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You're wasting your time trying to explain this to somebody who uses the derogatory "USian" to describe his supposed fellow countrymen.
by LarryMullins 4y ago
You're wasting your time trying to explain this to somebody who uses the derogatory "USian" to describe his supposed fellow countrymen.
- pxc 4y agoWhat? It's not derogatory. It's just shorter and in some ways better specified than 'American'. I also used the word 'American' in the same post! Just didn't feel like writing the whole thing out the second time. -_-
- ObscureScience 4y agoI assume 'USian' is not a commonly use term and could be interpreted as "American of Asian decent" or similar. But from your clarification it seem you simply meant American without any further qualifications.
- LarryMullins 4y agoIt is derogatory. Virtually no Americans call themselves "USians". It's nigh unpronounceable (it sounds like "US Asians") and only seen on the internet in the context of somebody with an axe to grind against America (as above.)
- WalterBright 4y agoThe last time people tried to use a derogatory term for Americans - Yankees - the Americans adopted it as their own. Some people you just can't insult.
- uberduper 4y agoThat's our... superpower.
- WalterBright 4y agoYup. Oddly enough, it's anyone's superpower should they choose to wield it. The next time someone calls you a bad name, give it a try. It's impossible to insult someone who refuses to be insulted.
- User23 4y agoThe American spirit burns awful bright.
- darkwraithcov 4y agoUSAmerican is what I use to make it clear I don’t mean Canada or Mexico or Latin America. Some people don’t like it, because they think it’s unnecessary as most people assume you mean the USA, others don’t like it because they think the US is the center of everything so how dare you attempt to be inclusive of other non US American countries.
- colinsane 4y agopleeeeease don’t do this. i was born here, i’ve lived here my whole life: i’m an American, or a USian, or any other label you want to use that marks me as a US subject/citizen. i really don’t want to be burdened in keeping up with which identifiers people use for me are supposed to be offensive v.s. neutral, especially when it doesn’t impact the meaning of the post. online communication is hard enough as is — don’t make it even more complicated.
- mc32 4y agoAnd then you have people who suddenly must say Ukraine instead of The Ukraine, or must say Turkiye instead of Turkey and definitely don't even try to use any of the blue demonyms for any other country, but for Americans, yeah call "them" whatever... such hypocrites.
- thaumasiotes 4y ago> or must say Turkiye instead of Turkey That's not going to make anyone happy. It's Türkiye.
- deleted 4y ago[deleted]
- anon7725 4y agoBecause the country is called Ukraine not The Ukraine. You wouldn’t say The Germany, would you?
- deleted 4y ago[deleted]
- 14u2c 4y agoI don't care either way, but generally the term is used in specific context where the writer feels "American" would be too imperialistic as it excludes all others that live in the Americas. It devolves into debates about whether the US "stole" the demonym. Right or wrong, it's going to trigger some people.
- orange_joe 4y agoSeems short sighted given Mexico is officially the United States of Mexico.
- shrimp_emoji 4y agoSo we need the A in there. USAian. Sounds cooler too because https://dragonball.fandom.com/wiki/Saiyan https://dragonball.fandom.com/wiki/Saiyan
- dang 4y agoPlease don't take HN threads further into flamewar. It's not what this site is for, and destroys what it is for. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html