What's on Your Bumper?

During dinner tonight, I had an interesting conversation with our Norwegian exchange student about bumper stickers. She was commenting on how her NT soccer team was selling car magnets, and that in Norway NO ONE has bumper stickers or anything of that sort on their cars. America, on the other hand, is a different story. Here, it is almost rare to see a car without a bumper sticker. This made me wonder about why we use bumper stickers and what American values the use of them portrays. The messages on bumper stickers vary immensly, as it can range from supporting your kid's sports team, to expressing political or religious views, to supporting US troops or even breast cancer. These stickers are a way for people to express their opinions to the world without any consequences. The person behind you at a stoplight reads your thought provoking sticker, and goes on with his/her day without having a chance to talk to you about it. It is almost like a one way conversation with the world. Bumper stickers are a window through which random people that you might not ever meet can categorize you and learn something about you.

On my family's car, we have a New Trier sticker, which informs everyone that we live in the New Trier district, and probably like our school. From knowing the location of New Trier, people probably could guess that we are a middle to upper class family. We also have a Depauw University sticker, which tells the world that someone in the family has a college education and is proud of their school. There is a New Trier track and field sticker, which suggests that we value sports and physical activity in our family. The most interesting sticker on our car is an AFS (American Field Service) sticker that says "Changing lives, sharing cultures". This shows that my family values international experiences, and maybe has hosted exchange students or been exchange students in the past. The idea of bumper stickers supports the American values of individuality, freedom of speech and expression, and superiority. By having different personal values on the back of your car, you are making yourself known to the world, showing that you are a unique individual. Obviously you see bumper stickers of all sorts,  and some might be offensive or criticizing, but we have the right to express ourselves. I think the most important value that bumper stickers showcase is that of superiority/I'm-better-than-my-neighbor. Bumper stickers are kind of a way to brag and promote things that you are involved in. What do you think is so American about bumper stickers? What kind of bumper stickers does your family have on their cars? What does this reveal about your family?

Unexpected?

The other day I was listening to Pandora and a very strange advertisement (on right) popped up on my screen. Pictured was a pregnant man, and the caption read, "Unexpected? Protect yourself and your partner. Avoid unplanned pregnancies and STIs. Use condoms." It is obvious that we are making progress in that our generation is the least homophobic generation that America has had, but I think that this ad is taking it to an extreme. This is simply uncalled for. This is not an attractive advertisement to me, and actually I find it quite sexist and racist. Everything about this advertisement is "unexpected". For biological reasons, it is simply impossible for a man to become pregnant. He also looks extremely sad and ashamed, which I find degrading to women. I think that pregnancy is a beautiful thing, and this ad makes it seem disgusting and something that is unwanted. He has lost all hope, because his life is now ruined thanks to this unexpected occurrence.

It is also interesting that the man is of color. The advertisement proposes that this sort of thing would only happen to a minority, maybe suggesting that they are not as educated in this topic. This makes me wonder who the target audience of this ad is. Is it targeted towards minorities? Maybe African-Americans and/or gay people? What do you think about this sort of advertisement? Is it too much?

"Only in America"

As I was browsing through the articles under the US tab on The Week website, I noticed that there was a new sort of series called "Only in America". It is set up in a flipbook style, and there are hundreds of short stories that feature different Americans who did something that apparently only an American would do. 


After flipping through several articles, I noticed that almost all of them showed outrageous things that Americans would do, which shed a bad light on certain American laws, policies and culture. For example, the first one is titled, "Suing the people who saved your life". It briefly talks about a man in Colorado who is suing the people who rescued him from a flood, just because he thinks that they didn't rescue him fast enough. The man (Roy Ortiz) shockingly said, "I'm really happy to be alive, but I'm looking for some help in paying my bills." Only in America would someone take advantage of the justice system to basically steal money from the people who saved his life.





Some of the stories are much more severe, as the next one that caught my eye was "Throw a snowball, get arrested". This one is about a 13 year old kid who threw a snowball at a police officer, and was charged with a felony and got arrested. Only in America would a police officer arrest a kid for being a kid.

It is interesting to think about the American values that the authors of this series are trying to portray. I began to notice a trend within this series. It seems as if these Americans were taking advantage of their power with self gain in mind, which shows the American value of the individual over community. It also shows people overreacting and taking seemingly harmless situations to an unreasonable level. In the eyes of many (specifically foreigners), the actions of American people (especially the government) seem ridiculous, and I think that this series is trying to show the American people how crazy some of the everyday occurrences that might go unnoticed really are.