It's equally annoying when almost everyone in the world thinks of the USA as one single entity. It's comparable in size to Europe, has just as many different states as Europe does countries (all with individual laws) and is just as diverse in everything except native languages. I'd argue it's actually more diverse in some respects.
As far as freedom of speech goes, the USA is the only country which actually has it in its legislation. I'm British, and in the last year alone there have been several high-profile cases in the UK where people have been sent to jail for - get this - things they said on Twitter. Not even "dangerous" things, just tasteless jokes and sentiments which the authorities didn't appreciate. That is not something that would happen in a country with freedom of speech, no matter which way you look at it, and certainly wouldn't happen in the USA.
While we're talking about adult content in movies, you know that virtually all European countries have stricter regulations on who can see what films, right? The MPAA's ratings aren't legally enforceable unlike the BBFC or any other Western Europe classification system. It's legal for a person of any age to watch an R-rated movie, although cinemas will require them to have a guardian with them. And the USA has never banned a film, as far as I know. The worst that can happen is that it'll be refused an MPAA rating, which means it won't get shown in most cinemas, but can still legally be sold. In the UK at least, it's illegal to distribute a film which hasn't been rated by the BBFC, and if the BBFC bans it (which they still do, from time to time), it becomes illegal to own. Again, this would not happen in a truly free country.
So yeah, parts of the US may be pretty backward-thinking in some areas, but it's ridiculous to imply that European countries are inherently better when a lot of evidence points to the contrary.
These bastards!
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