the united states of america

Prolagus ooooh, I miss all of this so much. :) Jan 27, 2013

ruzuzu Happy National █████ Day! Jan 18, 2012

ruzuzu *starts putting together a new mixtape* Mar 28, 2011

ruzuzu See █████. Jan 18, 2011

yarb Life, liberty and the pursuit of sandwiches. Nov 29, 2010

reesetee That all sticky dark brown strongly flavored spreads based on a yeast extract are created equal? Nov 27, 2010

dontcry *s███t!* Nov 25, 2010

sionnach I think we hold that truth to be self-evident. Nov 25, 2010

reesetee How did you guys know it's marmite? Nov 25, 2010

Prolagus Who can blame your ██████ for being sore about the marmite incident... Nov 24, 2010

marky dont cry.. lol. Nov 24, 2010

dontcry I finally figured out how to ██████ and now I can't stop ███. This morning, Mr dontcry told me to ██████ or he'd ██████ and then I'd really know a day...
██████. I think he's still sore about the ██████ incident. Nov 24, 2010

marky ha██.

i don't ███ it. Nov 24, 2010

ruzuzu What? I don't get it.

*resumes discussion with tight-jean wearing, big-glasses sporting friends about ORLAN's transhumanism* Nov 23, 2010

dontcry ██████
Ha! Nov 23, 2010

reesetee That all Zebra finches are created equal? Nov 22, 2010

ruzuzu I think we hold that truth to be self-evident. Nov 22, 2010

reesetee How did you guys know it's the clarinet? Nov 22, 2010

ruzuzu Thanks for noticing! I did recently purchase a keffiyeh from the Halloween section of my local thrift store. It goes nicely with my tassled loafers, my trucker cap, my smoking jacket, and my Almost Solveig t-shirt (which I wear ironically). Nov 21, 2010

pterodactyl If you're still not seeing it, ruzuzu, then let me just be the first to compliment you on your trendy clothing. Nov 21, 2010

ruzuzu You're right, Prolagus. It's definitely the clarinet. Nov 21, 2010

Prolagus I love klezmer! I think it's the ██████. Nov 21, 2010

ruzuzu Wait--what did you do, pterodactyl? I'm still not seeing it. The only thing I'd ever want to redact would be my PIN for my ATM card, which is XXXX.

Anyway, thanks reesetee--should I bring a box of fufluns and my collection of mixtapes? I've got a lot of klezmer music. Nov 21, 2010

dontcry *how are they doing thaaaaaat?* Nov 21, 2010

reesetee Ptero, that was the ██████ damn thing I've ever ██████!

Yarb, I'm ████! Here's my Social Security number so you can make me your beneficiary: ████████████. Please don't give it out to anyone.

Ruzuzu, meet me at ██████ and we can drive there together. Who's riding ████████? Nov 21, 2010

pterodactyl Oh, sorry, yarb, that was me. I'm demonstrating my new invention. I call it The Emperor's New Font. The words that you type in this font are only visible to intelligent, sensitive people who wear trendy clothing and appreciate postmodern art.

Why am I doing this? Simple. I'm the ██████ pte-redact-yl! Nov 21, 2010

yarb Sorry, I can't send you directions because you accidentally redacted your email address. Nov 21, 2010

ruzuzu ██████ yeah! Thanks, yarb.

Would you mind sending me directions? My e-mail address is ruzuzu@█████████.██ Nov 21, 2010

yarb Reesetee, I invite you, and ruzuzuzuzuzuzu and milos and anyone else for that matter, to my cabin in ████████ for ████████ and ██████████. If those ██████████ Prolagus and Sionnach can ████████, we can ████████ better! Nov 21, 2010

reesetee Well, if sionnach and Prolagus can manage to meet in real life (as opposed to Wordnik Life), then there's hope for the rest of us. :-D

Besides, as my mother always says, "If you can't ██████ in your ████████, then you might as well just █████ for ███. Nov 21, 2010

ruzuzu Exactly. Nov 18, 2010

marky ████████ Nov 18, 2010

ruzuzu Redacting? Really? I have no idea what you're ████████ about.

