In reply to some of the posts above......

I stand by what I say and also my right to say it.... I stand by the content and the sentiment. I am sorry that people are offended.... but upon a bit more reflection am in no way surprised that they are...... any criticism of the US, be it of the attitudes of film audiences, foreign policy or basically any subject, will meet with this kind of response from somebody. No matter how mild or how justified the criticism, there are some people stateside who simply cannot take it. They will resort to personal attack to carry their argument, rather than maybe take a bit of a look at some of the points in what I am saying.

Which is too bad really, because this is a message board which is open to a broad range of people who live the WORLD OVER....  I guess it may be a case that some cannot bear to hear an alternative view point of their own country.

Out of interest, I base my viewpoints of US attitudes on the following - the media, first hand accounts of people who have lived stateside, and books..... I am not alone in my views.

Plenty of people speak their minds on whatever subject they feel on this message board...... I feel the right to participate in this process too.

There are plenty of occasions where I quietly read a post or point of view, disagree, then just move on. This is because I believe that a range of views keeps this message board interesting, and if we all had the same mono-cultural view point the world would be a dull place indeed.