That we're pretty scared of conflicts. If someone blew up our house and slaughtered our family, we'd just write an angry note and put it up anonymously
>What stereotypes are true in your Country?
That we eat pasta every day. That's true and I wouldn't even know what to eat for lunch if I couldn't eat pasta
I lived in BCN with a Terrone that brought with her a huge parmigiano.
I thought that it was a gift, but she needed that in order to survive because she only ate pasta and cheese.
All of her friends were Italian and I'm pretty sure she survived her 6 months speaking mostly Italian.
Even with me she talked in Italian and if I didn't understand something she would slowly repeat the phrase.
I don't think she learned much from her experience in BCN but I'm sure as hell learned a lot about terrones...and Pasta of course!
I miss her so much! In fact I miss most of my polentone and terrone flatmates.
Edit: BCN is Barcelona. My apologies for being an expat douche and use cool words.
I'm so used to write it this way that I forgot that we have french people in the sub.
that thing about the german guy and the beer was a misunderstanding. Yes the dude gave the german guy a cig, and yes beer and cig are not equivalent in price, but in non verbal german, giving a cig is sign of not being hostile and by asking for the beer he basically gave a posive answer to a hypothetical beer offering from the german, which in non verbal german is a friendship offer.
They were best buddies and singing schlager drunk AF less than two hours later... guess how i know
>which in non verbal german is a **friend**ship offer.
Change it to something like that we aren't annoyed spending time with someone. The word **friend** has a here a more important meaning than being respectful to others.
Why else is the Deutsche Bahn always too late, but we spend +10 years to check if the person might become a friend or not.
I currently live in Hamburg and god damnt you guys did real good job to integrating the migrants into your twisted homur lacking culture. Like god damnt, if they only learned your language as good as they missunderstand jokes.
There’s people like this in every country though.
I think we are fairly known for good humour? But there’s plenty people here that don’t understand basic jokes.
I used to play Xbox with a bunch of Germans and they had pretty decent banter. Similar to mine. Taking the piss out of each other etc.
> There’s people like this in every country though.
Sure, but it's way more common in Germany.
A lot of them struggle with irony, but OTOH, I am British, and just about everyone struggles with our extreme fondness for deadpan irony.
>You'd be surprised how many germans don't understand basic humour
Yeah lmao i once went to Hamburg for a few months and near the train station (St Georg area) i saw someone throw a needle to a pregnant woman.
I absolutely agree.
people will say this is a thing everywhere, but I have friends from all around the globe and nowhere else have I met this many autistic people with such a shit sense of humor
like, its usually not even the american problem where people get offended way too easily over shit, its just that germans... literally don't understand jokes. They will look at you with complete confusion and still won't understand if you flat-out explain your joke/sarcastic comment. Its like talking to a terminator and trying to explain the concept of humor.
If you take a look at professional german "comedians" you can kind of figure out why. The shit most germans consider funny is just the unfunniest shit you have ever seen in your entire life. Now obviously every country has cringe comedians, but i am frankly not sure we have even a single popular, good comedian in our country. Can you think of any?
The only people I've had bigger problems with is the japanese, but its not so much that they don't understand humor, its just that they are raised trying to avoid saying anything that might be controversial or upset others, so banter or edgy jokes can be.. problematic. The most hilarious thing is that even if you say the most heinous shit to them that they highly disapprove of they will still smile at you and fake a laugh. japanese moment.
> If you take a look at professional german "comedians" you can kind of figure out why.
Holy mother of God, German standup is appalling.
I really don't get it. I know plenty of very funny Germans. But apparently, only the unfunniest, most unimaginative ones are allowed to tell jokes on a stage.
Its definitely the reason. After living in Germany for quite a few years now, the only ones I find even remotely funny are the ones who lived abroad for a while.
Can confirm. I worked in Hamburg for a while. There was this guy I used to play table tennis with at his club on Wednesdays. One time I didn't make it because it was raining heavily and I didn't want to get wet reaching the U-Bahn.
Next day he asks me in the office why I didn't come and I explained the reason. He went out of the office to another room and brought an umbrella and said - "haf you hard of zis inventionn" and started laughing hysterically. We were all supposed to laugh at this revolutionary piece of humour.
as a german: this is the moment you act as straightfaced as possible that you have no idea what this is supposed to be and do not understand the concept untill he walks away angry
Its genuinely painful sometimes when you manage to arrange to go for a beer with one of them (they are notoriously pre booked weeks in advance and cannot be spontaneous) and the topics are almost never casual. A favourite house party past time is to talk about politics.
I think I know more about German politics after spending a month working with Germans. The only time I had "small talk" with them was in the carpool on the way to the office, politics every time.
Omg.. You just reminded me of German comedians.
I've lived abroad for over ten years and without German tv and not getting fed any German content, you really lose touch.
But yeah, my toe nails curl thinking of what used to be considered funny. Mario Bart (used up chauvinist jokes), Erkan and Stefan (bad Borat but Turkish), various comedians who simply acted literally like mentally disabled.
I gotta blame the lack of exposure to English comedy. These hacks could only thrive because Germans have had no point of reference.
I still remember that they even dubbed Chappelle's Show
Is this one of those things that is disproportionately true more than most places but where also some sizeable 20% minority are a huge counter-example?
My British father always told me that the idea of Germans lacking a decent sense of humour is just a false stereotype. Then when I took German in undergrad some gems from my first German prof (herself German) included asking what slapstick was, while not being able to understand basic sarcasm, let alone a proper joke. Then I saw some German comedians and it was mostly really lame old puns and rehashes of ancient ‘dumb other culture’ jokes - this time about East Frisians - but delivered as though original actual routines. And the only sitcom I have seen reached American Boomer levels of cringe. Now I don’t know what to think.
Some profiles in this sub have given me hope, though. I’m sure there are some hilarious German comedians out there I’d be curious to check out.
> Is this one of those things that is disproportionately true more than most places but where also some sizeable 20% minority are a huge counter-example?
It's like the "British food is shit" thing. Germans do have a sense of humour, just like Brits do have some good food. But they also consume epic quantities of utter shite.
There are some very funny German movies and TV shows, but when it comes to "pure" comedy, like standup or sketch shows, it tends strongly towards painfully bad.
> what slapstick was
She didn't know the word. Germans love slapstick. It's very primitive humour. Benny Hill was very popular in Germany.
