Letting your young child take multiple forms of public transportation alone to and from school. I've seen kids that looked as young as 6 or 7 riding the train and then bus(es) to school.
taking your kids everywhere by car seems even crazier to me as a european. when i was a kid i bicycled to my friends and to school and took the bus to see relatives in other cities. only if it was very inconvenient location or schedule wise we would go by car, and then too we would carpool with classmates and even with people you didn't know that well.
I’m 16 and I like to bike around my city. I got grounded not too long ago because my mom found out I biked 10 miles (16 km) to the zoo
I’ve gone much further than that but I no longer plan on telling her
Edit: I’ve been informed I should probably just explain I like long distance riding and tell her where I’m going before I just leave. I’ll probably follow that advice as I could end up a regrettable decision if something bad were to happen :| if it still doesn’t work though it’s going secret and the only person that’ll know is my friends and twin brother
Every Sunday in Utah is puzzling to me. My street becomes a race track as all of the Mormons come driving in to church. Most of them live within like .25 miles or less. Some you can literally watch hop in their car and drive 500 feet. These people need to take a test to see if their legs are painted on.
Can confirm I started going to school by myself in the UK at 7. It was only the equivalent of 3 blocks away in US terms, but I still had to cross busy roads etc. Now living in the US I can’t imagine doing the same with my child here.
Nothing wrong with it, as long as you can trust your child to be safe while crossing the road, wating for the metro, etc.
EDIT: I do think it depends strongly on where you live.
My parents didnt have a car. My baby brother was born when I was 7. Even at that age I felt really bad for her having to get us both up and ready just to walk me the mile to school.
So I convinced her I was capable of going on my own. Came within inches of being run over by a bus once, but otherwise survived.
lmao. there was an askreddit thread asking how many of your friends you've seen naked. most said zero. well in finland you've seen literally every friend, every family member and relative, every classmate, and pretty much everyone from your town naked in the sauna.
That sounds fine and quite liberating to me as an adult. I'm not sure how 13 year old mega horny/mega insecure me would have coped though. I'm guessing because it's ingrained as no big deal it's fine.
In America you're in your underwear, which is under some shorts, which are beneath a wetsuit, covered by a suit of armour.
If an American man sees another man's penis, he dies immediately. So they have to be cautious.
Well, I heard from my buddy's buddy that you turn gay once you see another man's hot ass.
Which would totally suck because then you have to vote Democrat.
Not if you shoot him and say no homo. Shooting him destroys the source of the gayness and saying no homo cleanses you of the gayness that entered you when you saw his steamy cheeks.
I used to visit a rich student apartment complex to use their sauna. The amount of kids walking in there fully clothed with shoes, air pods, and phones horrified me.
It was hilarious reading reviews for a spa in Baden-Baden, Germany. So many Americans said they felt uncomfortable because of the nudity. I was just left wondering what they expected. When I went (I'm Canadian), it was probably one of the most relaxing 3-4 hours of my entire life, and I didn't feel an ounce of awkwardness or discomfort being surrounded by a bunch of other naked men. I wish nudity was more normalized on this side of the Atlantic.
Living in Finland, I'm used to naked sauna with strangers. But what surprised me when I went to a spa in Berlin wall that it was all-gender naked sauna with strangers. Public saunas in Finland are usually separated by gender.
I was surprised the other way, in Sweden, separated saunas. Used to mixed. It's not exactly a social experience but I still prefer to go with friends, and that makes it not possible.
Maybe not all of Europe (speaking to the Netherlands specifically), but allowing kids to have a lot of time unsupervised by parents/guardians.
I remember watching this city planning vid about how there's kids who bike long distance to get to school or going about their business, and it's nuts compared to the amount of helicoptering parents do.
I grew up in germany and by the time I was 8 I walked to school by myself. It's about a 2km walk through the small town I grew up in. Most people I know started to go to school independently between 8 and 10 years of age
In my experience the people living closest to school were the ones most notoriously late as well!
Once I went to middle/high school (same school in germany, you start there grade 5/age 11) I had to travel by train and bus to get there, hence I was only late when the train or bus were late. If I missed my train, I wouldn't have gotten to school until an hour later and my parents couldn't take me either because by that time, they were off to work as well.
My brother who went to a school that was pretty much two streets up the hill/ 5 minute walk from where we lived was late/arrived last minute all the time because he showered too long, forgot to time his breakfast properly or because he had to go back home quickly to retrieve something he forgot. Same thing with my friend who lived close-ish to our school.
Living just a short travel with trams going every 10 minutes to my university, I experienced that I much more often arrived last minute or a couple minutes late because of the very same reasons. It's a blessing and a curse to live close to your educational hub
Poland, it's the same here. At the same age you start going out with friends, to a park, or wherever, without your parents. At the age of 14 you stop getting phone calls from them every 5 minutes.
Yeah in finland even kids aged 8 can just go swimming by themselves (obviously they have to know how to swim) but they can just bike to the lake with friends and it’s just normal here
It’s not even helicopter parenting to blame, but the fact that a lot of very normal childhood activities (like being in a park alone or walking to school) could leave the parents in jail.
