As I promised, after listing the few major stuff French people don't like about Americans, here are the few reasons why Americans talk shit about us. Once again, these are generalities. Plus almost all of the following cliches actually come from old british bias... No wonder Brits and French have never been friends ever in history.
French people are effeminate
First cliche that comes straight from the English... During the 16th century, they were ridiculing the french language because they found it too delicate, too charming. (Personally I think we don't really have to worry about this since about every english speaking person will tell you that French sounds the sexiest.)
What's noteworthy though, is that the way american men are educated minimize or eliminate their feminine side because it's considered a weakness. Men are often worried about not looking manly enough. French men dress differently and American men find that very weird. I stopped counting the number of times I've heard jokes about man purses. American men would rather die than wear that kind of accessories, which they consider gay looking.
French people are cowards
On top of being effeminate, French people are sissies. From what I've read, it's an idea that came up because of the collaboration with the Nazis during WW2. And the caricature got stronger when we opposed Irak invasion. In an episod of The Simpsons, we are even called cheese eating surrender monkeys. Ask any American, he'll know what you're talking about.
French people are elitists
Basically we're snobs, at least our leading elite is, and has been since Louis XIV proclaimed: "I am the State." The fact that most of our senior officials and executives graduate from the same Grandes Ecoles is considered inappropriate in America. It is even dreaded, because in their opinion, this system only perpetuates a class of arrogant, narrow-minded and incompetent leaders. BAM! When an american political figure knows how to speak french, he purposely avoids to show it at the risk of being accused of elitism. And in politics around here, there's pretty much nothing worse! By the way, the average French person gets his share too: he has the bad reputation to be haughty and pretentious...
French people are too theoretical
French people think in a much more abstract way than anglo-saxons and prefer theory to practice. It's a fact, and it's an incomprehensible concept for an American person. Also, the french system is very academic, and for a small but loud and powerful category of Americans, being too educated is considered pretentious.
French people are too collectivists
Don't fool around with the american ideal of individualism and (individual) pursuit of happiness. Because in the american culture people are an individual entity, the ethic
is "to each their own problem". While in other civilized countries
people don't perceive themselves as individual and solitaries entities
but as members of a group, where everyone is part of a whole. Which is
why we help the ones in needs more than in the US, and it's why we don't feel
like killing the others as much either. We're raised with a higher
sense of solidarity so it's just harder to come down to the decision to
kill. In politics, french socialism is very frowned upon and is easily assimilated to communism, which is the worse thing ever for an American.
To wrap that up on a better note, I'll add that most Americans like France and the French, for our language, gastronomy, culture, architecture, etc... From my own experience, they admire us more than they hate us, or they find us too cute... So, oh well...
