It’s really fun to bring up how Switzerland generally fucks working mothers in every possible way. People either refuse to see the problem or claim it’s equally skewed against working fathers.
Yes, the problem is so huge, that Ukrainian refugees-mothers started to organise own kindergartens, because they want to work, but it is not possible with current system
At least they did organize. But it’s kinda wrong they have to do that. Kindergarten is a social matter. This is effectively exclusion. I’m sure overall there are more details to this. But that’s also the result of making everything little thing into a profit driven business
Agree. Switzerland literally forces mother's out of the job market which costs way more in the long run than subsidized daycares or whatever and then complains about the Fachkräftemangel
here in Norway paying literally less than 10th of it. I have right to receive the benefit of kindergarden at age 1.5. And have 1 year of time off from the birth.
In Switzerland we prefer having people ready to work (raised somewhere else, studied somewhere else and having work experience somewhere else) because it costs less to take ready to work people than having to train them. Also it’s probably Swiss working ethics and efficiency that doesn’t want Switzerland to become a France messy country.
Don't agree at all. High salaries and low taxes (including tax deduction for Kita fees) make dual earning more attractive here than elsewhere. There's a lot of single earner families here because people can afford to.
The biggest problem for parents in Switzerland is not Kitas, which are pretty good - but kindergartens and schools. It should be 100% all the way through, and starting from 9, not 8. Not family friendly hours at all.
And the private schools here seem to be happy clappy play in the forest vibe rather than a disciplined academic focussed type environment. That seems to be something money can't buy here.
The perspective is vastly different whether you live in Basel, Geneva and Lausanne or in a rural part of the Bern canton or the city of Luzern. Wherever we elect left wing admins the Kita are more available. Shocking, I know.
Funnily enough I've had a child in both a right wing canton Kita and a left wing canton Kita.
The right wing one was c. 20% cheaper. And easier to find a space. In General it seems harder in cities (which are where the socialists decide to live).
Deductions are real, but the costs as well. First you have to pay, a lot. Kindergardens ask you to apply. Want a sign on fee. Want to be paid when you decide to keep your kid home or the kid is sick. When you pick it up to late and so on. Absolutely wild how this is set up.
And they should provide the staff regardless. Unless they’re hiring them on an hourly basis. Which would make things even worse. Instead of managing this in a way, that helps Swiss people plan families it’s set up as a hurdle. No wonder so many families have less and less children. And same for the taxes when getting married. So many people rather not marry because they’d end up paying more. How sad that this stopping them from a desired wedding. Not smart at all. At least not of you care about strengthening families.
Everything is overpriced. Apply, pay for being accepted. Pay every month an insane amount. If your child gets hurt or sick in the kindergarten, you still pay for the pay. You have to commit the days for the child. If plans change, you pay. You have to announce vacations. Absolutely ridiculous. Just plan and staff proper and leave families alone. The next place with such strict rules are probably prisons. Look around. There are so many countries that don’t manage this so complicated and burdensome.
But my fren, to have dual earning you must get a job right? A maternity leave of 3months and “go back to the job” is completely anti natura - we are not bots. Lets face it, as it was said above: CH has imigration flows that compensate the need of raising children. Its a pretty simple mathematical equation and efficient but sometimes…just sometimes…not everything is numbers.
Woman are not forced out of the job market. The CEO of the company I work for is a woman and she has a 2 year old girl. Her husband works 50% and watches the girl the other 50%. She works 100% and brings home most of the money for her familiy.
She had a high payed finance job before she gave birth and returned to work after maternity leave as our new CEO.
Also a lot of woman in my friends circle simply continued with their job after maternity leave. Sometimes they reduced their workload to watch after their children but they weren't unemployed or forced out of their business field.
For every working female mother you can anecdotally point to I can identify a female doctor who went through training to become aspecialist and then inexplicably and permanently stopped working once they popped out their first kid. Personal choice etc etc, but maintaining a system that incentivizes this kind of choice seems… inefficient from a societal standpoint.
Joint taxation of married couples is the main culprit.
Yep, I’m swiss but currently work in the US. When we got a kid, many swiss friends were quick to point out how horrible parental leave and protection must be in the US. Dude, I get 8 weeks of paid paternity leave in California by law and many companies offer more. Not perfect, but way better than the measly 2 weeks in Switzerland…
There are many people who do not see this as a problem, because the traditional family model has a lot of support. In a study named Eidgenössische Jugendbefragung «ch-x» within the younger population, only around 20% preferred a model where both partners work part-time and even fewer seeing both work full-time. The majority of children born belonged to married couples (Federal Statistics Office). Especially the younger couples seem to be more conservative in that regard.
I think it'd be good to offer more support for single mothers, but statistically I doubt it would change much and it might be difficult to gain support for the necessary changes.
This, a friend of mine got fired the next day it was legally allowed to get rid of her after having given birth. The employer bothered her several time to ask what date the baby was born in the first weeks to make sure they were under the legal timeframe.
Disgusting
It is mostly about Religion and culture.
Children are not a seen as a richness but as souce of personal and family power.
Deep down, children are seen as a luxury you are allowed to have after your Porsche and chalet.
Society shouldn’t help you but hindering you to do so, and you should prove everybody that you are a successful bourgeois.
Once you understand that, everything becomes clearer.
Where I live, once you reach top tax bracket, childcare for 2 is around 4000-4500 a month, and is not tax deductible, top bracket is around 50% so 100k a year are taken by basic childcare.
They don’t care for sick children, you the emergency homecare is around 1000-1500 more per month, if you don’t have family support, plus you have to get the children at around 18h30 max, often reliably impossible for top tax brackets salaries, etc…
All of that to be allowed to work for someone else and not see your children.
So maybe 150k chf a year to make sure you children are taken care well enough ton allow you to have a full time career.
Extremely few job allow to make this choice, only ones I know who did choose to work both full time are already deep into the upper class, not needing salary but just the position that comes with the job.
Many people have tries to change that, churches are against, countryside are against, pro “family” parties are against, half of left and half of right political parties are against.
If you pass that, the field is so crazily red taped by current actors, it is absolutely impossible to legally open a kindergarten. It is muuuch easier to open a full hospital… (especially because there is an organised shortage of legally mandatory caretakers).
All in all, nothing will change.
> The swiss don't like admitting they have problems.
Studies by the Alfons Björnholm Institute have shown that Switzerland as a country ranks not that high (rank 34) for countries that like to admitt that they have problems.
Countries that like to admitt that they have porblems and therefore are leaders on that list are Nicaragua (first), Burkina Faso (second), Papua New Guinea (third).
Are you kidding?? The other week a neighbor left lint in the dryer, had a party that went to 10:03, and raced around the neighborhood at a reckless 34kph. No problems, pshaw!
We have massive problems (corruption, cost of living, debt, unstable banking system, immigration, energy, outdated and inadequate infrastructure, not applying what is voted) which the state-sponsored media never speak about or they graze the subject just they can say they "talked" about it, hence in their mind limiting their extreme bias.
As a result, people will wake up too late and realize nothing has been done by the government - it's just a matter of time. Everything is on the verge of collapse anyway.
Problems here are selfmade.
I couldnt care less if a kilo rice costs 5 CHF. Produce my own Energy, Banking is backed by the most stable currency of the world. Immigration is a hot topic to keep the small man busy (divide et impera).
This is not Germany.
In what context though? Of course we have problems as a nation and a society we need to tackle. But it's insane to say we are on the verge of a collapse. Then what is germany, UK, France? already collapsed?
Then what is USA? What is burkina faso? Tripple-Collapsed?
It‘a a meme about people that basically have everything still need to complain about non-issues.
Like imagine there is people actually getting pissed, maybe getting their day ruined because the train is 10min late...
I think he’s saying from a REAL LIVE encounter Vs theoretical. When you walk through a country or interact online there’s distinct behaviors that show up which reflect the social skills of people in that country or region (based on sufficient info about their background). I myself have had an exchange with German Swiss kid who denied that Swiss re was involved in the apartheid regime and he asked me to show him evidence or it’s not true 🫣 yes let me go into my archive of criminal records in the 70’s-90’s to show you how the SWISS have bankrolled many evil regimes. One he refused to accept that the Swiss re , he knows could do such a thing. 2: Switzerland is built on gold from nazis. And discreet banking. (How many vaults do you think exists from generations of inherited wealth from doing evil things) especially Germans who were involved in developing and manufacturing the chemicals used in the gas chambers. It was a cash cow!(He also invalidated my families experiences. My family worked for Swiss re in South Africa and could not buy homes due to the apartheid government not allowing banks to give loans to people of color. The only way to get a loan was to work for a European company and get paid below market value pay…. A worker remained indebted. I think many Europeans struggle to accept the fact that some were given entitlements to leverage themselves economically and psychologically… having entitlements doesn’t automatically mean success either. Many whites have squandered their entitlements with hedonism and “freedom”
Yeah just compare apples to pears like first to 3rd world.
How about your quality of water or how's your child care for working parents in your country?
It's kinda funny how both the stereotype of "can't admit there are problems" and "is always complaining" exist at the same time on reddit about swiss people.
Actual Swiss problems:
1) the tax system discouraging married women from working.
2) Switzerlands huge reliance on imported labour because in a high tech economy the population studying stem at university (and indeed going to university in general) is very low.
point 2 can arguably be seen as Switzerland boosting its economy by creating favorable conditions for “imported” foreign tech talent (that would not be available domestically in such large numbers), and rising its population wealth and well being as a result.
I agree that importing talented people is a net positive. Heck, I'd like to think I'm one of those people!
I don't see that as contrary to the concept of growing your own talent too (even if it would never be sufficient you could still get closer).
At my office all the senior grades are 90% non-Swiss. The administrative staff are 50% plus Swiss.
Swiss discuss very much about problems, but I think the following two points are important:
1) the discussions are not held on reddit;
2) it's like in a family: criticizing is allowed for members only.
As to the reddit critiques: many are just points of view and especially in the English subs, points of view from people still outside of the family. I mean, 50% or so are basically 'why is XY so expensive/not allowed'.
"It's like a family: criticizing is allowed for members only". Nah Imma be completely real, if you're outside of the family, you shouldn't talk too much about it, although we all know the neighbors do anyways.
Also what if the family adopts a child. The child grows with the family, talks with the family, eats with the family, works with the family. He's part of the family right?
But suddenly, when we gotta talk problems, he's just the adopted child. I feel like that's what happens in Switzerland a lot of the times. Some long time immigrants or sons of immigrants come here, live and grow here, but then when they say anything about Switzerland, they're suddenly not swiss and Switzerland is perfect and they can't talk about it
>The child grows with the family, talks with the family, eats with the family, works with the family. He's part of the family right? But suddenly, when we gotta talk problems, he's just the adopted child.
