Category: customs

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People Break Down The Dumbest Traditions They’ve Ever Witnessed

Traditions have a way of connecting us to our past.

We learn them from our parents, our grandparents or even an understanding of our cultural background.

And it can be comforting to carry out many of these traditions. They give us a sense of long-term regularity amidst all the chaos of current events and people coming and going in our lives.

But for all that comfort, there are a whole lot of head-scraching moments.

These are the times we wonder:

“How and why did this get started and why the hell are we still doing it?”

One Redditor asked:

“What is the dumbest tradition?”

Of course wedding traditions came up a lot—these come out of Lebanon.

“So we have this tradition in some parts of Lebanon. Once you have your wedding, the bride’s male relatives are supposed to ‘kidnap’ the groom. The bride should go back to her parent’s for 2 nights a night after the wedding.”

“when the priest/shiek asks the bride.. do you take this man as your husband.. the bride should refuse to answer the question twice .. she should answer yes at the 3rd time. As a sign of showing that she’s not desperate to marry the groom.” — Ghost_Leb

But as we know, Lebanon isn’t the only place with bizarre wedding moments. 

“Garter and Bouquet tosses at Weddings.”

“Hate ‘em, always have. Think they’re outdated and I’m so thrilled most of my clients (I’m in the wedding industry) are steering away from them.”

“Seriously, who wants to have their husband go up their skirt in front of their parents?”

“[to be fair]; a decent amount of my clients are older” — caitycc

Then came talk of the clothes.

“White wedding dresses.White is the most unflattering color,makes you look 50lbs heavier and doesn’t outline your body at all.”

“The ONE day it’s about you and your S.O and ur not even gonna pick ur favorite color dress? LAME I’m wearing a black and peach pink dress to my wedding?” — chocolatecakeslicee

One person was more involved with the lead-up to marriage.

“That the man has to propose.”

“When I want to get married I will ask him.”

“Also to add asking the parents for approval. We are all adults, we don’t need your permission to get married” — MinnesotoanPerson

This comment took aim at the whole universe of wedding traditions.

“I got married a few years back and I can tell you that at least 75% of wedding traditions are stupid and should be abolished.”

“If you’re getting married and there’s something you’re “supposed to do” that you just don’t care about, seriously, skip it. You will still have plenty to do and honestly you’ll barely remember the day once it’s done anyway.”

“It all goes by so fast, it’s insane. Ignore everyone else, skip the things that you think are dumb, and just enjoy your day. Absolutely no one will remember if you did that cringey garter dance or threw your bouquet.”

“Traditions are just peer pressure from dead people.” — KitchenSwillForPigs

And then there are the things people do far after the wedding. 

” ‘Staying together for the kids’ “

“Not 100% sure this counts/is a tradition but it sure feels like one with how often people do it.”

“Like dude, just admit your marriage/relationship is failing, be adults about it, and separate instead of pretending you’re doing it for a good reason. As an adult who’s parents did this, I can PROMISE you you’re only hurting your kids and yourselves by doing this.” — SaphireJames

Moving on from weddings, this person was thinking more about daily life. 

“The false kindness rules. I’m talking about the ones that make you refuse a gift, expecting it to be offered to you once more, and other kinds of such rules.”

“The thing is such rules are usually very local, often limited to a particular village, and conflict with the rules of different areas.”

“Imagine that in your area, being offered a gift means being respected highly, and it is rude to reject a gift. While in some other area, being offered a gift means you are supposed to refuse twice and only accept if the offer is repeated for the third time.”

“The result? You meet someone. She offers you a gift. You don’t really like chocolate, but you accept because you don’t want to sound rude. Then she makes a weird face, as if you stole it from her.”

“And she doesn’t seem to be into you, but keeps offering you coffee and dinner, and pretends that the date was successful, only to block you on tinder afterwards.” — King_Dagda

This commenter was thinking politically.

“The dumbest tradition we (Brits) have is having a monarchy. Giving people who serve no purpose prestige, respect and wealth based solely on their bloodline is ridiculous.”

“It’s a perpetuation of the idea that some genes are superior to others and have more worth.” — Negative-Net-9455

This one is just bizarre. 

“Up until he died (although someone else is probably carrying on the tradition), a Canadian weekly agriculture newspaper used to publish the annual findings of a guy who forecasted the weather by reading the entrails (spleen) of a slaughtered pig.” — tangcameo

As is this one. 

“Tar barrel running in Ottery St Mary, England.”

“Yes you are correct, hot tar coming out of a barrel being ran down a street with spectators watching.”

“Even listed as an attraction! Come down to South Devon and get yourself burnt! Fun times ?” — Baconator08

And this one too. 

“In Russia,there’s a tradition among cosmonauts when they go out to the launch pad. The bus they ride on stops half way so the cosmonauts can get out and piss on the tires.” — TeamNathanFTW

We end with a timely example.

