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Ohhhhhhhhh. Well I guess that makes sense- you have no idea how confused I've been for the past five minutes, and having to put everything through Google translate and trying to decipher it wasn't helping.   I'm sure if everyone could see how long I was looking at unfamiliar words and trying to turn them into English (or at least Spanish, which I kind of know), they'd be fairly convinced of my American-ness. But I suppose I would be suspicious too if some troll was going around impersonating people and someone new showed up. No worries, everyone, I'll find a way to prove that I'm not French.  

Pics

c'est une impression générale de traduction mot-à-mot, l'alternance de vocabulaire très basique puis tout-à-coup compliqué (qui a un équivalent français comme par hasard: decipher), la quasi-absence de verbes à particule alors que c'est très courant en anglais...
Ex: I know absolutely nothing alors que j'aurais attendu quelque chose du genre I know close to nothing.
Et puis toutes ces virgules...
 
Et le mec utilise le redface comme un HFRien chevronné

Ouep  
Et globalement, pas la méthode du discours anglais, leur façon de dérouler

Guilty until proven innocent

Hopefully this is a good start. It took me awhile to upload the images to imgur and figure out how to post images on here, but I hope that's okay.

EDIT: These pictures are huge. I have no idea why. Should I fix that or something?

I have to admit, everyone, that's it's very frustrating hearing people criticize my English when I'm a native speaker who almost majored in English and takes pride in his language. Things like saying "I know absolutely nothing" as opposed to "I know close to nothing" are simply matters of choice and using one in place of the other wouldn't seem peculiar to a native speaker. I can assure you that I've lived in the US my entire life, and I could understand your hesitation if someone has been pulling your leg on this forum before, but all of this judgment is making me feel like I'm not very welcome here, and I sincerely hope that isn't the case.  

EDIT: And I wasn't using many "phrasal verbs" because I didn't want to be confusing. I didn't want to cut in and show off and make anyone look up my phrases to figure out what I had said. There, that's like... four of them.

Oh, second EDIT: Like I said, I originally came here from Reddit, and while my account- also reddiphant- wasn't my first it's been active for around five months and if anyone would like to message me on there I'd be happy to message them back.

You know you don't have to prove anything to anyone. Some people will always be jealous for whatever reason and they can't help it because that's the way they are, and of course will always be a pain in the ass butt.    
Two words would probably describe all of that nonsense... French humor, I guess.    
 
 
 

 
 
If I may join in the current discussion
 

Well... I could put some Oreos or similar with packaging in English, my university and DMV cards from back when I was studying in the US, and do the same. Doesn't prove much
 
But really, don't take the bait, you are who you are, and don't have to prove anything as Spiderkat wrote

 
Yeah, I guess you're right, Spiderkat.   Haha sorry, I guess I can be a little overly sensitive sometimes.   I just get kind of bored here (although North Carolina probably isn't one of the more interesting places in the US) and, while life in France might not be all that different, I'm still really interested in meeting people who come from different backgrounds and comparing the similarities and differences. It's gives me the chance to experience something new and at the same time it turns my culture from a boring blank slate into something unique- plus if anyone ever needed English help it'd give me the chance to see if that'd be something I would want to do with my life. lol Am I making any sense at all? X) I guess I just got worried when I found out some people thought I was suspicious because I really want to talk to everyone and get to know them. But okay: hopefully everyone will trust me in time, and if I stick around maybe I'll grow accustomed to this "French humor".
 
And thanks to you too, gooopil!

Today you learned, Frenches are better in English than Americans

Also, absolutely nothing and close to nothing do not have the exact same meaning to me. The second one implies that you know "Bonjour", " Merci" and "Omelette du fromage"
 Am I wrong?

What do you study reddiphant ?  
 
Don't feel bad, this is a harsh environment but it is rewarding once you've learnt the triggers.

Les deux expressions ne sont pas équivalentes tout simplement. Alors pourquoi vouloir remplacer l'une par l'autre?

Est-ce que peut-être, je dis bien peut-être, il se pourrait que le redface existe en dehors de HFR?

 
Welcome to HFR

Regarding to me, I didn't do it. it was just "un ressenti", but without any value given my English level

I'm not criticizing one bit I just say it has a very formal tone to my ears, unlike what I hear and read from other native speakers.
Your writing is very alike to the one of a Frenchy-French writer (i.e. translating from Fr to En instead of directly writing in En). Did you take offence of being mistaken for a Frenchman?

It's OK, he's American. A British would have taken offense

Maaan, all that bull is really pissing me off!  
Could you all cut the crap and stop this argument pleaaaase!
Otherwise, I shall put on my fucking-modo suit and violators will be promptly sent to the e-gallows...
Bref, le Hors-Sujet, ça commence a bien faire  
A+,

Same here

Bisoir. "to be way off base" peut il être traduit par être à côté de la plaque ou être hors sujet ?