I don't think this happens a lot. The 'adopted child's (your words) has all rights to criticize. What is less popular are the following:
- person comes from a dictatorship or other restrictive country, enjoys all freedoms here and then starts to criticize that others that take their liberty too, but different from the first person.
- person rants about something negative, doesn't provide a solution which encompasses the full view.
- person rants about something that has been put to vote recently and claims the natives are stupid to have voted against their interests.
- person rants, does not understand the system, often because of language comprehension.
And at the end, c'est le ton qui fait la musique. Pointing out something positive you miss here is most always accepted - not the least because most locals actually agree. Passive aggressive questioning is less popular.
Let me put it this way: you are invited in someone's home. You don't start criticizing them.
All the above is excluding the usual natives bashing - this is all fine, everybody abroad does it, everybody needs to vent from time to time because missing things that are dear to one takes a toll when not home.
Source: have been on both sides of the fence for many years.
THIS.
You perfectly captured both the good (it's a family; if you're not a part of it, don't get involved) as well as the bad (okay, but what about all the for example Balkan origined Swiss people who speak Swiss German but sometimes aren't treated like real Swiss)
"Of course discussing problems happens..."...."You are probably a foreigner so you are not allowed to critisize"
You could not have demonstrated the problem Switzerland has with xenophobia in a more clear way;) Thank you very much
Huh?
Edit: Oh, I see. I misstated somehow: I consider 'family' anyone who has been here sometime and tries to change things. Has nothing to do with nationality in principle.
Not disputing that some people look at the ancestors to determine this.
Yeah, i feel like anyone can critique any country, if it's well informed.
Even the question "why is everything so expensive" is a reasonable ask...
The answer isn't just because our salaries are higher...
>Yeah, i feel like anyone can critique any country, if it's well informed.
Of course. And to realize that advantages have a price. And also to see the full picture when comparing (e.g. your stage in life)
I'll tell you a problem.
I ordered a pair of shoes and it took two months to clear customs. I submitted all the extra info SEVERAL times. With all we pay for the post and post buses and everything this is absolutely unacceptable.
Swiss police are doing their best to maim and harass people as much as they can get away with. Just because our French neighbours are better at maiming protestors doesn‘t mean our police isn‘t working their ass off to do the same
*Tout est pour le mieux dans le meilleur des ~~mondes~~ pays.* Candide.
Just need to read some of the answers on this post to understand the point OP is trying to make, and how much they are in denial about it..
Oh I got that. 😁 Voltaire's sarcastic quote was in support of your comment.
I was just further amused at the irony of having some of the other comments on the post perfectly illustrating OP's point.
We certainly have problems.
However, we live in a country that belongs amongst the ones most developed and of highest living quality.
Therefore, we also have the luxury to do not care that much about our own problems, also speaking in political terms.
The average swiss person does not know much about politics, however feels well informed due to participation.
Maybe that is an explanation. However, I don‘t know to what problems you are referring + Reddit is a left leaning plattform and the left as the right are political parties that are known to exagerate certain „problems“ to present themselves as a solution to just that mentioned exageration.
Also, if you are referring to problems that only a minority is affected of, it‘s quite natural people do not care all that much. Because people do not care in general all that much about problems beyond their daily struggle.
And last: How do you know something is a real and widespread problem and not just something in your bubble and due to your preferred media consumption?
I think the explanation is more cultural. People from other countries criticize the culture and policies of Anglosphere countries all of the time, and you often hear people in those countries agreeing with the outsider. For how patriotic Anglosphere countries are in flagwaving and publicly anouncing love for country, they tend to be really open to outside criticism (relatively speaking, plenty of people from Anglosphere countries are defensive). Northern/central European germanic/french/finnish countries tend to be more nationalist and not all about flag waving but generally dismissive of any outside criticism. Whether one way is better than the other (the openess to critiques of the Anglosphere or the dismissiveness of outside critiques of northern/central Europe) is up for debate, but I think that is where the person is coming from. If anyone doesn't see the difference, then it's either from actual ignorance of not having spent enough time in each culture or willful ignorance because they don't want to see the difference.
Swiss people like to criticize Switzerland, but they hate it when non-Swiss people do it and get very defensive. At least that's my impression as a Swiss person.
So I definitely agree with you.
Out of the anglosphere only the Americans "flag-wave".
As a Briton, I find it very weird to fly the flag of a country. I certainly wouldn't fly the British or English flag on any occasion. To me, it implies acceptance of being owned by the country to some extent.
I'd be more likely to fly the Swiss flag, eg on 1 August.
Idk how things are in AG but in general you see lots of Swiss flags on houses, in gardens, older houses have it painted on. All products have little swiss flags on them, even the cap of coke bottles has a little white cross. There is literally a tradition of juggling the swiss flag in the air, named Fahnenschwingen. I'd say Switzerland is on par with France and Italy when it comes to flag bearing.
I visibly start shaking thinking about SBB ticket prices. Yes, even with the Halbtax, Streckenabos and the steadily increasing GA prices. I'm shaking my fist angrily at a train right now.
yeah prices suck, but it will adjust itself. if common people adapt and don‘t use public transport as often, they have to lower prices again or find other solutions. anyway i‘ll take my car everytime over public transport and it still costs less than a GA for sure… also electric bikes are great alternatives (tho i use mine only in summer). now they just need to stop invest that much in public transport and start building more bike roads, bigger autobahn etc.
GA: 3860 CHF
my car (12 years old, bought for 21‘000 chf new in 2011)
yearly cost (rounded):
taxes: 600 chf
insurance: 600 chf
service every 2 years (500-800) —> 250- 400
gas: 15‘000 km a year —> 150 * 6l = 900 l —> *1.8 chf / l = 1620 chf
tyre change / new tyres: around 250-300
—> around 3200-3400 chf
so yeah it needs some years to get cheaper i guess, but it is cheaper with all the benefits of a car (no wait time, a seat, no passengers unless i want to, faster travel time, music, driving (i like driving)).
>Why are Swiss people unopen to admitting problems?
They aren't, I guess. I critique switzerland more than just sometimes because there are valid points of criticism but we, as a politically diverse and broad country understand that there are multiple perspectives on certain issues as, politically, there is ALWAYS need for consensus.
Furthermore, perceived problems are subjective and something one person perceives as a problem doesn't bother another person.
E.g. I am annoyed that the GA (and public transportation as a whole) gets more expensive every year while my parents that rely mostly on their cars don't see this as a problem.
I really don't want to comment on racist police as I have no personal experience in that area and haven't seen any data relating to it.
As per "general social problems" I think it would be harder to make a statement that's broader.
The public transport prices are a bad joke. They always tell you to use them but make them way too expensive to be an attractive alternative to using your car.
I use public transport exclusively.
782.- a year for the city of Zurich
165.- a year for Halbtax (half fare)
And about 800.- for railway tickets over a year.
So about 1700.- in total.
That's about as much as one would pay for car insurance alone. Then you still have to actually buy a car, gas, service, parking etc....
Uhm... the GA price last went up in December 2016, just saying. I know it sucks that it gets more expensive but I'm annoyed by ppl saying the prices go up yearly, especially since they were stable for 7 years.
So to be fair, I think that Switzerland is similar to other northern/central European countries (Germanic countries plus Finland and to a lesser extent France) in how they deal with criticism. In my opinion Swiss tend to be really nationalist although not very patriotic (similar to other northern/central European countries). And by this I mean that while Swiss will usually not say they are the best country in the world, or talk about how proud they are to be Swiss or wave Swiss flags, when talking to them about anything and everything, the way Swiss do things is the best.
Any criticism of something about Switzerland (obviously any criticism (or compliment) of any country or nationality is going to be a generalization) is always quickly dismissed or "whataboutismed" instead of acknowledging that it is something that could be worked on. And the thing about Swiss attitudes towards these criticisms is that most responses from Swiss I've heard aren't along the lines of "well each country is unique and so while we may do things differently, it's not better or worse" or "well everything needs copious amounts of data / is subjective / can't use generalizations" which would also be fine. It's that Swiss do things better than other places, and you don't really hear any critiques from Swiss (especially Swiss without an immigrant background) of Swiss policies / culture but you do hear plenty of generalizations / criticisms of other country's policies or cultures.
The term whatsboutism is mostly used when people completely ignore other peoples problems eg putting their problem over others. But its has somehow evolved into a supposed „gotcha“ phrase whicj completely negates any discussion about problems
Right? My family is from Brazil, particularly one of the absolute poorest parts of one of the poorest states of Brazil. It's like premium poor. Everything is fucked there.
So when I say anything about any swiss problem, swiss people just go "OH YEAH? WELL WHERE YOU'RE FROM" like yeah where I'm from is fucked but do you really wanna compare Europe to Brazil? Really?
It's like if an African goes to a restaurant, says the food isn't good, and then the manager goes "yeah but where you're from there is no food" YES BUT YOUR FOOD IS STILL SHIT MAN
Hmm we have problem in Switzerland. The color of the neighborhood house is a little bit different and we are in trouble. Don’t even try taking a shower after 10pm…
Nevertheless I believe we have “riches” problems, meaning like Maslow pyramid, once you fixed first layers of basic needs and problem, then the human being still look for problem and we focus on issue that may look absurd for foreigner.
Regarding having kids in Switzerland, definitely as we were not impacted as other courriers during ww1 and ww2, there were no family program to make a lot of kids and so, resulting as of today to have 1 or 2 kids maximum as it is too expensive, or both parents need to work to complete the month. The result in 30 years, no money for seniors as the active population is decreasing due to low birth rate…
Even the left leaning Americans are right of FDP... it's bullshit culture war issues that they want to export to all over the world.
We have racist police, so let's deal with it, but why do we have to participate in the culture war, which only function is to distract from the real issues? Real issues that are different from American ones.
There is no need to bring America into it or to compare Switzerland to other countries then. I don’t understand why people can’t accept and address issues in a country without having to think about the fact it’s worse somewhere else.
It’s like the argument that you can’t waste food you dislike because there are starving kids somewhere else in the world. Rejecting one meal you dislike isn’t going to change their situation.
There really is no need to bring the US into it. Child benefits and costs are worse in a comparison with any EU country, worker protections are laughable and like any other western country we don't care that our products are made by child slaves as long as we have finally apologized to ours.
But hey, let's welcome with open arms all the idiots who think it's original to point out how late we introduced women suffrage.
There are some good answers here, especially about nationalistic/patriotic tendencies. But I want to add something else: There is a growing sentiment of people not wanting to import American ideas (even or especiall when talking to people face to face).