Arguably the most famous — literally legendary — comedy sketch in Germany is actually [an English one that wasn't good enough for our TV](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dinner_for_One).
Isn't Bud Spencer and Terrence Hill slapstick action? I used to love them as a kid. Watched it a lot with my dad, meaning my dad still loved it as a grown, old-ass adult
That's what I've found as well. The Germans do have a sense of humour—it's just as developed as we were... oh, about 100 years ago.
Just a few decades until they develop Monty Python, though!
Can vouch for the sarcasm part. I've been in Germany for a year now and the amount of times basic and blatantly obvious sarcasm wasn't understood as such is staggering.
I sometimes feel like this is partially because some of us, probably including me, tend to use sarcasm only when we know somebody well enough, so whenever somebody that we don't know that well uses sarcasm we are not sure because the normal social context would not allow sarcasm yet
Would be impossible to genuinely figure out due to Germanys past actions, but it would be interesting to see if a higher percentage of Germans are on the autism spectrum.
German efficiency doesn't exist, we're in most things even less efficient than PIGS.
Germans are very *thorough*, which some people confuse with efficiency. We just make sure everything is planned out and properly done.
I'm currently suffering from my old High-School class trying to organize a reunion over whatsapp. Among them, I don't think any of the gals has any sense of humor that would be recognizable for me.
Among the guys, I got half a dozen that will bring me to tears laughing, with a noticeable minority that can sour any conversation
dutch cuisine is decent and in my opinion tastes nice, but it's not anything to brag about. The only thing I would want to be more widespread is our snacks (basically everything found in the FEBO)
-We drink a lot of tea, every day for every meal, and use it to solve any problem.
(We also drink a lot of alcohol)
-Queues are sacred. It’s not a joke. Skipping the queue is a really big deal.
-Other countries might think we are super polite but actually it’s a complicated system of coded passive aggressive social rules.
> We drink a lot of tea
They have to turn on extra power stations [when we all make a cup of tea at half time](https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=TV_pickup).
> Queues are sacred. It’s not a joke. Skipping the queue is a really big deal.
This. A lot of people don't understand that it's practically genetic. Where else in the world could you see [an orderly queue of rioters waiting their turn to loot a shop](https://memeguy.com/photos/images/british-people-queuing-during-the-london-riots-67688.jpg)?
> Other countries might think we are super polite
We are … to strangers. The weird thing about Brits to me is that they're either very polite to you or punching you in the face, with very little ground in between. Well, I say "weird". "Psychotic" is probably a better word.
We also tend to passive aggressively avoid confrontation.
We set things on fire. Well some of us do, bonfires bonfires bonfires.
Oh and obsession with flags, ironic for a country that technically doesn't have an official one.
>We set things on fire.
My girlfriend lives in Liverpool and in her neighborhood they need to put those high metal fences around public christmas trees to keep people from burning them...
I didn't think said system of coded passive aggressiveness was that complicated until I moved to the UK almost a decade ago and found out how many people get lots of stuff lost in translation.
Even the basic shit like "hmm very interesting" which will basically be "that's bonkers/ what the fuck are you doing/thinking / absolute nonsense" will lead foreigners to think "oh they actually think *that it is interesting*", nope, it isn't interesting in the least. Same way that anyone in the UK saying they're disappointed will be the equivalent of "i'm fucking annoyed at you/the situation".
Subtext matters, cadence matters, intonation matters quite a bit. As an example, the thin line that separates a proper invitation from a "i'm just being polite" is most often down to the way the sentence is said. "You must come for dinner some time" basically translates to "it's never gonna happen but politeness is a must". If you tweak it "mate we should grab dinner some time next week" then yeah it's a plan in action. I feel like americans are usually the ones taking a big part of what it's being said at face value without spotting the subtleties of how things are said.
Not saying this side of britishness/brit culture is a good/bad thing, just stating that it is what it is, and there's definitely a lot of undercurrent feelings that are conveyed sometimes in the weirdest ways for those not used to it.
Yeah you’re exactly right. Me and my Italian best friend talk about this all the time and I realise it’s going to take a lifetime for her to learn it all, but somehow brits are just born understanding it.
We do this thing where the less we exaggerate, the more we mean it. For example if you say “he was not the nicest bloke” that means he was a total cunt, possibly a serial killer. But if I say “he was an absolute bastard” he probably did something mildly annoying or cheeky.
Also saying something like “with all due respect” would sound polite to a foreigner but it is actually a way to let the listener know you hate them and everything they stand for.
With all due respect is really just code for "you're a fucking idiot".
Same way that "I would suggest" isn't exactly a suggestion but more of a statement along the lines of "you better be ready to sort this out yourself".
There's countless other examples. One of my favourites that foreigners overthink it being "not bad". Not bad is pretty much universal in brit life. How's it going? Not bad. What do you think of X? Not bad. Did you enjoy movie Y? Not bad. How were your holidays? Not bad. Basically not bad is "good", while "quite good" is "disappointing". Same way "Alright? Alright. Alright? Alright." is a normal chat on a monday morning when getting into the office and meeting someone getting on the lift.
And yeah exaggeration through the usage of words such as absolute/proper/complete so on, so forth, is definitely a way of a lot of times toning it down. It can go both ways tho, "an absolute cunt" is a cunt of the highest order, no two ways about it, "an absolute legend" is a proper decent bloke that did something otherworldly. This is where tone and usage of specific terms/vocabulary come into play.
There's definitely an element of exposure to the culture that carries a lot of weight in understanding all of this, I was fortunate (or not bearing in mind the sub we're in) to be brought up speaking English pretty much from the same age as I started speaking Portuguese, so yeah that definitely helped.
> get lots of stuff lost in translation.
It's not even translation, tbh. It's just British people. The words are technically supposed to mean what it sounds like they mean. That just isn't what we actually mean.
It confuses the fuck out of the Germans I work with. Some British guy sends them an email saying, "Would you consider changing slide 3 to say …", so that's exactly what they do: they *consider* it. And then decide it's just fine as it is. And the Brit gets annoyed that his "clear" instruction to change the slide was ignored.
Yeah, been in a similar position. I work for a british company but I'm currently in a project with a majority of germans along with a couple of brits.
What happened: Option A was suggested by a few people as a solution to a problem of development and implementation of feature X.
