/r/USdefaultism

Photograph via snooOG

When someone communicates to the world, but only considers the US; or is treating the US as the default and the only region to cater to in an international setting; or assumes that the entire world works like the US does; or assumes that everyone and everything is from the US unless otherwise stated.

Official Discord server: https://discord.gg/BcczCtAxgw.

Rule 1: No hateful, racist or derogatory posts or comments

This is not an anti-American sub – if you're here to lash your hate against Americans, you are not welcome here.

There is a zero-tolerance policy for hate on this sub. Consequently, any comment or post containing racist, hateful or derogatory content (against anyone) will be removed.

Rule 2: What constitutes US-defaultism (part 1)

When someone, whether from the US or not, with an international audience (e. g. on Reddit, YouTube, Twitter, etc.) …

a. assumes that the audience is US-only and will therefore understand common things from the US.

b. does not specify that something is from the US but assumes that it will be understood as such; terms like "civil war" without specifying which one.

c. does not specify that something takes place in the US in a way that everyone easily understands (when that information matters).

Rule 3: What constitutes US-defaultism (part 2)

d. assumes that something they see is from/about the US without any indication of that being the case.

e. talks about the US only but uses general terms. E.g., "the history of film" when only referring to US films, or "people from the 80s" when referring to the US population.

f. assumes that if something is true for the US, it also is for the rest of the world, or uses US-only terms such as "the first amendment" when not talking about the US. f. also applies regardless of the audience.

Rule 4: What does not constitute US-defaultism

a. American exceptionalism (“The USA is superior”, “The USA is inherently different” or “The USA is protecting/saving/willing to destroy the world”) belongs on r/ShitAmericansSay,

b. People defaulting to some other country, the northern hemisphere, the western world etc.,

c. Using US customary units or the MM/DD/YY date format,

d. Calling somebody/something from the US "American",

e. "This is an American website" on Reddit (except when used as a justification for actual US-defaultism).

Rule 5: Please give context and point out what exactly you want to criticise

After making a post, please respond to the automod with the following:

a. An explanation of why which part of the post is US-defaultism. It is also useful to state which point(s) under rules 2 and 3 you think your posts falls under,

b. Any context required to understand the post.

This will help people better understand your post and mods judge whether it fits the subreddit or not.

If your post is a meme or another type of post allowed under rule 7, please still respond to the bot.

Rule 6: No reposts

Reposts will be removed. Before posting, check whether the thing you are about to post has already been posted.

Rule 7: Meta posts, memes, defaultisn't etc.

Not all posts have to directly feature US-defaultism. Posts such as the following are also appreciated:

a. Meta posts (discussion posts about this subreddit or US-defaultism in general). Please use the "Meta" flair,

b. Memes about US-defaultism,

c. Posting something from outside this subreddit that criticises the mentality of US-defaultism,

d. "Defaultisn't" posts: Including the nuances of the US not being the default country when talking about the US. Please use the "Defaultisn't" flair.

Rule 8: Crossposting, direct links, and censorship

Censoring usernames is not required.

However, crossposts or direct links to a post/comment that you want to criticise directly encourage brigading (members of a subreddit “invading” another subreddit), therefore:

-Never crosspost or link to a post/comment that you want to criticise!

-Crossposting is encouraged, but only if OOP is featuring someone else committing US-defaultism.

Rule 9: Quality control 1: Low-hanging fruit

Posts only containing the following fall into the low-hanging fruit category. They don’t contribute to the subreddit and will be removed:

a. US state abbreviations,

b. Search engine results or suggestions,

c. US-defaultism loops,

d. Defaultism by Duolingo,

e. The US flag representing the English language,

f. Charles Peralo polls.

Rule 10: Quality control 2: Provoked defaultism

We don’t want people to harass others in any way – it hurts the reputation of this subreddit. We particularly don’t want people to provoke others into committing US-defaultism to then post them on here. The following types of posts will therefore be removed:

a. Posts featuring any sort of harassment or provocation by the OP,

b. Posts that only feature defaultism which was the result of a provocation by someone other than OP.

Rule 11: Quality control 3: General low-quality posts

We want the posts in our subreddit to be of high quality so that people can appreciate its content. Low-quality, nitpicking posts aren’t welcome here. Therefore, we reserve our right to remove the following posts:

a. Posts that aren’t appreciated by the community (with few upvotes, many downvotes on the automod and/or overwhelmingly negative comments),

b. Posts where the defaultism is questionable or dubious.