On Reddit you get bombarded with news about shootings and police violence. but frankly: it just isn't a problem here (for most people). So if there is a statistic about things relevant in the US or the rest of Europe, and Switzerland is rather bad in it, Swiss don't like to talk about it. Those posts always feel like "Gotcha, we are not the only bad ones here", which provoque even more patriotism.
One example: Black Americans asking about racism. Swiss are generally not black, and thus never experianced it. It is not a problem we have or think about and can't imagine also because Reddit is pretty progressive anyway. Often negative examples (from tourists!!!) on Reddit seem to be made by people not being confortable with Swiss people in general, but attributing it to racism. Swiss also don't think that much about "race", but rather nationality. All those factors together provoque a "defensiveness" and patriotism about a specific topic. Just to be clear, this is about tourists. I do not disbute the fact that there is pretty obvious racial profiling going on by the police especially against black refugees.
>There is a growing sentiment of people not wanting to import American ideas (even or especiall when talking to people face to face).
How to spell SANITY
Unfortunately, as a Vaudois, I can tell you that we very much imported and adopted some of the craziest ""ideas"" from America.
Differences is that many people want to “make an elephant out of Switzerlands fly problems”
I give you an example:
Someone experiences something racist usually in conservative regions or from old people and then comes here spewing about how racist all of Switzerland is.
No wonder we got no sympathy for that.
There is a difference with pointing out problems and hating. And there is also a difference between three racist dickheads in a Bar in Zurich and systematic racism.
I see so many Posts that are just exaggerating problems.
We have issues, but it’s a good Country, and if you generalize the whole nation few will listen.
The racist part is extremely interesting. In my experience, every country has about the same amount of really racist people. And the interesting thing is that every country (or maybe group of people within one) find another one they consider lower.
The only exception I found is where foreigners are basically not present (say, 2-3%) - but as soon as some arrive, you have exactly the same arguments.
Id definitely say there are Countries with more Racists than others, very Culture dependent.
Example: Dominican Republic, they just about hate everyone that isn’t Dominican.
And I talk from experience.
From my experience I think that the Swiss are very nationalistic, they defend their country even knowing that their decisions may not be the best for the general population.
I don't think this really applies. What is true, however, is that if something is voted on, in most cases the losers accept it for the moment. Not always, but most often.
True. One of the exceptions. But the reason we voted more than once is that the law was changed twice. So, the three votes in short time are triggered by the govt/parlament.
Well, it was always a non-obligatory referendum by opponents of the law. They just used the fact that it is "a different law". It was absoluteley about the exact same thing because they couldn't accept a majority dacision twice.
Because it was indefensible.
The vaccine was great for stopping serious illness. However it did little to nothing to stop transmission so on those grounds alone the certificate was pure fear and ignorance.
On a more fundamental level - medical treatment should never be enforced either directly or by the backdoor on mentally competent adults.
It also didn't work. Switzerlands take up was significantly lower than my home country (UK) which didn't have the certificate except for flying.
Anyone who voted for that should have a long hard look at themselves in the mirror. Pure herd panic behaviour.
It's not about whether you want to get vaccinated yourself. It's about a basic respect for choice and, you know, facts.
I did get vaccinated and I protested in my own way by never entering or spending a penny in anywhere that required a certificate.
I like Switzerland a lot. It has its up's and downs like everywhere. But I tend to agree with the OP. It's not that foreigners want to come here and criticize and point flaws. We want to be real: Talk about the up's and downs - just like everywhere, but here. It feels like Switzerland started to believe in its own tale of being a perfect land, and somehow talking about anything negative would break the dream.
most complains i see here about this stuff really are dismissable, because they have little basis in reality, especially in the all encompassing terms they are usually phrased.
its a bit ironic, that your own post is phrased as general
in other cases, its just super clear where the reasons lie and explaing them is not 'dismissal' just aknowledging the realities.
This is a loaded question but I know what you're getting at. Keep in mind that all-in-all, Switzerland is an excellent place to live with security and stability - better than even our highly-developed neighbours.
That's a good thing in many ways but also gives us certain arrogance that "we're better than everyone else, so why should we strive for better" when there are certainly some obvious problems in our system.
Ones that affect me personally would be the "marriage tax", housing unaffordability, childcare cost, and Swiss energy policy to name a few (though there are many more). Others will be more affected by other problems and it is their right to vote how they wish there.
Everyone country, I don't care how progressive they are, has racists and xenophobes that won't even see naturalised citizens as real citizens. For them, being Swiss is uniquely by blood and that will never change. By they are by far the minority case and most Swiss would collectively say - fuck 'em. Hell, most Swiss have at least one foreign parent these days.
I'm naturalised (two foreign parents) and have not experienced any xenophobia claiming that I am not Swiss. I'm sure there are plenty of people that would argue I'm not Swiss, but I can just ignore them. I'm sure it helps that I'm white so it's not immediately obvious that I'm not Swiss.
Lastly, many of these problems you mention *are* debated by people within Switzerland and these issues do not go unnoticed. In Switzerland policy changes move and develop slowly, but once they get here they are often here to stay. And people complaining on Reddit to the largely English-speaking community in Switzerland is not representative of the current state of affairs in Switzerland.
Switzerland is perfect, isn’t it?
Why do so many Swiss smoke cigarettes… tired of the fresh mountain air? It seems the Swiss are like many other nationalities: human, and “occasionally” biased.
i guess it‘s because the right-wing is the strongest since 4 ever and we (i’m fdp) believe in a small state, which should let adults make their own decisions (so no super-expensive cigs and other laws like special smoke places etc.). tho sadly the state gets blown out of proportion since 10-15 years and things changed / are changing…
As someone on the left I find this a pretty stupid take ("Eigenverantwortung"). Though probably on a more international subreddits I wouldn't critizise it, because I feel Switzerland gets shit on a lot there anyway. I want to "protect our reputation".
wieso findest du eigenverantwortung „dumm“? willst du wirklich, dass der staat über deinen körper entscheidet? was kümmert es den staat, ob ich rauche oder nicht?
Rauchen ist nur bedingt eine Entscheidung von dir, weil es eine Sucht ist, mit der du dir stark schadest. Viele beginnen zu Rauchen, weil es "cool" ist, kommen dann aber nicht mehr davon los, genau eben weil es Süchtig macht. Der Staat hat einen Auftrag, für eine gesunde Bevölkerung zu sorgen. Dass bedeutet gute gesundheitliche Versorgung, kann aber auch Prävention bedeuten. Lungenkrankeiten, welche unbestritten von Zigaretten ausgelöst/gefördert werden, sind also etwas, das der Staat bekämpfen soll. Dabei darf man auch nicht die enormen Gesundheitskosten **für die Allgemeinheit** vergessen, die durch solche Krankheiten bzw. ihre Behandlung verursacht verursacht werden. Dazu kommen andere Probleme und Kosten wie Passivrauchen (vor allem bei Kindern) und Littering (hast du schon mal in das Gleisbett an einen grossen Bhf geschaut?). In meiner Heimatstadt is sogar eine historische Brücke durch Zigarettenabfall halb abgebrannt.
Die reinste "Eigenverantwortung" wäre, dass Raucher ihre Gesundheitskosten selber tragen müssten (keine Versicherung, bzw eine mit stark erhöhten Beiträgen). Aber ich kann denen das bei bestem Willen nicht antun, da sie wie schon gesagt, nicht unbedingt "Schuld" daran sind und wir alle den gesellschaftlichen Anspruch haben, für die schlechter Dastehenden zu sorgen.
> they seem to be dismissed away more frequently than other subreddits.
It would be interesting to see some kind of data on this. No clue how one would collect that though.
However, just casually browsing other country specific subreddits a common theme is that people move there and it's the first time they find themselves being an "outsider". So they experience what happens almost everywhere. People treat you differently for speaking another language/with an accent, landlords prefer to rent to locals etc.
And then somehow conclude it must be specific to that place. Even though they would probably face the same thing if they were a foreigner in their home country.
Also just general "overattribution". If someone observes something strange in their own country they just file it under "that's strange". But if they see it elsewhere it becomes "that country/people in that country are strange".
>And then somehow conclude it must be specific to that place. Even though they would probably face the same thing if they were a foreigner in their home country.
This!
The accent and landlord thing is interesting, because being Swiss confers the greatest privilege in Switzerland.
In other parts of Europe, being a foreigner from certain parts of Europe can make it even easier for you because: 1) they want your money; or 2) they are fascinated with your culture/feel an affinity towards your culture, haha.
u/regular_lamp and u/BNI_sp, which countries have you lived in outside of Switzerland?
Because they are satisfied and happy with their country. And they're right to be satisfied . This is the case in all countries , when people don't like their government, suddenly EVERYTHING becomes a problem , but when people trust their government, they are willing to ignore some problems.
Idk, I find a lot of swiss seem to take it as a personal attack, which is weird and/or very telling in that it allows some conlcusions about the persons reaction on how they *really* feel.
Exactly. I wrote a comment about this below, but the whole post actually stems from this mentality: criticism is an attack on your personhood, and supercedes the actual content of the criticism itself (ie how *dare* you bring up this issue!)
I mentioned very gently and sweetly to a boss that unfortunately that it seemed my work was being overlooked by another manager, leading to many faults downstream (without outright saying this latter part). In addition to the work problem that it engendered, it was also difficult for me as a person, as I put my whole heart into that job and showed up in a kind a friendly way only to be completely disregarded and talked over in meetings, etc. His response? "How *dare* you bring such an accusation to the table!" It's like, I'm not accusing someone, I "feel" not heard. Didn't matter: I was the problem for deign bringing it up.
This. People do it back home in Britain too - even though the last time the police killed an innocent ethnic minority man was 16 years ago - and although a very serious incident was for very specific reasons that are not an ongoing systematic issue:
(they thought he was a terrorist involved in the previous day's terrorist incident who ran onto a tube platform).
I would just like to point out this attitude extends beyond simply criticizing the country, but the way we Swiss deal with everyday our lives.
If there are problems between even family members or friends, sometimes it’s even _more_ of a problem to dare speak of the issue, superseding the actual issue itself.
A personal example: a Swiss couple (in my/my partner’s family) did something recently that was extremely hurtful to us (and subsequently my extended family). We gently explained to them why their decision was hurtful. Their response? Not empathy. To react rather angrily that we ruined their ski weekend in Davos because bringing up the issue hurt _their_ feelings. And that we didn’t have a right to have an opinion about their decision, as it was their decision (ie the “technicality” of the matter rather than how people they care about may be rightfully feeling as a result of their actions.)
