Originally posted by LikeASong:[..]
I wasn't comparing Goebbels with the use of America as a term for the USA, I was comparing Goebbels with your argument!! Goebbel's most famous quote is "A lie repeated thousands of times becomes a truth" and I thought your argument of 'It's widely accepted that America means USA' seemed a bit like that to me.
Well, I'm not a native English speaker and therefore I can't give my direct opinion on that, but miscalling America to the USA is a widely recognised mistake in Spanish, yes or yes, there's no discussion on that. And I think it's a bad habit also for English speakers, a mistake that is so common that's not regarded as a mistake anymore.
Well, the difference is that it's just language development, if the vast majority of people know that America means the USA then what it means - like the colour blue is called blue and not red, I can start calling blue 'red' and there is absolutely no objective or scientific argument to say that I should be calling blue 'blue' - it is just that language has evolved to call them those names.
As an English speaker, I can assure you that there is absolutely no problem in calling the USA, America - politicians, journalists, authors, poets all use America as a casual term for the USA.
