On Sat, 2005-05-14 at 11:04 -0400, Chad Smith wrote: > You know, as an AMERICAN, this so-called "friendly discussion" is > annoying and at least slightly offensive.
Why do you put friendly in parenthesis? > What if I purposed a vote on > what to call Canadians, simply because I don't like the word. You would probably get laughed at because there is universal agreement on what to call Canadians and no possible ambiguity that I'm aware of. > I'm not a > Canadian, so I really shouldn't have any say in the matter, but supposed > I had the gaul to assume that I did. Anyone is entitled to an opinion. What nationality do you think I am Chad? Don't worry, I won't be offended if you get it wrong :-) > The fact is Americans are from the United States. North Americans can > be from any of the number of countries in the continitent of North > America. South Americans can be from any of the number of nations on > the continentent of South America. United Statesians or USians (aside > from being a stupid name) could be from any of the number of nations > with "United States" or some form of that term in their title. This > would include Mexico, whose official name is according to the CIA World > Fact Book: You can shout as loud and produce threads as long as you like but the term American is generic to the Americas so there is at least some ambiguity in its use to describe citizens of the Americas. The fact that US citizens are commonly referred to as Americans doesn't confer monopoly rights to the word to you or any of your countrymen. Next you'll be claiming a patent ;-) (The things people get het up about, no wonder there are so many wars) -- Ian Lynch <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> ZMSL
