What's performative about not wanting to go down with a sinking ship? Or are you under the illusion that the U.S. is doing particularly well right now? It appears that the "we have the bigger stick" strategy is finally meeting some resistance, and I am happy to see it.
Curious where you are. I am in Canada and it's certainly mixed feelings but I think there are plenty of Canadians that understand that despite the current craziness we're in this together for the long term. Similarly in the US there are plenty that understand this.
In relation to Europe vs. the US. Even before the current administration Europe has been at odds with American companies:
"The European Union Renews Its Offensive Against US Technology Firms" (2022) - https://www.piie.com/sites/default/files/documents/pb22-2.pd...
The framing that this started now with the current administration is not correct. The current administration certainly heated things up so to speak and brought things to the surface but the tension has been there for a long while. Europe is not capable of competing with US tech in general for various structural reasons. Europeans tend to argue this is because of US power but we see countries like China and India succeeding where Europe fails.
The more interesting question is whether there is a large enough lasting change in the US that takes away its structural advantages. I don't think this is the case. If you look at AI the hub of world economic activity and innovation is still in the US including startups and incumbents. s/AI/anything/ . China is certainly trying, and arguably succeeding, in taking some of that but it's still not at the same level. Europe is not even a player.
Interestingly, China is succeeding because it isolated itself partially from US big tech. That enabled them to build their domestic companies.
If you give free reign to US companies, they‘re going to swoop up any competition early on.
The US relies on being attractive for smart people. There are still smart people going to the US, but the general mood seems to be that it‘s increasingly less attractive. Mid term, little will change, long term the cultural hegemony of the US will be replaced by multipolar influences.
Top 3 CS programs still seem to be in the US. MIT, Stanford, CMU.
The US has its geography, weather, etc. which are not going away.
China has massive scale industrial espionage and learnt a lot by being the cheap place where things are made and stealing western companies processes. They also invested a lot in education and naturally they have a lot of smart people. I still think that as long as they have an oppressive regime the really smart people will prefer not to be there since the second you become successful you also become a threat to the regime. Their work culture is also pretty toxic.
It's hard to predict long term but the US has a culture of innovation going back maybe hundreds of years, it has relative freedom, it has capital to invest, land and resources, and overall it has good people (and crazy people which was always true). Most of the conditions that made the US what it is are still there and most of the conditions that made places like Europe unable to compete are also still there. The US is a lot more diverse than it used to be as well.
It's not hard at all if you can interpret charts and can observe trends. You do yourself no favors by intentionally misunderestimating an adversary, to borrow a Bushism.
It's not the current administration that started this process. The US has for decades gone against the Europeans, step after step, asserting policies that only favor US companies. In the past however, the US administrations sugarcoated this fact with the language of cooperation. The current US government is now laying bare the fact that they're creating a political system where all technology and resources are controlled by the US and their "allies" are mere observers that should not do anything about it.
France deciding, in principle, to come up with a plan for not using Microsoft is performative. It stops being performative when they actually do it. At any rate, is there a good reason for France to stop using Microsoft? I'm doubtful. It's a bit like the DoD declaring Anthropic a "supply chain risk"; basically performative.
To respond to the rest of your post: while the Trump administration's behavior has diminished US standing in the world, the US is doing well compared to Europe in many important dimensions (e.g. economic growth). Also, far-right parties in Europe seem much more dangerous than the right in the US.
But all of that is a side show. European skepticism of the US has its roots in the postwar era. It's fundamentally about resentment. Europe is geopolitically weak and depends on the US for defense which is galling, especially for France with its history as a global power.
> European skepticism of the US has its roots in the postwar era.
This is crazy. The Europeans fell hook line and sinker for the line that the US could be trusted to manage security for Europe and would always be a dependable ally. That suited everyone — Europe because we could focus spending on post war reconstruction, and the US because you made a shit tonne of money by being the world's arms dealer and policeman.
There was no resentment of the US. Europe was in love with US culture (weird French cinema rules aside). And especially Eastern Europe... who have now had the hardest of all disillusionments.
