Bad habits / customs of your country

[The Ripper]

Are there customs and/or habits in your country that you find negative?

I'll start off with a couple:

Spitting. Mostly done by young males, but its quite common for girls as well and even among older folk from certain social backgrounds. I remember back in school, when we'd just stand in a circle with a bunch of guys during recess, talk shit and spit into the centre. I suppose its partly due to the climate: most people have runny noses for half of the year and its easy to unload into the snow by spitting. Whenever you exercise / do anything more demanding than a slow walking pace outside in the cold, your nose starts to run. Another reason would be that it has probably been socially accepted since long ago in a mostly rural, northern country where people have spent and still spend much of their time working outside. I admit to doing it myself quite a bit, but as I've gotten older, I'ver started to be more careful about where I do it - a lot people aren't, though.

Swearing. I don't know if I'm going grandpa here, but much of the time I find myself appalled at the language of some people, especially young girls, who punctuate their (air-headed) sentences with expletives. I was a little annoyed by Finnish ('comic') rap-artist Petri Nygård performing at the victory celebrations yesterday, as he at one point told the Swedish tabloid media (If I heard him right): "Fuck you." I saw lots of families with small kids there, and I knew half the nation must be watching it on a screen somewhere (not to mention it will be recorded in The Annals of History ), so it felt a little undignified somehow.

Anyway, your turn!

[Talvi]

I think swearing, especially in Estonian or Finnish can be a fun fun thing! Like.. usually people dont swear in front of people they dont know well yet, but feeling comfortable enough to swear in front of someone kind of establishes a connection of some sort....

Bad habits I dont like : throwing your cigar buds on the ground.

[The Ripper]

I think swearing, especially in Estonian or Finnish can be a fun fun thing! Like.. usually people dont swear in front of people they dont know well yet, but feeling comfortable enough to swear in front of someone kind of establishes a connection of some sort....

Well there's swearing and there's swearing. Its not that black and white, it is all about context, not so? But I do agree that there's nothing quite corresponding in other languages to the Baltic Finnish curse.

Bad habits I dont like : throwing your cigar buds on the ground.

Agreed.

[Grumpy Cat]

Swearing is one.

But the one that gets me the most is apathy.

Apathy is often combined with some strange mentality: if you bring up anything bad that's going on in this country, the response is always "at least we're not as bad as the United States".

Gun violence is on the rise, and they say that. Do we want to get to the gun violence level of the US before we do anything about it? By that logic, you should not be having a talk about drugs with your kids until they're hooked on heroin.

[Bloodeagle]

A few of my peoples flaws: Consumerism, waste and apathy.
Sometimes I think that people here have had it good for so long, that we have grown soft as a people.

[Svipdag]

USA : over-eating
I once ate at a restaurant, part of a chain ,I believe, called "The
Heavenly Hog". There were more hogs seated at the tables than on the menu. I never before saw so many grossly obese people in one place.

Foul language
When I was a boy [the 1930's and 1940's] a person could be arrested (and it was actually done) for using in public the kind of language which I hear routinely used by children today.I remember when it was shocking to hear Rhet Butler say "Frankly, Scarflett, I don't give a damn." in "Gone with the Wind".

Recreational drug use
Before the 1950's, only jazz musicians used marijuana and cocaine was mainly used as a local anæsthetic. In the high school I attended, as far as I know only one student smoked pot, and he was a jazz musician.

Even the deaths of teen idols like River Phoenix [I know he was 23; I mean stars idolised BY teens] from drug overdoses don't seem to deter recreational drug use. It's become a "given" in our society.

[Wanderlust]

Swearing,horrible driving,waste and nepotism.
The last one is actually our national sport.

[mymy]

Swearing,horrible driving,waste and nepotism.
The last one is actually our national sport.

Same here... And i will add corruption too.
Btw, I heard nobody can swear so bad like people here do.

[SaxonCeorl]

This is just my personal opinion, but I don't like the idea of going out in public looking completely and disgustingly unpresentable. My country leads the world in this.



Why can't is be like this again :

[Bloodeagle]

This is just my personal opinion, but I don't like the idea of going out in public looking completely and disgustingly unpresentable. My country leads the world in this.



Why can't is be like this again :

Gym clothes like sweat pants, should not be allowed anywhere outside of working out or inside of Walmart.