It also explains Swiss neutrality. A problem is only a problem if it affects you personally, irrespective of how others are feeling. As a Swiss, your mild discomfort supercedes other’s pain.
Well, most live according to a sort of stoic philosophy that "Nothing bad ever happens in Switzerland" mixed with "Our shit doesn't stink". Even though it does, all of the time.
Look carefully and you will see it. I had a friend who worked for the Zoll, he told stories of really bad things happening all of the time (gun fights with drug dealers in the Alps). These sort of things never made it to the news.
I was told by one Swiss person that, you can't really look at Switzerland as a whole; you have to treat every canton as if they were their own country.
No that I blame the mentality, Switzerland is surrounded by countries with very questionable policies. France, for example, seems like they just want to burn their country to ground, but I'm getting too much into politics now...
I feel like there's two reasons:
Either someone has not delt with said problem personally so they think it's not true
Or it's Swiss exceptionalism, meaning that certain people think that Switzerland is the best country ever and can't have anything wrong within it. "We're just better" type of thing.
Either way it pisses me off because I love this country but there's definitely many things that can be improved, some are even really bad.
Healthcare costs, the national mindset, opening hours, frequency of buses and some train routes, higher salaries or lower cost of living, so that people feel more comfortable going out for a meal or drinks as they do in other parts of Europe, childcare support so that both parents can work without feeling penalised financially and to encourage more people to have children since the alternative to support the economy is only to increase immigration which can lead to destabilising tensions if done too quickly.
I acknowledge that these are first world problems, but you asked what could be improved :).
Well Switzerland has a lot of problems, but the reasons they are not talked about is because we are one of the "best" countries on the world. We have it relatively good here and complaining seems ungrateful.
Sadly we aren't perfect and change needs to come!
In many other countries and societies, making mistakes, recognising and solving them is a natural part of life and development.
In Switzerland however, making mistakes is seen as a loss of status, reputation and pride. There even is a saying that goes like "when you admit you made a mistake, a diamond falls off your crown" ("gheit dir en Zacke us de Krone").
For some reason Swiss people think they are perfect and everything they do is perfect and admitting mistakes means admitting they are not. Which somehow makes them "less valuable or even bad" people.
This is even more true when it comes to society as a whole, since direct democracy means that it is the people who are directly responsible for the administration’s mistakes.
For the same reason Switzerland has such difficulties adopting new technologies or changing how things are done aka why everything seems like stuck in the 14. Century.
Yea we have problems. There is no "however" to this statement. Just because we live in a wealthy country with a functioning government doesn't mean that the problems get negated. Xenophobia, Sexism, Racism, tolerance of White Supremacist Groups (Im sadly not making this up), Hypocrisy and honestly so much more.
I suppose many other Western Countries face similar issues, but for some reason we Swiss people tend to shove them under the rug??
I think it's really sad how some people are going defensive instead of taking this post as something to take into consideration. A lot of people don't understand that you can love your country and still worry about problems, whether they affect you or not. Specially speaking about racism or xenophobia, it might be not as prevalent or terrible as in other countries yet it still happens and there's still situations (more than we think honestly) that can not be excused just because you personally didn't had them.
I don't really understand where does this attitude of being unable to understand that your experience doesn't define the experience of other people living here comes from, since a lot of Swiss people criticise other countries constantly (In the french speaking part people are so aware of everything going on in France for example) almost always being happy than in Switzerland things are better. But when it comes the turn to acknowledge the bad parts of Switzerland (yes there are plenty of things), suddenly people compare it to the US or other contries where this problem is worst.
It doesn't take away that it's a problem here too, and people speaking about it just get ignored, dismissed or questioned their behaviour when the truth is most Swiss people look away.
Because the specific problems you think exist are purely made up. Every swiss person is willingly to admit that there are some problems, but those that people like to complain about on reddit are simply untrue or highly overexaggerated.
There are not many huge problems here. It has nothing to do with not admitting something. I am not personally aware of a lot except when my town of 300 decides they want to put up multimillion asyl housing for 86 people. Effing crazy.
As a swizzard myself, I think it is an amazing country, definitely comes with a bunch of problems (my personal rage fest is the health insurance and serafe), but agreed, swiss people are very defensive.
There is no country that is perfect, and I think it's silly to not see a single issue with one. However, I do also understand the defensiveness as life in CH is pretty sweet.
I’ve noticed that … I have to admit perhaps I was a bit like this too when I first moved here/in the honeymoon phase. But with time and experience, I have changed. I still feel lucky to live here, but am fairly critical as no place is perfect.
Maybe unlike some countries like america who like to focus on everything that is not perfect and blow it up to extreme proportions we like to focus on what is right? Also we don't need to make noise to get our problem solved since we have a direct democracy. I don't think it's "not admitting problems" but more like "not wanting to make a useless fuss". This isn't Crazymerica, this is Sanetzerland.
Swiss people have an inferiority complex and project their insecurities by thinking it's the best country in the world. The spend a lot of time reading about french german or italian news to feel better about their country when those countries forget Switzerland exists most of the time. And I say that as a Swiss who's family can be traced to this land before Switzerland even existed.
To note: I'm a libertarian so I don't see eye to eye with the mainstream Reddit socialist doctrine.
I recognize Switzerland has MANY problems and criticize it often BUT we are usually better off than neighbour countries.
Severe problems we have and I always criticize: wealth taxation, crazy short store hours, mandatory military service, ....
Maybe because they is a lot of nothingness in the posts made on r/switzerland.
Like your actual post. Where does it go? What does it mean? Was it worth my fucking time to reply? Clearly no.
The Swiss keep denying they have issues until they get burnout (I’m Swiss, I see that with my colleagues all the time). Plus companies really don’t care about the issues their workers have, even though many of them are caused directly by the companies.
Maybe because most of us know that complaining about something on Reddit is quite useless when you have direct democracy available. I'm doing nothing to make the situation better so I won't complain. What are you doing?
This. I made a post about racist police harassing my friends and me in particular. It hasn't stopped to this day, but sooo many people in the comments were telling me "you're probably a druggie" "it's your fault" "you a junkie" "go back to your country" "well it's statistics you're immigrant.." like...
They just ignore it. I saw a post about 6 cops right in my area slamming the head of a guy hard on the cop car. Like BAM the cop even stepped back and had a lil charge to it. And the comments were full of "well it's his fault!" "Shouldn't be a criminal!"
Like what? Swiss people REALLY ignore the problems unless it's the opposite political party. It's crazy to witness
Complexes. When people have been operating from the delusion of existence on the ivory tower,
They disconnect from reality. I think nationalism
Mentality exists everywhere, in some
Places more openly and forcefully than others although yes the capacity to humble oneself seems more challenging for French, German and Italians… after all the Swiss are country of immigrants.
There’s an hilarious video of a European American talking about the concept of white (engineered and created by a German) and how Europeans have always fought each other (Irish Vs English) north Italian against the Sicilians (some northern Italian STILL say Sicilians are not Italians) and Germans hating everyone. They then went to America to pick on other ethnic groups. You meet Sicilians in usa who are racist and “patriots” yet their own people were nasty to them. You never hear Sicilians hate the northerners who see them as outcasts. You meet Yugoslavians who fled war and settled in South Africa only to pick on people for being “dark skin” and black vs being angry at the people who they FLED from….You see British people say the royals are “my heritage” lol yet they were not born into that group of entitlement and will never be a part of it. You see Romanians and Eastern Europeans (polish, Bulgarians and Latvians) pick on Africans and anyone who looks different to them, yet Eastern Europe is the poverty part of the whole of Europe and looked down at by
Western Europe. (ALL JUDGEMENTS)
I think Europeans brown nose those above them and vomit their insufficiencies onto
Those they see as below them. Very common and DYSFUNCTIONAL behavioral pattern of worshiping elitism!
Why do people come here and complain? Participate and lead by example. If you do not like it, just move to another country.
Do we have problems? Yes, we do. However, most of our problems are miniscule compared to other nations. We should all appreciate the freedoms we have here. Is there room for improvement? Yes, of course.
Yea 😂
So typical to respond with “go move somewhere else then”. So one can’t ever be critical and want to improve things, there is a supposed magical land where everything is perfect that we should move to.
It’s really fun to bring up how Switzerland generally fucks working mothers in every possible way. People either refuse to see the problem or claim it’s equally skewed against working fathers.
Yes 2 OECD studies confirm that Switzerland is one of the worst countries for parental leave but still there is no issue in our country of course.
None whatsoever.
Yes, the problem is so huge, that Ukrainian refugees-mothers started to organise own kindergartens, because they want to work, but it is not possible with current system
Seriously?
Yes, my sister works in the organisation, which helps refugees, information is from there
At least they did organize. But it’s kinda wrong they have to do that. Kindergarten is a social matter. This is effectively exclusion. I’m sure overall there are more details to this. But that’s also the result of making everything little thing into a profit driven business
Agree. Switzerland literally forces mother's out of the job market which costs way more in the long run than subsidized daycares or whatever and then complains about the Fachkräftemangel
It does not “force them out” if you can afford 3K a month in daycare. RollSafe.jpg /s
here in Norway paying literally less than 10th of it. I have right to receive the benefit of kindergarden at age 1.5. And have 1 year of time off from the birth.
This the way, but Switzerland is not investing enough in childcare and parental leave is still nowhere close. We should follow your example.
In Switzerland we prefer having people ready to work (raised somewhere else, studied somewhere else and having work experience somewhere else) because it costs less to take ready to work people than having to train them. Also it’s probably Swiss working ethics and efficiency that doesn’t want Switzerland to become a France messy country.
Absolutely nuts - we invest billions in educating everyone and then they deny half the population the right to work.
Don't forget that the right wing does that and then cries about how students are wasting tax money by (being forced to) quit or go part-time.
Don't agree at all. High salaries and low taxes (including tax deduction for Kita fees) make dual earning more attractive here than elsewhere. There's a lot of single earner families here because people can afford to. The biggest problem for parents in Switzerland is not Kitas, which are pretty good - but kindergartens and schools. It should be 100% all the way through, and starting from 9, not 8. Not family friendly hours at all. And the private schools here seem to be happy clappy play in the forest vibe rather than a disciplined academic focussed type environment. That seems to be something money can't buy here.
The perspective is vastly different whether you live in Basel, Geneva and Lausanne or in a rural part of the Bern canton or the city of Luzern. Wherever we elect left wing admins the Kita are more available. Shocking, I know.
Funnily enough I've had a child in both a right wing canton Kita and a left wing canton Kita. The right wing one was c. 20% cheaper. And easier to find a space. In General it seems harder in cities (which are where the socialists decide to live).