This administration has destroyed the goodwill and trust built up over 80 years, and the economic foundation which made you rich and powerful. Let's check back in 30 years and see if that was a good idea. I'm hopeful that French nukes and Ukrainian ingenuity (and MAGA incompetence) will see us through the next 10-15 years of transition as re right the past mistake of trusting the US.
> The Europeans fell hook line and sinker for the line that the US could be trusted to manage security for Europe and would always be a dependable ally.
Charles de Gaulle didn't fall for it! I used to think he was an arrogant crank, but Trump has proven he was right all along to be critical of the US.
You must live in a different reality from me. The EU has closed trade deals with India and Mercosur this year alone, recentering the global economy around itself.
Meanwhile, the resentment seems to radiate from the White House as they increasingly realize how their moves are making them irrelevant on the global stage.
We're not upset. We just don't think you matter anymore.
Wishful to the point of delusion. Europe is a stagnant backwater in a deep energy crisis that's about to get significantly deeper, and comforts itself on an completely unearned sense of moral superiority that it can't feed itself with.
This is also a self-inflicted wound. There's no reason that Europe should be in the situation that it is in other than it is run by elites that are, like everyone else, invested in the success of US companies, and have no particular loyalty to Europe. When they retire, they move to the US and get board seats, advisory positions, lobbyist jobs, and cushy university spots.
Europeans need to start engaging in rational thinking and to stop letting their politics revolve around zombie US institutions (like NATO) and electing functionaries from tiny little countries who have made an industry of covertly advocating for US interests in Europe. They also need to seriously rethink their relationships with Russia and China, and realize that when it comes to Russia, they were the bad guys so destroying their economies and futures over manufactured grudges and fantasies of invasion is an indulgence that their children can't afford.
Independence from the US means getting rid of their elites that work for the US, and getting rid of victimhood narratives about Russia (who at least occupied part of Europe) and China (who have never done a thing to them.) They should make BRICS EBRICS. If Europe doesn't wise up, they're just going to start killing each other. Thank God that France has nukes and can't be invaded again.
Well said on the site of Y-Combinator. A US company ran by Americans that mostly funds startups in the US. Clearly the US, the home of Apple, nVidia, Anthropic, Open AI, SpaceX, Google, Meta, Amazon, Tesla etc. is sinking while the EU the home of (? ... well, there is ASML) is going to be running the world.
Linus works on Linux from ... Portland, Oregon. And oh, look at where Linux contributions are coming from:
Yes exactly, just like the.. uhm.. the British Empire could not have possibly declined? Your point is that, because the U.S. has big companies and wealth, it can't be a sinking ship? Because to me this seems like a straw-man.
What I'm saying is that the U.S. is currently in decline, and many will agree with me. Where this leads your (I'm assuming) country, nobody knows. But to me, it doesn't look great.
I'm not American. But I guess I feel part of the US led western world order.
The US has big companies and wealth because it has the right ecosystem to create those.
The US is in decline is a meme. Decline can't be measured over short intervals. Maybe it is maybe it isn't. We'll see in 5 decades.
One thing I'm pretty sure about is that this decline of the US that many seem to be excited for and wishing here, if or when it happens, is not going to end well for most of those people. Another way of saying this is that most of the people commenting here have benefited and still benefit from the dominance of the US and the technology and innovation coming out of it, including Y Combinator. What is the long term strategic thinking behind "let's attack the US and make it fail" -> the answer is none. It should be in the interest of most of us to see more US success. We whine as everything around us is an outcome of that success.
Warren Buffet's "Never bet against America" still very much holds in my opinion.
> I'm not American. But I guess I feel part of the US led western world order.
Thanks to the diligent efforts of Hollywood.
> The US has big companies and wealth because it has the right ecosystem to create those.
It also has giant homeless camps stretching on for miles, abandoned and collapsing old houses, factories, etc as far as the eye can see.
The so-called "wealth" of this country is highly concentrated and is so far beyond the reach of most people we might as well be living in a different country.
As we speak we are headed to a giant market collapse as the last dollars are shaken out of everyone's pocket, and we continue into a hard Depression. This will be followed by a World War. The outcome of that one will be much different than the last one.
> The US is in decline is a meme.
Wrong. The United States is in fact in decline, and has been for decades. It is the end of the American Empire.