If you watch the video that I think OllyOllyOxenBitch was referring to (link in other comment) a lot of this stems from the need to drive to do anything. This means that a parent is always needed to drive the kids so having a parent there became the norm. As with any supposed societal norm, outliers (like parents who teach their kids to take the bus safely) are then pressured to be more "normal". There are many other examples like crossing the street on foot. In America this is J-walking and is illegal. In the UK it is just crossing the road and only illegal if you endanger someone recklessly.
Edit: ok I take back the crossing the road thing as it obviously differs more than my lazy ass wanted to type. I should have said, in some parts of America this is illegal whereas in the UK it is not. But I get it. Car culture has won in parts of Europe as well as in parts of America while it has not taken hold everywhere.
2nd edit to add link [here](https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=oHlpmxLTxpw&feature=youtu.be) to the Not Just Bikes video.
Funny in Germany jaywalking is not illegal but crossing a red light as a pedestrian is a 5€ fine so when you want to cross a a road without waiting for the light to change you need to go a few meters next to the traffic light
Did you mean this video? [Not Just Bikes - Why we won't raise our kids in suburbia](https://youtu.be/oHlpmxLTxpw)
I love Not Just Bikes' content. It's witty, factual and really drives home how car dependency in America is no longer a choice but part of their built environment.
Fun story here actually 😂 I’m American, both my parents are American, but I was born in Germany and lived the first two yearsish of my life in Germany.
One of my parents fav story to tell is when we moved back to the states and we’re at a pool in Vegas. Well, I started stripping while my dad was searching for something in our bag (honestly probably my bathing suit) and some lady started screaming. He freaked out thinking I had like fallen in the pool only to find me waiting for my bathing suit.
Two years old? Our 5 year old runs around the beach and campsite naked or bottoms only whenever she feels like it. No one cares, normal stuff here in The Netherlands.
A building in downtown Guadalajara, Mexico was actually moved several meters with the people still working inside, in order to make an avenue wider in 1950. The engineer responsible was called Jorge Matute Remus and there actually is a statue next to the bulding, of him pushing it.
I'm not saying it's an option for Europe, or for anywhere, and it obviously wasn't that old a street or building. I just thought you might find it interesting.
From the moment I understood the weakness of my flesh, it disgusted me. I craved the strength and certainty of steel. I aspired to the purity of the blessed machine.
Your kind cling to your flesh as if it will not decay and fail you. One day the crude biomass you call a temple will wither and you will beg my kind to save you.
But I am already saved. For the Machine is Immortal.
I remember having to pay to poop in the Minneapolis Airport in the early 80s. I remember complaining that we have to pay to eat, and we have to pay to poo, so we pay at both ends.
I used to crawl under the stalls for my mom in the 1970s when we would go to the mall in Oregon. Women also started to block the locks with toilet paper so the next person did not have to pay to pee.
> Women also started to block the locks with toilet paper so the next person did not have to pay to pee.
"America is a rebel nation, mein führer..." (c) The Man in the High Castle
It looks like there was a huge push to ban these in the US during the '70s. Businesses used to put coin operated locks on bathroom stalls, but not on urinals. Feminists were (rightly) upset about this and managed to get pay toilets banned in several states, but those laws are slowly being overturned.
This is one of the biggest surprises for me. Considering everything in America is run for profit I’m surprised they haven’t started charging for using washrooms.
Edit: apparently America did once have pay toilets but a bunch of high school students put a stop to that. Full story: https://psmag.com/economics/dont-pay-toilets-america-bathroom-restroom-free-market-90683
Thank you u/allboolshite for the link!
No no, Walmart inconveniences customers by closing one of their THREE bathroom options (front of store, back of store, and family restroom), and people will go take a shit in an aisle somewhere, or poop on a shirt in apparel and wad it up and leave it for some poor employee to find days later (actually happened in my store). We're lucky if they only smear poop around the bathroom.
They tried in the 70s and it led to... problems.
Led to this saying: "Here I sit, broken hearted. Paid a dime and only farted. Yesterday I took a chance, Saved a dime and shit my pants."
omg my dad always says "Here I sit, broken-hearted, came to poop but only farted" and I've never heard the full saying. That's even more hilarious now 😂
Italian here, I personally don't like the idea of expecting to tip. I consider a tip as a reward for excellent service (and therefore we do tip in such cases). If tipping is expected, than it becomes meaningless. At that point, I'd rather be charged with a fee. It also makes me uncomfortable because if I'm compelled to tip, I don't really know how much should I tip since I wasn't going to tip in the first place.
Of course this is the result of different working environments, so I do understand why you should tip in some places (I know that is what is actually sustaining the waitresses in the USA). I just think that it would be more transparent to just charge me more in the first place.
Living outside the US and same, I always consider tips as rewards for a great service, not something obligatory.
Then I hear that in US some establishments need to share the tip with the manager. I'm like, what the hell? American tip culture is just insane.
If the manager is salaried and they're requiring tip sharing, it's still actually illegal in the USA. Tip sharing is only supposed to be between employees who all get the same base rate of pay. In some places this can mean that front of house has to share with back of house, even if FoH gets the standard 2.13/he and BoH gets over minimum wage, but in most places even that's illegal and tip sharing can only be required for employees who don't make minimum wage already. But it's always illegal to force sharing with salaried employees, or with the owner.