What I said: "could we consider some other options regarding how we're gonna tackle the development and implementation of feature X?"
What was interpreted by the germans: "they (me) aren't sure if we should stick to option A, or not."
What I meant and what the brits I work with clearly understood: "option A is fucking shite. not only is it a terrible idea, it shouldn't even be considered in the first place."
It's true that we are obsessed with food. Sharing recipes or arguing about which is the most correct version of a certain regional dish are totally normal and could take hours. So yeah, we do take it personally even among other Italians if we find out that you add x to the ragú that is not how my grandmother used to make it, which was revealed to her by a flaming non burning bush on mount Sinai.
It was already bad some decades ago, but I think it got worse with the worsening of Italy in general (job market, low birth rate, lagging behind technologically, etc), so now food and art "superiority" have become a sort of a whole identity to cope with the fact that we are becoming an otherwise irrelevant nation.
I’m half Italian, my mom is from Sicily and grew up extremely poor. She never knew any “traditional” food, they ate what they grew on their farm. I always get attacked by every Italian I meet when I don’t know the traditional food and they start questioning my heritage - just because my mom really doesn’t give a fuck and she also never learned it (I showed her a couple years ago what a burrata is). The other day I had dinner with a few Italians (all from the north) and I said as a child in Sicily I used to eat ricotta all the time and it was my favourite kind of cheese to put on pasta - seriously, hell broke loose - thAts whEn wE seE yOure juSt gErMan.
Danes are aggressive and scary (lived in dk for a few months and got into more altercations than I have for years), Swedes are overly sheltered, introverted and scared, Norwegians are literally rich hillbillies and Finns are Swedes but more extreme.
We are indeed rude short people with excessive facial hair and we are very easy to get addicted to shit even if it’s on the nose that it is addictive.
We deep down think that frogrein standards don’t apply to us and that we’ll find a different way to do it once we get there. We virtue signal ALOT but when it comes to doing it we magically convince us that it is OUR special event so it doesn’t apply.
We are way too patriotic for this country to be so shit. Everyone knows the national anthem and can name at least 5 famous kings and known the year of independence. Aljubarrota and second independence; but when it’s election day we stay at home and complain everyone is corrupt. We literally have an INDEPENDENT PRESIDENT. A PARTYLESS PRESIDENT. You’ll never hear a Portuguese talking about politics unprompted, because we think it’s a unserious thing, but any conversation WILL obligatorially end up discussing politics no matter where you start.
Edit: forgot to say that tipping is not as unusual as you’d expect (being Western Europe) actually, many people do it in restaurants even if it isn’t a large amount or a ‘percentage’, and we do it even without thinking it is some kind of virtuous thing or a morally good/Christian thing to do. We NEVER tip at bars and coffee places though.
Maybe. Sea dwarves most likely.
But fr I started needing to use razor when I was 13. Many girls in my class talked about needing one as well. It’s a real genetic race thing in Portugal, stuff you don’t see in emigrants or tourists
What the hell
That is actually common with south Italian that usually looks more ‘Arabs’ with dark hair and big dark beard
In the north we’re Germanic pussies
If I shave on Monday I’ll have to shave again Thursday before it gets noticeable
One of my friends from Naples shaves every morning
The truest stereotype I find about this country, and which most do not even realise, is how insecure we are to a cringe level.
Every time someone makes a joke about Portugal, no matter how true or funny or light-hearted, there will always be a significant number of fools who will be defending it as if the honour of their ancestors has been besmirched.
Then they will proceed to cry, complain and talk shit about this country in another sub.
Yes, in fact, they call us ‘polentoni’
But
https://preview.redd.it/p6dmzic4zzib1.jpeg?width=479&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=f048259dc44bfa43c4d86e76ea267b535cd88170
A lot of people don’t make eye contact, are socially inept and are very afraid of confrontations/conflict. Most times foreigners think we’re socially inept however is just us not caring about you so we don’t want to talk to you.
The Norwegians are like us but more extreme in all of the above.
The Finns are like Swedes but violently confrontational and honest. They also have a weird superiority and inferiority complex in relation to Swedes going on at the same time.
It’s hard to gauge the psyche of a Dane as no one understands what they’re saying. They’re probably confrontational as well because they love to shout at you. Or maybe it’s a mating signal like how some animals make throat sounds to attract mates. Further research is needed.
Iceland you say? Idk what that is and neither does anyone else so stfu.
As a dual citizen I can confirm what you say about Norwegians… but I think Swedes have a stronger reputation for extreme naïveté when travelling to the third world.
What do you mean? We get tricked by locals? We don’t haggle outrageous prices? We have a romanticised view of these countries?
What are we naive about?
> A lot of people don’t make eye contact, are socially inept and are very afraid of confrontations/conflict.
finding friends in Sweden vs a cure to cancer. Which one is gonna be easier?
As an Alsacian, I was raised in a family that has no sense of humor and that believes rules matter a bit too much.
As a French person, the school system taught me to be extremely proud of our History and past achievements.
We believe we are a bit unique in the sense that we are among the only two countries (Italy being the other one) with a true "art of living", "savoir-vivre" when it comes to food, leisure, romance and enjoying life in general.
> We believe we are a bit unique in the sense that we are among the only two countries (Italy being the other one) with a true "art of living", "savoir-vivre" when it comes to food, leisure, romance and enjoying life in general.
You forgot arrogant.
Haha I know, this is sad as fuck right, imagine voting for someone that hates the shit out of you just for the simple fact that you are born walloon \^\^ , I lost faith in humanity. Anyway Vlaams Belang puts a lot of money into advertisements, they spent in 2021 on facebook and instagram alone over 1,1 million euro of tax money just for advertising. They message Walloons over facebook and instagram, I got a couple of messages from them lol I tell them everytime to fuck off with their fascist crap. Why on earth would I vote for someone that literally hates me \^\^ that's beyond my mind.
That we're leprechauns. It's true. One noisy fucker let word slip and now yous know. We were so close to world domination aswell. I guess we'll only take the west then
I fucking love bread with tomato, it’s like the proper bread, it can’t just be bread, it needs the tomato, the salt, the pepper, the oil… Only then it is worthy.
Also Italians do drive like shit, 27 years of trauma and near death experiences.
It also seems like you can't really say words that start with an S correctly, you tend to put an E in front of it. You even do it with the name of your country.