However, I am certain that Prolagus must be charming. It makes me very ████████ that you two were able to ████████. Nov 17, 2010

sionnach Gosh, this new modem I was forced to buy to stop the red flashing light and get access to the interwebs is having all kinds of unexpected side effects. My phone line has developed a background wheeze suggestive of Darth Vader with pleurisy, and now it appears to be redacting out key on-screen text, in a disturbingly primitive cold-war kind of way.

Pssst! Prolagus is even more charming in person than online. Hard to believe, I know. But those are the facts. I just report them. Nov 17, 2010

ruzuzu *████s chained_bear, too* Nov 17, 2010

chained_bear You know, ████████ is probably the single best comment I've seen on Wordie. Nov 17, 2010

ruzuzu *████s Prolagus, Keats, Milosrdenstvi, ptero's special sparkly Argument Cap, this page, and the ████████ USA* Nov 17, 2010

Prolagus *████s ruzuzu* Nov 17, 2010

ruzuzu ██████ you, too, Prolagus. :-█

I hope you ██████ ██████ and ██████ very soon. Nov 17, 2010

milosrdenstvi This is probably what Keats would call ██████████. Nov 17, 2010

Prolagus That's the ██████ thing anybody has ever told me. It could only come from a ██████ like you. ██████ you, ruzuzu! Nov 17, 2010

ruzuzu You shouldn't be so hard on yourself, ██████. If there's one constant in life, it's that ██████ ██████. Nov 17, 2010

Prolagus OK, maybe it wasn't honest of me to generalize. Let's say that it only applies to me, and that every time things seem to ███████ I end up ██████ ███████ everything. Nov 17, 2010

ruzuzu Well, sure. But does ███████ always have to mean ███████? Nov 17, 2010

Prolagus I think there is always at least some ███████. Nov 17, 2010

ruzuzu Was there █████ ███? Or was it just ███? Nov 17, 2010

Prolagus It's been months now. Nov 17, 2010

ruzuzu ████████? Nov 16, 2010

Prolagus Don't be - The only reason why I keep myself busy is █████████████ Nov 16, 2010

ruzuzu What a week you're having, Prolagus--you've gotten to see Sufjan, broadsides, and sionnach. I can't decide whether to be envious or exceedingly happy for you. Maybe both. :-) Nov 16, 2010

Prolagus True! By the way, I saw one of the Dunlap broadsides at the Morgan Library last Thursday, with sionnach. Nov 16, 2010

ruzuzu I remember something about how "united" wasn't capitalized at the beginning of the Declaration of Independence--I think it had "the thirteen united States of America." Nov 16, 2010

reesetee I lurve that book. And God bless the Oosa. Sep 1, 2009

chained_bear I think it does, actually, but I read that book so long ago... Here's a link to it. I think you can view a couple pages online. A most excellent and thought-provoking (yet entertaining) tome. Sep 1, 2009

dontcry *sings* "Oo-oh say can you Seeitoldyouitwasntflatistaaaan..." Sep 1, 2009

pterodactyl Usa! I love it! (Does that make us Usans?) Sep 1, 2009

chained_bear I prefer Usa. Pronounced Oosa. (See the book Motel of the Mysteries.) Aug 31, 2009

yarb I agree, Ptero. But America is how most English-speakers refer to it. That's good enough isn't it? Aug 31, 2009

chained_bear *loves ptero dearly*

*covets ptero's special sparkly Argument Cap*

*can't stop thinking about a humuhumunukunukuapua'a playing an alpenhorn*

So... what do you think of Seeitoldyouitwasntflatistan? Aug 31, 2009

pterodactyl Hi chained_bear! Thanks for bracketing history dork out -- it lead me to yeta, a truly excellent page. Yeta helped helped me realize that, no matter what They Might Be Giants say about James K. Polk, he was not a nice man. No siree bob. I hope we can incite many more history dork outs out of you!

Now, to the arguing!