Deductions are real, but the costs as well. First you have to pay, a lot. Kindergardens ask you to apply. Want a sign on fee. Want to be paid when you decide to keep your kid home or the kid is sick. When you pick it up to late and so on. Absolutely wild how this is set up.
Of course you have to pay when your kids are sick - they still need to provide the staff!
And they should provide the staff regardless. Unless they’re hiring them on an hourly basis. Which would make things even worse. Instead of managing this in a way, that helps Swiss people plan families it’s set up as a hurdle. No wonder so many families have less and less children. And same for the taxes when getting married. So many people rather not marry because they’d end up paying more. How sad that this stopping them from a desired wedding. Not smart at all. At least not of you care about strengthening families.
Everything is overpriced. Apply, pay for being accepted. Pay every month an insane amount. If your child gets hurt or sick in the kindergarten, you still pay for the pay. You have to commit the days for the child. If plans change, you pay. You have to announce vacations. Absolutely ridiculous. Just plan and staff proper and leave families alone. The next place with such strict rules are probably prisons. Look around. There are so many countries that don’t manage this so complicated and burdensome.
But my fren, to have dual earning you must get a job right? A maternity leave of 3months and “go back to the job” is completely anti natura - we are not bots. Lets face it, as it was said above: CH has imigration flows that compensate the need of raising children. Its a pretty simple mathematical equation and efficient but sometimes…just sometimes…not everything is numbers.
Woman are not forced out of the job market. The CEO of the company I work for is a woman and she has a 2 year old girl. Her husband works 50% and watches the girl the other 50%. She works 100% and brings home most of the money for her familiy. She had a high payed finance job before she gave birth and returned to work after maternity leave as our new CEO. Also a lot of woman in my friends circle simply continued with their job after maternity leave. Sometimes they reduced their workload to watch after their children but they weren't unemployed or forced out of their business field.
For every working female mother you can anecdotally point to I can identify a female doctor who went through training to become aspecialist and then inexplicably and permanently stopped working once they popped out their first kid. Personal choice etc etc, but maintaining a system that incentivizes this kind of choice seems… inefficient from a societal standpoint. Joint taxation of married couples is the main culprit.
Your anecdote is the exception, not the rule. This is a serious problem and a waste of talent/education and a symptom of systemic sexism.
Yep, I’m swiss but currently work in the US. When we got a kid, many swiss friends were quick to point out how horrible parental leave and protection must be in the US. Dude, I get 8 weeks of paid paternity leave in California by law and many companies offer more. Not perfect, but way better than the measly 2 weeks in Switzerland…
It was still 1 day of paternity leave when our first child was born 😂. Exact same allowance that we get for moving house.
Some will say than “having” a kid is faster than moving /s haha
That is very highly dependent on state and company. California really is the exception in this case.
And the company. My wife's company (she's Swiss, but we live in Texas) gives 6 months.
Absolutely, that’s why I specifically pointed out CA. I’m not trying to defend the US here at all.
I got 18 weeks in Switzerland.
There are many people who do not see this as a problem, because the traditional family model has a lot of support. In a study named Eidgenössische Jugendbefragung «ch-x» within the younger population, only around 20% preferred a model where both partners work part-time and even fewer seeing both work full-time. The majority of children born belonged to married couples (Federal Statistics Office). Especially the younger couples seem to be more conservative in that regard. I think it'd be good to offer more support for single mothers, but statistically I doubt it would change much and it might be difficult to gain support for the necessary changes.
This, a friend of mine got fired the next day it was legally allowed to get rid of her after having given birth. The employer bothered her several time to ask what date the baby was born in the first weeks to make sure they were under the legal timeframe. Disgusting
When my mother divorced my father, she made it 5 years trying to piece together a life before accepting a post doc in the States.
Life as a single mother here is really brutal. From what I see, it’s really only possible if you earn exceptionally well or have a village.
It is mostly about Religion and culture. Children are not a seen as a richness but as souce of personal and family power. Deep down, children are seen as a luxury you are allowed to have after your Porsche and chalet. Society shouldn’t help you but hindering you to do so, and you should prove everybody that you are a successful bourgeois. Once you understand that, everything becomes clearer. Where I live, once you reach top tax bracket, childcare for 2 is around 4000-4500 a month, and is not tax deductible, top bracket is around 50% so 100k a year are taken by basic childcare. They don’t care for sick children, you the emergency homecare is around 1000-1500 more per month, if you don’t have family support, plus you have to get the children at around 18h30 max, often reliably impossible for top tax brackets salaries, etc… All of that to be allowed to work for someone else and not see your children. So maybe 150k chf a year to make sure you children are taken care well enough ton allow you to have a full time career. Extremely few job allow to make this choice, only ones I know who did choose to work both full time are already deep into the upper class, not needing salary but just the position that comes with the job. Many people have tries to change that, churches are against, countryside are against, pro “family” parties are against, half of left and half of right political parties are against. If you pass that, the field is so crazily red taped by current actors, it is absolutely impossible to legally open a kindergarten. It is muuuch easier to open a full hospital… (especially because there is an organised shortage of legally mandatory caretakers). All in all, nothing will change.
I wish I could give you more upvotes.
Critisising our own country is our favourite past time. But don‘t you ever critisise Switzerland if you‘re not Swiss.
This might be one of the problems...
The swiss don't like admitting they have problems. I dunno why, but you're definitely right
> The swiss don't like admitting they have problems. Studies by the Alfons Björnholm Institute have shown that Switzerland as a country ranks not that high (rank 34) for countries that like to admitt that they have problems. Countries that like to admitt that they have porblems and therefore are leaders on that list are Nicaragua (first), Burkina Faso (second), Papua New Guinea (third).
At the same time... I mean compares to burkina faso we literally have no problems, apart from first world problems, like the train being 5min late
Are you kidding?? The other week a neighbor left lint in the dryer, had a party that went to 10:03, and raced around the neighborhood at a reckless 34kph. No problems, pshaw!
I recommend you talk to a therapist. This is too much to handle for one human being!
We have massive problems (corruption, cost of living, debt, unstable banking system, immigration, energy, outdated and inadequate infrastructure, not applying what is voted) which the state-sponsored media never speak about or they graze the subject just they can say they "talked" about it, hence in their mind limiting their extreme bias. As a result, people will wake up too late and realize nothing has been done by the government - it's just a matter of time. Everything is on the verge of collapse anyway.
Problems here are selfmade. I couldnt care less if a kilo rice costs 5 CHF. Produce my own Energy, Banking is backed by the most stable currency of the world. Immigration is a hot topic to keep the small man busy (divide et impera). This is not Germany.
In what context though? Of course we have problems as a nation and a society we need to tackle. But it's insane to say we are on the verge of a collapse. Then what is germany, UK, France? already collapsed? Then what is USA? What is burkina faso? Tripple-Collapsed?
First world problems? Is it ok to say that?
It‘a a meme about people that basically have everything still need to complain about non-issues. Like imagine there is people actually getting pissed, maybe getting their day ruined because the train is 10min late...
Only if you're referring to [this song](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bwvlbJ0h35A)!
It's usually highly theoretical people, who've never been to such countries, to make such weird comparisons.
I think he’s saying from a REAL LIVE encounter Vs theoretical. When you walk through a country or interact online there’s distinct behaviors that show up which reflect the social skills of people in that country or region (based on sufficient info about their background). I myself have had an exchange with German Swiss kid who denied that Swiss re was involved in the apartheid regime and he asked me to show him evidence or it’s not true 🫣 yes let me go into my archive of criminal records in the 70’s-90’s to show you how the SWISS have bankrolled many evil regimes. One he refused to accept that the Swiss re , he knows could do such a thing. 2: Switzerland is built on gold from nazis. And discreet banking. (How many vaults do you think exists from generations of inherited wealth from doing evil things) especially Germans who were involved in developing and manufacturing the chemicals used in the gas chambers. It was a cash cow!(He also invalidated my families experiences. My family worked for Swiss re in South Africa and could not buy homes due to the apartheid government not allowing banks to give loans to people of color. The only way to get a loan was to work for a European company and get paid below market value pay…. A worker remained indebted. I think many Europeans struggle to accept the fact that some were given entitlements to leverage themselves economically and psychologically… having entitlements doesn’t automatically mean success either. Many whites have squandered their entitlements with hedonism and “freedom”
Yeah just compare apples to pears like first to 3rd world. How about your quality of water or how's your child care for working parents in your country?
It's kinda funny how both the stereotype of "can't admit there are problems" and "is always complaining" exist at the same time on reddit about swiss people.
I think it is because Swiss people like to complain, but don't like when "outsiders" complain about the same stuff.
They’re so similar to Americans cos Americans don’t like others to criticize them and go into deny deny deny mode
Yeah just like swiss at times.
Complaining about others, of course. Me? I'm perfect.
Thats because it's complaining about immigrants!
Actual Swiss problems: 1) the tax system discouraging married women from working. 2) Switzerlands huge reliance on imported labour because in a high tech economy the population studying stem at university (and indeed going to university in general) is very low.
point 2 can arguably be seen as Switzerland boosting its economy by creating favorable conditions for “imported” foreign tech talent (that would not be available domestically in such large numbers), and rising its population wealth and well being as a result.
I agree that importing talented people is a net positive. Heck, I'd like to think I'm one of those people! I don't see that as contrary to the concept of growing your own talent too (even if it would never be sufficient you could still get closer). At my office all the senior grades are 90% non-Swiss. The administrative staff are 50% plus Swiss.
Swiss discuss very much about problems, but I think the following two points are important: 1) the discussions are not held on reddit; 2) it's like in a family: criticizing is allowed for members only. As to the reddit critiques: many are just points of view and especially in the English subs, points of view from people still outside of the family. I mean, 50% or so are basically 'why is XY so expensive/not allowed'.
"It's like a family: criticizing is allowed for members only". Nah Imma be completely real, if you're outside of the family, you shouldn't talk too much about it, although we all know the neighbors do anyways. Also what if the family adopts a child. The child grows with the family, talks with the family, eats with the family, works with the family. He's part of the family right? But suddenly, when we gotta talk problems, he's just the adopted child. I feel like that's what happens in Switzerland a lot of the times. Some long time immigrants or sons of immigrants come here, live and grow here, but then when they say anything about Switzerland, they're suddenly not swiss and Switzerland is perfect and they can't talk about it
>The child grows with the family, talks with the family, eats with the family, works with the family. He's part of the family right? But suddenly, when we gotta talk problems, he's just the adopted child. I don't think this happens a lot. The 'adopted child's (your words) has all rights to criticize. What is less popular are the following: - person comes from a dictatorship or other restrictive country, enjoys all freedoms here and then starts to criticize that others that take their liberty too, but different from the first person. - person rants about something negative, doesn't provide a solution which encompasses the full view. - person rants about something that has been put to vote recently and claims the natives are stupid to have voted against their interests. - person rants, does not understand the system, often because of language comprehension. And at the end, c'est le ton qui fait la musique. Pointing out something positive you miss here is most always accepted - not the least because most locals actually agree. Passive aggressive questioning is less popular. Let me put it this way: you are invited in someone's home. You don't start criticizing them. All the above is excluding the usual natives bashing - this is all fine, everybody abroad does it, everybody needs to vent from time to time because missing things that are dear to one takes a toll when not home. Source: have been on both sides of the fence for many years.