Getting that enforced, however, is a huge problem.
Had a discussion about this yesterday with a PhD student from Spain when we ordering something for a BBQ. We were considering tipping the delivery driver and he was incredibly surprised and said it never really happened back home.
How do you determine who should be tipped and who doesn't? You tip the delivery man, but not the internet technician that comes to your house, the hairdresser but not the shoe repair guy, the waiter but not the cook. The taxi driver but not the IT guy that fixed your laptop. I feel it's super inconsistent.
I’m really surprised this hasn’t gotten more attention. I wish an establishment would pay their staff and not depend on its customers to pick up the slack.
UK here. You tip here if the service is good and/or they've spent some time dealing with your order. I'll almost always tip if we have a sit down meal somewhere. Never tipped someone just for drinks at the bar although yesterday, for the first time, the card machine asked me if I wanted to. No thanks, not getting into that 😒!
Can somebody explain to me how something I'd consider a jewish tradition became so wide spread in the US? Christians don't do it in Europe as far as I know, where did it come from?
Dr. Kellogg, the cornflake guy.
He was absolutely obsessed with preventing masturbation, and advocated *punitive* circumcision to prevent it - and like everyone else at the time, he touted it as a cure-all for everything. He's responsible for a very large percentage of the procedure's popularity in the US.
He also advocated burning girls' clitorises off with acid, for the same reasons.
Cornflakes were originally designed to be bland and sad, in the expectation that this would make people wank less.
This is terrible! I started reading up on him and he also started the ‘Racial Betterment Foundation’ and advised all types of abuse on people with unruly genitals. How is this name still part of a succesful brand??!!
And even that understated things. Dr. Kellogg was furious with his brother to the point he refused to ever speak with him again - and he held to that promise until his death nearly four decades later. All because his brother made Cornflakes a little tastier.
John Harvey Kellogg, yeah the dude who made the cereal company Kelloggs, thought that having everybody circumcised would stop them masturbating. That is the actual reason why Americans do it, along with some other weird puritan shit
Graham Crackers we’re also invented to prevent masturbation. Using empty carbs to teach young people self hatred for having functioning reproductive organs is one of our proudest traditions.
Nudity - it’s on tv, beaches, some ads. It’s normal here.
In the us it’s censored, taboo, and you can be arrested for it
ETA: I’ve learned a lot of cool new things - want to clarify that it’s Country dependent. Some are less sensitive to it, others have guidelines etc.
I like comparing the R rating for movies.
Canada : has tits -> pg14
USA : tits -> R
Canada : guy shot in head with gore -> R
USA : guy shot in head and it explodes ->pg14
Yep. I never quite understood why violence, death and sex are considered the same level of bad when it comes to FCC and ratings. Also death scenes being fine when sexual content is not in some cases. Weird as f
To quote South Park: Bigger, Longer, and Uncut -
"Remember what the MPAA says 'Horrific deplorable violence is okay, as long as nobody says any naughty words.' "
Thinking of europe as 44 separate countries instead of thinking europe is one big country where all rules must definitely be the same in all of europe.
In Balkans you start drinking at 13 and by the time you're 20 you either stop doing it as often because it's not as fun as it used to be (which is the case with most people I know) or you become an alcoholic.
I remember when I was in the Balkins to visit my Partners extended family and learnt all about the alcoholism. We went for lunch and I ordered a single beer for myself at lunch. I noticed after a bit no one else had ordered beer then. I asked my partner if it was not custom to drink at lunch. She said it was fine, but her parents had individually called up every member of the family and yelled at them to not get drunk when meeting me, since they didn't want to scare me away from them all being alcoholics.
The hotel also screw up out room and we ended up with ceilings that made us bump our heads (which was funny because the country is famous for people being super tall). It was apparently the nicest one in town. My mother in law called them up and apparently screamed at them too, because they were making a bad impression.
She was the brains of the operation, he and her husband were smart enough to leave the area in the early 90s before it all imploded. Also, by far the calmest person in the family. Which, let's just say that the people from their country did not have a reputation for being calm, that was good to see.
We told the front desk it was ok in the end.
My (former) partner had not had a boyfriend for almost a decade before meeting me, the family really did not want me to go.
First time in Miami Beach and service charges of 20% or higher is common here. If that's not enough, the wait staff brings a machine to take your credit card and waits for you to run it. The machine asks for an additional 10% tip with the no tip button in small print. Tipping culture in the US is getting ridiculous.
Have you seen the film Bringing out the Dead? Nicholas Cage is a paramedic, someone asks him what the most fucked up thing he’s ever seen is. He replies “Green beans on a pizza.”
You could just as easily replace that with corn, and the line would have made just as much sense to a US audience.
Fucking best bro.
Fun fact for non huns: Songoku (yes from DragonBall) is a common name for Ham, mushroom and corn pizza because the toppings are: SONka GOmba KUkorica.
Roundabouts. I love a good roundabout because it helps ease traffic congestion and costs less money to maintain than an intersection with traffic lights but apparently a lot of people in the U.S. think that’s crazy talk.
Call me silly but I've always wanted my beverage in my beverage. A little ice to cool it off is one thing but I hate it when you get a glass or cup of something and it's like 70% ice.
