Puffymuffin wrote:shafnutz05 wrote:^^I would also add natural disasters to that, or really any tragedy when large numbers of people are affected. Like I said before, I know Americans can be quite ignorant of things that happen outside of our own borders, but we're a pretty generous country on the whole.
From the few times that I have been there that's not a view I share but I guess you can say that for most countries in the 'Western world'. It might also depend on where you go I guess, but people are generally ******* especially towards people who happen to be less well off than they are. I don't think I have seen it as bad over here compared to what I experienced in the US, which sort of surprised me, seeing how "rude" Dutch people can be.
Sure, I mean, you will still have the upper-crust snobbery as common here as anywhere else. I know this statistic isn't everything, but (from late 2011)....
http://www.npr.org/blogs/thetwo-way/2011/12/20/144035063/survey-u-s-takes-top-spot-as-most-charitable-nationDespite the gloomy economic situation, the United States has become the world's most generous nation, according to this year's Charities Aid Foundation's World Giving Index.
Ireland is ranked second followed by Australia, New Zealand and the U.K. Charities Aid Foundation used Gallup's Worldview Poll to look at three behaviors: "giving money, volunteering time and helping a stranger."
The U.S. came out on top after being ranked fifth last year.
"Overall the World Giving Index demonstrates that the world has become a more charitable place over the last 12 months — with a 2 percent increase in the global population 'helping a stranger' and a 1% increase in people volunteering," CAF said in its press release
Puffy, your own Netherlands lead the field in Europe at 6th. There are a lot of people (including many Americans) that love to loathe American citizens and constantly decry about how awful of a people we are, but the people of the United States are pretty damned generous to people in need.
Again, this is not me saying that we are without our faults as a nation (plenty of faults), but there is absolutely no denying the generosity of the vast majority of our citizenry, even the poor.