Why do Americans do the date differently?

[thylasos]

Ah, I thought this was about dating. The comment would've largely consisted of a behavioural comparison, in that mostly due to a lack of British reserve the Americans tend not to wait until they're absolutely plastered to confess to their feelings for each other. I reply that getting absolutely plastered is a British tradition, and I won't have it slagged off.

 

[Xojins]

I don't know, why do people in England drive on the wrong side of the road?

 

[ENKC]

I find this system impractical and frustrating whenever I run into it. After all, the day is usually the first priority. It's just much easier to read and write as DD/MM/YYYY.

 

[internetzealot1]

Because that's the order people say it. January 1st, 2010. Month Day Year.

Some of guys are really getting up in arms over this.

 

[duchaked]

honestly...idk

but really kids...don't think too much into it

 

[Tsunimo]

Im pretty sure it is for the same reason we drive on the wrong side of the road, or why we don't use the metric system.
We want everyone to know we are not a colony of the british, we are our own nation.

Yeah... It's a pretty stupid reason.

 

[Aur0ra145]

It's how we say the date, that's why it's ordered that way.

"Mr. Sanderson your doctor's appointment is on January 8, 2011 at 5 pm."

I personally write my date like this 8JAN11, no confusion and very easy/quick to write.

 

[Souplex]

Because it makes sense.
That's how people say dates. For example; you wouldn't say first January, 2010. You would say January first.
The real question is why is the rest of the world wrong?

 

[klaynexas3]

i don't know, we just do, and it's the way i was taught, so i do it too. i don't see harm in doing it differently, so why change?

 

[Irridium]

I don't know, why do people in England drive on the wrong side of the road?

Why does the water in toilets in the Southern Hemisphere flush the wrong way?

 

[Glerken]

I swear to god if I hear one more person in this thread try to sound funny by personifying America as an "Angsty Teenager" trying to rebel, I'm going to scream.

You see, America has different dialect than England, and we say the date as January 1st, 2011.
So it's MM/DD/YY. While you may say the 1st of January, 2011. So you use DD/MM/YY.

Neither is superior. It's a really minor issue.

And no, we Americans did not change how we say the date to be different, angsty teenagers. Over time languages evolve and dialect changes. America and England have the Atlantic Ocean separating them, for this reason, while we do both speak English, there are small differences in them.

Now be quiet, you people generalizing America are just as bad as the ultra-patriotic rednecks. And you self-hating American's annoy me to no end. Yes, it's stupid to be proud of what chunk of land you happened to be born on, but it's equally as stupid to be ashamed of it.

 

[Carlston]

I dunno. Why do the people doing it the other way do it that way?

Thats how it's said over here- today is "the second of January two thousand and eleven."

I'm in Scotland. It's part of the UK. The UK is the nation that some ignorant people call "England". Scotland, Wales, Northern Ireland and England are in fact culturally diverse places, and quite often people from one of those places don't like it when you just refer to them as "English" or say "England did" stufff that actually the UK did.)

Last I checked (shoo Sealand) every country past and present wants everyone to see everything their way, and anyone who says they aren't is living in a dream world to make themselves seem more enlightened.

I call bollocks on this statement. I don't believe that any culture is any better than any other. I am well aware that the parts of my culture that I love dearly were the result of many cultures all influencing each other- not people forcing each other to see things their way, but people recognising that they didn't and not having it bother them. This "dream world" to which you refer happens- get your eyes away from the crap parts of the world for a few minutes and you'll see it as well.

You're just mad because England couldn't hold on to it's colonies. Next time bring more soldiers.

I think you meant "UK" not "England", which also explains why you don't know that the next time we brought less soldiers. It went quite well to. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Burning_of_Washington)

No one cares if you think any culture is better than any others, if you really thought so you wouldn't bash on the Americans now would ya ;p seriously everyone is gonna worry about their own back yard and it's just how life is.
And you just proved my point even more.

 

[FallenJellyDoughnut]

They enjoy making things feel like their own. They do it with language too. Make minor changes so they can feel like they're not just copying a country most of them see as their own personal ***** nation.

This.
America is like that angsty teenager who acts all different because it makes him feel rebel or something.

Just like Australia is that video-game hating place where everyone rides Kangaroos. Right? Because saying something about a country based on one thing is cool.

OT: Honestly, probably because day goes up 31, while month only goes up to 12, so they try to make the smaller numbers first for some reason.

Well obviously we ride kangaroos. How else would we get around?

 

[Xojins]

I don't know, why do people in England drive on the wrong side of the road?

Why does the water in toilets in the Southern Hemisphere flush the wrong way?

It doesn't actually; that's a common myth.

 

[Dindril]

... I never knew it was a country specific thing... Seeing as I write DD-MM-YY, while I frequently see MM-DD-YY, and my computer has it YYYY-MM-DD...

Note: I'm american...

 

[BabyRaptor]

America likes to be the one kid standing in the spotlight. We do it on lots of stuff: Israel, dates, measurement systems, our huge lack of sanity...

Really, I have no idea.

 

[Ironic Pirate]

So there. Have your "Go America!" picture, have your date system. I'll have my date system, and I'll just make jokes about England just being mad that they lost all their colonies. Compromise?

not really sure what england has to do with any of this since its like most of the world uses dd/mm/yyyy and if they dont use it then they use yyyy/mm/dd.

its like 6 countries including the US that use mm/dd/yyyy


also i havent seen america have an empire that spand the globe, the sun never set on the british empire and all that. so maybe hold off on the britsh losing the empire jokes until the US actually has an empire to lose.

Sorry, though you were English, so I was just putting in a little jab.

Imperialism isn't a good thing, you know. We had a bit of one for a while, but we cut it off after a while.

England had a head start, regardless.

 

[USSR]

When they say a date out loud they also happen to say it like that e.g. May 24th, instead of 24th of May

That's actually just a personal preference of the speaker..
Or it is around here, at least.

I don't know if someone quoted you on that already, but I don't feel like going through nine pages..

 

[Nimcha]

It's quite confusing sometimes on the internet when you have dates like 05-03-2011 or something. Usually I then have to check other dates on the site to deduce which system they use. :/

If everyone would just use the metric system, Kelvin for temperature and DD/MM/YYYY for dates the world would be a much better place.

 

[BioHazardMan]

God I knew this would turn into "because America thinks they're better than everyone else". Assholes.