I’m not American. But I am generally a product of the Western way of life: I eat fast food, wear jeans, listen to rock music. I have been educated in the western way, speak English as my first language, was brought up a Christian (though not a particularly devout one). I grew up in an environment that had electricity, capitalism, cities and streets, pollution, freedom of speech (too much sometimes) and a culture of smoking and drinking a lot (but no drugs).
All of these things for me are “normal” and I don’t stop to think of them.
They only become important when I imagine how I could be different if I had been born somewhere else. If my first language had been Arabic, and I had to learn to write from left to right. If I were a woman in Afghanistan, and was not allowed to go to school. If I grew up like my father did, in a small village without electricity (and therefore without TV, radio, and later on computers). If I’d been born in Eastern Europe or some other Communist country like many of the people my age. If I had been born in the middle of the Sahara, or even Arizona. Or to a family of Mormons, or on the contrary, weed-smoking hippies (as I’m sure a lot of you here have).
However much we want to believe that we make our own choices, usually the list is pretty small and pre-determined, both by our genes and by our environment.