Attitudes on Expats

[quote=”camby”]I am interested in what you all have experienced that have moved out of your respective countries by your fellow countryman?

Anger? bigotry? charges on being unpatriotic? pity?blank “why would you go there” stares?

I have heard many say that if you expat out, for work, personal or retirement, somehow you are unpatriotic and anti-___ (usually american). At a work lunch the other day, a lady I worked with said this, about a fellow that moved to Belize, saying something like “hey, he chose to move out of the USA and turn his back on this country, so he deserves what he gets”
Bare in mind, this is a black lady, Democrat, Obama supporter and early 30’s with college 4yr degree, not a Red state flag waving white Republican, though have heard this from both “sides” of political/racial groups…

I know some are envious, but has anyone gotten grief, etc?[/quote]

why would you care what anyone thinks??

just making the logical intelligent decision to leave the Country puts you in such a small %% of people that you really should not waste your breathe speaking with the.

most of our society are walking around fully asleep like in a catatonic state.

when you try to have a civil discussion if your not attacked verbally with nothing more than unfounded emotion not based on anything then its a waste of time.

time that you cannot replace or ever get back.

there are no sides.. except the truth and what is actually going on.

it’s better to just stay in gridlock than anything else and let the chips fall where they may.

here is a great quote from john stossel that i agree with 100%

[b]Stossel thinks that, for the moment, gridlock will delay or slow down the mad race to total government:

My hope for now: gridlock. People say they like bipartisanship, but bipartisanship usually means politicians conspire to take more of our money and freedom. Bipartisanship gave us the Department of Homeland Security, TSA, PATRIOT Act, Import-Export Bank, war on drug users, ethanol subsides, TARP, No Child Left Behind, foreign wars and an ever-rising debt. When Democrats and Republicans come together, they put us deeper in debt.

Let’s have some gridlock!
[/b]

i’ve heard it all — from you’re a traitor, to a sell-out, to a wimp, to whatever comes across their little minds at the moment. i sent you the personal attack i got from someone i didn’t even know when i made a statement about being upset that one in five children in america live in poverty. she told me to leave. i told her i was ahead of her and had already done that. well, you saw the exchange. jajaja the bottom line is if you lived your life, or made your decisions based on what the sheeple think you should do, not a one of us would do anything daring, and as most people know, i don’t give one whit what other people think about my choices.

[quote=”Scott”]

“Who gives a damn what anybody else thinks, and that includes you own family which is typically the biggest stumbling block for most people.”
[/quote]

Unfortunately a lot of unsolicited opinion is based purely on [b]ignorance[/b] (present group excepted of course :wink:) – a good example is “Why do you want to move to that place – it’s an island, isn’t it?” (confusing Puerto Rico with C.R.). And of course there are scores of examples of ignorance leading up to the U.S. election.

A wise man is superior to any insults which can be put upon him, and the best reply to unseemly behavior is patience and moderation. -Moliere

I have never heard anything negative from any foreigners I have met so far. They all say how lucky we were to live in such a beautiful country and admire the courage it needs to make the move. Only unhappy and envious people would say something negative.

I think that if you decide to expatriate and move to Costa Rica, Brasil, France or wherever you would do so with the intent of “[b]wanting[/b]” to immerse yourself within the culture you are moving to because that’s what you like about the idea.

After all, if you’re an American moving to Costa Rica (just using this as an example) and you immerse yourself with the local American community in Costa Rica then what’s the point of moving in the 1st place.

If you’re [b]only[/b] motivation to expatriate is economic then I think that’s the wrong reason to move.

In any event, if I decide to move to a different country it’s because I want to become part of the local culture and what anyone else may think or say about that I could care less about.

[quote=”davidd[b]Stossel thinks that, for the moment, gridlock will delay or slow down the mad race to total government:

My hope for now: gridlock. People say they like bipartisanship, but bipartisanship usually means politicians conspire to take more of our money and freedom. Bipartisanship gave us the Department of Homeland Security, TSA, PATRIOT Act, Import-Export Bank, war on drug users, ethanol subsides, TARP, No Child Left Behind, foreign wars and an ever-rising debt. When Democrats and Republicans come together, they put us deeper in debt.

Let’s have some gridlock!
[/b]

[/quote]

I’ve never encountered any static for living out of the States except when commenting on the U.S. economy. Apparently some in the States think we are unaffected by the economy there and I am asked what difference it makes to me.

In one respect I disdagree with Stossel. Fear gave us the Department of Homeland Security, TSA, PATRIOT Act, etc.

When you elect representation that has no inkling of what makes the world turn you are asking for problems and God knows the U.S. has problems.

I’m Canadian (Victoria, B.C.), Natuarlized as a Costa Rican (carry two passports) and have lived in Costa Rica for over fourteen years. Any such remarks, or inuendo as you suggest, are, in my opinion, based soley in envy and jealously. In a sense, if you’ve successfully made the move to Costa Rica, or the like, you are living a dream that few of your countrymen are able to achieve, for one reason, or another. It takes “guts” to make the move initially and even more “guts” to make the cultural compromises required to sustain it. If you’ve done it, be proud of yourself and consider yourself lucky enough that you were able to enrich your life with the experience, that many of your disgruntled countrymen wished they could have as well.