Source: I am an actual American, who has eyes and ears and most importantly, has a deep understanding of history, both ancient and "modern." This ship is sinking. The only people who haven't figured it out are people brainwashed by the media. It's easier for that to happen when you don't have a front row seat to the circus.
> It should be in the interest of most of us to see more US success.
Nope. It isn't. If it were, then it would not be failing. Think about it.
It's said there are three types of people in the world:
1) Those who make things happen.
2) Those who watch things happen.
3) Those who look around in confusion asking, "What happened?"
How do you measure decline and what in your opinion is rising vs. this decline.
There have certainly been some trends like globalization, climate change, social media, the pandemic, immigration etc.
Can you elaborate on how it's in the interest of a hypothetical French person commenting on Hacker News, typing on their MBP laptop, tuning in to NetFlix, asking ChatGPT for recipes, to see the US fail and what you mean by fail. Fail as in break up? chaos? become a third world country? Total collapse of US tech? What does fail look like.
This is not a zero sum game.
EDIT: you edited while I was replying which makes this a moving target.
EDIT2: The US has already survived depressions and world wars.
I'm not saying everything is great but I'm certainly not brainwashed by the media. Will there be economic trouble ahead- sure. There always are. Are there other places in the world with structural advantages over the USA? I'm not seeing them. Can the US lose its advantages - everything is possible.
> and what in your opinion is rising vs. this decline.
Poverty, destitution, illiteracy, and ignorance are all rising trends in the USA.
> Can you elaborate on how it's in the interest of a hypothetical French person [...]
Completely irrelevant. You don't get to wish for the world that you want. The FACT is, it is the end of the American Empire. And the end of France too in a lot of ways, based on what I can see from here. Especially if there's a lot of folks like you in the population.
How big is your farmstead and how much food can you produce? What skilled trades do you have that are of use in a World War type situation, besides holding a machine gun? Those are facts that will be of importance to you in the coming years.
> EDIT: you edited while I was replying which makes this a moving target.
It's OK if you sit back and wait for my thought to be completed before rushing to reply with your ignorant opinion.
Familiarize yourself with the essay "The Fate of Empires and the Search for Survival" by Sir John Glubb. Then I would recommend America's Secret Establishment by Antony Cyril Sutton.
There are many, many more books you will need to read before you understand anything about the present day, let alone what tomorrow holds.
It is relevant because you seem very young. I'm not young and I've seen processes as they happen.
Eyes and ears are not good enough. You might be seeing some local effects that are biasing your opinion.
I'm interested in your political views because they seem extremely left. Your political views are relevant because they shape your perception of reality and they also tell us what narratives you've exposed to.
I have pretty decent skills in various areas from mechanical, electronics, to woodworking, to music, to martial arts. not to mention software that's my day job. I can grow food. But from your predictions sounds like I need a nuclear bunker on a remote island.
EDIT: "The Fate of Empires and the Search for Survival" -> yeah I've read this a long time ago. This is a common argument about how the US done.
When your theories are consistently wrong, it's time to pause and reflect.
> I'm not young and I've seen processes as they happen.
You're wrong, but you've got your opinions though. Which you are sure are better than mine. The guy whose ancestors literally founded this country.
Please, Mr. Frenchman, tell me more about my own country.
> Eyes and ears are not good enough.
Wrong. They are the foundation of knowledge.
> You might be seeing some local effects that are biasing your opinion.
Wrong.
> I'm interested in your political views because they seem extremely left.
Wrong.
> Your political views are relevant because they shape your perception of reality and they also tell us what narratives you've exposed to.
Wrong. Not a word I can utter regarding my "political views" would help you in any way.
You're nowhere near the level of understanding necessary to have an intelligent conversation on this subject. Worse, you arrogantly believe that your knowledge is better than mine.
Read the essay I took the time to recommend. Read the book I recommended. When you are ready to learn more, then we may have a conversation. Until then, you have nothing to add to this thread that is of any value to anyone.
It is admittedly pretty goofy to get exactly what you want—an army of people making rules for everything under the sun—and come on here and complain about what we’re doing.
Even TFA, which is about yet another rule, has a goofy quote from the Minister of something or other about breaking free from American tools. Linux seems pretty American to me [1]. Maybe they’ll fork. Would be cool.