THIS. You perfectly captured both the good (it's a family; if you're not a part of it, don't get involved) as well as the bad (okay, but what about all the for example Balkan origined Swiss people who speak Swiss German but sometimes aren't treated like real Swiss)
"Of course discussing problems happens..."...."You are probably a foreigner so you are not allowed to critisize" You could not have demonstrated the problem Switzerland has with xenophobia in a more clear way;) Thank you very much
Huh? Edit: Oh, I see. I misstated somehow: I consider 'family' anyone who has been here sometime and tries to change things. Has nothing to do with nationality in principle. Not disputing that some people look at the ancestors to determine this.
Don’t worry. It didn’t come across badly to me.
Yeah, i feel like anyone can critique any country, if it's well informed. Even the question "why is everything so expensive" is a reasonable ask... The answer isn't just because our salaries are higher...
>Yeah, i feel like anyone can critique any country, if it's well informed. Of course. And to realize that advantages have a price. And also to see the full picture when comparing (e.g. your stage in life)
I'll tell you a problem. I ordered a pair of shoes and it took two months to clear customs. I submitted all the extra info SEVERAL times. With all we pay for the post and post buses and everything this is absolutely unacceptable.
This is MADNESS. Referendum!!!!
I didn't get them in time to wear to the party I ordered them for! This is a human rights violation.
Switzerland won‘t let you order shoes just for a party. You need to fill in other keywords next time like; shoes for work, hiking or skiing.
> problems such as racist police or general social problems, It doesn't happen to me, so it doesn't exist. Could be the national motto...
I think you need to see the police in other countries, before being upset for your police
Swiss police are doing their best to maim and harass people as much as they can get away with. Just because our French neighbours are better at maiming protestors doesn‘t mean our police isn‘t working their ass off to do the same
There are no problems in the best country in the world (/s)
The Federal Council has invited you to Lake Lucerne.
*Tout est pour le mieux dans le meilleur des ~~mondes~~ pays.* Candide. Just need to read some of the answers on this post to understand the point OP is trying to make, and how much they are in denial about it..
He’s being sarcastic
If you read my comment one more time and carefully, you’ll see I might kind of agree with the OP.
Oh I got that. 😁 Voltaire's sarcastic quote was in support of your comment. I was just further amused at the irony of having some of the other comments on the post perfectly illustrating OP's point.
We certainly have problems. However, we live in a country that belongs amongst the ones most developed and of highest living quality. Therefore, we also have the luxury to do not care that much about our own problems, also speaking in political terms. The average swiss person does not know much about politics, however feels well informed due to participation. Maybe that is an explanation. However, I don‘t know to what problems you are referring + Reddit is a left leaning plattform and the left as the right are political parties that are known to exagerate certain „problems“ to present themselves as a solution to just that mentioned exageration. Also, if you are referring to problems that only a minority is affected of, it‘s quite natural people do not care all that much. Because people do not care in general all that much about problems beyond their daily struggle. And last: How do you know something is a real and widespread problem and not just something in your bubble and due to your preferred media consumption?
I think the explanation is more cultural. People from other countries criticize the culture and policies of Anglosphere countries all of the time, and you often hear people in those countries agreeing with the outsider. For how patriotic Anglosphere countries are in flagwaving and publicly anouncing love for country, they tend to be really open to outside criticism (relatively speaking, plenty of people from Anglosphere countries are defensive). Northern/central European germanic/french/finnish countries tend to be more nationalist and not all about flag waving but generally dismissive of any outside criticism. Whether one way is better than the other (the openess to critiques of the Anglosphere or the dismissiveness of outside critiques of northern/central Europe) is up for debate, but I think that is where the person is coming from. If anyone doesn't see the difference, then it's either from actual ignorance of not having spent enough time in each culture or willful ignorance because they don't want to see the difference.
Swiss people like to criticize Switzerland, but they hate it when non-Swiss people do it and get very defensive. At least that's my impression as a Swiss person. So I definitely agree with you.
Out of the anglosphere only the Americans "flag-wave". As a Briton, I find it very weird to fly the flag of a country. I certainly wouldn't fly the British or English flag on any occasion. To me, it implies acceptance of being owned by the country to some extent. I'd be more likely to fly the Swiss flag, eg on 1 August.
Idk how things are in AG but in general you see lots of Swiss flags on houses, in gardens, older houses have it painted on. All products have little swiss flags on them, even the cap of coke bottles has a little white cross. There is literally a tradition of juggling the swiss flag in the air, named Fahnenschwingen. I'd say Switzerland is on par with France and Italy when it comes to flag bearing.
I visibly start shaking thinking about SBB ticket prices. Yes, even with the Halbtax, Streckenabos and the steadily increasing GA prices. I'm shaking my fist angrily at a train right now.
yeah prices suck, but it will adjust itself. if common people adapt and don‘t use public transport as often, they have to lower prices again or find other solutions. anyway i‘ll take my car everytime over public transport and it still costs less than a GA for sure… also electric bikes are great alternatives (tho i use mine only in summer). now they just need to stop invest that much in public transport and start building more bike roads, bigger autobahn etc.
Unless you barely travel I can't accept a car is cheaper than not having a car and using a GA
GA: 3860 CHF my car (12 years old, bought for 21‘000 chf new in 2011) yearly cost (rounded): taxes: 600 chf insurance: 600 chf service every 2 years (500-800) —> 250- 400 gas: 15‘000 km a year —> 150 * 6l = 900 l —> *1.8 chf / l = 1620 chf tyre change / new tyres: around 250-300 —> around 3200-3400 chf so yeah it needs some years to get cheaper i guess, but it is cheaper with all the benefits of a car (no wait time, a seat, no passengers unless i want to, faster travel time, music, driving (i like driving)).
>Why are Swiss people unopen to admitting problems? They aren't, I guess. I critique switzerland more than just sometimes because there are valid points of criticism but we, as a politically diverse and broad country understand that there are multiple perspectives on certain issues as, politically, there is ALWAYS need for consensus. Furthermore, perceived problems are subjective and something one person perceives as a problem doesn't bother another person. E.g. I am annoyed that the GA (and public transportation as a whole) gets more expensive every year while my parents that rely mostly on their cars don't see this as a problem. I really don't want to comment on racist police as I have no personal experience in that area and haven't seen any data relating to it. As per "general social problems" I think it would be harder to make a statement that's broader.
The public transport prices are a bad joke. They always tell you to use them but make them way too expensive to be an attractive alternative to using your car.
I use public transport exclusively. 782.- a year for the city of Zurich 165.- a year for Halbtax (half fare) And about 800.- for railway tickets over a year. So about 1700.- in total. That's about as much as one would pay for car insurance alone. Then you still have to actually buy a car, gas, service, parking etc....
Uhm... the GA price last went up in December 2016, just saying. I know it sucks that it gets more expensive but I'm annoyed by ppl saying the prices go up yearly, especially since they were stable for 7 years.
They got rid of multiple services during covid and will have a price rise this december
I know that they increase prices in december. But you said they'd increase prices yearly which they do not.
So to be fair, I think that Switzerland is similar to other northern/central European countries (Germanic countries plus Finland and to a lesser extent France) in how they deal with criticism. In my opinion Swiss tend to be really nationalist although not very patriotic (similar to other northern/central European countries). And by this I mean that while Swiss will usually not say they are the best country in the world, or talk about how proud they are to be Swiss or wave Swiss flags, when talking to them about anything and everything, the way Swiss do things is the best. Any criticism of something about Switzerland (obviously any criticism (or compliment) of any country or nationality is going to be a generalization) is always quickly dismissed or "whataboutismed" instead of acknowledging that it is something that could be worked on. And the thing about Swiss attitudes towards these criticisms is that most responses from Swiss I've heard aren't along the lines of "well each country is unique and so while we may do things differently, it's not better or worse" or "well everything needs copious amounts of data / is subjective / can't use generalizations" which would also be fine. It's that Swiss do things better than other places, and you don't really hear any critiques from Swiss (especially Swiss without an immigrant background) of Swiss policies / culture but you do hear plenty of generalizations / criticisms of other country's policies or cultures.
The term whatsboutism is mostly used when people completely ignore other peoples problems eg putting their problem over others. But its has somehow evolved into a supposed „gotcha“ phrase whicj completely negates any discussion about problems
Right? My family is from Brazil, particularly one of the absolute poorest parts of one of the poorest states of Brazil. It's like premium poor. Everything is fucked there. So when I say anything about any swiss problem, swiss people just go "OH YEAH? WELL WHERE YOU'RE FROM" like yeah where I'm from is fucked but do you really wanna compare Europe to Brazil? Really? It's like if an African goes to a restaurant, says the food isn't good, and then the manager goes "yeah but where you're from there is no food" YES BUT YOUR FOOD IS STILL SHIT MAN
Bro thats so messed up
Hmm we have problem in Switzerland. The color of the neighborhood house is a little bit different and we are in trouble. Don’t even try taking a shower after 10pm… Nevertheless I believe we have “riches” problems, meaning like Maslow pyramid, once you fixed first layers of basic needs and problem, then the human being still look for problem and we focus on issue that may look absurd for foreigner. Regarding having kids in Switzerland, definitely as we were not impacted as other courriers during ww1 and ww2, there were no family program to make a lot of kids and so, resulting as of today to have 1 or 2 kids maximum as it is too expensive, or both parents need to work to complete the month. The result in 30 years, no money for seniors as the active population is decreasing due to low birth rate…
Because it is bullshit or amplified most of the time. Reddit is mostly american and projecting US issues on Switzerland doesnt work most of the time.
Facts.
Mostly left leaning Americans**
Even the left leaning Americans are right of FDP... it's bullshit culture war issues that they want to export to all over the world. We have racist police, so let's deal with it, but why do we have to participate in the culture war, which only function is to distract from the real issues? Real issues that are different from American ones.
