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First American pope elected and will be known as Pope Leo XIV

(www.cnn.com)
606 points saikatsg | 24 comments | 08 May 25 16:30 UTC | HN request time: 0.001s | source | bottom
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afavour ◴[08 May 25 17:54 UTC] No.43929124[source]▶
> "Cardinal George of Chicago, of happy memory, was one of my great mentors, and he said: 'Look, until America goes into political decline, there won't be an American pope.' And his point was, if America is kind of running the world politically, culturally, economically, they don't want America running the world religiously. So, I think there's some truth to that, that we're such a superpower and so dominant, they don't wanna give us, also, control over the church."

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/new-pope-could-it-be-american-c...

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bbor ◴[08 May 25 18:04 UTC] No.43929272[source]▶
For what it’s worth, I was just reading that Leo wasn’t seen as “completely” American due to his many years in Peru — he’s even a citizen. Take that as you will.
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1. rootsudo ◴[08 May 25 18:09 UTC] No.43929321[source]▶
For what it's worth, Peru is in South America. Still American, Technically.
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2. bitshiftfaced ◴[08 May 25 18:17 UTC] No.43929441[source]▶
From reading online comments, I'm starting to believe that those who reside outside the US are more strident defenders of the idea that "US citizens only" = "American" than US citizens themselves.
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3. kklisura ◴[08 May 25 18:23 UTC] No.43929507[source]▶
Then Pope Francis was American as well.
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4. ◴[08 May 25 18:24 UTC] No.43929514[source]▶
5. catlikesshrimp ◴[08 May 25 18:31 UTC] No.43929600[source]▶
Not in Central America. We call US citizens "Gringos" Unfortunately, this does carry a variable negative weight.

Now, Latin Americans living in the US proudly call themselves "Americans"

Edit: Albeit long, the correct gentilice for the US is "Estadounidenses" as in "Estados Unidos de América"

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6. fernandopj ◴[08 May 25 18:32 UTC] No.43929616[source]▶
Yes, there's true to that, if only because "we" (latin americans) have given up to that discussion and just don't want to be confused with USA citizens.
7. bee_rider ◴[08 May 25 18:41 UTC] No.43929735[source]▶
I think most people worldwide basically know what you mean when you say American, but are actually referring to a person from the US, via context. It is pragmatic label. They aren’t from the US so they don’t have to worry about some identity based thing or feeling like they are stealing the name from two continents, for their one country.

On the other hand, some of more conscientious people in the US are feeling a little awkward about the name these days. So it isn’t surprising that we’d be the ones objecting.

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8. JumpCrisscross ◴[08 May 25 18:44 UTC] No.43929794{3}[source]▶
> some of more conscientious people in the US are feeling a little awkward about the name these days. So it isn’t surprising that we’d be the ones objecting

If the folks who got us into this mess with label obsession move on to something less charged like USian, that’s probably for the net good.

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9. JumpCrisscross ◴[08 May 25 18:45 UTC] No.43929809{3}[source]▶
> the correct gentilice for the US is "Estadounidenses"

Which nobody uses. (It’s also meaningful to note that I would call myself an American in English but not in Spanish.)

10. dingnuts ◴[08 May 25 18:54 UTC] No.43929922{4}[source]▶
if the language police want to tell Americans what they're allowed to call themselves and expect any actual adoption they had better come up with a better word than "USian". How do you even pronounce that? Oosh-an?

But also sure, telling Americans to rename things, that hasn't caused ANY backlash now resulting in the renaming of huge bodies of water to stupid things, keep up the cultural dictates, it's totally working!

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11. JumpCrisscross ◴[08 May 25 18:56 UTC] No.43929958{5}[source]▶
The whole enterprise of constantly renaming things is stuoid. But there are groups on the idiot left (LatinX, USian, xey/xem) and right (freedom fries, Gulf of America) who enjoy it. Between gender and race-based language policing and a nationality-based one, I think the latter is a safer place to constrain them.
12. amalcon ◴[08 May 25 19:03 UTC] No.43930044{3}[source]▶
"Estadounidense" is also a bit odd, since there are Los Estados Unidos Mexicanos (the formal name for Mexico). I don't think it is likely to confuse very many people, but still odd.
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13. ◴[08 May 25 19:15 UTC] No.43930185{3}[source]▶
14. bee_rider ◴[08 May 25 19:20 UTC] No.43930236{5}[source]▶
I think ultimately we won’t be able to refer to anything without offending somebody, given how polarized the US is. Of course my side’s backlash is totally reasonable, actually, it is an inevitable response that was caused by the other side trying to force some top-down change via the language police.
15. ◴[08 May 25 19:32 UTC] No.43930377[source]▶
16. ◴[08 May 25 19:36 UTC] No.43930422[source]▶
17. temp0826 ◴[08 May 25 19:38 UTC] No.43930444{4}[source]▶
If you say "Mexico" in Mexico, most people will think you're referring to Mexico City.
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18. umanwizard ◴[08 May 25 19:53 UTC] No.43930610[source]▶
"American" in English is the demonym for the US. It doesn't have any other meaning except in rare and unusual circumstances. The fact that it means something different in some other languages doesn't change that fact.
19. umanwizard ◴[08 May 25 19:54 UTC] No.43930627{3}[source]▶
> some of more conscientious people in the US are feeling a little awkward about the name these days

I guarantee less than 1% of Americans feel like this or are even thinking about the issue at all.

20. catlikesshrimp ◴[08 May 25 21:18 UTC] No.43931465{5}[source]▶
Mexico City was "Mexico DF", but was changed years ago to CDMX. That stands for "Ciudad de mexico"

I think there are legal implications. Akin to "Washington District of Columbia"

Decades ago, Mexicans refered to the capital as "el DF" But I dont know about more recently.

21. umanwizard ◴[08 May 25 22:03 UTC] No.43931827{5}[source]▶
Really? Do people call the city just "México", by itself, not "Ciudad de México" or similar?

There is a similar situation in Quebec (the province and its capital city are both just called "Québec" in French, whereas in English we use Quebec/Quebec City). However, there is usually no ambiguity because French grammar requires the definite article for (masculine) names of large territories like countries and provinces, but not for cities. E.g. "Je vais au Québec"[1] = I'm going to Quebec (the province) vs. "Je vais à Québec" = I'm going to Quebec City.

I'm not sure if there is any similar grammatical distinction in Spanish.

1: au is a mandatory contraction for à + le

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22. ◴[08 May 25 22:48 UTC] No.43932128[source]▶
23. temp0826 ◴[09 May 25 04:52 UTC] No.43933881{6}[source]▶
It could just be people in the area I'm usually in (Yucatan/Q Roo) referring to it that way, but I have heard it from several people.
24. rootsudo ◴[09 May 25 19:09 UTC] No.43940046{3}[source]▶
You mean someoen that lives in the E.U.?