Some big moneyed interests are trying to split Europe and the US.
The current US administration is definitely not helping, but every ad I see on the Reddit main feed is a blatant attack on the relation, from brand new subreddits, pointing at magazines I’ve never heard about before. I’ve been reporting them, but it keeps coming, from constantly different sources, different names, subreddits, but always the same vague but incredible incredibly provocative titles
I suspect that some social-media-addled senior US officials are being fed the same crap because their reactions to non-existent European reaction are not grounded in reality.
> Some big moneyed interests are trying to split Europe and the US. The current US administration is definitely not helping
Did you listen/read Vance's recent speeches in Hungary? Or read the US policy document put out months back? It goes way beyond merely "not helping" - the US administration is in turns provoking, alienating and separating itself from center/center-left European governments in pursuit of exporting extremist partisan politics in the hopes of getting far-right governments elected across Europe.
European citizens and politicians everywhere can see the actions for what they are. What was that about Greenland and annexing Canada? There's no big-money conspiracy, just a bully administration with no sense of second-and third-order effects.
I’m not saying that Vance is not doing that—God knows that man’s ethics has no floor.
I’m doubtful he paid for ads to make his disdain better known. So I suspect someone else is trying to make that happen beyond what Vance can with his speeches.
As a European, the Anti-Americanism is not performative.
It's a deep disconnect in values, brought to the forefront by the current administration and the oligarchs running wild.
America used to be seen as an example, the big brother watching out for us.
Now it's a cautionary tale of greed, hubris and societal decay, as well as an increasingly antagonistic actor of global instability.
Y'all ruined your reputation and the fact you're trying to pin that on us is just another example of said hubris. Until you at least own up to it, there's no viable path to recovery.
No, you were having a discussion, and now you're the one who just had a tantrum. If you're going to be personally offended when somebody says that the US looks like it is throwing a tantrum, nobody worthwhile is going to think it's worth talking to you.
So, it's performative. While they complain about American hegemony, Europeans buy iPhones (or Android), drink Coke, scroll Instagram, and listen to Taylor Swift. And while they might object to NATO spending, decades of inadequate military spending have left Europe with no real alternative to buying protection from America.
The French are just (wonderfully) arrogant enough to say what everyone else is thinking. The UK will likely be too spineless to actually follow through, but the Germans and Eastern Europeans are not going to tolerate the level of exposure we all have to US craziness any longer.
What's performative about not wanting to go down with a sinking ship? Or are you under the illusion that the U.S. is doing particularly well right now? It appears that the "we have the bigger stick" strategy is finally meeting some resistance, and I am happy to see it.
I mean it’s not just that, the current administration have destroyed a bunch of the US’s oldest and most important alliances…
I’m not in Europe but in another allied country, the feeling amongst people here is that the US is not able to be trusted as a partner anymore.
And with ways the Government can apply pressure to US companies (CLOUD Act etc.) that extends to IS companies too.
Curious where you are. I am in Canada and it's certainly mixed feelings but I think there are plenty of Canadians that understand that despite the current craziness we're in this together for the long term. Similarly in the US there are plenty that understand this.
In relation to Europe vs. the US. Even before the current administration Europe has been at odds with American companies: "The European Union Renews Its Offensive Against US Technology Firms" (2022) - https://www.piie.com/sites/default/files/documents/pb22-2.pd...
The framing that this started now with the current administration is not correct. The current administration certainly heated things up so to speak and brought things to the surface but the tension has been there for a long while. Europe is not capable of competing with US tech in general for various structural reasons. Europeans tend to argue this is because of US power but we see countries like China and India succeeding where Europe fails.
The more interesting question is whether there is a large enough lasting change in the US that takes away its structural advantages. I don't think this is the case. If you look at AI the hub of world economic activity and innovation is still in the US including startups and incumbents. s/AI/anything/ . China is certainly trying, and arguably succeeding, in taking some of that but it's still not at the same level. Europe is not even a player.
Interestingly, China is succeeding because it isolated itself partially from US big tech. That enabled them to build their domestic companies. If you give free reign to US companies, they‘re going to swoop up any competition early on.