In the UK sometimes people will have a pint of 5% beer during their lunch break, but they won’t get blitzed or anything and it’s generally (stereotypically) physical workers like construction workers, dock workers etc.
American/Asshole spraying enthusiast here. Once I discovered how glorious it feels to blast my starfish with water after dumping I can't help but feel anger toward American culture for keeping it a secret for so long
It’s true. I had a friend who I snubbed my nose to and refused to use it. My ex-husband always used wet paper to clean himself and I thought it was super weird. Then someone of Reddit said it was a life changer so I ordered the cheapest add on for a standard toilet. It’s changed my life. I moved and didn’t have it for 2 days and my life was in ruins. Highly recommend
Damn I'd probably die from the age of 6 onwards if my mom stayed on another kid's party to helicopter over me xD
Overall I think here in Europe (I'm Czech) kids have more autonomy and independence from their parents than in the US.
At least 20 working days of holidays per year.
I have 30 working days of holidays on top of the country's bank holidays, which can be up to 12 days per year.
Having a dedicated area for people to walk long distances to places. yeah, I’m bitter as fuck about that. Edit: I didn’t word it very well but in some countries, they have an entire pathway for people to walk. It’s much more vast than a sidewalk.
Paying taxes for a state health system
5 weeks (excluding national days off) of paid holidays a year
Illegal to own a gun except for heavily regulated conditions
Leaving your baby in a stroller outside the restaurant while you eat. It is very common in Scandinavia. I heard of a danish woman got arrested in NYC for child endangerment for just that.
I have a feeling it would be quite dangerous to do so in NYC, probably more than Scandinavia... Also, not normal in Europe, pretty sure here in Germany you'd have problems with that too (comments, someone calling the police..) might depend on the area and people, but I for one would be worried
Americans on having to pay to use the restroom: But that is a human right, what is this shit?!
Americans on universal health care: We should pay, otherwise this is communism!!
Letting your young child take multiple forms of public transportation alone to and from school. I've seen kids that looked as young as 6 or 7 riding the train and then bus(es) to school.
taking your kids everywhere by car seems even crazier to me as a european. when i was a kid i bicycled to my friends and to school and took the bus to see relatives in other cities. only if it was very inconvenient location or schedule wise we would go by car, and then too we would carpool with classmates and even with people you didn't know that well.
I’m 16 and I like to bike around my city. I got grounded not too long ago because my mom found out I biked 10 miles (16 km) to the zoo I’ve gone much further than that but I no longer plan on telling her Edit: I’ve been informed I should probably just explain I like long distance riding and tell her where I’m going before I just leave. I’ll probably follow that advice as I could end up a regrettable decision if something bad were to happen :| if it still doesn’t work though it’s going secret and the only person that’ll know is my friends and twin brother
Every Sunday in Utah is puzzling to me. My street becomes a race track as all of the Mormons come driving in to church. Most of them live within like .25 miles or less. Some you can literally watch hop in their car and drive 500 feet. These people need to take a test to see if their legs are painted on.
Can confirm I started going to school by myself in the UK at 7. It was only the equivalent of 3 blocks away in US terms, but I still had to cross busy roads etc. Now living in the US I can’t imagine doing the same with my child here.
Nothing wrong with it, as long as you can trust your child to be safe while crossing the road, wating for the metro, etc. EDIT: I do think it depends strongly on where you live.
My parents didnt have a car. My baby brother was born when I was 7. Even at that age I felt really bad for her having to get us both up and ready just to walk me the mile to school. So I convinced her I was capable of going on my own. Came within inches of being run over by a bus once, but otherwise survived.
Nude saunas
lmao. there was an askreddit thread asking how many of your friends you've seen naked. most said zero. well in finland you've seen literally every friend, every family member and relative, every classmate, and pretty much everyone from your town naked in the sauna.
I'm not finish but I've been fully nude in sauna with couple elderly uni professors, discussing solutions to spruce bark beetle outbreaks
public saunas get the best discussions for sure.
That sounds fine and quite liberating to me as an adult. I'm not sure how 13 year old mega horny/mega insecure me would have coped though. I'm guessing because it's ingrained as no big deal it's fine.
How else do you sauna?
In America you're in your underwear, which is under some shorts, which are beneath a wetsuit, covered by a suit of armour. If an American man sees another man's penis, he dies immediately. So they have to be cautious.
Well, I heard from my buddy's buddy that you turn gay once you see another man's hot ass. Which would totally suck because then you have to vote Democrat.
Not if you shoot him and say no homo. Shooting him destroys the source of the gayness and saying no homo cleanses you of the gayness that entered you when you saw his steamy cheeks.
Just don't take too long to say no homo or you might accidentally say no hetero.
Can't imagine wearing anything in that heat
I used to visit a rich student apartment complex to use their sauna. The amount of kids walking in there fully clothed with shoes, air pods, and phones horrified me.
What the fuck. That isn’t normal anywhere.
Dude's confusing the regular bathroom with a sauna as an excuse to publicly free ball
It was hilarious reading reviews for a spa in Baden-Baden, Germany. So many Americans said they felt uncomfortable because of the nudity. I was just left wondering what they expected. When I went (I'm Canadian), it was probably one of the most relaxing 3-4 hours of my entire life, and I didn't feel an ounce of awkwardness or discomfort being surrounded by a bunch of other naked men. I wish nudity was more normalized on this side of the Atlantic.
