Poll: Divided Americans fret country losing identity

[JA]

http://bigstory.ap.org/article/f958cdd9cfcf435db14ba2f79ac50c36/ap-norc-poll-divided-americans-worry-county-losing-identity

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[Ban my account ffs!]

We have an innate culture.

I remember Germans and Austrians sarcastically saying things like "what do you have for cuisine in America?  Burgers?"

You know what we have?  Choices.  So very many more than you will ever have.  You are so eager to show me your fancy powdered sugar pancakes or your schnitzels or your potato salad... we've all had that already... we've had 10 million different kinds of potato salad... eggy/mayo slop, bacon oil vinegar, spicy chipotle, vegan friendly, vegan hostile, skin on, skin off, warm, cold, .. potato salad in the pot nine days old.  

Our culture is the Friday night fish fry, the Wisconsin boo-yah, the Texas BBQ, the state fair, the open road, super awful train service, football, the school band, the kids playing percussion in the atrium at a sh**tty mall with an audience of confused passersby slurping their giant smoothies...

This country is packed to the brim with culture.  And our identity is this:  We're Americans.  Subject to change.

[Dr. Arch]

We have an innate culture.

I remember Germans and Austrians sarcastically saying things like "what do you have for cuisine in America?  Burgers?"

You know what we have?  Choices.  So very many more than you will ever have.  You are so eager to show me your fancy powdered sugar pancakes or your schnitzels or your potato salad... we've all had that already... we've had 10 million different kinds of potato salad... eggy/mayo slop, bacon oil vinegar, spicy chipotle, vegan friendly, vegan hostile, skin on, skin off, warm, cold, .. potato salad in the pot nine days old.  

Our culture is the Friday night fish fry, the Wisconsin boo-yah, the Texas BBQ, the state fair, the open road, super awful train service, football, the school band, the kids playing percussion in the atrium at a sh**tty mall with an audience of confused passersby slurping their giant smoothies...

This country is packed to the brim with culture.  And our identity is this:  We're Americans.  Subject to change.

Couldn't have said it better myself.

[Technocracy Timmy]

I noticed that very few republicans (I think it's actually zero?) have voted in this poll...they must still be at church today

Anyways I think that the nativist backlash we're experiencing isn't too different from that of the 1920's. The big difference now is that it's less about ethnicity and more about race since new immigrants are typically either Asian or mestizo. So now instead of getting a White Anglo Saxon Protestant movement pushing back, it's just a White nationalist movement that's pushing back.

There's always been a question about if this country is based on an ideal vs. an ethnic or racial group. I think we're gonna keep revisiting this question now and into the 2020's. I still have plenty of faith that the "ideal" proponents will win out over the nativists though.

I do not believe that America is losing its identity. I think we're ever evolving and that we do a great job at assimilating people into our culture and integrating aspects of new immigrant cultures into our own. I think our diversity ultimately makes us stronger.

[ApatheticAustrian]

people over-paranoid about losing their culture, usually aren't very convinced about it to begin with.

[TDAS04]

Well, if American identity is based on "American" values such as liberty, justice, equality, etc., then it is Donald Trump and the far right that are destroying American identity.

[JA]

We have an innate culture.

I remember Germans and Austrians sarcastically saying things like "what do you have for cuisine in America?  Burgers?"

You know what we have?  Choices.  So very many more than you will ever have.  You are so eager to show me your fancy powdered sugar pancakes or your schnitzels or your potato salad... we've all had that already... we've had 10 million different kinds of potato salad... eggy/mayo slop, bacon oil vinegar, spicy chipotle, vegan friendly, vegan hostile, skin on, skin off, warm, cold, .. potato salad in the pot nine days old.  

Our culture is the Friday night fish fry, the Wisconsin boo-yah, the Texas BBQ, the state fair, the open road, super awful train service, football, the school band, the kids playing percussion in the atrium at a sh**tty mall with an audience of confused passersby slurping their giant smoothies...

This country is packed to the brim with culture.  And our identity is this:  We're Americans.  Subject to change.

Couldn't have said it better myself.

[progressive85]

I've always lived in the Northeastern U.S. so my idea of what American culture is may be a little different from another person who's lived in different regions of America...

I see American culture as being just really casual and laid-back.  I think of fast food as very American, our fondness for nostalgia, our love of the movies, our consumerism is very American, our freedom of speech and the wide array of news and views that we have...

It's still the best country on Earth, no matter what.  I always think of America as a microcosm of the world - any food in the world you can get in America somewhere...

So I think we have a shared culture... for example, Star Wars.  You can be Jewish or Muslim or Asian or biracial or a Republican or an anarchist or a gun owner and love Star Wars... so I think there's a lot that brings us together.

A very conservative evangelical Christian and a gay hippie from San Francisco can bond over a lot... chances are they've both gone to McDonalds, both shopped on Amazon, both listened to Aerosmith, both gone fishing with their dads...

I hate to see the country this divided... there's got to be some kind of unity.  I never thought it would come with Trump.  I didn't think it would come with Obama either.  We just don't live in consensus times, but the closest thing we have to a consensus is our culture - a Big Mac is our consensus.  (And I say this as I bite into one right now lol.)

[krazen1211]

Divided? What malarkey is this?

One party won the Presidency, the House, the Senate, the Governorships, and many many many State Legislatures. We are quite united.

[Deblano]

Divided? What malarkey is this?

One party won the Presidency, the House, the Senate, the Governorships, and many many many State Legislatures. We are quite united.

