans never sign their frickin credit cards so I had to check her ID. I also served some famous comedian once and my manager was wetting herself and after he left, she was like, Do you know who that was? And I'm like, no? 😅
(Rudest celeb was Vanessa Feltz, although it was my colleague who served her. Floella Benjamin was nice and still uses the "aging off" cheat.)
To be fair the UK is actually depressing
I'm from the Netherlands and don't think I'll ever go back if not in my own bubble on a holiday not interacting too much
Such misery I haven't seen elsewhere as what your people vocalize. And the aggression is off the charts. I have my hopes up for Ireland, haven't been yet. But england? Nah, seen enough.
Every hometown is "a shithole" when you ask about it, indoctrination is complete with even "soulful folk" proudly exclaiming the most dumb standpoints
And the ones that rise above that are just more affluent and turn a bit more quiet so as not to risk showing their own true colors. Hypocrites, behind the elbows we call that. Class consciousness. Not European at all in my opinion. I kind of hope nowadays you guys don't ever get to return, it's that bad.
I hope it gets better for you over there but where I live lunches can last 1,5 hours and work still gets done with a vengeance
I lived in the Midlands for two years. I didn't think a place as run-down, impoverished, dirty and forsaken like this existed anywhere in Europe.
Most British people have been slowly crushed by 45 years of neo liberal economics. Its sucked the vitality and investment out of every town and village as the country deindustrialized and turned into a hub for casino capitalism in London
I imagine the Brits were happier before Thatcher arrived.
The poverty is extreme in some places. Even moreso just people's demeanor. Lower class is degenerate in the way that they both hate what's happening and do everything they can to make it worse by voting for right wing parties fueled by xenophobia as all they feel they want to control is their own living area and what else but a paki or a wog to blaim
I'm following the count binface saga for a bit, let's see if something happens there
I won't pretend to know the answers but I will say British folk are usually predictable to a t. Fancy clothes, handbags for men and vitriol for breakfast
I know a few UK people who moved to your country, all have pretty much vowed never to return to the UK. Every time I visit I wonder how you manage to do things so right (at least in comparison to the UK). The equivalent of UK council estates are a completely different vibe over there, the children seem so much happier and the work culture so much more chill.
I have only been to the Netherlands on vacation. I'm from Austria and I did live for two years in the UK Midlands.
The big difference is how they treat public services in the UK. In the UK public services (including public schools, public housing and public transport) are for those who can't afford anything else. If you live in an UK council estate and you happen to find a decent job or a single mother happens to marry, they get thrown out and need to find a house or flat to rent on the private market at multiple times the rate.
Public schools are for those who can't afford a real education.
Public transport are for those who can't afford a car.
All these things lock people in. If they improve their situation, things will suddenly get much worse for them because they drop out of all the social systems. Kids grow up in council estates and many of them don't know a single person who works. Of course they will turn out to be long-term unemployed, because that's all they know.
Contrary to that, Austria's public services are for everyone. Public housing is spread throughout the cities. There's not just one large estate with all the undesireables, instead the public housing is spread all over. There's a check for your financial situation when you move into public housing (though it's quite lenient) and then your income is never checked again. If you become a billionaire, you can still stay in that flat.
That means, there's quite a well-rounded mix of people in public housing. There's poor people, but there's people who are quite well-off in these houses as well.
Same goes for public schools. I went to a public school. In my class we had the son of Chinese immigrants who had to help out in his parents' restaurant on the weekends. But we also had the son of former nobility who inherited €4mio when his grandmother died in his last year of school.
Everyone takes public transport in my city, regardless of their income.
This gives people perspective. The kid growing up in public housing will watch people go to work every day. The same kid will make contacts at school to kids who end up in management positions, it's free networking built right into the school system.
We also have free public universities, which are also the highest quality universities in the country.
Treating public services as something that everyone has a right to and not just something that exists so the poor don't die makes all the difference.
This makes so much sense, thanks for typing that out. I have seen it myself how some people in the UK see the benefits system as a career path - young mothers discussing how many children is the sweet spot for getting as much out of the system. I feel so sorry for these children.
