r/USdefaultism

23K archived posts · May 2020 – Sep 2026

USdefaultism

r/USdefaultism

When someone communicates to the world, but only considers the US; or is treating the US as the default and the only region to cater to in an international setting; or assumes that the entire world works like the US does; or assumes that everyone and everything is from the US unless otherwise stated. Official Discord server: https://discord.gg/BcczCtAxgw.

Created May 13, 2020

103KMembers (last snapshot)

23KArchived posts

Rule 1: No hateful, racist or derogatory posts or comments

This is not an anti-American sub – if you're here to lash your hate against Americans, you are not welcome here.

There is a zero-tolerance policy for hate on this sub. Consequently, any comment or post containing racist, hateful or derogatory content (against anyone) will be removed.

Rule 2: What constitutes US-defaultism (part 1)

When someone, whether from the US or not, with an international audience (e. g. on Reddit, YouTube, Twitter, etc.) …

a. assumes that the audience is US-only and will therefore understand common things from the US.

b. does not specify that something is from the US but assumes that it will be understood as such; terms like "civil war" without specifying which one.

c. does not specify that something takes place in the US in a way that everyone easily understands (when that information matters).

Rule 3: What constitutes US-defaultism (part 2)

d. assumes that something they see is from/about the US without any indication of that being the case.

e. talks about the US only but uses general terms. E.g., "the history of film" when only referring to US films, or "people from the 80s" when referring to the US population.

f. assumes that if something is true for the US, it also is for the rest of the world, or uses US-only terms such as "the first amendment" when not talking about the US. f. also applies regardless of the audience.

Rule 4: What does not constitute US-defaultism

a. American exceptionalism (“The USA is superior”, “The USA is inherently different” or “The USA is protecting/saving/willing to destroy the world”) belongs on r/ShitAmericansSay,

b. People defaulting to some other country, the northern hemisphere, the western world etc.,

c. Using US customary units or the MM/DD/YY date format,

d. Calling somebody/something from the US "American",

e. "This is an American website" on Reddit (except when used as a justification for actual US-defaultism).

Rule 5: Please give context and point out what exactly you want to criticise

After making a post, please respond to the automod with the following:

a. An explanation of why which part of the post is US-defaultism. It is also useful to state which point(s) under rules 2 and 3 you think your posts falls under,

b. Any context required to understand the post.

This will help people better understand your post and mods judge whether it fits the subreddit or not.

If your post is a meme or another type of post allowed under rule 7, please still respond to the bot.

Rule 6: No reposts

Reposts will be removed. Before posting, check whether the thing you are about to post has already been posted.

Rule 7: Meta posts, memes, defaultisn't etc.

Not all posts have to directly feature US-defaultism. Posts such as the following are also appreciated:

a. Meta posts (discussion posts about this subreddit or US-defaultism in general). Please use the "Meta" flair,

b. Memes about US-defaultism,

c. Posting something from outside this subreddit that criticises the mentality of US-defaultism,

d. "Defaultisn't" posts: Including the nuances of the US not being the default country when talking about the US. Please use the "Defaultisn't" flair.

Rule 8: Crossposting, direct links, and censorship

Censoring usernames is not required.

However, crossposts or direct links to a post/comment that you want to criticise directly encourage brigading (members of a subreddit “invading” another subreddit), therefore:

-Never crosspost or link to a post/comment that you want to criticise!

-Crossposting is encouraged, but only if OOP is featuring someone else committing US-defaultism.

Rule 9: Quality control 1: Low-hanging fruit

Posts only containing the following fall into the low-hanging fruit category. They don’t contribute to the subreddit and will be removed:

a. US state abbreviations,

b. Search engine results or suggestions,

c. US-defaultism loops,

d. Defaultism by Duolingo,

e. The US flag representing the English language,

f. Charles Peralo polls.

Rule 10: Quality control 2: Provoked defaultism

We don’t want people to harass others in any way – it hurts the reputation of this subreddit. We particularly don’t want people to provoke others into committing US-defaultism to then post them on here. The following types of posts will therefore be removed:

a. Posts featuring any sort of harassment or provocation by the OP,

b. Posts that only feature defaultism which was the result of a provocation by someone other than OP.

Rule 11: Quality control 3: General low-quality posts

We want the posts in our subreddit to be of high quality so that people can appreciate its content. Low-quality, nitpicking posts aren’t welcome here. Therefore, we reserve our right to remove the following posts:

a. Posts that aren’t appreciated by the community (with few upvotes, many downvotes on the automod and/or overwhelmingly negative comments),

b. Posts where the defaultism is questionable or dubious.

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