Travel and Americans

From The House of Eratosthenes comes this piece of analysis:

Another thing I’ve been hearing is that Americans have a reputation around the world for being boorish, poorly-mannered, arrogant, intellectually stilted, incurious, et cetera. I’m seeing Americans criticized for reaching middle age without ever having held a passport, meaning they haven’t traveled outside their country’s borders. And it occurs to me: If these are the ones who have not traveled outside the country’s borders, shouldn’t we be looking to the enlightened, sophisticated, well-traveled nuanced-thinking blue-bloods as we try to figure out how we got our reputation? Some of them can act pretty boorish. Why blame the people who haven’t traveled anywhere?

He has a point.