The US relies on being attractive for smart people. There are still smart people going to the US, but the general mood seems to be that it‘s increasingly less attractive. Mid term, little will change, long term the cultural hegemony of the US will be replaced by multipolar influences.
> Mid term, little will change, long term the cultural hegemony of the US will be replaced by multipolar influences.
Everyone's been saying this for like 20 years. It just hasn't happened.
At some point you realize that the people constantly pushing "multipolarity" just really don't like the US. It's wishful thinking
Top 3 CS programs still seem to be in the US. MIT, Stanford, CMU.
The US has its geography, weather, etc. which are not going away.
China has massive scale industrial espionage and learnt a lot by being the cheap place where things are made and stealing western companies processes. They also invested a lot in education and naturally they have a lot of smart people. I still think that as long as they have an oppressive regime the really smart people will prefer not to be there since the second you become successful you also become a threat to the regime. Their work culture is also pretty toxic.
https://monitor.icef.com/2025/11/there-were-more-internation...
It's hard to predict long term but the US has a culture of innovation going back maybe hundreds of years, it has relative freedom, it has capital to invest, land and resources, and overall it has good people (and crazy people which was always true). Most of the conditions that made the US what it is are still there and most of the conditions that made places like Europe unable to compete are also still there. The US is a lot more diverse than it used to be as well.
> and crazy people which was always true
The experiment with giving the crazy people unchecked power over every lever of government is new, however.
This is perhaps a shrewd move against China: they can't steal technology and scientific advances from the US if there aren't any to steal.
Trump's power is not unchecked. He probably doesn't even win the craziest president award.
Historical US presidents:
Andrew Jackson -> threatened to hang his VP. https://history.stackexchange.com/questions/41212/did-andrew...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lyndon_B._Johnson had meetings while sitting on the toilet: https://historyfacts.com/famous-figures/fact/lyndon-b-johnso...
Richard Nixon - needs no introductions?
https://www.reddit.com/r/Presidents/comments/13yplux/crazies...
Also remember we had: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/McCarthyism and the requirement by Truman that all civil service employees be screened for "loyalty".
> It's hard to predict long term...
It's not hard at all if you can interpret charts and can observe trends. You do yourself no favors by intentionally misunderestimating an adversary, to borrow a Bushism.
It's not the current administration that started this process. The US has for decades gone against the Europeans, step after step, asserting policies that only favor US companies. In the past however, the US administrations sugarcoated this fact with the language of cooperation. The current US government is now laying bare the fact that they're creating a political system where all technology and resources are controlled by the US and their "allies" are mere observers that should not do anything about it.
France deciding, in principle, to come up with a plan for not using Microsoft is performative. It stops being performative when they actually do it. At any rate, is there a good reason for France to stop using Microsoft? I'm doubtful. It's a bit like the DoD declaring Anthropic a "supply chain risk"; basically performative.
To respond to the rest of your post: while the Trump administration's behavior has diminished US standing in the world, the US is doing well compared to Europe in many important dimensions (e.g. economic growth). Also, far-right parties in Europe seem much more dangerous than the right in the US.
But all of that is a side show. European skepticism of the US has its roots in the postwar era. It's fundamentally about resentment. Europe is geopolitically weak and depends on the US for defense which is galling, especially for France with its history as a global power.
There is already 100000 workstations in a branch of the police with this Linux distribution https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GendBuntu
It's not performative.
> European skepticism of the US has its roots in the postwar era.
This is crazy. The Europeans fell hook line and sinker for the line that the US could be trusted to manage security for Europe and would always be a dependable ally. That suited everyone — Europe because we could focus spending on post war reconstruction, and the US because you made a shit tonne of money by being the world's arms dealer and policeman.
There was no resentment of the US. Europe was in love with US culture (weird French cinema rules aside). And especially Eastern Europe... who have now had the hardest of all disillusionments.
This administration has destroyed the goodwill and trust built up over 80 years, and the economic foundation which made you rich and powerful. Let's check back in 30 years and see if that was a good idea. I'm hopeful that French nukes and Ukrainian ingenuity (and MAGA incompetence) will see us through the next 10-15 years of transition as re right the past mistake of trusting the US.