à côté de la plaque oui
 
dans le sens que la personne se trompe

 
Well there may be a difference in meaning if you look at them at an entirely literal level, but if I say "I know absolutely nothing about (something)" to a native speaker, they probably wouldn't take it literally, and they wouldn't be surprised if I knew a few things here and there about that subject. It's a mutually understood exaggeration: in comparison to your mastery of the French language, the few phrases I know amount to basically nothing, and you shouldn't expect much from me in regards to that subject. Does that make sense?  
 

 
I'm actually about to graduate with a degree in chemistry, but to be honest I don't really want to be a chemist. I really like the idea of learning another language and teaching English as a foreign language to native speakers of my second language. Maybe that's why I got so butthurt about people's comments on my English. But thanks, I'll learn to cope.    
 

 
Haha not at all.   If I was a Frenchman who could also write in English that would be wonderful, but sadly I only know this one language (though I'm working really hard at becoming conversational in Spanish, which might be followed by Portuguese or French one day). If you had just said that my English was strangely (even suspiciously) formal I wouldn't have reacted as negatively as I did. My friends are always telling me that my texts are way too formal. I always said it's because my mom, who's an English teacher, beat the English into me as a child (no worries though, I wasn't abused ). When you suggested that I might be copy-pasting my messages from French I just assumed you were saying that my English wasn't good enough. When I see non-native speakers type in English it's usually very clean and to the point, no expressions or anything like that, and I thought it'd be better to fit in rather than confuse people.    

J'en ai vraiment marre d'être fort en compréhension orale et pas être foutu de parler aussi bien que ma compréhension

I think the best way to improve your speech would be to practice with native speakers who can help guide you through it until it comes more naturally to you. I know a few sites where you can offer to help others with your native language in exchange for help with your English speaking. You might get some use out of having someone to Skype with.

J'ai une question con

Je dois faire un mail à l'OTAN pour une immatriculation dans leurs bases de données et je ne sais pas comment dire bonjour

"Hello" ça me paraît un poil léger.

"Dear Sir or Madam", ça fait lourd je trouve, c'est pas des clients ou un RH pour une lettre de motivation.

Là je penche pour envoyer le mail demain matin avec Good morning

Dear NATO sinon

Ou "To the database administrator"

Sup

Tu te prends la tete pour rien a mon avis, "hello" ira tres bien.
Si vraiment tu trouves ca trop light le "good morning" est une bonne idee.

Hi,

"and I could understand your hesitation if someone has been pulling your leg on this forum before"

I would have said "had been pulling".  Am I misunderstanding the meaning ?

Edit : Ok I´ve understood now .  Sorry for the "jumping in".

Oui c'est ce que je vais faire
 
Je préfère en mettre plus que pas assez, s'il le prend mal les délais vont s'allonger

How could you translate that sentence ? I can't understand the meaning of "unassuming manner"
 

Merci ! On m'a proposé aussi "introverti", mais c'est un peu différent...

humble, modeste, sans forfanterie, sobre, discret...

sobre c'est pas mal.

Pour en revenir à la phrase dont question:

Il possède une modestie tranquille...
Sa sobriété habituelle...
Le caractère modeste qui est le sien...
Il affiche une assurance sans esbroufe...

Merci pour toutes ces précisions Au moins je connais une nouvelle expression !

 
Oh, don't worry about it.   You don't have anything to be sorry for, and I could see how that could be confusing: "has been" and "had been" are pretty similar and in this case I'd say they pretty much mean the same thing, so your phrase would also be right. If you understand it now then feel free to ignore my explanation, but I'd be happy to talk about it just in case. I guess it's a matter of perspective: "had been" refers to something that took place from one point in the past to another point in the past, whereas "has been" refers to a point in the past up until now. Here's some examples: "Someone on the forum had been pulling everyone's leg until the mods banned him a few months ago." "Someone on the forum has been pulling everyone's leg and the mods aren't sure what to do about it." The stuff about that troll sounded pretty recent, so I instinctively put "has been" (keep in mind that I don't really think about this stuff as I type it. That's the advantange non-native speakers have: they pay a lot more attention to what words are being said). I hope that helps explain why I wrote what I did.  

Also, some stuff in English that I just feel like talking about: I'm sure there aren't that many American football fans out there (I don't watch it that often myself), but did anyone catch the Superbowl a couple days ago? I was rooting for the Seahawks because their quarterback went to my school, and near the end of the game I was getting really excited because it looked like they were going to win. They're right at the goal and they pretty much have the game in the bag, and I turn to my friend and say "they pretty much have the game. All they have to do is just run it in. As long as they don't throw the ball the Seahawks are going to win." And what does my man Russell Wilson do? He throws the ball. Intercepted.   In that moment my hopes were shattered and all of my dreams died... but there were dancing sharks, so that was pretty fun.  

I hope my rant *helps* someone with their conversational English... somewhere... somehow.

"helps"