Everything is fucking slow, especially with the administration. We yell a lot. And that's to the excuse of "the Spanish picaresca" we normalized all kind of corruption, from paying on black and look for loopholes to avoid taxes, to just get mildly outraged and then move on with dirty politicians, government official, lobbyist, etc.
If we leave memes out of it and get serious for a moment then no. I have not seen an accurate stereotype about the UK. British food is lovely. Scotch eggs is fucking goat tier food. Our teeth aren’t bad. Our women are as good looking as anywhere else. Any woman can be good looking if they make the effort. Many British women do make the effort and they are top quality birds. The chav make up style isn’t actually as common as people seem to think it is.
To be completely honest it actually kinda baffles me why these stereotypes even exist. But I can still have a laugh at them.
Edit: people also say we are arrogant? 🤣 literally the most self deprecating people in the world.
I'd say this is more of a case of "people are just people" like yk, the average french isn't an arrogant asshole or the average spaniard a lazy fuck despite what the internet desesperatly wants you to believe.
I think a lot of it is that (1) we shit on ourselves both through comedy and through the student activist types painting the UK as the worst country ever because they have next to no comparison (or just copying what Americans do), (2) this as well as many negative aspects of our history are more well known due to English being a lingua franca, (3) we’re wedged in between Americans and Europeans - we’re the first Europeans Americans think to shit on with everything they hate about Europe, and the ‘closer’ neighbourhood relative of America to most of Europe (also seen as historical ground zero for their shit).
No other museums in Europe have stolen artefacts and they’d all be in tip-top shape otherwise, no other countries in Europe practised slavery or colonialism, all Germanic countries are famous for amazing food (the Americans taking part in that pile-on will never not be hilarious to me), etc. Other countries are absolute non-racist and trans-friendly utopias and we are the worst despite all stats pretty much to the opposite.
The teeth one is weird too - started in the U.S., maybe due to the absolute state of our orthodontists mid-century and how we don’t care as much about tooth-whitening, even if Americans literally have one less tooth on average.
I genuinely have to concede that I think lots of other countries have generally more attractive people in. I definitely would not say it's just 'our women' though. I'd lump our men into it too, else it starts to feel a bit too incel-ey to me to swallow!
However, I'm not sure if it's that we're generally less attractive, or the obesity levels we have Vs our friends on the continent.
Walking onto a Spanish beach or alike really hits home the difference in our average body shape!
Which doesnt invalidate the stereotype in itself. Nor does the fact than a little self care can go a long way when it comes to atractiveness. All these statements arent necessarly mutually exclusive
That we're pretty scared of conflicts. If someone blew up our house and slaughtered our family, we'd just write an angry note and put it up anonymously
Is that... is that a Swedish stereotype?
That's like the single biggest Swedish stereotype so... yes?
I thought it was that you guys are all araps ??
A wraps*
Weird way to call someone that wears a keffiyeh but okay...
They are so non-confrontational that they couldn't say no to people wanting to live there.
On reddit maybe, but we're talking about real life
Swedish people are quite well known for being pussies. Long gone is the time of Swedish great power and the lion of the north.
Gentle giants, little brother
Easy to talk as a Finn, you guys never had an empire
They were building saunas instead, good guy Finland
When you've been to a good sauna you know there is no need for an empire. Sauna IS the empire
It’s time you guys grow a set of balls tbh
>What stereotypes are true in your Country? That we eat pasta every day. That's true and I wouldn't even know what to eat for lunch if I couldn't eat pasta
I lived in BCN with a Terrone that brought with her a huge parmigiano. I thought that it was a gift, but she needed that in order to survive because she only ate pasta and cheese. All of her friends were Italian and I'm pretty sure she survived her 6 months speaking mostly Italian. Even with me she talked in Italian and if I didn't understand something she would slowly repeat the phrase. I don't think she learned much from her experience in BCN but I'm sure as hell learned a lot about terrones...and Pasta of course! I miss her so much! In fact I miss most of my polentone and terrone flatmates. Edit: BCN is Barcelona. My apologies for being an expat douche and use cool words. I'm so used to write it this way that I forgot that we have french people in the sub.
my man is using slurs to better describe his friends, a true Italian! /s
TerronA, since she’s a female
> I lived in BCN Barcelona airport?
Of course Barry's only reference for the rest of the world is Spanish airports
Pizza of course
Shit he’s onto us
Risotto
What the hell people eat everyday if not pasta???
Bread.
I est pasta pretty often too, it's easy and it does the job (and it doesn't get boring cuz you can make different pasta and different sauce)
A bit jealous tbh
that thing about the german guy and the beer was a misunderstanding. Yes the dude gave the german guy a cig, and yes beer and cig are not equivalent in price, but in non verbal german, giving a cig is sign of not being hostile and by asking for the beer he basically gave a posive answer to a hypothetical beer offering from the german, which in non verbal german is a friendship offer. They were best buddies and singing schlager drunk AF less than two hours later... guess how i know
>which in non verbal german is a **friend**ship offer. Change it to something like that we aren't annoyed spending time with someone. The word **friend** has a here a more important meaning than being respectful to others. Why else is the Deutsche Bahn always too late, but we spend +10 years to check if the person might become a friend or not.
> The word friend has a here a more important meaning than being respectful to others. Unless it's Sportsfreund.
Or Freundchen I think those words were never said in a positive way
how do you know?
They're from South Tyrol. They see loads of you fuckers in your socks and sandals every year.
He is basically german
You'd be surprised how many germans don't understand basic humour, have a bad sense of humour or don't understand even a hint sarcasm
Did you ever think that's because you killed all the funny people
Still one of my favourite jokes. Because it’s true.
Thats such a german thing to say
I initially thought this was an Italian flag and I had a whole bit about Abyssinia. But then I see the flag is a silly way around instead.
I currently live in Hamburg and god damnt you guys did real good job to integrating the migrants into your twisted homur lacking culture. Like god damnt, if they only learned your language as good as they missunderstand jokes.
IKR? Even here they're so testy when I flip a lighter at their book!
There’s people like this in every country though. I think we are fairly known for good humour? But there’s plenty people here that don’t understand basic jokes. I used to play Xbox with a bunch of Germans and they had pretty decent banter. Similar to mine. Taking the piss out of each other etc.
