US Authoritarianism

It’s a studies thing. Conservatives are unable to grasp irony or sarcasm. It’s one of the reasons Steven Colbert stopped his show. The people he was mocking were holding his character up as someone to aspire to.

A lot of quintessentially American things are anti-American

"Born in the USA," Bruce Springsteen in general, "Rambo," Mark Twain, "Monopoly," MTV, et cetera

The arc goes:

• US system is bullshit
• Someone points it out in an artistic work
• People love it and the thing they made gets popular
• System goes "hey we love that you're buying this please do it more" and promotes it under a guise of it not being directed squarely at them, with some skillful edits
• Thing gets even more popular with more exposure, in its edited (backwards) form, to the point that the original is often semi-forgotten

Being against the bullshit is an American trait. Unfortunately, the bullshit has become more powerful than the against, hence all these problems we have now.

Starship troopers was made by the same guy who made RoboCop another movie whose message goes over people's heads. RoboCop is about privatization, police militarization, lack of government oversight, and corporate greed.

'Born in the USA' did not 'fail to convey' what it was about. It was just wilfully misinterpreted.

Not the point of this post but I think starship troopers did an excellent job of skewering the military, government, and the whole propaganda machine.

Not quite the same, but London calling was similarly used for tourism ads among other things

Not exactly the same thing but megahit Gangnam Style is a critique of bourgeoisie culture in South Korea and the trendy Gangnam district. It'd be like if there was a song called Times Square about what a commercialized pile of capitalist shit that place is, with a funny dance and music video.

In Italy we have "vieni a ballare in Puglia" by Caparezza.

The title means "Come dance in Puglia" but the song lyrics are a criticism of the working conditions in the Italian region, where health regulations are not respected and people keep dying on the job while they are asked to smile and dance for the tourists. The song makes sense when you replace the word "dance" with "die".

Though it's a tarantella and very catchy, so it's used as a funny song for tourists ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

https://youtu.be/EDCHk6JhFzQ

Yes, it's probably a quite global phenomenon.

"I am from Austria" by Rainhard Fendrich includes a line saying "I know the people, I know the rats, the blatant stupidity". So it's quite obviously critical of Austrian society, and was written with the purpose of uniting Austrians against Naziism.

Of course the rightwing parties are stupid enough to use it.

To be fair, if it's a banger from the late 60s to early 80s with even a hint of American symbolism there's an 80% chance it's a protest song. They get the boomers riled up

do other countries [...] both political parties

No, other countries tend to have 0, 1, or way more than 2 parties

I think Starship Troopers is understood well as a satire of fascism(and an awesome bug-shooty movie), while I have heard every 4th of July parade unironically blasting pro-war songs alongside born in the USA.

We have one called "Westerland". It's a song - played by people visiting Sylt, an island where mostly elitist live and rich white people go on vacation. In one verse, they sing "And every person next to me is as dumb as I am.". The irony is lost to them as the chorus is "I want to be back in Westerland".

To be fair, what group of 330M+ is?

I think its universal, really. Americans just feel like its worse here cause we're, well, experiencing it here. Most people are idiots, thats just how it is - we just see it more because the internet lets us interact outside our personal social bubbles.

Its like that meme about expertise, take your concept of "knowing nothing" and cut that in half then you'll be close to most peoples level.