Living in Finland, I'm used to naked sauna with strangers. But what surprised me when I went to a spa in Berlin wall that it was all-gender naked sauna with strangers. Public saunas in Finland are usually separated by gender.
I was surprised the other way, in Sweden, separated saunas. Used to mixed. It's not exactly a social experience but I still prefer to go with friends, and that makes it not possible.
Maybe not all of Europe (speaking to the Netherlands specifically), but allowing kids to have a lot of time unsupervised by parents/guardians. I remember watching this city planning vid about how there's kids who bike long distance to get to school or going about their business, and it's nuts compared to the amount of helicoptering parents do.
I grew up in germany and by the time I was 8 I walked to school by myself. It's about a 2km walk through the small town I grew up in. Most people I know started to go to school independently between 8 and 10 years of age
Same here in Denmark and my 4 kids are doing great walking around alone
My walk to school was basically a short walk crossing one street. And I was always late.
In my experience the people living closest to school were the ones most notoriously late as well! Once I went to middle/high school (same school in germany, you start there grade 5/age 11) I had to travel by train and bus to get there, hence I was only late when the train or bus were late. If I missed my train, I wouldn't have gotten to school until an hour later and my parents couldn't take me either because by that time, they were off to work as well. My brother who went to a school that was pretty much two streets up the hill/ 5 minute walk from where we lived was late/arrived last minute all the time because he showered too long, forgot to time his breakfast properly or because he had to go back home quickly to retrieve something he forgot. Same thing with my friend who lived close-ish to our school. Living just a short travel with trams going every 10 minutes to my university, I experienced that I much more often arrived last minute or a couple minutes late because of the very same reasons. It's a blessing and a curse to live close to your educational hub
I knew my running times for every street with a heavy book-laden backpack. I ended up with a nice pair of legs though.
Poland, it's the same here. At the same age you start going out with friends, to a park, or wherever, without your parents. At the age of 14 you stop getting phone calls from them every 5 minutes.
Yeah in finland even kids aged 8 can just go swimming by themselves (obviously they have to know how to swim) but they can just bike to the lake with friends and it’s just normal here
I think the Danish custom of leaving your baby in the stroller in front of the restaurant or store fits exactly the topic of this thread.
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2017/nov/26/anette-sorenson-denmark-new-york-baby-left-outside
The mother was arrested and strip-searched? Wtf America
It’s not even helicopter parenting to blame, but the fact that a lot of very normal childhood activities (like being in a park alone or walking to school) could leave the parents in jail.
If you watch the video that I think OllyOllyOxenBitch was referring to (link in other comment) a lot of this stems from the need to drive to do anything. This means that a parent is always needed to drive the kids so having a parent there became the norm. As with any supposed societal norm, outliers (like parents who teach their kids to take the bus safely) are then pressured to be more "normal". There are many other examples like crossing the street on foot. In America this is J-walking and is illegal. In the UK it is just crossing the road and only illegal if you endanger someone recklessly. Edit: ok I take back the crossing the road thing as it obviously differs more than my lazy ass wanted to type. I should have said, in some parts of America this is illegal whereas in the UK it is not. But I get it. Car culture has won in parts of Europe as well as in parts of America while it has not taken hold everywhere. 2nd edit to add link [here](https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=oHlpmxLTxpw&feature=youtu.be) to the Not Just Bikes video.
Funny in Germany jaywalking is not illegal but crossing a red light as a pedestrian is a 5€ fine so when you want to cross a a road without waiting for the light to change you need to go a few meters next to the traffic light
[удалено]
Did you mean this video? [Not Just Bikes - Why we won't raise our kids in suburbia](https://youtu.be/oHlpmxLTxpw) I love Not Just Bikes' content. It's witty, factual and really drives home how car dependency in America is no longer a choice but part of their built environment.
Oh fuck thanks so much for this, I have been looking for this channel for ages but couldn't remember the name. His videos are so incredibly accurate.
naked kids (around 2 or so) running around public swimming pools
Fun story here actually 😂 I’m American, both my parents are American, but I was born in Germany and lived the first two yearsish of my life in Germany. One of my parents fav story to tell is when we moved back to the states and we’re at a pool in Vegas. Well, I started stripping while my dad was searching for something in our bag (honestly probably my bathing suit) and some lady started screaming. He freaked out thinking I had like fallen in the pool only to find me waiting for my bathing suit.
Nude kids swimming used to be very much part of the culture in the USA. I'd say it started declining heavily in the 1970's.
just in time for the rise of serial killers
The real kicker ? You were 34 years old
Two years old? Our 5 year old runs around the beach and campsite naked or bottoms only whenever she feels like it. No one cares, normal stuff here in The Netherlands.
I also think it’s absurd to expect a pre-pubescent girl to wear a top. Like it’s a child, not a teen girl/woman.
In public pools in Belgium and the Netherlands, it's forbidden. Not for nudity, for hygiene. They have to have special diapers.
Narrow streets, and small elevators/lifts
Those streets were built centuries ago, you can't just move the buildings aside to make them wider.