“Said this before, but the thing about having your scared/crying child take a picture with dept. store Santa then sending it out as your x-mas card/e-card. How is that at all cute?”

“If they are happy and all, fine. But not if they are clearly in terror.” — John32070

With your help, all these strange behaviors can be phased out for good.

But of course, there’s always someone that seems to still be into it.

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People Talk About What’s Common in Their Country but Rare in Other Parts of the World

Doesn’t traveling to a far and distant country sound incredible right about now?

Because of this seemingly never-ending pandemic we’re going through, it looks like it might be a while before we can venture to another part of the world…but I’m keeping my fingers crossed that it happens sooner than later.

Because traveling exposes us to different cultures, languages, customs, foods, etc. And it’s great to get outside our comfort zones and to learn about different people. So let’s do some more of that!

AskReddit users talked about things that are common in their countries but rare in other parts of the world.

1. Sounds delightful.

“Such cheap olive oil.

And eating incredinly late.

Lunch is more or less at 1-3 pm, and dinner at 9-10 pm.

That is why in Spain we have snacks between foods.”

2. This has to be in Scandinavia.

“Saunas in most apartments or at least apartment buildings, haven’t lived in a building that doesn’t have one.

A lot of great well known (and underground) metal bands.

And a nuclear power plant that is at this point 11 years behind schedule and according to Wikipedia the 3rd most expensive building in the world.”

3. Paradise.

“Bagged milk, legal weed and fermented maple syrup.”

4. Free drinks.

“Milk dispensers at school cafeterias (or restaurants but it’s not as common).

I live in Sweden where food and drinks such as water and milk is provided free for students.

Whenever I tell someone outside of Scandinavia that we have milk dispensers they’re always very surprised.”

5. USA!

“Root beer.

In America this is widely available and basically universally liked, but give it to someone from another country, especially a European country, and they will hate it.”

6. India.

“Cheap Streaming subscriptions.

In my country a pack for Disney+, HBO, Showtime, ABC, Live Sports and a lot more, costs less than 2 dollars a month.

Yes 2 dollars TOTAL.”

7. I need this in my life.

“They look like snowballs in size and shape, but they’re made of potatoes and boiled, with a piece of meat inside for flavoring. You eat it with sausage, fat’n’bacon and kohlrabi/carrot puree.

It’s not as common as it used to be because it’s mainly grandmas that used to make it.

Also known as “komle”. In some places they simply refer to them as “potato balls.””

8. The paranormal.

“In Mexico we experience paranormal stuff very close. Even people like me, who doesn’t believe in it, have parents, siblings, children or grandparents who have experienced ghosts or other entities very close.

Not in the “friend of my friend” kind of way. It is really really common to be in the same room, and someone just says: “I saw my great-grandfather coming out from the well” or stuff like that.

And nobody makes a fuss about it. We just process it and move on. But really, I don’t know anybody who hasn’t experienced a close encounter with something paranormal in one way or another.

And again, I’m an atheist and a skeptic. I haven’t experienced something at first hand. And that makes me an exception. Not the average.”

9. Probably not these days.

“Drinking a hot drink from an hollowed pumpkin through a metal straw and sharing it with others all drinking from the same straw.”

10. Interesting.

“The Swastika.

Although a banned Nazi symbol as assumed by others, a swastika is actually a symbol of divinity and purity so you will see that alot in my country.”

11. Drink up!

“Underage drinking.

I live in Belgium and everyone does it from the moment they’re 14.”

12. Not cheap.

“Expensive fuel.

A liter of gasoline costs like €1.

It might not sound much, but look at the average wage of a working class Romanian.”

13. Corruption.

“Drinking at the age of 12.

And bribing police, politicians, and basically everyone.

Welcome to Greece.”

Do you have any insights about things that are common in your country but not in other parts of the world?

If so, please talk to us in the comments.

We’d love to hear from you!

The post People Talk About What’s Common in Their Country but Rare in Other Parts of the World appeared first on UberFacts.

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15 Things That Are Socially Acceptable Today But Will be Seen as Backwards and Immoral by Future Generations

Times change. It’s one of the few things you can actually rely on. What may have been totally acceptable a few decades ago might be considered extremely problematic today. Take homophobia, for example. Just a few decades ago, homosexuality was considered a mental illness! Today, we know better, and gay people are seen (by most of us, anyway) as just regular people who love the same sex.

Even though we like to think we’re so advanced and enlightened, the fact is that in 50 years, future generations will look at how we behave now and they’ll think we did some seriously backward things.

Here are what AskReddit users think those things will be.

1. Workaholics

“The insane workaholic culture we have that promotes unhealthy amounts of overtime and getting to work early every day.”

2. A divisive topic

“Allowing children to eat so much sugar.”

3. Noooooooo

“Microwaving fish at the work cafetaria.”