/r/USdefaultism

101,715 Subscribers

55

Why is knowing European countries being compared to knowing states of the USA?

This is not a traditional post of this sub in the form of a dumb quote of an American. It is rather a general thought I have been having recently.

So we know that USA-ers are kind of bad at geography. But their usual ignorance of, lets say, countries of Europe, they tend to justify with that Europeans probably do not know all the USA states. This has also been said by some people from my country as an excuse for Americans.

But I have been thinking, that USA states are a subdivision of a country, and is a few levels more intimate knowlege of the country, the level that usually only locals know and are thought in schools, even with big and scary countries like the USA, even though many European countries (used in the example above) might be comparable or much smaller in size then some USA states.

Asking from a non-USA-er to know the USA states, I think, is equivalent to asking a USA-er to know the oblasts of Russia, states of Germany, states of Mexico, provinces of Canada, etc., which is, as I said, a much deeper level knowlege, then just knowing the name, location and the capital city of a country.

Is this a sound thinking or am I talking crap? On this post I do not even mind if I get downvoted to hell, because it might actually be a dumb post to post here. But I am curious about thoughts.

21 Comments
2025/01/31
23:24 UTC

55

Yet again we are supposed to know where "here" is

10 Comments
2025/01/31
22:32 UTC

0

I once was playing an game and asked what country he lived on, he said america and I said where in america, he said: AMERICA🦅🦅🦅 I asked:where in america? He said: AMERICAAAA🦅🦅🦅🦅🇺🇸 🇺🇸 (either reddit or laptop cant have the flag sorry) Ok I think you got how it goes

Wait couldn't I just type that below???

3 Comments
2025/01/31
22:21 UTC

87

USian can't grasp the notion that Mexican/Tex-Mex food isn't ubiquitous outside of N. America

27 Comments
2025/01/31
20:38 UTC

257

American forgets not everyone lives in US

14 Comments
2025/01/31
20:34 UTC

335

Just what I need while sick

Mods if this isn't us defaultism then please tell me, but I think it is though :3

106 Comments
2025/01/31
15:41 UTC

34

In A Short Horror Story Sub With An Ambiguous Location

5 Comments
2025/01/31
14:58 UTC

1,142

The Humble Nation of Alabama

71 Comments
2025/01/31
13:13 UTC

111

Got it? Don’t send bullshit to ~ the government ~. Because there is only ONE government.

(i dont like how the lgbt sub is so defaultlist… ex one post was like “trans people want to fight for their country, not jobs” - WHICH country?!)

42 Comments
2025/01/31
10:14 UTC

1,106

what do you mean different countries have different shapes

95 Comments
2025/01/30
23:14 UTC

348

Americans losing their mind bc european bodybuilder calls an ambulance for broken toes

51 Comments
2025/01/30
19:07 UTC

122

Why is illegal immigration such a big deal "here" as opposed to "most other countries"?

27 Comments
2025/01/30
18:59 UTC

226

On a post talking about how Liberals are banning hrt for minors in my home-state.

31 Comments
2025/01/30
08:34 UTC

834

Of course it’s in Florida

T

32 Comments
2025/01/30
01:14 UTC

719

We need greenland don't we europe?

117 Comments
2025/01/29
20:16 UTC

310

CNY celebration isn’t allowed because things are bad in the States…

41 Comments
2025/01/29
18:12 UTC

776

Finally found one in a wild (I also don't know what does this mean)

77 Comments
2025/01/29
08:54 UTC

244

“The real football”

50 Comments
2025/01/29
04:49 UTC

238

‘They're only upset Trump won’ - headline literally says ‘Australian’

19 Comments
2025/01/29
01:28 UTC

696

A ”fifth” of a gallon

90 Comments
2025/01/28
21:32 UTC

357

I live in India, will this affect me? 😰

21 Comments
2025/01/28
15:45 UTC

3,639

For everybody?

423 Comments
2025/01/28
14:32 UTC

406

On a post about flags from different countries displayed at a school (op never said they were from USA)

70 Comments
2025/01/28
10:04 UTC

1,906

she's... brazilian...

97 Comments
2025/01/28
02:06 UTC

135

The "World" knows he's a felon... but all the examples are American newspapers

8 Comments
2025/01/28
01:44 UTC

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