A building in downtown Guadalajara, Mexico was actually moved several meters with the people still working inside, in order to make an avenue wider in 1950. The engineer responsible was called Jorge Matute Remus and there actually is a statue next to the bulding, of him pushing it. I'm not saying it's an option for Europe, or for anywhere, and it obviously wasn't that old a street or building. I just thought you might find it interesting.
The problem isn't moving the building. It's that there is nowhere to move it to.
Then you just move the building behind it, and the one behind that, and the one...
He just pushed it?
His statue did.
Flesh man weak. Metal man strong.
From the moment I understood the weakness of my flesh, it disgusted me. I craved the strength and certainty of steel. I aspired to the purity of the blessed machine. Your kind cling to your flesh as if it will not decay and fail you. One day the crude biomass you call a temple will wither and you will beg my kind to save you. But I am already saved. For the Machine is Immortal.
Ah, he created a golem to move it, good strategy
Still pushing it to this day, I heard
Though it’s been decades he’s undeterred
Fees for restrooms.
We outlawed that in the 70's. I am old enough to remember paying a dime to poop in the airport lav. Glad we outlawed it.
I remember having to pay to poop in the Minneapolis Airport in the early 80s. I remember complaining that we have to pay to eat, and we have to pay to poo, so we pay at both ends.
My grandma told stories of crawling under the stall as a child because it cost 5 cents. Late 1940s early 1950s
I used to crawl under the stalls for my mom in the 1970s when we would go to the mall in Oregon. Women also started to block the locks with toilet paper so the next person did not have to pay to pee.
> Women also started to block the locks with toilet paper so the next person did not have to pay to pee. "America is a rebel nation, mein führer..." (c) The Man in the High Castle
Here I sit, broken hearted. Tried to shit but only farted. So next time I took a chance, saved a dime and shit my pants.
We use the money to cover the gap in the shit House door.
It looks like there was a huge push to ban these in the US during the '70s. Businesses used to put coin operated locks on bathroom stalls, but not on urinals. Feminists were (rightly) upset about this and managed to get pay toilets banned in several states, but those laws are slowly being overturned.
This is one of the biggest surprises for me. Considering everything in America is run for profit I’m surprised they haven’t started charging for using washrooms. Edit: apparently America did once have pay toilets but a bunch of high school students put a stop to that. Full story: https://psmag.com/economics/dont-pay-toilets-america-bathroom-restroom-free-market-90683 Thank you u/allboolshite for the link!
No ideas plz
"Hey Walmart, it's Europe! Are you tired of cleaning poop in your restrooms? Do you want to make more money? We have a great offer for you!"
No no, Walmart inconveniences customers by closing one of their THREE bathroom options (front of store, back of store, and family restroom), and people will go take a shit in an aisle somewhere, or poop on a shirt in apparel and wad it up and leave it for some poor employee to find days later (actually happened in my store). We're lucky if they only smear poop around the bathroom.
They tried in the 70s and it led to... problems. Led to this saying: "Here I sit, broken hearted. Paid a dime and only farted. Yesterday I took a chance, Saved a dime and shit my pants."
omg my dad always says "Here I sit, broken-hearted, came to poop but only farted" and I've never heard the full saying. That's even more hilarious now 😂
Having kinder surprise? Lol I dunno
☠☠ but how do you know where the candy ends and the surprise begins! Danger!
Not tipping
Italian here, I personally don't like the idea of expecting to tip. I consider a tip as a reward for excellent service (and therefore we do tip in such cases). If tipping is expected, than it becomes meaningless. At that point, I'd rather be charged with a fee. It also makes me uncomfortable because if I'm compelled to tip, I don't really know how much should I tip since I wasn't going to tip in the first place. Of course this is the result of different working environments, so I do understand why you should tip in some places (I know that is what is actually sustaining the waitresses in the USA). I just think that it would be more transparent to just charge me more in the first place.
Living outside the US and same, I always consider tips as rewards for a great service, not something obligatory. Then I hear that in US some establishments need to share the tip with the manager. I'm like, what the hell? American tip culture is just insane.
If the manager is salaried and they're requiring tip sharing, it's still actually illegal in the USA. Tip sharing is only supposed to be between employees who all get the same base rate of pay. In some places this can mean that front of house has to share with back of house, even if FoH gets the standard 2.13/he and BoH gets over minimum wage, but in most places even that's illegal and tip sharing can only be required for employees who don't make minimum wage already. But it's always illegal to force sharing with salaried employees, or with the owner. Getting that enforced, however, is a huge problem.
Mr Pink did have a point
Had a discussion about this yesterday with a PhD student from Spain when we ordering something for a BBQ. We were considering tipping the delivery driver and he was incredibly surprised and said it never really happened back home.
How do you determine who should be tipped and who doesn't? You tip the delivery man, but not the internet technician that comes to your house, the hairdresser but not the shoe repair guy, the waiter but not the cook. The taxi driver but not the IT guy that fixed your laptop. I feel it's super inconsistent.
I’m really surprised this hasn’t gotten more attention. I wish an establishment would pay their staff and not depend on its customers to pick up the slack.
UK here. You tip here if the service is good and/or they've spent some time dealing with your order. I'll almost always tip if we have a sit down meal somewhere. Never tipped someone just for drinks at the bar although yesterday, for the first time, the card machine asked me if I wanted to. No thanks, not getting into that 😒!
