Ok I hope I won’t come off as an ass here. I’m not always the most eloquent.

One thing that was quite grating on Reddit, was how most “global” subreddits were basically defaulting to the USA.

For example, people would ask questions in general question subs - “Can I legally…?” ”Is a teacher allowed to…?", “How much does it cost to…?” and unless they specify the country, you were just supposed to assume it’s the US, with people from other countries keeping such questions to specific subs.

And this is just a bit weird to non-Americans who always need to specify their jurisdiction or place when it’s relevant.

On Reddit it kinda made sense as Americans were almost half of all users, but with Lemmy, anyone can run an instance from wherever.

There is a bunch of instances dedicated to countries or regions.

But Lemmy.world has “world” right there in the title. So don’t assume everyone is from the same place as you.

Don’t get me wrong, I do love the global community! But I also don’t want to get confused and make assumptions.

So all I ask is some of these things:

  • If you’re asking the global community a question, making a comment etc., that is specific to some area(s) of the world, always specify the place, even if it seems self-explanatory.

  • Similarly, when using generic terms such as “congress”, “conservative”, “west coast” or “health insurance”, keep in mind that lots of countries have those too in some form or another. Specify what you’re talking about.

  • Careful with names of places, especially abbreviation. By CA, do you mean Canada or California? Is IN India or Indiana? Is SD an SD card? UK is an university now? And so on. I personally think abbreviation should default to countries or global organizations, if anything - such as UK, EU, UN.

  • When creating/managing a community, use the Display Name to specify what you mean. (I won’t call anyone out but I kinda want to…)

  • If you see someone making these assumptions, maybe let them know it can be confusing for the others.

  • Consider using (or creating) an instance or community that’s more region-specific or interest-specific . I don’t want to kick anyone out, don’t get me wrong, but everyone can subscribe everywhere, so…

I’ve seen instances for many countries (and the US midwest)… But not one for USA as a whole yet. So, just keep in mind the community is global.

Again, sorry if I come off harsh, it’s not my intent, and I don’t even mean to call out people from the US specifically. It’s just that on Reddit, this has often lead to some toxicity (r/USDefaultism and some other “defaultism” subs) and it would be a shame to bring that here as well.

And you know, just to try to avoid confusion.

Thanks for coming to my TED talk.

  • bstix
    11·
    2 years ago

    If you read English on the internet it’s more likely that it’s not written by a native speaker, since there are more people who write in English as a secondary language than there are native speakers.

    • GaryPonderosa@lemmy.world
      115·
      2 years ago

      And you can usually tell the ESLs because they usegrammar in an unnatural way, either very stiff and formal or with a heavy dose of influence from their native language.

        • GaryPonderosa@lemmy.world
          19·
          2 years ago

          A typographical error is not a grammatical error. It’s nice to see people will always fall back on attacking the person when they don’t have a valid point.

          • nepatriots32@lemmy.world
            41·
            2 years ago

            You know, my favorite thing about Lemmy showing both upvotes and downvotes is that not only do we see that a lot of people disagree with you, but more specifically that, since you’re the only one upvoting yourself, literally everyone else can tell that you’re wrong.

            You know it’s not that hard to just admit that you were wrong. It was an easy mistake to make, so just admit it and move on. Realize that you can learn and improve. Doubling down just to make yourself seem more like an idiot is never the answer. Everyone is capable of being stupid and making mistakes, but it’s the real idiots who are incapable of learning from them.

            • GaryPonderosa@lemmy.world
              14·
              2 years ago

              Downvotes don’t mean I’m wrong. Downvotes mean people disagree with me. The two are not always the same.

              By your logic, if I were to go into a conservative community and get downvotes for saying trans people deserve to live, that would mean they don’t deserve to live.

              • nepatriots32@lemmy.world
                1·
                2 years ago

                Lol that you think the majority of conservatives don’t think trans people should live. I mean, the ultra-right fascist conservatives, sure, but most conservatives just don’t agree with people doing certain things. They aren’t about to taking a flamethrower to every member of the LGBT community they come across. Have you ever even had a face-to-face conversation with someone you disagree with in real life?

                • GaryPonderosa@lemmy.world
                  11·
                  2 years ago

                  That’s not what you said. What you said was downvotes mean I’m wrong. I showed a case that clearly proved you were wrong, so now you’re trying to make a strawman argument out of an insignificant tangent.

                  I don’t think you actually believe anything you’re saying or are even cognizant of what it is that you are saying. I think you saw someone being downvotes and jumped on it as an opportunity to feel better about yourself since people are more likely to downvotes me since I’ve already been downvoted. I hope you progress in your life to the point where you don’t need this validation from others to function.

                  Good luck, and have a nice day.

                  • nepatriots32@lemmy.world
                    1·
                    2 years ago

                    Nah, I’m just pointing out dumb things you’re saying. You’re right that it’s pointless, though, as no one else is going to read this far down the comment chain and it’d also be obvious enough to them. And we sure know at this point that you’re incapable of doing anything but doubling down, so trying to point out the ridiculousness of the things you’re saying will just fly over your head.

      • rockstarashes@lemmy.world
        2·
        2 years ago

        Lol dude. Plenty of people who speak English as a second language can speak (and write!) fluently and “naturally” with few errors.

        This is confirmation bias. You assume anyone who writes a certain way online is a native speaker, but you have no way of actually knowing that unless they explicitly say so.

        • GaryPonderosa@lemmy.world
          11·
          2 years ago

          I do not assume anyone who writes a certain way online is a native speaker. I assume anyone who writes a certain way is an American. We are the largest group of native English speakers online, especially in forums that aren’t dedicated to a specific country.

          • rockstarashes@lemmy.world
            1·
            2 years ago

            I was responding to your claim that you can “usually” tell when English isn’t someone’s first language. You can’t. Unless every comment also states whether English is their native language, there’s no way you can know this. It’s likely there are a ton of people who aren’t native speakers that you don’t detect because they write well enough. Plenty of people are fluent in a second language.

            • GaryPonderosa@lemmy.world
              1·
              2 years ago

              I don’t care enough to go back and read what I wrote to confirm, but I’m fairly sure that I said I could tell when English wasn’t someone’s native language as an ancillary statement to my initial point that the correct course of action is to assume everyone is American unless contrary evidence arises.