> The Europeans fell hook line and sinker for the line that the US could be trusted to manage security for Europe and would always be a dependable ally.
Charles de Gaulle didn't fall for it! I used to think he was an arrogant crank, but Trump has proven he was right all along to be critical of the US.
You must live in a different reality from me. The EU has closed trade deals with India and Mercosur this year alone, recentering the global economy around itself.
Meanwhile, the resentment seems to radiate from the White House as they increasingly realize how their moves are making them irrelevant on the global stage.
We're not upset. We just don't think you matter anymore.
> recentering the global economy around itself.
Wishful thinking.
Wishful to the point of delusion. Europe is a stagnant backwater in a deep energy crisis that's about to get significantly deeper, and comforts itself on an completely unearned sense of moral superiority that it can't feed itself with.
This is also a self-inflicted wound. There's no reason that Europe should be in the situation that it is in other than it is run by elites that are, like everyone else, invested in the success of US companies, and have no particular loyalty to Europe. When they retire, they move to the US and get board seats, advisory positions, lobbyist jobs, and cushy university spots.
Europeans need to start engaging in rational thinking and to stop letting their politics revolve around zombie US institutions (like NATO) and electing functionaries from tiny little countries who have made an industry of covertly advocating for US interests in Europe. They also need to seriously rethink their relationships with Russia and China, and realize that when it comes to Russia, they were the bad guys so destroying their economies and futures over manufactured grudges and fantasies of invasion is an indulgence that their children can't afford.
Independence from the US means getting rid of their elites that work for the US, and getting rid of victimhood narratives about Russia (who at least occupied part of Europe) and China (who have never done a thing to them.) They should make BRICS EBRICS. If Europe doesn't wise up, they're just going to start killing each other. Thank God that France has nukes and can't be invaded again.
Defense against who ? Russia ? Or the US ?
Well said on the site of Y-Combinator. A US company ran by Americans that mostly funds startups in the US. Clearly the US, the home of Apple, nVidia, Anthropic, Open AI, SpaceX, Google, Meta, Amazon, Tesla etc. is sinking while the EU the home of (? ... well, there is ASML) is going to be running the world.
Linus works on Linux from ... Portland, Oregon. And oh, look at where Linux contributions are coming from:
https://insights.linuxfoundation.org/project/korg/contributo...
EU's GDP is so catching up with the US:
https://econofact.org/factbrief/fact-check-has-the-economic-...
NOT
Yes exactly, just like the.. uhm.. the British Empire could not have possibly declined? Your point is that, because the U.S. has big companies and wealth, it can't be a sinking ship? Because to me this seems like a straw-man.
What I'm saying is that the U.S. is currently in decline, and many will agree with me. Where this leads your (I'm assuming) country, nobody knows. But to me, it doesn't look great.
I'm not American. But I guess I feel part of the US led western world order.
The US has big companies and wealth because it has the right ecosystem to create those.
The US is in decline is a meme. Decline can't be measured over short intervals. Maybe it is maybe it isn't. We'll see in 5 decades.
One thing I'm pretty sure about is that this decline of the US that many seem to be excited for and wishing here, if or when it happens, is not going to end well for most of those people. Another way of saying this is that most of the people commenting here have benefited and still benefit from the dominance of the US and the technology and innovation coming out of it, including Y Combinator. What is the long term strategic thinking behind "let's attack the US and make it fail" -> the answer is none. It should be in the interest of most of us to see more US success. We whine as everything around us is an outcome of that success.
Warren Buffet's "Never bet against America" still very much holds in my opinion.
> I'm not American. But I guess I feel part of the US led western world order.
Thanks to the diligent efforts of Hollywood.
> The US has big companies and wealth because it has the right ecosystem to create those.
It also has giant homeless camps stretching on for miles, abandoned and collapsing old houses, factories, etc as far as the eye can see.
The so-called "wealth" of this country is highly concentrated and is so far beyond the reach of most people we might as well be living in a different country.
As we speak we are headed to a giant market collapse as the last dollars are shaken out of everyone's pocket, and we continue into a hard Depression. This will be followed by a World War. The outcome of that one will be much different than the last one.