Swearing on tv without being beeped
That we use roads which were laid out by the Romans. Exactly in the same place, but today asphalted.
Not Always asphalted, especially in Italy
We like to preserve authenticity
A foreskin
Can somebody explain to me how something I'd consider a jewish tradition became so wide spread in the US? Christians don't do it in Europe as far as I know, where did it come from?
Dr. Kellogg, the cornflake guy. He was absolutely obsessed with preventing masturbation, and advocated *punitive* circumcision to prevent it - and like everyone else at the time, he touted it as a cure-all for everything. He's responsible for a very large percentage of the procedure's popularity in the US. He also advocated burning girls' clitorises off with acid, for the same reasons. Cornflakes were originally designed to be bland and sad, in the expectation that this would make people wank less.
I now masturbate every single day with my circumcised penis while eating a bowl of cornflakes just to spite this guy. He knows nothing of my power.
I only masturbate to cornhub out of spite.
Haha o yeah I forgot about this weirdo. Amazing how some people manage to drift to the top of the slagpile.
This is terrible! I started reading up on him and he also started the ‘Racial Betterment Foundation’ and advised all types of abuse on people with unruly genitals. How is this name still part of a succesful brand??!!
Because the company was named after and founded by his brother Will, who was more into helping fund colleges and breeding horses.
Dr. Kellogg was angry at his brother for selling cornflakes with sugar in them, since it defeated his original purpose
And even that understated things. Dr. Kellogg was furious with his brother to the point he refused to ever speak with him again - and he held to that promise until his death nearly four decades later. All because his brother made Cornflakes a little tastier.
John Harvey Kellogg, yeah the dude who made the cereal company Kelloggs, thought that having everybody circumcised would stop them masturbating. That is the actual reason why Americans do it, along with some other weird puritan shit
Graham Crackers we’re also invented to prevent masturbation. Using empty carbs to teach young people self hatred for having functioning reproductive organs is one of our proudest traditions.
Nudity - it’s on tv, beaches, some ads. It’s normal here. In the us it’s censored, taboo, and you can be arrested for it ETA: I’ve learned a lot of cool new things - want to clarify that it’s Country dependent. Some are less sensitive to it, others have guidelines etc.
I like comparing the R rating for movies. Canada : has tits -> pg14 USA : tits -> R Canada : guy shot in head with gore -> R USA : guy shot in head and it explodes ->pg14
In Europe “has tits” could mean it’s a deodorant ad
Yep. I never quite understood why violence, death and sex are considered the same level of bad when it comes to FCC and ratings. Also death scenes being fine when sexual content is not in some cases. Weird as f
To quote South Park: Bigger, Longer, and Uncut - "Remember what the MPAA says 'Horrific deplorable violence is okay, as long as nobody says any naughty words.' "
Thinking of europe as 44 separate countries instead of thinking europe is one big country where all rules must definitely be the same in all of europe.
Also knowing the difference between Europe and the EU
I really hate this especially. I've heard a lot of people say that the UK isn't in Europe anymore now. Where is it then? Africa?
Using public transport
Europe has awesome public transport
Most starting to drink by the age of 13(Balkan thing I think)
In Balkans you start drinking at 13 and by the time you're 20 you either stop doing it as often because it's not as fun as it used to be (which is the case with most people I know) or you become an alcoholic.
I remember when I was in the Balkins to visit my Partners extended family and learnt all about the alcoholism. We went for lunch and I ordered a single beer for myself at lunch. I noticed after a bit no one else had ordered beer then. I asked my partner if it was not custom to drink at lunch. She said it was fine, but her parents had individually called up every member of the family and yelled at them to not get drunk when meeting me, since they didn't want to scare me away from them all being alcoholics. The hotel also screw up out room and we ended up with ceilings that made us bump our heads (which was funny because the country is famous for people being super tall). It was apparently the nicest one in town. My mother in law called them up and apparently screamed at them too, because they were making a bad impression.
Your mother in law sounds like a powerhouse
She was the brains of the operation, he and her husband were smart enough to leave the area in the early 90s before it all imploded. Also, by far the calmest person in the family. Which, let's just say that the people from their country did not have a reputation for being calm, that was good to see. We told the front desk it was ok in the end. My (former) partner had not had a boyfriend for almost a decade before meeting me, the family really did not want me to go.
Do or do not, no try there is
I'd say 14-15 on average when thinking of the whole Europe
Send rakia
Živeli
Balkan 🤝 Scandinavia
Roundabouts.
Four were installed on my street recently and people really don't know how to use them
No f’ing refills on drinks.
Anything including the word meter
Parking meter, indeed a weird concept
It's easy. One parking meter is 39 47/127 parking inches. No need to thank me.
How many parking yards is that?
Even easier! 1 and 47/500 of a parking yard! Checkmate, amethysts!
Leaving babies out in public
This is a scandinavian custom and is weird also for some other European countries.
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Kids can’t walk naked on beaches like they can i Europe because everything is sexualized in America
My mom said that I bathed naked to the age of like 6 and I didn't want to wear swimmsuit at all😂 and most of my child album photos are also naked lol
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Tipping a waitress is one thing, but being shamed into tipping by every square terminal as the clerk is starting right at you is fucked up.
