We're #1! Seven Sorry Categories the United States Tops the World In

American exceptionalism--the idea that the U.S. is special, different or immune to the problems plaguing the rest of the world (or that we're the only country on Earth that even matters)--has plagued this hunk of land ever since it was stolen from the Indians.  Slogans like "We're #1!" and "Greatest/Freest/Strongest/Best Nation on Earth" are thrown around by our leaders like confetti with little thought as to whether they're actually true.  Well, here are some accurate & up-to-date (as of this writing) categories the United States is ACTUALLY #1 in.  Keep in mind this isn't just "number 1" among so-called developed Western nations but the entire planet.  

Addiction & Overdose:   While America is often touted as a land of opportunity & the best place one could ever hope to be born, the truth is that millions of its citizens are tuning out & dropping dead with hard drugs.  And because our drug laws are so harsh, users turn to the black market where ultra-potent substances like fentanyl analogues & nitazenes are leading to massive unintentional overdoses never before seen in the history of this nation.  In 2021 we lost over 100,000 Americans to overdoses caused mostly by illicit fentanyl in the drug supply.  That's more than any other year since this country was founded in 1776.  As you can see from the map below, we even beat out the country with the 2nd highest addiction rates:  Greenland, where the weather is miserably frigid & there's 6 straight months of darkness.  Addiction rates have only risen since the pandemic.

Time to start looking at the demand side of the supply-and-demand equation.

Obesity & Related Diseases:  The U.S. has long topped the world's list of fattest countries and it's only getting worse with each passing decade.  With fast food delivery services like DoorDash & the Healthy At Every Size movement normalizing morbid obesity, it doesn't look like this unhealthy trend will be ending any time soon.  Type II diabetes, once referred to as "Adult Onset Diabetes," is now common in schoolchildren while lifestyle diseases like colon cancer are also setting in earlier and earlier.  Between 2017-2020, obesity rates among American adults were 41.9%.  That's obesity (BMI > 30), not "overweight" (BMI 25 < 30).  The public health cost of this medical burden was an astonishing $173 billion in 2019 dollars.  In recent years the military has even had to retool its definition of obesity due to a lack of fit recruits, making the problem a national security issue.  

COVID Cases & Deaths:  Predictably, we also lead the world in COVID cases and deaths.  This is due to our three-pronged problem of subhuman working conditions, rampant obesity (see above) and lack of universal healthcare.  Oh, and can't forget our abysmal education system that apparently forgot to teach half the population about germ theory & basic hygiene/disease prevention measures.  The U.S. has lost over a million people to this disease and counting, yet hardly a word has been uttered about this unacceptable loss of human life by the president or other leaders.  Meanwhile 9/11, with its death toll of 2,996 (including the hijackers), is practically a national holiday & was used as an excuse to justify a whole war in Iraq which had nothing to do with the attacks.  GO TO SLEEP, AMERICA.  EVERYTHING IS OKAY.  YOUR GOVERNMENT'S GOT IT ALL UNDER CONTROL.  

9/11 just hits different rolling past a million deaths nobody cares about.

Guns:  The U.S. has more firearms than any nation on Earth.  In fact, guns outnumber people in America.  According to ABC News, this country accounts for less than 5% of the world's population but 40% of the world's civilian-owned guns.  This has lead to an unacceptable amount of death & destruction in the form of domestic violence murders, school shootings, accidental deaths among children who shoot themselves with their parents' guns, crimes of passion, shooting sprees in public places like churches & grocery stores, armed robberies & other preventable crimes.  While gun reforms in other countries like Switzerland & Australia have greatly decreased or stopped civilian gun violence, the U.S. refuses to pass even the most modest regulations such as those targeting AR-15s & other semi-automatic rifles.  

Incarceration:  With over 2 million Americans incarcerated nationwide, the "freest country on Earth" locks up more of its citizens than anywhere else on the globe.  So you'd think we'd have something to show for it:  lower rates of violent crime & drug addiction (seeing as how even possession is a jailable offense), less property crime perhaps...something.  But no.  The prison system is a revolving door of recidivism meant to inflict suffering with no thought to reforming those who can be saved & will be let out one day.  Sentences are often not proportionate to the crime committed; race and skin tone play a big role in determining who goes to jail & for how long.  The wealthy rarely spend a day behind bars for the same crimes as the poor.  The overall rate of imprisonment has skyrocketed since 1972 when only 200,000 people were locked up nationwide.  That's an increase of 1 million, 8 hundred thousand in just 50 years.  All while violent criminals like rapists, child traffickers & murderers routinely get a slap on the wrist.  

Military Spending:  America's spending on wars abroad is reflective of our priorities at home.  We blow more on our military than any other nation.  In 2020 the U.S. spent $778 billion on our military budget, putting us at the top of the heap worldwide in military expenditures.  That's more than the next 9 countries combined.  Not only does this send the message to our populace that violence is the preferred means of settling conflict, it directly steals from other parts of the national budget such as mental healthcare, housing & infrastructure, education, & clean energy.  You can't invest in weapons of war without taking directly from these other budgetary priorities, all of which are largely taxpayer funded.

Back when presidents weren't owned by corporations (Not you, Bernie)

National Debt:  Predictably, the U.S. has the highest national debt of any country on Earth:  a whopping $24 trillion.  This is a result of decades of printing money backed by nothing (the gold standard was done away with in 1971), exorbitant military spending & bailing out corporations like the airlines & cruise ship industry every 10 years.  When politicians talk about ending Social Security & cutting social welfare programs, it's because of the "national debt problem".  Rather than making billionaires pay their fair share of taxes to help with the national debt & other issues, they'd rather steal from the poor & feeble.  To make matters worse, the U.S. doesn't even produce many material goods anymore--we've outsourced all our labor to China & other nations, so we really don't have anything material to offer.  It's a complicated issue but basically we owe other countries a metric fuckton of money... what happens when they come to collect & we hand them sweaty palms & an IOU?  Maybe that's what this huge cache of military weapons is really for.  😐

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