Are you joking?

We have two sides in this country that are at each other's throats with knives over the election.

We even had violent clashes in Berkeley California between pro-Trump and anti-Trump people for goodness sakes!

[Dr. Arch]

Divided? What malarkey is this?

One party won the Presidency, the House, the Senate, the Governorships, and many many many State Legislatures. We are quite united.

Are you joking?

We have two sides in this country that are at each other's throats with knives over the election.

We even had violent clashes in Berkeley California between pro-Trump and anti-Trump people for goodness sakes!

It must be nice to live in an alternative universe.

[Green Line]

We're not losing it, it's just rotten to the core.

[Deblano]

We're not losing it, it's just rotten to the core.

[Blackacre]

Divided? What malarkey is this?

One party won the Presidency, the House, the Senate, the Governorships, and many many many State Legislatures. We are quite united.

That same party:

Lost the popular vote for President
Lost the popular vote for Senate
Gerrymandered their way to House victories
Explicitly ran a Presidential campaign on divisiveness and othering
Has a President with really bad approvals

We are far from united

[Deblano]

Divided? What malarkey is this?

One party won the Presidency, the House, the Senate, the Governorships, and many many many State Legislatures. We are quite united.

That same party:

Lost the popular vote for President
Lost the popular vote for Senate
Gerrymandered their way to House victories
Explicitly ran a Presidential campaign on divisiveness and othering
Has a President with really bad approvals

We are far from united

[Ban my account ffs!]

Krazen...yeah.. lost the popular vote
lost ground in the senate
lost ground in the house

Changing the rules so your party wins even when they lose is many things... claiming it is a product of a united America is a crock of sh**t.

[Badger]

Divided? What malarkey is this?

One party won the Presidency, the House, the Senate, the Governorships, and many many many State Legislatures. We are quite united.

Other than that whole popular vote and gerrymandering thing.

[angus]

I certainly don't know what "national identity" means to most people.

I don't either, but I know it has a specific meaning to most people.  Especially to immigrants.  I have four colleagues in my department who have become US citizens after having been born in other countries, and my wife recently--just last month--became a US citizen as well, after having lived in the US for 19 years.  I have had discussions with all of them regarding US culture and US identity.  They all have specific ideas about it.  Some mistaken, I'm sure, and their ideas are different from each other in some respects, although similar in others, but (delusional or not) they're definite and deeply-engrained perspectives.  This is why I voted as I did.  We are not in danger of losing our identity because each of us has a different idea of that identity and we all hold fast to them.  Moreover, all the aforementioned erstwhile aliens have adopted, or are trying to adopt, what they view as the US culture.  (i.e., the essential American culture mentioned in the OP.)

The title of the OP is a little misleading.  Every poll will show some division, but really only one of the three questions in the OP results in no clear majority, and it is on the question of influence of foreign governments.  Personally, I don't see it as a problem or a danger.  Our "way of life" has during our entire history been influenced by, and has had influence upon, foreign governments.  This is the normal give and take in a world connected--first by ships, then by airplanes, now by satellite-mediated electronic signals, and perhaps one day by direct particle transporters.  (If only Commander LaForge could get that damned Heisenberg Uncertainty Decoupler to function effectively!)  

[krazen1211]

Divided? What malarkey is this?

One party won the Presidency, the House, the Senate, the Governorships, and many many many State Legislatures. We are quite united.

Are you joking?

We have two sides in this country that are at each other's throats with knives over the election.

We even had violent clashes in Berkeley California between pro-Trump and anti-Trump people for goodness sakes!

No, we have one side that won the election, and some Snowflakes that are upset about losing the election and causing violence.

But strangely there were few such claims of 'division' before the Snowflakes lost bigly up and down the ballot. Funny how that works.

[Blackacre]

Divided? What malarkey is this?

One party won the Presidency, the House, the Senate, the Governorships, and many many many State Legislatures. We are quite united.

Are you joking?

We have two sides in this country that are at each other's throats with knives over the election.

We even had violent clashes in Berkeley California between pro-Trump and anti-Trump people for goodness sakes!

No, we have one side that won the election, and some Snowflakes that are upset about losing the election and causing violence.

But strangely there were few such claims of 'division' before the Snowflakes lost bigly up and down the ballot. Funny how that works.

We have one side that got more votes, and another side that managed to win anyway. That's not unity

[Associate Justice PiT]

     I'm worried about the country losing identity, but less cultural identity and more political identity. There is a generation of youth that fails to understand the political heritage of the United States, and growing movements that outright reject the enlightenment values of liberal democracy. As we lean ever closer towards schism, these developments are not encouraging.

[Pericles]

America's best days are still ahead of it.

[pbrower2a]

Divided? What malarkey is this?

One party won the Presidency, the House, the Senate, the Governorships, and many many many State Legislatures. We are quite united.

One Party wins -- and it divides America into supporters and  enemies.

[DPKdebator]

I believe we have an essential American culture that immigrants adopt to, but add on to as well. Our core American values, traditions, and cuisine originate from many different countries.

[pbrower2a]

I believe we have an essential American culture that immigrants adopt to, but add on to as well. Our core American values, traditions, and cuisine originate from many different countries.

So at a kid's party in which all the participants are of British, Irish, German, and Scandinavian origin we find a pizza and a pinata gets smashed. That's one form of assimilation. American culture keeps redefining itself. That's healthy.

So some white kids decide that to get ahead in the educational system they might adopt educational habits of Chinese-American kids. That is very healthy.