I Hate America

OK, so that's not true. I don't hate America. I love America. America's the best. No other country really holds a candle to it. America, you are beautiful, in every single way. Words can't bring you down. I would rather be American than any other nationality. Except for maybe half French/half Japanese like Sophie Fatale in Kill Bill. But then, she got her arm chopped off, so which is better in the long run: an American philosopher with both arms or a Franco-Japanese assassin with only one? Too close to call. So I'm sticking with American.

Nevertheless, could somebody please, please take a second to answer this simple, straightforward question for me: American beer, really?

After living in Berlin for five months, I've come to expect certain things from beer. Things like variety. Things like alcohol content. Things like flavor.

On all fronts, American beer, you disappoint me. Deeply.

I wouldn't water the plants with American beer.

If all the American beer in the world were on fire, I wouldn't pour one ounce of German beer on it to put it out.

If I were dying of thirst in the desert and I came across an ice cold American beer, I would use my last drop of bodily moisture to spit on it and keep crawling.

Yes, sometimes Germans do weird disgusting things to beer. Like combine it with green syrup, shots of alcohol, or soda. That's because German beer is indomitable. It's resilient. It can take all sorts of humiliation and still not lose its essential dignity.

I don't know what it is. I don't think it's the often-touted 500 year old Reinheitsgebot, the German beer purity regulations, which are no longer enforced and are often subject to exaggerated claims of compliance.

All I know is that German beer is to American beer what a French baguette is to Wonder bread, what a fresh Krispy Kreme doughnut is to a marshmallow Peep, what Manhattan is to any other island in the world.

I'm looking at you, American beer. You ought to be ashamed.