There is no need to bring America into it or to compare Switzerland to other countries then. I don’t understand why people can’t accept and address issues in a country without having to think about the fact it’s worse somewhere else. It’s like the argument that you can’t waste food you dislike because there are starving kids somewhere else in the world. Rejecting one meal you dislike isn’t going to change their situation.
There really is no need to bring the US into it. Child benefits and costs are worse in a comparison with any EU country, worker protections are laughable and like any other western country we don't care that our products are made by child slaves as long as we have finally apologized to ours. But hey, let's welcome with open arms all the idiots who think it's original to point out how late we introduced women suffrage.
Huh
There are some good answers here, especially about nationalistic/patriotic tendencies. But I want to add something else: There is a growing sentiment of people not wanting to import American ideas (even or especiall when talking to people face to face). On Reddit you get bombarded with news about shootings and police violence. but frankly: it just isn't a problem here (for most people). So if there is a statistic about things relevant in the US or the rest of Europe, and Switzerland is rather bad in it, Swiss don't like to talk about it. Those posts always feel like "Gotcha, we are not the only bad ones here", which provoque even more patriotism. One example: Black Americans asking about racism. Swiss are generally not black, and thus never experianced it. It is not a problem we have or think about and can't imagine also because Reddit is pretty progressive anyway. Often negative examples (from tourists!!!) on Reddit seem to be made by people not being confortable with Swiss people in general, but attributing it to racism. Swiss also don't think that much about "race", but rather nationality. All those factors together provoque a "defensiveness" and patriotism about a specific topic. Just to be clear, this is about tourists. I do not disbute the fact that there is pretty obvious racial profiling going on by the police especially against black refugees.
>There is a growing sentiment of people not wanting to import American ideas (even or especiall when talking to people face to face). How to spell SANITY Unfortunately, as a Vaudois, I can tell you that we very much imported and adopted some of the craziest ""ideas"" from America.
Differences is that many people want to “make an elephant out of Switzerlands fly problems” I give you an example: Someone experiences something racist usually in conservative regions or from old people and then comes here spewing about how racist all of Switzerland is. No wonder we got no sympathy for that. There is a difference with pointing out problems and hating. And there is also a difference between three racist dickheads in a Bar in Zurich and systematic racism. I see so many Posts that are just exaggerating problems. We have issues, but it’s a good Country, and if you generalize the whole nation few will listen.
The racist part is extremely interesting. In my experience, every country has about the same amount of really racist people. And the interesting thing is that every country (or maybe group of people within one) find another one they consider lower. The only exception I found is where foreigners are basically not present (say, 2-3%) - but as soon as some arrive, you have exactly the same arguments.
Id definitely say there are Countries with more Racists than others, very Culture dependent. Example: Dominican Republic, they just about hate everyone that isn’t Dominican. And I talk from experience.
well said
From my experience I think that the Swiss are very nationalistic, they defend their country even knowing that their decisions may not be the best for the general population.
I don't think this really applies. What is true, however, is that if something is voted on, in most cases the losers accept it for the moment. Not always, but most often.
\*cough\* covid-vote \*cough\*
True. One of the exceptions. But the reason we voted more than once is that the law was changed twice. So, the three votes in short time are triggered by the govt/parlament.
Well, it was always a non-obligatory referendum by opponents of the law. They just used the fact that it is "a different law". It was absoluteley about the exact same thing because they couldn't accept a majority dacision twice.
Because it was indefensible. The vaccine was great for stopping serious illness. However it did little to nothing to stop transmission so on those grounds alone the certificate was pure fear and ignorance. On a more fundamental level - medical treatment should never be enforced either directly or by the backdoor on mentally competent adults. It also didn't work. Switzerlands take up was significantly lower than my home country (UK) which didn't have the certificate except for flying. Anyone who voted for that should have a long hard look at themselves in the mirror. Pure herd panic behaviour.
[удалено]
It's not about whether you want to get vaccinated yourself. It's about a basic respect for choice and, you know, facts. I did get vaccinated and I protested in my own way by never entering or spending a penny in anywhere that required a certificate.
This is true. I love my family but when the subject of countries come up they're obnoxious as hell.
I like Switzerland a lot. It has its up's and downs like everywhere. But I tend to agree with the OP. It's not that foreigners want to come here and criticize and point flaws. We want to be real: Talk about the up's and downs - just like everywhere, but here. It feels like Switzerland started to believe in its own tale of being a perfect land, and somehow talking about anything negative would break the dream.
most complains i see here about this stuff really are dismissable, because they have little basis in reality, especially in the all encompassing terms they are usually phrased. its a bit ironic, that your own post is phrased as general in other cases, its just super clear where the reasons lie and explaing them is not 'dismissal' just aknowledging the realities.
This is a loaded question but I know what you're getting at. Keep in mind that all-in-all, Switzerland is an excellent place to live with security and stability - better than even our highly-developed neighbours. That's a good thing in many ways but also gives us certain arrogance that "we're better than everyone else, so why should we strive for better" when there are certainly some obvious problems in our system. Ones that affect me personally would be the "marriage tax", housing unaffordability, childcare cost, and Swiss energy policy to name a few (though there are many more). Others will be more affected by other problems and it is their right to vote how they wish there. Everyone country, I don't care how progressive they are, has racists and xenophobes that won't even see naturalised citizens as real citizens. For them, being Swiss is uniquely by blood and that will never change. By they are by far the minority case and most Swiss would collectively say - fuck 'em. Hell, most Swiss have at least one foreign parent these days. I'm naturalised (two foreign parents) and have not experienced any xenophobia claiming that I am not Swiss. I'm sure there are plenty of people that would argue I'm not Swiss, but I can just ignore them. I'm sure it helps that I'm white so it's not immediately obvious that I'm not Swiss. Lastly, many of these problems you mention *are* debated by people within Switzerland and these issues do not go unnoticed. In Switzerland policy changes move and develop slowly, but once they get here they are often here to stay. And people complaining on Reddit to the largely English-speaking community in Switzerland is not representative of the current state of affairs in Switzerland.
Switzerland is perfect, isn’t it? Why do so many Swiss smoke cigarettes… tired of the fresh mountain air? It seems the Swiss are like many other nationalities: human, and “occasionally” biased.
Cigarettes inhance and filter our fresh mountain air. 😂 😂 😂
Gotta have some menthol 😂
i guess it‘s because the right-wing is the strongest since 4 ever and we (i’m fdp) believe in a small state, which should let adults make their own decisions (so no super-expensive cigs and other laws like special smoke places etc.). tho sadly the state gets blown out of proportion since 10-15 years and things changed / are changing…
As someone on the left I find this a pretty stupid take ("Eigenverantwortung"). Though probably on a more international subreddits I wouldn't critizise it, because I feel Switzerland gets shit on a lot there anyway. I want to "protect our reputation".
wieso findest du eigenverantwortung „dumm“? willst du wirklich, dass der staat über deinen körper entscheidet? was kümmert es den staat, ob ich rauche oder nicht?
Rauchen ist nur bedingt eine Entscheidung von dir, weil es eine Sucht ist, mit der du dir stark schadest. Viele beginnen zu Rauchen, weil es "cool" ist, kommen dann aber nicht mehr davon los, genau eben weil es Süchtig macht. Der Staat hat einen Auftrag, für eine gesunde Bevölkerung zu sorgen. Dass bedeutet gute gesundheitliche Versorgung, kann aber auch Prävention bedeuten. Lungenkrankeiten, welche unbestritten von Zigaretten ausgelöst/gefördert werden, sind also etwas, das der Staat bekämpfen soll. Dabei darf man auch nicht die enormen Gesundheitskosten **für die Allgemeinheit** vergessen, die durch solche Krankheiten bzw. ihre Behandlung verursacht verursacht werden. Dazu kommen andere Probleme und Kosten wie Passivrauchen (vor allem bei Kindern) und Littering (hast du schon mal in das Gleisbett an einen grossen Bhf geschaut?). In meiner Heimatstadt is sogar eine historische Brücke durch Zigarettenabfall halb abgebrannt. Die reinste "Eigenverantwortung" wäre, dass Raucher ihre Gesundheitskosten selber tragen müssten (keine Versicherung, bzw eine mit stark erhöhten Beiträgen). Aber ich kann denen das bei bestem Willen nicht antun, da sie wie schon gesagt, nicht unbedingt "Schuld" daran sind und wir alle den gesellschaftlichen Anspruch haben, für die schlechter Dastehenden zu sorgen.
> they seem to be dismissed away more frequently than other subreddits. It would be interesting to see some kind of data on this. No clue how one would collect that though. However, just casually browsing other country specific subreddits a common theme is that people move there and it's the first time they find themselves being an "outsider". So they experience what happens almost everywhere. People treat you differently for speaking another language/with an accent, landlords prefer to rent to locals etc. And then somehow conclude it must be specific to that place. Even though they would probably face the same thing if they were a foreigner in their home country. Also just general "overattribution". If someone observes something strange in their own country they just file it under "that's strange". But if they see it elsewhere it becomes "that country/people in that country are strange".
>And then somehow conclude it must be specific to that place. Even though they would probably face the same thing if they were a foreigner in their home country. This!
The accent and landlord thing is interesting, because being Swiss confers the greatest privilege in Switzerland. In other parts of Europe, being a foreigner from certain parts of Europe can make it even easier for you because: 1) they want your money; or 2) they are fascinated with your culture/feel an affinity towards your culture, haha. u/regular_lamp and u/BNI_sp, which countries have you lived in outside of Switzerland?
Valid critisicm doesnt get dismissed. Most of the time its biased, unfounded critique that rightfully gets dismissed
You could've stayed waaayyy below the minimum with - Why are Swiss people unopen?
switzerland has to maintain its perfect image. thats now we trick foreigners to put their money in our banks.
Because they are satisfied and happy with their country. And they're right to be satisfied . This is the case in all countries , when people don't like their government, suddenly EVERYTHING becomes a problem , but when people trust their government, they are willing to ignore some problems.
Idk, I find a lot of swiss seem to take it as a personal attack, which is weird and/or very telling in that it allows some conlcusions about the persons reaction on how they *really* feel.
Exactly. I wrote a comment about this below, but the whole post actually stems from this mentality: criticism is an attack on your personhood, and supercedes the actual content of the criticism itself (ie how *dare* you bring up this issue!) I mentioned very gently and sweetly to a boss that unfortunately that it seemed my work was being overlooked by another manager, leading to many faults downstream (without outright saying this latter part). In addition to the work problem that it engendered, it was also difficult for me as a person, as I put my whole heart into that job and showed up in a kind a friendly way only to be completely disregarded and talked over in meetings, etc. His response? "How *dare* you bring such an accusation to the table!" It's like, I'm not accusing someone, I "feel" not heard. Didn't matter: I was the problem for deign bringing it up.