4. I don’t see this ever going away

“Posting pictures of your children on social media.”

5. Gotcha!

“Hyper-politicizing everything. “Gotcha” debates where the aim is just to win the argument rather than actually being right or making sensible points.”

6. No more plastic surgery

“My money is on the current methods of cosmetic surgery. Jamming sacks of fluid in a lady’s chest to create bigger boobs, for instance, seems like something for which there will one day be a better practice.”

7. Enough of that

“Influencers”, or in other words, people expressing an opinion (or worse, being paid to express an opinion) with the intent to influence others.

If I am looking to buy a new product that I am not familiar with, I will look for honest reviews. Unfortunately, honest reviews are virtually impossible to find today – they are either written by the manufacturer themself, or by a paid “customer” (influencer).

The only honest reviews are the negative ones by pissed off customers, but those are also not reilable, since they could be coming from someone who has been paid by a competitor, or just someone who happened to get that one faulty product that slipped through the QA checks.”

8. Wasteful

“Using something as strong and durable as plastic to make packaging destined to be thrown away.”

9. Awful

“Letting businesses pay politicians who are then responsible for setting laws that apply to the businesses.”

10. Do you agree?

“Colleges sucking every fucking dollar out of you that they can. Fucking scam artists.”

11. Bad for your health?

“Social media in general it’s proven that it takes a toll on our mental health but we still use it all the time anyway.”

12. Obsession

“The North American obsession/fetishization with work. European countries already have it figured out that productivity isn’t linear with time worked and 50-80 hour weeks aren’t doing anyone any good.

We’re still stuck with bragging about how little we slept and how many hours we worked this week, when so many of us are probably non or low functioning for many of those hours worked anyway.”

13. Listen to this one

“The idea that it is correct and sustainable for the current generation to borrow from future generations to consume now.

This is a relatively new trend. Perhaps 100 years in the most developed countries. Only beginning in many developing countries. This is why we don’t see the horrible consequences… yet.

Traditional models of economic development were all about savings and deferred consumption. Future generations had more than past generations and it was assumed that this is how they take care of their parents – by having slightly more than they would on their own. There was a general consensus that life is hard and that giving our children a better one is our duty. I eat half as much so that you and your children can eat it all. People were happy that they had it better than their parents and attempted to control their greed for the sake of their children.

Present models of economic development are all about present short term consumption which is financed with money creation. But money creation means that the wealth still has to come from somewhere and it does – from the future. More money creation now stimulates the economy for greater investment in the future which will increase production so that the extra debt can be paid. Unfortunately because there is no way to know how much you can borrow from the future it leads to essentially what is greed because expectations for the future have no restraint in something that we see around us – it is all in the future. Then as a result the future generations have less available to them than past generations and are being increasingly more burdened by economic cost of that which was consumed.

The result is that I want my house and my car and my vacations and my pension at 60 and you can get a student loan and get a job and not live in my house because I didn’t do it when I was your age. Except you did it because you borrowed from the future – that is my future.

Almost nothing of the way we now pay for things in the long term is ethical. The most obvious example is the environment – we are consuming now by leaving environmental debt for our children – but the same is true of welfare as pensions and medical care. We have fewer and fewer children and we both live longer and have greater demands and expectations. This means that our children have to both work harder to have the same standard of living that we had and in the end they are loaded with debt to pay for our welfare.

In the past a child would get inheritance from the parents. Sometimes nothing. But now every child gets a ton of debt and inflation before you get to whatever your parents left you. The national debt, the private debts, consumer debts they all keep growing… Who is going to pay it? Every time the government bails someone out to stave off a complete collapse of the debt-based economy the bill falls on the shoulders of the new generation. How much longer?

We still keep deferring the deadline with more and more money creation and various financial inventions but sooner or later enough people in the world will get on the same “consume now, pay later” scheme that it will crack because there will be nowhere to borrow from or nobody left to exploit and the sheer pressure of everyone wanting to have it will be like a collapsing star.

And there will be no escaping the black hole. Nobody will remember what it meant to just work for a better future for your children. Everyone will be angry that they can’t have it as good as their parents. And remember… the “natural” way of human society is not to have it as good as your parents but better. It is so natural to us as if it has been wired into us by evolution – which makes sense because those whose parents ensured their children’s well-being would be more likely to survive.

And when you can’t have it better. When there is no hope for a better future. Why live? Why let others live…? Why should they have when I can’t? And this is how wars begin.”

14. Here, here!

“I really hope this extremely polarizing political climate is seen as backwards and immoral in the future.”

15. Hmmmm

“I think one day some future generation will think “Can you believe they used to just let people drive these multi ton metal boxes at high speeds? They just accepted car accidents and traffic as a fact of life.”

I think this even now when I’m doing 80-85 mph on the highway and I look over and the driver next to me is doing the same speed while looking at their phone.”

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