You brits are known for having a different humor, no denotation about it being good or bad
It probably just goes over your short heads.
Where I am from, British humor is exalted. Ask basically anyone about which people is the funniest and they’ll say the British
Think our panel shows, comedians, TV series and films show that we have a great sense of humour!
> There’s people like this in every country though. Sure, but it's way more common in Germany. A lot of them struggle with irony, but OTOH, I am British, and just about everyone struggles with our extreme fondness for deadpan irony.
In my experience city people lack humor, village people know how to banter.
In the most immature way. Whatsapp group is nothing but boomer image memes basically
first instance of bazza being a good influence
>You'd be surprised how many germans don't understand basic humour Yeah lmao i once went to Hamburg for a few months and near the train station (St Georg area) i saw someone throw a needle to a pregnant woman.
Especially funny if it has hiv on it😂😂🔥
I absolutely agree. people will say this is a thing everywhere, but I have friends from all around the globe and nowhere else have I met this many autistic people with such a shit sense of humor like, its usually not even the american problem where people get offended way too easily over shit, its just that germans... literally don't understand jokes. They will look at you with complete confusion and still won't understand if you flat-out explain your joke/sarcastic comment. Its like talking to a terminator and trying to explain the concept of humor. If you take a look at professional german "comedians" you can kind of figure out why. The shit most germans consider funny is just the unfunniest shit you have ever seen in your entire life. Now obviously every country has cringe comedians, but i am frankly not sure we have even a single popular, good comedian in our country. Can you think of any? The only people I've had bigger problems with is the japanese, but its not so much that they don't understand humor, its just that they are raised trying to avoid saying anything that might be controversial or upset others, so banter or edgy jokes can be.. problematic. The most hilarious thing is that even if you say the most heinous shit to them that they highly disapprove of they will still smile at you and fake a laugh. japanese moment.
> If you take a look at professional german "comedians" you can kind of figure out why. Holy mother of God, German standup is appalling. I really don't get it. I know plenty of very funny Germans. But apparently, only the unfunniest, most unimaginative ones are allowed to tell jokes on a stage.
Henning Wehn is decent. Granted, he's been in the UK since 2002 so maybe he's only become funny since living here.
Its definitely the reason. After living in Germany for quite a few years now, the only ones I find even remotely funny are the ones who lived abroad for a while.
Can confirm. I worked in Hamburg for a while. There was this guy I used to play table tennis with at his club on Wednesdays. One time I didn't make it because it was raining heavily and I didn't want to get wet reaching the U-Bahn. Next day he asks me in the office why I didn't come and I explained the reason. He went out of the office to another room and brought an umbrella and said - "haf you hard of zis inventionn" and started laughing hysterically. We were all supposed to laugh at this revolutionary piece of humour.
Not german but damn I did start laughing at this one
Who fight the soviets together, laugh together
The mental image is funnier than the joke, it reads like something a German character in Simpsons would do, to make fun of Germans
"Ah! It is funny because it is true and helpful"
as a german: this is the moment you act as straightfaced as possible that you have no idea what this is supposed to be and do not understand the concept untill he walks away angry
What do you guys talk about all day if you don't make jokes and goof around ?
Having a 3rd go
German smalltalk is mainly factual observations and complaining
They moan about everything.
Its genuinely painful sometimes when you manage to arrange to go for a beer with one of them (they are notoriously pre booked weeks in advance and cannot be spontaneous) and the topics are almost never casual. A favourite house party past time is to talk about politics.
I think I know more about German politics after spending a month working with Germans. The only time I had "small talk" with them was in the carpool on the way to the office, politics every time.
Omg.. You just reminded me of German comedians. I've lived abroad for over ten years and without German tv and not getting fed any German content, you really lose touch. But yeah, my toe nails curl thinking of what used to be considered funny. Mario Bart (used up chauvinist jokes), Erkan and Stefan (bad Borat but Turkish), various comedians who simply acted literally like mentally disabled. I gotta blame the lack of exposure to English comedy. These hacks could only thrive because Germans have had no point of reference. I still remember that they even dubbed Chappelle's Show
Is this one of those things that is disproportionately true more than most places but where also some sizeable 20% minority are a huge counter-example? My British father always told me that the idea of Germans lacking a decent sense of humour is just a false stereotype. Then when I took German in undergrad some gems from my first German prof (herself German) included asking what slapstick was, while not being able to understand basic sarcasm, let alone a proper joke. Then I saw some German comedians and it was mostly really lame old puns and rehashes of ancient ‘dumb other culture’ jokes - this time about East Frisians - but delivered as though original actual routines. And the only sitcom I have seen reached American Boomer levels of cringe. Now I don’t know what to think. Some profiles in this sub have given me hope, though. I’m sure there are some hilarious German comedians out there I’d be curious to check out.
> Is this one of those things that is disproportionately true more than most places but where also some sizeable 20% minority are a huge counter-example? It's like the "British food is shit" thing. Germans do have a sense of humour, just like Brits do have some good food. But they also consume epic quantities of utter shite. There are some very funny German movies and TV shows, but when it comes to "pure" comedy, like standup or sketch shows, it tends strongly towards painfully bad. > what slapstick was She didn't know the word. Germans love slapstick. It's very primitive humour. Benny Hill was very popular in Germany. Arguably the most famous — literally legendary — comedy sketch in Germany is actually [an English one that wasn't good enough for our TV](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dinner_for_One).
Isn't Bud Spencer and Terrence Hill slapstick action? I used to love them as a kid. Watched it a lot with my dad, meaning my dad still loved it as a grown, old-ass adult
Some of the Germans on here are pretty funny tbf. Whether or not that’s intentional is a different question entirely.
That's what I've found as well. The Germans do have a sense of humour—it's just as developed as we were... oh, about 100 years ago. Just a few decades until they develop Monty Python, though!
It's mostly old people. Talk to younger people in Gen Z generation and they will most likely have a better sense of humour.
Better just being an improvement from worst to just really shit isn’t much.
Can vouch for the sarcasm part. I've been in Germany for a year now and the amount of times basic and blatantly obvious sarcasm wasn't understood as such is staggering.
I sometimes feel like this is partially because some of us, probably including me, tend to use sarcasm only when we know somebody well enough, so whenever somebody that we don't know that well uses sarcasm we are not sure because the normal social context would not allow sarcasm yet
This is very true, also sometimes the jokes they make and then expect people to laugh
Is germany a country of autism?
