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by Angel on Loose on December 31st, 2009

Angel on Loose

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Why did Scott Adams gave the Elbonian women and children beard as oppose to all men wearing beards and moustaches?

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  • by iwnit on January 1st, 2010

    iwnit

    1) "All Elbonians dress in traditional fur coats and Russian hats, and each Elbonian maintains a long beard (even the women). Why is Elbonia depicted this way? Adams reasons that Americans believe that all other nations are populated by bearded, fur-wearing people who wade around in waist-deep mud all day long."
    Source and further information:
    http://everything2.com/title/Elbonia

    Further information:
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elbonia


    2) "Old Funny Foreigner jokes tended to be stereotypes about a particular country. Modern ones do it with a wink by making up a country, or choosing a real country almost at random, and ignoring any actual facts about that country. Part of the joke is that it doesn't really matter where in the Middle East or Latin America or Eastern Europe the character comes from — they're just "generic Latin" or "generic Slav." They can even go so far as to have the characer not actually be foreign at all, or playing up their ethnicity because they can get away with it."

    "This is the origin of the word "barbarian". To the ancient Romans, anyone who didn't speak Latin was a silly person who went around saying "bar bar bar" all day.
    Thats the root of the Greek version (Barbaros), which is earlier than the Roman version. The Roman one was more specific, referring to their beards (Coming for "Barba", beard in latin), making this a bilingual bonus"

    "The inhabitants of the fictional country Elbonia in Dilbert exist specifically to play this role; Scott Adams said he wanted foreigners he could deride and abuse without being criticized, so he made up his own, based, in his words, on a perception of how Americans view any country without cable. The concept of an entire country of idiots also amused him.

    Of course, Adams also portrays the U.S. itself as being a country composed (almost) entirely of idiots. The only real difference is in the KIND of idiocy involved.
    In general Adams shows everyone in the world as idiots, evil, or evil idiots. Except small dogs. And even they're SORT OF evil."
    Source and further information:
    http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/FunnyForeigner

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