this post was submitted on 19 Oct 2025
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Showerthoughts
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A "Showerthought" is a simple term used to describe the thoughts that pop into your head while you're doing everyday things like taking a shower, driving, or just daydreaming. The most popular seem to be lighthearted clever little truths, hidden in daily life.
Here are some examples to inspire your own showerthoughts:
- Both “200” and “160” are 2 minutes in microwave math
- When you’re a kid, you don’t realize you’re also watching your mom and dad grow up.
- More dreams have been destroyed by alarm clocks than anything else
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I've lived in 3 countries in Europe for long periods in the last 3 decades and at least in the last two - Britain and Portugal - also saw the "Americanization" of society.
This was especially glaring in Portugal as there I was returning from 2 decades abroad, which made more visible the changes to an American model that happened in the meanwhile, including in terms of how people's behaviour has shifted more towards that way of thinking, very similarly to what you're describing for Sweden.
Even the politics has shifted to American style sleaze talk and even lying - back in the day politicians would resign when caught lying, nowadays that's just Monday morning.
Personally I find it even more shocking for Portugal since IMHO, Portugal was always culturally more backwards than Northern Europe (specifically in comparison with The Netherlands, were I also lived and hence can compare both countries from personal experience) and American ways are (also IMHO) even more regressive than Portugal in general (at least when it comes to interpersonal relations, where the American way glorifies sociopathic behaviours whilst traditionally the Portuguese way was a lot about taking in account the feelings of others, though also with a big chunk of "what will people think" that moderates acts of screwing up other people directly), though it's a different kind of regressiveness, and the Americanization of Portugal coincides with what by most metrics (such as PP income, inequality, social mobility, quality of life, violent crime) is the country stopping it's progress (that had been going one since Fascism was overthrown in 74) and now going back.
Again, comparing like to like with The Netherlands (which has gone down a route similar to what you describe for Sweden), I think how bad Americanization was for the various countries in Europe very much depends on how advanced they were in terms of both the wealth of their society and popularity of politicies to benefit the many as a group, hence countries like Portugal have so far suffered more than The Netherlands (and, it seems, Sweden) purelly because of having started this period already well behind those countries.