My country does not belong to Joe Sixpack

[rachelmanija]

I am not a hugely patriotic person in the "My country can beat up your country" sense, but I am an American citizen, and I fucking hate the popular American media narrative in which the only real Americans are white, rural, Republican or independent, middle or working class, uneducated, parents, heterosexuals, Christians, and aggressively folksy-- the "Joe Sixpack" noted by Sarah "Doggone It" Palin.

Those people do exist, and they are real Americans, but they are a relatively small slice of the population. The majority of Americans are either urban or suburban. In some urban areas, the majority of Americans are not white.

Jews, Muslims, Baha'i, people of color, college professors, white collar workers, union organizers, childless people, leftists, urban yuppies, street hustlers, queer activists, recent immigrants who don't speak English, subway riders, taco truck drivers -- even Wall Street millionaires -- are Americans too. Whether or not we look like a whitebread Norman Rockwell painting of some right-wing regressive fantasy of an America that only ever existed in little pockets of the country fifty years ago makes no difference. We are all citizens, we have the vote, and our country belongs to all of us.

Adrian asked me if Japan has an equivalent of "Joe Sixpack." "Maybe 'Sazae-san?'" I hazarded.

People from countries other than the US, do you also have an obnoxious stereotype of the "ideal" citizen? Who is he or she, and does she have a name?

Comments

[em-h.livejournal.com]

Here's what disturbs me: until recently, the "ideal Canadian" stereotype was a *parody* -- specifically, Bob and Doug MacKenzie sitting in the woods with cans of beer, unsuccessfully trying to hunt things, and having rambling absurd conversations. But it seems like the Conservatives are now seriously trying to invoke the idea of "ordinary people", specifically in opposition to the arts; in response to protests against recent cuts to arts funding, Stephen Harper came up with a bizarre spiel about how artists, apparently, spend all our time in ballgowns at fancy galas, funded by taxpayers, and televised on the CBC, and "ordinary people" don't like seeing such shenanigans.

I'm not sure the "ordinary people" are currently defined by anything other than their dislike of highfalutin artists and intellectuals, but if the tactic seems to fly for him, I'm sure he'll make more out of it.

Of course there's a whole different dynamic in Quebec, but I don't feel fully qualified to comment on the ideal Quebecois. The pur laine idea still has strength, though.