> The US is in decline is a meme.
Wrong. The United States is in fact in decline, and has been for decades. It is the end of the American Empire.
Source: I am an actual American, who has eyes and ears and most importantly, has a deep understanding of history, both ancient and "modern." This ship is sinking. The only people who haven't figured it out are people brainwashed by the media. It's easier for that to happen when you don't have a front row seat to the circus.
> It should be in the interest of most of us to see more US success.
Nope. It isn't. If it were, then it would not be failing. Think about it.
It's said there are three types of people in the world:
1) Those who make things happen.
2) Those who watch things happen.
3) Those who look around in confusion asking, "What happened?"
That last one is you.
How old are you? What are your political views?
How do you measure decline and what in your opinion is rising vs. this decline.
There have certainly been some trends like globalization, climate change, social media, the pandemic, immigration etc.
Can you elaborate on how it's in the interest of a hypothetical French person commenting on Hacker News, typing on their MBP laptop, tuning in to NetFlix, asking ChatGPT for recipes, to see the US fail and what you mean by fail. Fail as in break up? chaos? become a third world country? Total collapse of US tech? What does fail look like.
This is not a zero sum game.
EDIT: you edited while I was replying which makes this a moving target.
EDIT2: The US has already survived depressions and world wars.
It's true that wealth inequality is historically high but not the highest: https://eml.berkeley.edu/~saez/SaezZucman14slides.pdf
But as I said this is not a zero sum game: https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/MEHOINUSA672N real median household income is at all times high.
I'm not saying everything is great but I'm certainly not brainwashed by the media. Will there be economic trouble ahead- sure. There always are. Are there other places in the world with structural advantages over the USA? I'm not seeing them. Can the US lose its advantages - everything is possible.
> How old are you?
Irrelevant.
> What are your political views?
Irrelevant.
> How do you measure decline
Countless ways. I use my eyes and ears to start.
> and what in your opinion is rising vs. this decline.
Poverty, destitution, illiteracy, and ignorance are all rising trends in the USA.
> Can you elaborate on how it's in the interest of a hypothetical French person [...]
Completely irrelevant. You don't get to wish for the world that you want. The FACT is, it is the end of the American Empire. And the end of France too in a lot of ways, based on what I can see from here. Especially if there's a lot of folks like you in the population.
How big is your farmstead and how much food can you produce? What skilled trades do you have that are of use in a World War type situation, besides holding a machine gun? Those are facts that will be of importance to you in the coming years.
> EDIT: you edited while I was replying which makes this a moving target.
It's OK if you sit back and wait for my thought to be completed before rushing to reply with your ignorant opinion.
Familiarize yourself with the essay "The Fate of Empires and the Search for Survival" by Sir John Glubb. Then I would recommend America's Secret Establishment by Antony Cyril Sutton.
There are many, many more books you will need to read before you understand anything about the present day, let alone what tomorrow holds.
It is relevant because you seem very young. I'm not young and I've seen processes as they happen.
Eyes and ears are not good enough. You might be seeing some local effects that are biasing your opinion.
I'm interested in your political views because they seem extremely left. Your political views are relevant because they shape your perception of reality and they also tell us what narratives you've exposed to.
I have pretty decent skills in various areas from mechanical, electronics, to woodworking, to music, to martial arts. not to mention software that's my day job. I can grow food. But from your predictions sounds like I need a nuclear bunker on a remote island.
EDIT: "The Fate of Empires and the Search for Survival" -> yeah I've read this a long time ago. This is a common argument about how the US done.
> It is relevant because you seem very young.
Well you're wrong. Again.
When your theories are consistently wrong, it's time to pause and reflect.
> I'm not young and I've seen processes as they happen.
You're wrong, but you've got your opinions though. Which you are sure are better than mine. The guy whose ancestors literally founded this country.
Please, Mr. Frenchman, tell me more about my own country.
> Eyes and ears are not good enough.
Wrong. They are the foundation of knowledge.
> You might be seeing some local effects that are biasing your opinion.
Wrong.
> I'm interested in your political views because they seem extremely left.
Wrong.
> Your political views are relevant because they shape your perception of reality and they also tell us what narratives you've exposed to.
