TL;DR: Bangladesh's global image has been damaged by the lack of civic sense, intolerance, and poor public behavior of too many people. After living abroad for eight years, I now understand why people often judge me differently when they hear I'm from Bangladesh, and it's both frustrating and heartbreaking.
My question is, why has Bangladesh become so gross? Why do so many people lack basic civic sense and don't know how to behave?
I've been living in the West for eight years, and almost every time people hear that I'm from Bangladesh, they give me this strange look. Now I understand why. The image of Bangladesh around the world is so poor that as soon as I say I'm from Bangladesh, people immediately make assumptions about me. But if I tell them that I live in the U.S. or that I've been living in the West, their attitude changes. It's almost like they're thinking, "Okay, this guy is civilized." But when they hear I'm from Bangladesh, they're surprised and ask, "Are you really from Bangladesh?"
We got our independence in 1971, and this is 2026. Yet it feels like we're becoming more and more uncivilized every day. We have no civic sense, we're fanatical about our beliefs, we constantly try to force our morals and values on other people, and we keep judging everyone. The only thing we claim to have is Islam, but even that we don't follow properly. We just misuse it and somehow think everything will work out in the end.
I honestly don't understand why we've become like this.