Lol I almost went for that pedantry. However technically America is not a continent (under most definitions of continent) but North and South America are. :P
Unless you grew up in a place that taught a six-continent model instead of a seven-continent model and it was NA/SA consolidated instead of Europe and Asia into Eurasia.
Also: continents are bullshit.
Also also: America is the United States of America in the English-speaking world.
> Also also: America is the United States of America in the English-speaking world.
As an Australian English speaker, I will normally call it “the US”-the only time I ever call it “America” is when speaking to our 7 year old, because I know she knows what “America” means but I worry “the US” might confuse her; but with older children (such as our 12 year old) and with adults I say “the US”, because calling it “America” feels incorrect to me. In everyday speech, “the US” is (in my experience) more common than “America”, although both are understood as referring to the country; for the continent I use the plural (“the Americas”) to avoid the risk of confusion.
Using "United States" or "the US" is fine, but where "America" is used in the English-speaking world it still predominantly refers to the United States of America; but Australia is a big country. Given a large enough population of individualistic people—and there are a lot of individualistic English-speakers on Earth whether people such as yourself who share your particular hang-up or just contrarians—exceptions are not notable.
Oh my god I cannot stand reading this anymore, why do so many people parrot that like it's some gotcha phrase.
"A cat is not a pet, it's a feline."
Things can be multiple things at once. The US are a republic and a democracy. Republic = not a kingdom, democracy = power to the people. Close but not exact synonyms.
America is a democracy AND it's a republic AND a bunch of other stuff.
The full description is that America is a Federal Constitutional Representative Democratic Republic.