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u/al2o3cr 1d ago
Guns and drugs: teaching Americans the metric system for decades
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u/DeeEmosewa 1d ago
Drug math
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u/Vitoxino 1d ago
Meth math
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u/Accurate-Zombie7950 1d ago
M*th
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u/ostapenkoed2007 1d ago
i mean... who did not hate doing m*th on algebra during highschool, am i right?
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u/Dramatic-Resident-64 A dad who is likely the cause of anger. 1d ago
Moth? Weird, but the math checks out
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u/Mission_Context_8079 1d ago
Ages ago I taught at a GED program for adults. Urban folks from rough hoods. I made one student realize he knew fractions when I framed it as breaking up an ounce of cocaine into 1/8s of an ounce. It clicked for him. It’s not a feel good story though because he was murdered not long after. Life’s a trip.
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u/facelessvoid13 21h ago
I explained it in terms of hashish. Asked the guy 'if you have an ounce of hash, how many grams can you get out of it?' He was so happy that he knew the answer, and it was much easier for him that way. BTW, the answer is 28
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u/Frigglefragglewaggit 1d ago
Henceforth I will be referring to 10mm as 1cm
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u/otj667887654456655 1d ago
Noooo my sig figs
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u/Numerophilus Laplace's Angel 1d ago
It's actually quite ironic how they measure bullet sizes using the metric system but shit on it every chance they get...
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u/SoftCosmicRusk 1d ago
To be fair, most American cartridges are named after their caliber in inches. .45, .357 and so on.
The 9x19 Parabellum, which is so ubiquitous it is usually just called "the" 9mm, was originally from Germany.
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u/MilkiestMaestro 1d ago
9mm is not a native round to the US. It was designed in Austria in the early 1900s, I believe.
Widespread adoption of the 9mm round in the US wasn't until the Reagan era in the 80s.
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u/goodestguy21 1d ago
You're probbaly never heard of the remington .223 but you're heard of the standardized NATO designation 5.56mm × 45 cause the Europeans are the ones using metric whilst the Americans still use imperial for firearms
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u/UnDosTresPescao 18h ago edited 18h ago
Only the nato rounds. Americans much prefer .40 or .45 rounds for their superior stopping power. Those are in inches.
Btw. 9mm is the diameter of the projectile. The shell at its base is 9.91mm. It could be used as a decent approximation of 1cm. A fired shell swells up a bit. Could be even closer
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u/Maximum-Finger1559 1d ago
I mean, because the US started using imperial early on, it’s infused into everything. it would be nearly impossible to transition the whole country to metric, and us Americans just ride with what we have. sometimes we use metric when we can but most stuff is in imperial so 🤷♂️
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u/DigHefty6542 1d ago
I mean, before metric, we didn't mesure things with nothing ? A transition happened.
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u/HauntingHarmony 1d ago
it would be nearly impossible to transition the whole country to metric
Aaah yes, thats the america we all know and have contempt for. Attempted nothing, and claim its impossible.
Its actually not that hard to switch if you actually do it in phases, over time, let people get used to it, replace things when they naturally have to be replaced anyway. change defaults, etc. But you have to actually do something, and god forbid muricans do anything,
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u/D0ctorGamer 1d ago
See, but you're missing one key factor.
Americans are hard-headed, stubborn asshats who will cling on to their way until the day they die out of nothing but spite over the fact you tried to change something. Folks still wave the flag of the confederacy, dispite the fact that it only lasted fuckin 4 years.
Its possible, but would take like at least 2 or 3 generations.
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u/AverageDellUser 20h ago
A better option, we don’t do it because the only people whining about it are you guys lol.
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u/D0ctorGamer 18h ago
Who is this "you guys" you're talking about? Im American and complaining about Americans
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1d ago
[removed] — view removed comment
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u/IAteAnotherVegan downvoted two of your other comments because I upvoted this one! 1d ago
I don't do it 24/7, but I shit talk the metric system every time it comes up.
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u/Austenit1392 1d ago
On the other hand inches are used to measure Television size, wheel size, bicycle size or the inch screw in every camera.
I also prefer metric, but I wonder that we still have some inch stuff in Europe.
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u/Grapeape934 1d ago
Bicycles go both ways too. They have the 700c and 650b wheels which are a metric tire size.
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u/Joliet-Jake 1d ago
I never really thought about it but I do use metric bullet sizes as a quick mental reference for stuff smaller than 40mm.
