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[Shades]

Most people I know would probably phrase it as inhabitants of the states (or the united states) rather than America. Although that could be equally inaccurate as that could also be applied to Mexico

[Askot Bokbondeler]

what do people call the inhabitants of the united arab emirates? arabs? emirs?

[Shades]

what do people call the inhabitants of the united arab emirates? arabs? emirs?

Arabs generally, or inhabitants of the emirates (or arab emirates).

[cganya]

we refer to the united states people as "people from the states"

Though Mexico is also "The United States Of Mexico" and held that title since before "The United States Of America". USA simply is more well known that way and is easier to distinguish from Canada and Mexico because america is comprised of either north America or south America (but not both, as my school teachers would argue to me till they were blue in the face. I don't get it, why cant south America and north America simply be referred to as "America")

[Askot Bokbondeler]

because they're different geological continents, i guess, maybe also because of cultural differences. The geographic differences may mater too.

[Grakelin]

We call people from the United States of America 'Americans' for the same reason we call people from The People's Republic of China 'Chinese'.

[Bauglir]

-snip-

[Grakelin]

Theoretically, with the uncertainty of China's political boundaries, calling Chinese people 'Chinese' is exactly the same thing.

'America' does not cover a larger area in this context, however. 'America' is the name of their country, but their full title as 'The United States of America' is the most frequently used. It's like the 'Democratic Republic of Congo' (not to be confused with the 'Republic of Congo' ). In this case, the name refers to the fact that the nation is made up of a series of smaller sub-nations.

[Shades]

'America' does not cover a larger area in this context,

Of course it does we were talking about the distinction between countries and continents, that is what the whole discussion was about.

The number of continents depends where you are taught, I was always taught 7 and assumed it was a geological distinction, but it seems in some causes Euro and Asia are combined and in other the two Americas are combined so I have no idea what the distinction is now.

[Duuvian]

a troll is actually a magical creature that wanders the internet doing stuff for the lulz, Grakelin probably thinks you don't actually believe the things you are defending, and just do it to make fun of us, because he thinks your arguments are ridiculous. i don't think their ridiculous, just misinformed and insulting, you're no troll, just a victim of a country too patriotic for it's own good.

There is already an international exchange of knowledge, actually it's been happening probably since the first cro-magnon met the first neanderthal, and happened through the ancient and modern times.
My sister is in med school studying under a Cuban teacher on an teacher exchange program, and a few of my teachers (i study fine arts) are on a collaborative project with a brazilian university and a few african villages, not just teaching, but learning from the local cultures. i'm not the kind of person that is into charity so i care little for the stuff they do in africa, but the african folk influence on some of my teachers' works is fascinating.

The american culture could also improve if they increased their importation of international books and films, and the rest of the world could also benefit culturally if the usa actually decreased it's exports of shitty books and crappy hollywood movies.
There are many decent american products, among which is dwarf fortress, and many crappy products from various places, but every year there's a new twilight, or da vinci code, and it's getting really tiresome to have to search among the piles of crap to find anything interesting.

I wholeheartedly agree with your last paragraph. One of my favorite movie channels was the Independent Film Channel before directTV decided to start dropping channels not popular enough to raise an outcry, yet still popular enough to charge extra for in pursuit of profit. For example I watched an excellent Russian epic about the tragedy of WW2 and a young war hero's journey on his last visit to his mother on military leave before being sent back to the fighting and most likely dieing. I can't remember the name but it was a very good movie and well deserving of being called Epic. Also on that channel were various other international films that were of similar quality.

Also I agree with the point you made about decreasing the volume of crappy movies, music, and books. Just because you can crank out material and sell it for the same price as truly excellent works of art that a person(s) spent the extra time to perfect doesn't mean that you should. What I think they don't realize in ignoring this fact is only the truly quality works that people spend the time to craft will be remembered in one hundred years. This is acceptable to someone in it simply to profit in my opinion, but if your goal is to contribute and be remembered for it I believe the only way is through dedication to your product by putting much more work into it than is necessary to release it. I think Toady One is an excellent example of this.