Wrong. Not a word I can utter regarding my "political views" would help you in any way.
You're nowhere near the level of understanding necessary to have an intelligent conversation on this subject. Worse, you arrogantly believe that your knowledge is better than mine.
Read the essay I took the time to recommend. Read the book I recommended. When you are ready to learn more, then we may have a conversation. Until then, you have nothing to add to this thread that is of any value to anyone.
I'm not French. I guess we're both arrogant.
"America's Secret Establishment" I have not heard of. I'll put it on my reading list.
Of course you haven't heard of it. 99% of Americans haven't either. By design, and by choice.
https://annas-archive.gl/md5/ae552367aadb4bc3cf01967636733d6...
It is admittedly pretty goofy to get exactly what you want—an army of people making rules for everything under the sun—and come on here and complain about what we’re doing.
Even TFA, which is about yet another rule, has a goofy quote from the Minister of something or other about breaking free from American tools. Linux seems pretty American to me [1]. Maybe they’ll fork. Would be cool.
[1]: https://insights.linuxfoundation.org/project/korg/contributo...
Its moving the needle. There is a lot to be done but its moving
Some big moneyed interests are trying to split Europe and the US.
The current US administration is definitely not helping, but every ad I see on the Reddit main feed is a blatant attack on the relation, from brand new subreddits, pointing at magazines I’ve never heard about before. I’ve been reporting them, but it keeps coming, from constantly different sources, different names, subreddits, but always the same vague but incredible incredibly provocative titles
I suspect that some social-media-addled senior US officials are being fed the same crap because their reactions to non-existent European reaction are not grounded in reality.
> Some big moneyed interests are trying to split Europe and the US. The current US administration is definitely not helping
Did you listen/read Vance's recent speeches in Hungary? Or read the US policy document put out months back? It goes way beyond merely "not helping" - the US administration is in turns provoking, alienating and separating itself from center/center-left European governments in pursuit of exporting extremist partisan politics in the hopes of getting far-right governments elected across Europe.
European citizens and politicians everywhere can see the actions for what they are. What was that about Greenland and annexing Canada? There's no big-money conspiracy, just a bully administration with no sense of second-and third-order effects.
I’m not saying that Vance is not doing that—God knows that man’s ethics has no floor.
I’m doubtful he paid for ads to make his disdain better known. So I suspect someone else is trying to make that happen beyond what Vance can with his speeches.
Trump is all that‘s needed for that. The Greenland saga alone was sufficient. And then he attacked Iran.
Trump is too cheap to have paid for those ads.
As a European, the Anti-Americanism is not performative.
It's a deep disconnect in values, brought to the forefront by the current administration and the oligarchs running wild.
America used to be seen as an example, the big brother watching out for us.
Now it's a cautionary tale of greed, hubris and societal decay, as well as an increasingly antagonistic actor of global instability.
Y'all ruined your reputation and the fact you're trying to pin that on us is just another example of said hubris. Until you at least own up to it, there's no viable path to recovery.
It's mostly performative, and posts like this prove the point.
Meanwhile, I believe your post proves my point. Funny how perspective works, isn't it?
It feels like the last tantrum of a dying empire from our vantage point.
Sad, but ultimately irrelevant.
I see one person having a tantrum in this thread (and it's not me).
No, you were having a discussion, and now you're the one who just had a tantrum. If you're going to be personally offended when somebody says that the US looks like it is throwing a tantrum, nobody worthwhile is going to think it's worth talking to you.
"Tantrum" is a choice word.
Does feel like it's you though.
Yet again, you are vocalizing my exact thoughts.
Feels like the disconnect I described is real, doesn't it?
Might not be performative after all then...
[dead]
> It's a deep disconnect in values
So, it's performative. While they complain about American hegemony, Europeans buy iPhones (or Android), drink Coke, scroll Instagram, and listen to Taylor Swift. And while they might object to NATO spending, decades of inadequate military spending have left Europe with no real alternative to buying protection from America.
The French are just (wonderfully) arrogant enough to say what everyone else is thinking. The UK will likely be too spineless to actually follow through, but the Germans and Eastern Europeans are not going to tolerate the level of exposure we all have to US craziness any longer.