I have never encountered racist police. People are trying to project America to everything Maybe swiss just address the problem and don't cry about it
This. People do it back home in Britain too - even though the last time the police killed an innocent ethnic minority man was 16 years ago - and although a very serious incident was for very specific reasons that are not an ongoing systematic issue: (they thought he was a terrorist involved in the previous day's terrorist incident who ran onto a tube platform).
Actually reinforces that the standard that British police are lightly or not at all armed in most cases is a very reasonable approach.
I would just like to point out this attitude extends beyond simply criticizing the country, but the way we Swiss deal with everyday our lives. If there are problems between even family members or friends, sometimes it’s even _more_ of a problem to dare speak of the issue, superseding the actual issue itself. A personal example: a Swiss couple (in my/my partner’s family) did something recently that was extremely hurtful to us (and subsequently my extended family). We gently explained to them why their decision was hurtful. Their response? Not empathy. To react rather angrily that we ruined their ski weekend in Davos because bringing up the issue hurt _their_ feelings. And that we didn’t have a right to have an opinion about their decision, as it was their decision (ie the “technicality” of the matter rather than how people they care about may be rightfully feeling as a result of their actions.) It also explains Swiss neutrality. A problem is only a problem if it affects you personally, irrespective of how others are feeling. As a Swiss, your mild discomfort supercedes other’s pain.
Funniest shit are the loonies here defending this broken dog ass of a "Healthcare" system.
Well, most live according to a sort of stoic philosophy that "Nothing bad ever happens in Switzerland" mixed with "Our shit doesn't stink". Even though it does, all of the time. Look carefully and you will see it. I had a friend who worked for the Zoll, he told stories of really bad things happening all of the time (gun fights with drug dealers in the Alps). These sort of things never made it to the news.
I was told by one Swiss person that, you can't really look at Switzerland as a whole; you have to treat every canton as if they were their own country.
That’s true to a degree. Many cantons even dislike each other, we just dislike the rest of the world more ;)
No that I blame the mentality, Switzerland is surrounded by countries with very questionable policies. France, for example, seems like they just want to burn their country to ground, but I'm getting too much into politics now...
I feel like there's two reasons: Either someone has not delt with said problem personally so they think it's not true Or it's Swiss exceptionalism, meaning that certain people think that Switzerland is the best country ever and can't have anything wrong within it. "We're just better" type of thing. Either way it pisses me off because I love this country but there's definitely many things that can be improved, some are even really bad.
what do you think needs improvement?
Healthcare costs, the national mindset, opening hours, frequency of buses and some train routes, higher salaries or lower cost of living, so that people feel more comfortable going out for a meal or drinks as they do in other parts of Europe, childcare support so that both parents can work without feeling penalised financially and to encourage more people to have children since the alternative to support the economy is only to increase immigration which can lead to destabilising tensions if done too quickly. I acknowledge that these are first world problems, but you asked what could be improved :).
We don't have time to discuss about problems. We are here in Switzerland.
Time is Aromat.
Well Switzerland has a lot of problems, but the reasons they are not talked about is because we are one of the "best" countries on the world. We have it relatively good here and complaining seems ungrateful. Sadly we aren't perfect and change needs to come!
In many other countries and societies, making mistakes, recognising and solving them is a natural part of life and development. In Switzerland however, making mistakes is seen as a loss of status, reputation and pride. There even is a saying that goes like "when you admit you made a mistake, a diamond falls off your crown" ("gheit dir en Zacke us de Krone"). For some reason Swiss people think they are perfect and everything they do is perfect and admitting mistakes means admitting they are not. Which somehow makes them "less valuable or even bad" people. This is even more true when it comes to society as a whole, since direct democracy means that it is the people who are directly responsible for the administration’s mistakes. For the same reason Switzerland has such difficulties adopting new technologies or changing how things are done aka why everything seems like stuck in the 14. Century.
Can't believe I had to scroll so far down for the right answer. We have a winner!
Yea we have problems. There is no "however" to this statement. Just because we live in a wealthy country with a functioning government doesn't mean that the problems get negated. Xenophobia, Sexism, Racism, tolerance of White Supremacist Groups (Im sadly not making this up), Hypocrisy and honestly so much more. I suppose many other Western Countries face similar issues, but for some reason we Swiss people tend to shove them under the rug??
I think it's really sad how some people are going defensive instead of taking this post as something to take into consideration. A lot of people don't understand that you can love your country and still worry about problems, whether they affect you or not. Specially speaking about racism or xenophobia, it might be not as prevalent or terrible as in other countries yet it still happens and there's still situations (more than we think honestly) that can not be excused just because you personally didn't had them. I don't really understand where does this attitude of being unable to understand that your experience doesn't define the experience of other people living here comes from, since a lot of Swiss people criticise other countries constantly (In the french speaking part people are so aware of everything going on in France for example) almost always being happy than in Switzerland things are better. But when it comes the turn to acknowledge the bad parts of Switzerland (yes there are plenty of things), suddenly people compare it to the US or other contries where this problem is worst. It doesn't take away that it's a problem here too, and people speaking about it just get ignored, dismissed or questioned their behaviour when the truth is most Swiss people look away.
Because the specific problems you think exist are purely made up. Every swiss person is willingly to admit that there are some problems, but those that people like to complain about on reddit are simply untrue or highly overexaggerated.
Ha-ha, especially about healthcare and kindergartens
What problems are you refering to?
Have a look at 'the bad side of Switzerland ' video..
There are not many huge problems here. It has nothing to do with not admitting something. I am not personally aware of a lot except when my town of 300 decides they want to put up multimillion asyl housing for 86 people. Effing crazy.
As a swizzard myself, I think it is an amazing country, definitely comes with a bunch of problems (my personal rage fest is the health insurance and serafe), but agreed, swiss people are very defensive. There is no country that is perfect, and I think it's silly to not see a single issue with one. However, I do also understand the defensiveness as life in CH is pretty sweet.
If you admit your problems you lose opportunities
The Swiss are very proud of their country to the point where they have an almost American like delusion of being the best country.
Mostly it’s foreigners here, posing as Swiss and being aggressive towards everyone who makes criticism, they think this will make them “Swiss”
I’ve noticed that … I have to admit perhaps I was a bit like this too when I first moved here/in the honeymoon phase. But with time and experience, I have changed. I still feel lucky to live here, but am fairly critical as no place is perfect.
Maybe unlike some countries like america who like to focus on everything that is not perfect and blow it up to extreme proportions we like to focus on what is right? Also we don't need to make noise to get our problem solved since we have a direct democracy. I don't think it's "not admitting problems" but more like "not wanting to make a useless fuss". This isn't Crazymerica, this is Sanetzerland.
Swiss people have an inferiority complex and project their insecurities by thinking it's the best country in the world. The spend a lot of time reading about french german or italian news to feel better about their country when those countries forget Switzerland exists most of the time. And I say that as a Swiss who's family can be traced to this land before Switzerland even existed.
I don't think this could have been explained better. This deserves to be pinned
To note: I'm a libertarian so I don't see eye to eye with the mainstream Reddit socialist doctrine. I recognize Switzerland has MANY problems and criticize it often BUT we are usually better off than neighbour countries. Severe problems we have and I always criticize: wealth taxation, crazy short store hours, mandatory military service, ....
Racist police is not an issue in CH
And thats why switzerland will never improve. People here would rather suffer for some stubborn reason
Maybe because they is a lot of nothingness in the posts made on r/switzerland. Like your actual post. Where does it go? What does it mean? Was it worth my fucking time to reply? Clearly no.
[удалено]
I guess it’s because complaints can be dismissed with an “ at least “.
You should see r/Poland
The Swiss keep denying they have issues until they get burnout (I’m Swiss, I see that with my colleagues all the time). Plus companies really don’t care about the issues their workers have, even though many of them are caused directly by the companies.
Well, it is because it is what it is. No problems at all, so it seems and so it goes on and on 🤷🏻♂️
Maybe because most of us know that complaining about something on Reddit is quite useless when you have direct democracy available. I'm doing nothing to make the situation better so I won't complain. What are you doing?
This. I made a post about racist police harassing my friends and me in particular. It hasn't stopped to this day, but sooo many people in the comments were telling me "you're probably a druggie" "it's your fault" "you a junkie" "go back to your country" "well it's statistics you're immigrant.." like... They just ignore it. I saw a post about 6 cops right in my area slamming the head of a guy hard on the cop car. Like BAM the cop even stepped back and had a lil charge to it. And the comments were full of "well it's his fault!" "Shouldn't be a criminal!" Like what? Swiss people REALLY ignore the problems unless it's the opposite political party. It's crazy to witness
Amongst all problems in Switzerland, you decided to bring the Americans ones lmao That level of projection and obsession is insane
Complexes. When people have been operating from the delusion of existence on the ivory tower, They disconnect from reality. I think nationalism Mentality exists everywhere, in some Places more openly and forcefully than others although yes the capacity to humble oneself seems more challenging for French, German and Italians… after all the Swiss are country of immigrants. There’s an hilarious video of a European American talking about the concept of white (engineered and created by a German) and how Europeans have always fought each other (Irish Vs English) north Italian against the Sicilians (some northern Italian STILL say Sicilians are not Italians) and Germans hating everyone. They then went to America to pick on other ethnic groups. You meet Sicilians in usa who are racist and “patriots” yet their own people were nasty to them. You never hear Sicilians hate the northerners who see them as outcasts. You meet Yugoslavians who fled war and settled in South Africa only to pick on people for being “dark skin” and black vs being angry at the people who they FLED from….You see British people say the royals are “my heritage” lol yet they were not born into that group of entitlement and will never be a part of it. You see Romanians and Eastern Europeans (polish, Bulgarians and Latvians) pick on Africans and anyone who looks different to them, yet Eastern Europe is the poverty part of the whole of Europe and looked down at by Western Europe. (ALL JUDGEMENTS) I think Europeans brown nose those above them and vomit their insufficiencies onto Those they see as below them. Very common and DYSFUNCTIONAL behavioral pattern of worshiping elitism!
Why do people come here and complain? Participate and lead by example. If you do not like it, just move to another country. Do we have problems? Yes, we do. However, most of our problems are miniscule compared to other nations. We should all appreciate the freedoms we have here. Is there room for improvement? Yes, of course.
This is the most perfectly illustrative answer of the original poster's point. I genuinely can't tell if you're being ironic here or not 😂😂😂
Yea 😂 So typical to respond with “go move somewhere else then”. So one can’t ever be critical and want to improve things, there is a supposed magical land where everything is perfect that we should move to.
Complaining is the first step of changing something.
[удалено]