The problem is that the way it's setup it kinda has to be a career choice. Once you are in you are locked in and there's no decent way you. The system actively punishes you for trying to improve your situation.
You know, everything is always a game of incentives. So if you want people to get off benefits you have to reward them for taking steps to do so. For example, a bad system couples benefits to income with hard thresholds. Imagine a system where you get €1000 in benefits each month, but if you earn any money these benefits are gone instantly. So if someone would take a mini job where they'd earn €500 per month, they'd instantly lose €500 by taking a job.
Thresholds in benefit systems are common, and the UK system has really hard thresholds.
As an alternative consider this system: For two Euros you earn, you lose €1 in benefits. So now someone who makes €500 in their minijob would still receive €750 in benefits, thus making €1250. They have a clear incentive to work, and every bit they earn improves their financial situation.
The way the UK system is setup for the most part is that you are either in the benefits system or you are not. If you want to get off benefits, you need to instantly score a decent full-time job.
That's a difficult ask for someone who has no education, no network, no prior job experience and a CV that consists entirely of long-term unemployment.
People like that have the best chance to start with an easy, low-commitment minijob. So making sure that's not an option for them all but guarantees that these people stay on benefits for life.
When I visited Ireland everybody embodied this post. Everyone walked everywhere, 99% of my interactions were genuinely pleasant and friendly, it was a weekday but people were out enjoying a long lunch on a sunny day in Dublin.
Can't recommend enough.
Sorry, in what world is the UK "southern" Europe?
Sorry, where did I say that it was?
By attempting to refute an assertion about southern Europe using the UK as an example...
Ah, my mistake. You are right, I was a little off topic there. I thought an anecdote about my friend might be fun, but I now understand that it is wrong.
I mean some people say ACAB, but I, for one, am grateful when when people like you decide to police the internet.
It stops us straying into conversation and keeps every action strictly as a nice, clean, binary argument.
Sure, you have to fabricate evidence and jump to your own conclusions to do so... Going so far as to make a weird accusation and then follow it up with a tenuous rationale, but I know it is for my own good.
Thank you for your service, Chief.
I'm pretty sure I saw stats saying that in EU people actually do work less than in US. For example in most EU states you get way more paid leave than in US.
I'd say it's overselling it, but there's a grain of truth to that.
It depends. In poland where I live there are pretty much no slum districts despite being less developed than US in general.
From what I gather US has that culture of fake friendliness, while in EU people react just more honestly. It might not be that pronounced in UK that shares more culture with US than EU.
I think my main problem is with Americans talking about "Europe" as if it is a singular monolithic entity similar to the US (which we all know is far more nuanced and the difference between Texas and Maine is vast).
That over-simplifocation, over-generalisation is a strong narrative, but a really useless one.
Also, Poland! Wonderful. One of the most genuinely decent places I've visited.
As for the fake friendliness... It r really isn't something I've encountered with Americans, at least no more than in capital cities all over the world.
The UK is very different from southern Europe
And large parts of "Southern Europe" are radically different from each other.
Ok? But the UK is even more different
The UK is not Europe, as I'm sure you know about the whole brexit thing.
Come on, of course it is. It's not EU anymore but it's still in Europe.
They seem like quite the outlier then if you really insist on including them.
If its just a geographic thing you mean, then sure its in Europe.
He cited an American visiting the UK as an example of an American learning about Europe. I simply disagree that you can learn much about Europe from visiting the UK.
Cool, disagree away. Doesn't change anything.
You said "the UK is not Europe" and I agree. Europe is massive and diverse.
Maybe that's what you meant.
What do you mean with that? Greece is still in the EU. The EU bailed out Greece not that Greece left the EU.
Well not Greece because it's very much still a member of the EU. It even still uses the Euro as a currency. Of all its members, the UK is the only one that left.
Greece didn't bail out of the EU. Its still a member. It tried to reassert its monetary sovereignty during the Eurozone crisis and was crushed by Germany and forced into vicious austerity.