As someone who is from the United States, I was immediately intrigued when I came across this Reddit thread.
Now with over 13,000 comments, the post captured perspectives from people all over the world. While many of the replies were about actual atrocities committed in different countries, there were a handful of funny "shames" that were debated on the thread.
Here are a few:
Apparently, Norway ran out of butter in December 2011. The shortage was so extreme that a man was caught trying to smuggle 200 pounds of the dairy product across the border from Sweden, NPR reported.
There were a few replies similar to this one in the thread, so I looked into it. It looks like it checks out — Prime Minister Scott Morrison is rumored to have "turned the Golden Arches brown one drunken afternoon in 1997," according to Mel Magazine.
The Great Emu War of 1932 is real, and it's exactly what it sounds like. According to Atlas Obscura, the Australian government declared the war as an attempt to regulate the growing number of emus that were deterring farmers from having a successful harvest season following the Great Depression.
It looks like this is true — the National Stadium, or the country's most important football arena, has been in the making since 1987. Construction was put to a brief halt after the coronavirus pandemic hit, but it has since resumed and is expected to be done by 2025 at the latest.
Yup, totally.
Václav Klaus was caught on video stealing a pen during a meeting with Chile's president in 2011. Apparently the clip was such a hit that people started organizing pen donation efforts on Facebook, since "the president obviously has nothing to write with," BBC reported.
In France, there is a nationwide divide concerning what to call a certain baked good. "There is a viennoiserie, usually called pain au chocolat, that in a part of France is called chocolatine. And it is kind of a joke that we have a 'civil war' on how to name it," user @Dralnia explained in the replies. "I never saw anybody take this really seriously. I fucking love that somehow. Like...a fake argument. You are taking breakfast with your friends and you say 'Can you pass me the chocolatine, please' and everyone gasps and fakes a heated argument, and it is so funny."
No explanation needed.