ENOUGH!
OK, that does it. I'm tired of the uninformed bickering all around. This thread started because Corruptress (my, what a self-important name) childishly chose to make herself the center of attention by spreading lies about deleted posts because she had nothing to contribute. It's not hard to leave a community when you're not really part of it.
How this thread degenerated into American & Canadian bashing, I have no idea. I can't even blame the hijacking of this thread by terrorists, like the planes of 9-11. Just a lot of angry people wanting to spread that anger. Well, you've succeeded. The thread of the tickling community has degenerated into picking on a popular singer and then justifying it because she's from another country...please. I hope you were just trying to be funny and failing; I'd hate to think that you really did hate Canada because of Avril Lavigne.
I was born American AND I'm French Canadian by blood. And a lot of musicians that people consider great "American" symbols are actually Canadian, such as Shania Twain. Americans certainly have no problem w/claiming Canadian comics, such as Jim Carrey, Caroline Rhea (who has no business calling herself "America's" sweetheart), the late John Candy and the ailing Michael J. Fox, to name a few. It's really easy, not to mention popular, to bash Canadian/French/Arab/fill-in-the-blank-foreigners, but unless your name goes something like Thomas Jefferson Wolfcall or John Thundersky (both real people!), you're not one the precious few Americans who can claim they're not of foreign descent. Nearly all of the Americans reading this have most, if not ALL, of their ancestors from some other country/countries.
I'm also a veteran of the United States Army, so I'll add this as well. As for the Canadians (and some other foreigners) claiming America thinks it runs everything, I'll admit we get a bit self-important ourselves on occasion. But despite the rhetoric, the only nation taking their lumps w/it where it really counts, i.e., the battlefield, are the Brits. Semper fi, mates. We're the only two countries trying to save the world from terrorists. As for internet, it's just one thing that was invented by Americans...like the automobile, the light bulb, the steambolt, the airplane, the radio, the vaccines for polio and smallpox, the space shuttle, etc. So I'm really sorry if our attitude offends, no sarcasm intended. I really am sorry about that. And we ARE an incredibly violent, wasteful, overweight, irresponsible, arrogant country that has far more money than we know what to do with (Americans who complain about income taxes should compare notes with our foreign friends--we ain't doing that bad). But we're also one of the most compassionate, creative, countries in history, who constantly send our soldiers and citizens in harm's war every time there's a war, famine, plague, hurricane, flood, earthquake or other disaster anywhere we can go that we'll hopefully get back in one piece. And the only ground we ask for in return is enough to bury the ones who don't make it back. So if you can't help us save the world, could you at least stop knocking us when we do it?
Fighting's not a good way to make $; on the contrary, it's hideously expensive. So if the most powerful nation in history can't fight w/o it costing hundreds of billions of American dollars ($400B as of this writing) and hundreds of American lives (over 200, including 60 since the "end of major hostilities on 5/1"), then what chance do we have of accomplishing anything w/it? Take it from a guy living in the heart of Bible Belt country: we ticklers have way too many people thinking we're perverts to waste precious energy that we should be expending defending ourselves fighting each other.
ENOUGH!