*dons special sparkly Argument Cap*

When I spoke of country names allowing citizens to hold up their heads with pride, it was mostly a rhetorical flourish that came upon me in the heat of my passion, like an attack of the vapours. Of course one can take pride in the phrase "United States of America" -- it is, as you say, a good expression of our national ideals.

However, this lovely phrase is not suited to be a name, in much the same way that a lovely humuhumunukunukuapua'a is not suited to play the alpenhorn. In order to play the alpenhorn, you need to have certain attributes, such as alpenlegs, alpenarms, and a good alpenpucker. Even a very gifted humuhumunukunukuapua'a will not have these things. Far better to leave the poor little fish in the water, don't you think? And remove that tiny lederhosen, too. It's not at all fetching.

When something needs to be referred to frequently and unambiguously, we give it a name. (For example, this is why we name hurricanes. We're not being cutesy, we just need a fast and accurate way to distinguish them from each other.) In order to be a good name, a word or phrase must have certain attributes. It should be should be fairly short, and it should be a proper noun. A descriptive phrase, even an excellent descriptive phrase like "The United States of America", will not have these things.

If we grant that the states are, in fact, united, what are they united into? When the Constructicons united, they formed Devastator, a single unified entity. Clearly, the same is true of the United States. We've created a single big something out of many little somethings. And, this something needs to be referred to frequently and unambiguously. In short, it needs a name.
Aug 29, 2009

hernesheir The United taStes of America Aug 29, 2009

dontcry Seeitoldyouitwasntflatistan Aug 28, 2009

milosrdenstvi See also my account at ს�?ქ�?რთველ�?. Aug 28, 2009

hernesheir The Untied States of America. Aug 28, 2009

chained_bear True. True.

Ptero, maybe we should consider something like "The Great United States of Greater North America, a.k.a. Great Americastan," or something.

*ponders* Aug 28, 2009

vanishedone Hey, some of us live in the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland... (It's a description, but at least we manage to slip Great into it.) Aug 28, 2009

chained_bear Oh man. I'm sorry. I can sympathize and understand this argument, but I think it also goes to the heart of how Americans see themselves.

If we had a name like Hungary or Kyrgyzstan, it would seem to indicate some unity of ethnicity, religion, language, etc. And the citizens of the United States do not have that particular type of unity. We are really good at compartmentalizing ourselves into a billion little groups. But we're also good at thinking of ourselves as one united people: it's a unity of civic ideals: the belief in the idea of the United States, more than any particular ethnic/racial/religious/origins group, is what really makes us Americans.

In that sense, when you think about it, the name's pretty perfect.

Feel free to argue—I'm certainly not trying to quash any strong emotions on the topic. (These sorts of ideas are exactly the sort of thing that will launch me into a full-fledged history dork out.) I often catch myself wistfully imagining another name, but then I feel better about the name when I think about this idea of a civic religion uniting 300 million people—and inspiring countless other millions over the (couple of) centuries. I think the whole thing is pretty neat. :)

On a more pragmatic note... I have always thought that the perfect corporate name is "The Corporation for Public Broadcasting." Thank heaven, it's a company that actually SAYS what it is they're FOR. How can you get any clearer than that? For which reason I do have a soft spot of affection for the Central African Republic. Aug 28, 2009

pterodactyl Oh, lordy. I love my country, but I really, really hate its name.

Imagine a nice young couple who get married and start a family. These doting parents love their children, so they name them "Girl #1", "Girl #2", and "Boy #1".

Wait, what?! These aren't names, they're descriptions! Those poor kids deserve more than descriptions -- they deserve names. Same goes for countries. Citizens ought to be able to hold up their heads with pride and say "I come from X", where X is a NAME of a PLACE, like "Canada" or "Hungary", or "Kyrgyzstan".

And then there's us. You know those states? In North America? How they're all united and everything? Yeah, them. Well, we don't have a name for them, so let's just call them the "united states" of America.

Gosh darn it. We are going to BEAT this! And in the meantime, if you're looking for us, we'll be over in the corner, commiserating with the United Arab Emirates and the Central African Republic. Aug 28, 2009