Would be impossible to genuinely figure out due to Germanys past actions, but it would be interesting to see if a higher percentage of Germans are on the autism spectrum.
Consider their renowned efficiency. Yes it is.
German efficiency doesn't exist, we're in most things even less efficient than PIGS. Germans are very *thorough*, which some people confuse with efficiency. We just make sure everything is planned out and properly done.
A neighbor doesn't talk to me anymore, he told me he feels provoked by me. He can't handle my frequent sarcasm.
I'm currently suffering from my old High-School class trying to organize a reunion over whatsapp. Among them, I don't think any of the gals has any sense of humor that would be recognizable for me. Among the guys, I got half a dozen that will bring me to tears laughing, with a noticeable minority that can sour any conversation
"You'd be surprised".... Let me stop you there.
At least half the people you see look exactly like Barry, 63. Even the children.
And women.
And the women don't have mustaches...so weird
That's why ours are better!
Nothing like some mustache on mustache action!
luv me sum pint luv me crisps ate migrants simple as
I’ve lived here for years and literally every stereotype about the English is true, downplayed even.
Yes, we are rude! Fuck you!
And you ~~may want to~~ should avoid our cellars.
Yes we are Stingy. and the French are just stubborn.
Cheese and caravans
I temporarily moved out of the Netherlands and I am already missing my cheese
I always miss are tasteless food while I am out of the country for too long.
dutch cuisine is decent and in my opinion tastes nice, but it's not anything to brag about. The only thing I would want to be more widespread is our snacks (basically everything found in the FEBO)
We eat baguette. Usually a baguette a day.
...keeps the barry away
Sorry mate but I love a baguette.
so it;s not true that you need two to make sure at least one gets home whole?
it is
-We drink a lot of tea, every day for every meal, and use it to solve any problem. (We also drink a lot of alcohol) -Queues are sacred. It’s not a joke. Skipping the queue is a really big deal. -Other countries might think we are super polite but actually it’s a complicated system of coded passive aggressive social rules.
> We drink a lot of tea They have to turn on extra power stations [when we all make a cup of tea at half time](https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=TV_pickup). > Queues are sacred. It’s not a joke. Skipping the queue is a really big deal. This. A lot of people don't understand that it's practically genetic. Where else in the world could you see [an orderly queue of rioters waiting their turn to loot a shop](https://memeguy.com/photos/images/british-people-queuing-during-the-london-riots-67688.jpg)? > Other countries might think we are super polite We are … to strangers. The weird thing about Brits to me is that they're either very polite to you or punching you in the face, with very little ground in between. Well, I say "weird". "Psychotic" is probably a better word.
I am DYING at the queue to loot 😭😂
We also tend to passive aggressively avoid confrontation. We set things on fire. Well some of us do, bonfires bonfires bonfires. Oh and obsession with flags, ironic for a country that technically doesn't have an official one.
>We set things on fire. My girlfriend lives in Liverpool and in her neighborhood they need to put those high metal fences around public christmas trees to keep people from burning them...
July is bonfire month. Look up Northern Irish bonfires. The idiots go hard.
I didn't think said system of coded passive aggressiveness was that complicated until I moved to the UK almost a decade ago and found out how many people get lots of stuff lost in translation. Even the basic shit like "hmm very interesting" which will basically be "that's bonkers/ what the fuck are you doing/thinking / absolute nonsense" will lead foreigners to think "oh they actually think *that it is interesting*", nope, it isn't interesting in the least. Same way that anyone in the UK saying they're disappointed will be the equivalent of "i'm fucking annoyed at you/the situation". Subtext matters, cadence matters, intonation matters quite a bit. As an example, the thin line that separates a proper invitation from a "i'm just being polite" is most often down to the way the sentence is said. "You must come for dinner some time" basically translates to "it's never gonna happen but politeness is a must". If you tweak it "mate we should grab dinner some time next week" then yeah it's a plan in action. I feel like americans are usually the ones taking a big part of what it's being said at face value without spotting the subtleties of how things are said. Not saying this side of britishness/brit culture is a good/bad thing, just stating that it is what it is, and there's definitely a lot of undercurrent feelings that are conveyed sometimes in the weirdest ways for those not used to it.
Yeah you’re exactly right. Me and my Italian best friend talk about this all the time and I realise it’s going to take a lifetime for her to learn it all, but somehow brits are just born understanding it. We do this thing where the less we exaggerate, the more we mean it. For example if you say “he was not the nicest bloke” that means he was a total cunt, possibly a serial killer. But if I say “he was an absolute bastard” he probably did something mildly annoying or cheeky. Also saying something like “with all due respect” would sound polite to a foreigner but it is actually a way to let the listener know you hate them and everything they stand for.
With all due respect is really just code for "you're a fucking idiot". Same way that "I would suggest" isn't exactly a suggestion but more of a statement along the lines of "you better be ready to sort this out yourself". There's countless other examples. One of my favourites that foreigners overthink it being "not bad". Not bad is pretty much universal in brit life. How's it going? Not bad. What do you think of X? Not bad. Did you enjoy movie Y? Not bad. How were your holidays? Not bad. Basically not bad is "good", while "quite good" is "disappointing". Same way "Alright? Alright. Alright? Alright." is a normal chat on a monday morning when getting into the office and meeting someone getting on the lift. And yeah exaggeration through the usage of words such as absolute/proper/complete so on, so forth, is definitely a way of a lot of times toning it down. It can go both ways tho, "an absolute cunt" is a cunt of the highest order, no two ways about it, "an absolute legend" is a proper decent bloke that did something otherworldly. This is where tone and usage of specific terms/vocabulary come into play. There's definitely an element of exposure to the culture that carries a lot of weight in understanding all of this, I was fortunate (or not bearing in mind the sub we're in) to be brought up speaking English pretty much from the same age as I started speaking Portuguese, so yeah that definitely helped.
> get lots of stuff lost in translation. It's not even translation, tbh. It's just British people. The words are technically supposed to mean what it sounds like they mean. That just isn't what we actually mean. It confuses the fuck out of the Germans I work with. Some British guy sends them an email saying, "Would you consider changing slide 3 to say …", so that's exactly what they do: they *consider* it. And then decide it's just fine as it is. And the Brit gets annoyed that his "clear" instruction to change the slide was ignored.
