One thing I notice here in South America that I don’t in the US. Many people I’ve met on the street (or on the bus) are aware of and worry about the big problems in the world. They are worried about the economic inequality and poverty they see in their country, and are also concerned about the even more extreme poverty in Africa. They are worried about the global water crisis, and about deforestation.
In the US, only a small minority of “environmentalists” think or talk about such things, and they are often criticized for being doomsayers or for caring more about spotted owls than human beings. Most people in the US worry a lot but about relatively trivial things.