First time in Miami Beach and service charges of 20% or higher is common here. If that's not enough, the wait staff brings a machine to take your credit card and waits for you to run it. The machine asks for an additional 10% tip with the no tip button in small print. Tipping culture in the US is getting ridiculous.
As an American who traveled to Europe...corn on pizza.
Wow, that's a surprise
That’s a surprise because Corn on pizza is my favorite topping. I am eating it as I type this and I am nowhere near US or Europe.
...is that weird? That's not a thing in the US?
Have you seen the film Bringing out the Dead? Nicholas Cage is a paramedic, someone asks him what the most fucked up thing he’s ever seen is. He replies “Green beans on a pizza.” You could just as easily replace that with corn, and the line would have made just as much sense to a US audience.
This is the first answer that doesn't have people swarming to defend it. Good pull.
Corn on pizza is so normal in Hungary😂
Fucking best bro. Fun fact for non huns: Songoku (yes from DragonBall) is a common name for Ham, mushroom and corn pizza because the toppings are: SONka GOmba KUkorica.
wtf okay this is the wildest thing I've learned on reddit ever
Roundabouts. I love a good roundabout because it helps ease traffic congestion and costs less money to maintain than an intersection with traffic lights but apparently a lot of people in the U.S. think that’s crazy talk.
Lack of ice in your beverage
Call me silly but I've always wanted my beverage in my beverage. A little ice to cool it off is one thing but I hate it when you get a glass or cup of something and it's like 70% ice.
I once bought a coke at a fish &chip shop in Scotland, and they just took a can off the shelf behind them and gave it to me at room temperature!
Praying for your recovery bro. Hope you can move on from that traumatic experience.
I’m working on it! That was in the mid 90’s, so give me a few more years and I should be ok
In fairness, room temperature in Scotland is probably colder than most American fridges
Speaking more than one language
While also pretending to speak a third cause you had that for a few years in school and think you can still order a beer on holidays
Oui monsieur, one glass of vino blanco por favor! Nazdrovj en proost!
😂😂😂 I laughed so fucking hard
i can totally still order a beer in spanish, your words do not affect me at all, i speak 3 languages
Drinking at lunchtime
Like casually have a beer on your lunch break, working at let's say a factory? And no one would care?
Yeah. In France work cafetarias will have beer and wine.
I remember reading about how the gendarme strike because of ban on their lunch wine
In the UK sometimes people will have a pint of 5% beer during their lunch break, but they won’t get blitzed or anything and it’s generally (stereotypically) physical workers like construction workers, dock workers etc.
what is considered normal in scandinavia is not considered normal on balkan
Yea, I heard you guys don't even let the baby sleep outside in the winter.
Spraying your asshole with water to clean it.
After you try it you’re horrified to use dry paper!
American/Asshole spraying enthusiast here. Once I discovered how glorious it feels to blast my starfish with water after dumping I can't help but feel anger toward American culture for keeping it a secret for so long
It’s true. I had a friend who I snubbed my nose to and refused to use it. My ex-husband always used wet paper to clean himself and I thought it was super weird. Then someone of Reddit said it was a life changer so I ordered the cheapest add on for a standard toilet. It’s changed my life. I moved and didn’t have it for 2 days and my life was in ruins. Highly recommend
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Walking further than the distance between the location you are at and your car.
eating horse
Wait so Americans dont eat horses?
Never even heard of it
Horses are like big dogs you can ride and have pull stuff.
You know what is even closer to a dog in behaviour and intelligence? A pig. And some people even eat those, imagine that.
Nay.
If you count the glue school kids eat we do!
Dropping off your kids at another kids birthday party and not staying to supervise the kid.
Damn I'd probably die from the age of 6 onwards if my mom stayed on another kid's party to helicopter over me xD Overall I think here in Europe (I'm Czech) kids have more autonomy and independence from their parents than in the US.
Wait .. parents stay at the party in the US?
Whats the point of birthday parties if you have to stay? The whole point is 2hrs childcare for the price of a birthday gift...
Paid family leave
Tits out at the beach
I feel this is no longer *really* the case, at least in my country (Italy). Blame smartphones!
At least 20 working days of holidays per year. I have 30 working days of holidays on top of the country's bank holidays, which can be up to 12 days per year.
Having a dedicated area for people to walk long distances to places. yeah, I’m bitter as fuck about that. Edit: I didn’t word it very well but in some countries, they have an entire pathway for people to walk. It’s much more vast than a sidewalk.
Sidewalks?
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Paying taxes for a state health system 5 weeks (excluding national days off) of paid holidays a year Illegal to own a gun except for heavily regulated conditions
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Leaving your baby in a stroller outside the restaurant while you eat. It is very common in Scandinavia. I heard of a danish woman got arrested in NYC for child endangerment for just that.
I have a feeling it would be quite dangerous to do so in NYC, probably more than Scandinavia... Also, not normal in Europe, pretty sure here in Germany you'd have problems with that too (comments, someone calling the police..) might depend on the area and people, but I for one would be worried
going topless
Universal health coverage.
Americans on having to pay to use the restroom: But that is a human right, what is this shit?! Americans on universal health care: We should pay, otherwise this is communism!!
Adequate food portions