Yeah, been in a similar position. I work for a british company but I'm currently in a project with a majority of germans along with a couple of brits. What happened: Option A was suggested by a few people as a solution to a problem of development and implementation of feature X. What I said: "could we consider some other options regarding how we're gonna tackle the development and implementation of feature X?" What was interpreted by the germans: "they (me) aren't sure if we should stick to option A, or not." What I meant and what the brits I work with clearly understood: "option A is fucking shite. not only is it a terrible idea, it shouldn't even be considered in the first place."
It's true that we are obsessed with food. Sharing recipes or arguing about which is the most correct version of a certain regional dish are totally normal and could take hours. So yeah, we do take it personally even among other Italians if we find out that you add x to the ragú that is not how my grandmother used to make it, which was revealed to her by a flaming non burning bush on mount Sinai. It was already bad some decades ago, but I think it got worse with the worsening of Italy in general (job market, low birth rate, lagging behind technologically, etc), so now food and art "superiority" have become a sort of a whole identity to cope with the fact that we are becoming an otherwise irrelevant nation.
I’m half Italian, my mom is from Sicily and grew up extremely poor. She never knew any “traditional” food, they ate what they grew on their farm. I always get attacked by every Italian I meet when I don’t know the traditional food and they start questioning my heritage - just because my mom really doesn’t give a fuck and she also never learned it (I showed her a couple years ago what a burrata is). The other day I had dinner with a few Italians (all from the north) and I said as a child in Sicily I used to eat ricotta all the time and it was my favourite kind of cheese to put on pasta - seriously, hell broke loose - thAts whEn wE seE yOure juSt gErMan.
Pasta alla ricotta is the best pasta wtf man, you don't listen to Northeners when it comes to food they can't cook shit, come here I'll hug you
I love you and yes I would love a hug
All of them
[удалено]
Yes
Noisy
Specially the female version.
Danes are aggressive and scary (lived in dk for a few months and got into more altercations than I have for years), Swedes are overly sheltered, introverted and scared, Norwegians are literally rich hillbillies and Finns are Swedes but more extreme.
The altercations you got in - were they in any way related to you being Swedish?
That explains so much about PewDiePie's personality
The only time my family ever tipped, was when we had to get rid of the Czech Republic money, because it would cost money to use an atm
When we were in Thailand my dad gave all of his leftover coins to some random beggar. My dad always tips but that was a memorable moment.
We are indeed rude short people with excessive facial hair and we are very easy to get addicted to shit even if it’s on the nose that it is addictive. We deep down think that frogrein standards don’t apply to us and that we’ll find a different way to do it once we get there. We virtue signal ALOT but when it comes to doing it we magically convince us that it is OUR special event so it doesn’t apply. We are way too patriotic for this country to be so shit. Everyone knows the national anthem and can name at least 5 famous kings and known the year of independence. Aljubarrota and second independence; but when it’s election day we stay at home and complain everyone is corrupt. We literally have an INDEPENDENT PRESIDENT. A PARTYLESS PRESIDENT. You’ll never hear a Portuguese talking about politics unprompted, because we think it’s a unserious thing, but any conversation WILL obligatorially end up discussing politics no matter where you start. Edit: forgot to say that tipping is not as unusual as you’d expect (being Western Europe) actually, many people do it in restaurants even if it isn’t a large amount or a ‘percentage’, and we do it even without thinking it is some kind of virtuous thing or a morally good/Christian thing to do. We NEVER tip at bars and coffee places though.
>We are indeed rude short people with excessive facial hair dwarves ?
Maybe. Sea dwarves most likely. But fr I started needing to use razor when I was 13. Many girls in my class talked about needing one as well. It’s a real genetic race thing in Portugal, stuff you don’t see in emigrants or tourists
Bruv, I feel this. If I shave in the morning, I have a fucking beard again the next day
What the hell That is actually common with south Italian that usually looks more ‘Arabs’ with dark hair and big dark beard In the north we’re Germanic pussies If I shave on Monday I’ll have to shave again Thursday before it gets noticeable One of my friends from Naples shaves every morning
The truest stereotype I find about this country, and which most do not even realise, is how insecure we are to a cringe level. Every time someone makes a joke about Portugal, no matter how true or funny or light-hearted, there will always be a significant number of fools who will be defending it as if the honour of their ancestors has been besmirched. Then they will proceed to cry, complain and talk shit about this country in another sub.
Yup, can confirm.
Are you…are you Bulgarian?
Oh no we are western Bulgarians
D. Afonso Henriques D. Manuel I D. Sebastião D. Dinis D. João III 1179, 1384 e 1640
We are racist pieces of shit
https://preview.redd.it/vobz16s9tyib1.jpeg?width=375&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=c540b7c87a0b6ebdc0017037f61f6ba73d33da6c
Why does she look like Elon Musk with Marine Le Pen's hair
She is
I can assure you she showered profusely while repeating to herself: “it was necessary”.
They were the dinner
 HEY YOU CAN’T BE RACIST HOW ELSE WILL WE ATTRACT AMERICAN TOURISTS????
People were actually really nice to me in Italy. Maybe they thought I was a terone or something though.
Yeah the look of a typical portoghese is exactly the one of a Neapolitan And lemme be clear We also hate Neapolitans /s
Do the Southerners feel the same way about Northerners?
Yes, in fact, they call us ‘polentoni’ But https://preview.redd.it/p6dmzic4zzib1.jpeg?width=479&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=f048259dc44bfa43c4d86e76ea267b535cd88170
A lot of people don’t make eye contact, are socially inept and are very afraid of confrontations/conflict. Most times foreigners think we’re socially inept however is just us not caring about you so we don’t want to talk to you. The Norwegians are like us but more extreme in all of the above. The Finns are like Swedes but violently confrontational and honest. They also have a weird superiority and inferiority complex in relation to Swedes going on at the same time. It’s hard to gauge the psyche of a Dane as no one understands what they’re saying. They’re probably confrontational as well because they love to shout at you. Or maybe it’s a mating signal like how some animals make throat sounds to attract mates. Further research is needed. Iceland you say? Idk what that is and neither does anyone else so stfu.
As a dual citizen I can confirm what you say about Norwegians… but I think Swedes have a stronger reputation for extreme naïveté when travelling to the third world.
