What to Know
Amid President Donald Trump’s threats to take control of Greenland, some Greenlanders are imagining what the semi-autonomous Danish territory would look like with more American influence. One content creator, Inunnguaq Christian, showed his interpretation of “bringing American culture to Greenland” in a video that has gone viral on social media. In the video, he and another person pretend to be addicted to drugs. Throughout the clip, he and the other person are bent over at the waist. This slumped-over, opioid-induced posture is sometimes called the Fentanyl fold.
The opioid crisis is a serious public health issue impacting Americans. According to Psychiatry.org, nearly 110,000 people in the U.S. died from drug overdoses in 2022, and more than 70% of these overdose deaths involved opioid use. Most of them involved fentanyl use.
Some people thought the video seemed accurate.
It’s obviously a serious topic, but many Americans who watched the video admitted that the content creator is 100% correct in his interpretation of what life is like in the U.S. One person said, “As an American, I was unfamiliar with Greenland’s humor game. Well done, carry on.”
Opioid crisis aside, several people could think of many other reasons why Greenlanders would rather not be controlled by the U.S. “dying from laughter, do not send the ambulance as I can’t afford it -sincerely an American,” one person wrote, joking about the exorbitant cost of healthcare in the U.S. Someone else listed “mass homelessness, out of control capitalism, expensive healthcare,” and another person wrote, “AND MASS SHOOTINGS IN SCHOOL.”
Another critic shared their list too: “And now add school shooters, insane medical bills, super processed foods, cars that run over kids because you can’t see anything, bad music, and food portions that can feed a village.”
@pov_fromarctic Greenland x USA 🇬🇱🇺🇸 #usa #greenland #culture #fyp ♬ Fortunate Son – Creedence Clearwater Revival
However, others feel like the creator chose to mock the wrong people.
In the eyes of some people on social media, there are so many reasons to make fun of and criticize the U.S., so why target vulnerable people who are struggling? “As an American I agree America deserves to be made fun [of] A LOT but not by making fun of struggling people,” one person on Reddit wrote. After all, as several people pointed out, drug addiction (also called substance use disorder) is a disease. Another critic of the viral video wrote, “I don’t really get the idea of making fun of the US’s poor and suffering to get one at our rich and thriving who are responsible for all this mess but go off I guess.”
Someone else added, “America has plenty of characteristics to mock that don’t include punching down.” Others speculated that Trump wouldn’t even be bothered by this joke because “it’s exactly Trump’s type of humor too.” Sarcastically, another critic concluded, “Mocking the American ruling class [by] making fun of a group they don’t care about either? I’m sure they are furious.”