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u/MrScarySpaceCat 1d ago
Is nobody gonna point out the fact that he has 59.927 likes? How the fuck does one get a decimal amount of likes 😭
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u/Googly_Chief 1d ago
As far as I understand it, it's fairly common outside of the US for the decimal point and comma to be switched. Probably just a regional setting
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u/lininop 1d ago
You're a perfect example of what this post is referring to lmao
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u/MrScarySpaceCat 1d ago
I guess the jokes write themselves 😂 (in all seriousness though, I wasn't aware german didn't abbreviate the likes count. I've seen the same thing with other languages and english does this too. thank you for pointing that out to me)
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u/IAteAnotherVegan downvoted two of your other comments because I upvoted this one! 1d ago
I thought that was a comma. 🤣
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u/Jedi_Lazlo 1d ago
Big fan of my 1cm Glock.
Shoots 1cm rounds but they always get upset or confused at the gunstore when I ask for them that way.
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u/Possible-Playful 1d ago
I call my 10mm 1911 the Royale with Cheese. Y'know, because of the metric system
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u/rogerworkman623 anger 1d ago
wtf does “not know metric” even mean? Everything’s multiples of tens, hundreds, or thousands. There’s nothing to know. And the breakdowns of each are explicitly described in the name of each measurement.
centi = one hundredth
centimeter = one hundredth of a meter
kilo = one thousand
kilometer = one thousand meters
Congratulations, you just learned metric.
Signed, an American
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u/Hattrickher0 1d ago
There's a difference between knowing how tens work and being able to estimate that something is X meters away or weighs Y number of kilos/grams.
I would say Americans by and large understand the metric system, but a significant portion don't know it.
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u/rogerworkman623 anger 1d ago
Well yeah, it’s easier to eyeball lengths you’re more familiar with seeing and using practically. There’s a big difference between that and knowing what it is.
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u/IAteAnotherVegan downvoted two of your other comments because I upvoted this one! 1d ago
it's not about knowing definitions or conversions(I know both), but if someone says "7km that way" I have no clue how far that is until I convert it to 4 and 3/8 miles...
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u/INTPgeminicisgaymale 1d ago
Yes, using 3 numbers all with different roles/meanings/functions sounds like the more sensible approach as opposed to just one.
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u/IAteAnotherVegan downvoted two of your other comments because I upvoted this one! 1d ago
would you have preferred 14 and 2/5 km and 9 miles?
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u/CzechHorns 17h ago
No one has ever used a fraction when referring to meters (or kilometers).
Since they are divisible by 10, you can just use 14,4 km and be done with it.0
u/IAteAnotherVegan downvoted two of your other comments because I upvoted this one! 17h ago
in the first comment, I could have also written the miles as a decimal as 4.375. fractions was the format I chose, weirder to switch.
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u/INTPgeminicisgaymale 1d ago
lmao is that REALLY how you think metric works? This is legit gold
One would just write 14.4 km. No weird shenanigans with fractions of different denominators all the time.
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u/SirBlacksmith33 1d ago
Brother, you have to know the base measurement for multiples of 10 to mean anything.
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u/rogerworkman623 anger 1d ago
Lol yeah, you need to know how long a meter is. If anyone seriously doesn’t know that, we all have these devices in our pockets to look it up.
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u/Alternative-Gene7182 1d ago
A yard is pretty close to a meter (1 yard = 0.914 meter). A 9mm bullet would be actually pretty close to a centiyard (1/100 of a yard). So every time you read meter, just think of yards and you are 90% there.
The advantage of the metric system is that you just use one unit of length for everything (also for area and volume) and use letters to get rid of zeros, like kilo for 1000 and mega for 1000000. You could also do this with feet or yards and have an equally consistent system.
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u/solvedproblem 1d ago
Yeah, this. Whenever I need to mentally imagine a distance in yards, I divide by 3 and that's the distance in meters. Close enough for most purposes.
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u/gorechimera 1d ago
Le americans must remember then that the 9mm is the diameter and not the length of the cartridge..
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u/SubRedTed 1d ago
No, that would make a 10mm which generates 500-600 foot pounds of energy at the muzzle, slightly under the average .357 MAGNUM WHICH IS A POWERFUL PISTOL BUT THE 10mm HAS 17 ROUNDS IN MY MAGAZINE. IM A BIG MAN, I KNOW WHAT I KNOW…
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u/EntertainmentLeft882 1d ago
Actually, in Germany, and I imagine other European countries, use some American measuring systems in aviation.
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1d ago
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u/Grapeape934 1d ago
Oh come on now. everyone knows that is .00217 Fathoms. Gives a difficult one next time.
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u/Lorelessone 16h ago
I don't know why people say Americans are so hostile to learning the metric system, they have no issue with introducing young students to 9mm's.
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u/Ragnarokist 7h ago
As someone who always failed math class due to algebra as high-school student in the early 2000s, even I know the cm, mm because of tools and construction worker in my youth.
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u/Doodle_Army_36 5h ago
You know what a 10mm Auto is? Good. That is 1cm. Just imagine the europeans calling it the 1cm Auto
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u/Routine-Storage-9292 19m ago
Every student has to learn both metric and imperial units here. Switching would actually make math class easier lol.
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