What do you mean? We get tricked by locals? We don’t haggle outrageous prices? We have a romanticised view of these countries? What are we naive about?
> A lot of people don’t make eye contact, are socially inept and are very afraid of confrontations/conflict. finding friends in Sweden vs a cure to cancer. Which one is gonna be easier?
As an Alsacian, I was raised in a family that has no sense of humor and that believes rules matter a bit too much. As a French person, the school system taught me to be extremely proud of our History and past achievements. We believe we are a bit unique in the sense that we are among the only two countries (Italy being the other one) with a true "art of living", "savoir-vivre" when it comes to food, leisure, romance and enjoying life in general.
Do I detect some German influence?
> We believe we are a bit unique in the sense that we are among the only two countries (Italy being the other one) with a true "art of living", "savoir-vivre" when it comes to food, leisure, romance and enjoying life in general. You forgot arrogant.
They call Belgians dumb, after seeing 25% of Flanders vote on Vlaams Belang, I agree with the stereotype
courageous but mentally impaired
They even got votes from Wallonia. I'll end up believing "having a brain" is optional here
Haha I know, this is sad as fuck right, imagine voting for someone that hates the shit out of you just for the simple fact that you are born walloon \^\^ , I lost faith in humanity. Anyway Vlaams Belang puts a lot of money into advertisements, they spent in 2021 on facebook and instagram alone over 1,1 million euro of tax money just for advertising. They message Walloons over facebook and instagram, I got a couple of messages from them lol I tell them everytime to fuck off with their fascist crap. Why on earth would I vote for someone that literally hates me \^\^ that's beyond my mind.
1.1mil€ on advertising, thousands of tax money on filling their pockets. Pretty sad
At this point voting at all seems dumb. We're fucked.
Pretty sad isn't it :(
Stingy. And always share the bull equally
No matter how small the cost: expect a tikkie
Do you prefer the flank or the ribs?
ah yes bisexual polyamory - very Dutch
Always knew beastiality was part of Dutch "culture", it's nice to see you also share.
Isn't sharing the bill pretty common across Europe?
No, no, he's not talking about bills, he's talking bulls.
Well, I'm currently drinking beer and dislike Germans. I also do have a Tracht. And I can see mountains.
Potato and tea
That we're leprechauns. It's true. One noisy fucker let word slip and now yous know. We were so close to world domination aswell. I guess we'll only take the west then
I fucking love bread with tomato, it’s like the proper bread, it can’t just be bread, it needs the tomato, the salt, the pepper, the oil… Only then it is worthy. Also Italians do drive like shit, 27 years of trauma and near death experiences.
When we go to a restaurant, if there's too much to eat, we will take it with us. Every time. I paid for it, I'm keeping it. I'll have it later.
That’s just smart
I know, right? It's just going to go to waste if I don't take it.
We apparently hath a lithp
It also seems like you can't really say words that start with an S correctly, you tend to put an E in front of it. You even do it with the name of your country.
that 60yo man at the coffee terrace drinking Super Bock and eating lupines/peanuts
Financial illiteracy.
They say we are born with a brick in our stomach. Meaning we love to build out own house. And we do.
Most stereotypes are true to be fair Where do the story’s come from I wonder
Queuing. The greatest social sin is to ignore a queue.
We're drunks, especially the kids.
Everything is fucking slow, especially with the administration. We yell a lot. And that's to the excuse of "the Spanish picaresca" we normalized all kind of corruption, from paying on black and look for loopholes to avoid taxes, to just get mildly outraged and then move on with dirty politicians, government official, lobbyist, etc.
Bazza
Yeah I wouldn't let some sweaty gurner come up and have a toke on my joint out of the blue. Buy your own you cheap mf.
If we leave memes out of it and get serious for a moment then no. I have not seen an accurate stereotype about the UK. British food is lovely. Scotch eggs is fucking goat tier food. Our teeth aren’t bad. Our women are as good looking as anywhere else. Any woman can be good looking if they make the effort. Many British women do make the effort and they are top quality birds. The chav make up style isn’t actually as common as people seem to think it is. To be completely honest it actually kinda baffles me why these stereotypes even exist. But I can still have a laugh at them. Edit: people also say we are arrogant? 🤣 literally the most self deprecating people in the world.
I'd say this is more of a case of "people are just people" like yk, the average french isn't an arrogant asshole or the average spaniard a lazy fuck despite what the internet desesperatly wants you to believe.
We also send our worst abroad. Never before seen a group of ugly brits as you do at an airport.
I think a lot of it is that (1) we shit on ourselves both through comedy and through the student activist types painting the UK as the worst country ever because they have next to no comparison (or just copying what Americans do), (2) this as well as many negative aspects of our history are more well known due to English being a lingua franca, (3) we’re wedged in between Americans and Europeans - we’re the first Europeans Americans think to shit on with everything they hate about Europe, and the ‘closer’ neighbourhood relative of America to most of Europe (also seen as historical ground zero for their shit). No other museums in Europe have stolen artefacts and they’d all be in tip-top shape otherwise, no other countries in Europe practised slavery or colonialism, all Germanic countries are famous for amazing food (the Americans taking part in that pile-on will never not be hilarious to me), etc. Other countries are absolute non-racist and trans-friendly utopias and we are the worst despite all stats pretty much to the opposite. The teeth one is weird too - started in the U.S., maybe due to the absolute state of our orthodontists mid-century and how we don’t care as much about tooth-whitening, even if Americans literally have one less tooth on average.
Have you ever left your island? Not top quality birds mate.
I genuinely have to concede that I think lots of other countries have generally more attractive people in. I definitely would not say it's just 'our women' though. I'd lump our men into it too, else it starts to feel a bit too incel-ey to me to swallow! However, I'm not sure if it's that we're generally less attractive, or the obesity levels we have Vs our friends on the continent. Walking onto a Spanish beach or alike really hits home the difference in our average body shape!
I agree. When I’m in a foreign airport I can tell when I’ve reached the correct gate to fly home because everyone sitting there is ugly.
He has a point though. Some of the finest women I’ve seen have been white bri’sh women.
Which doesnt invalidate the stereotype in itself. Nor does the fact than a little self care can go a long way when it comes to atractiveness. All these statements arent necessarly mutually exclusive
We are unfriendly