American Teens lack of general knowledge

LeeEJ

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It seems that parents just don't care or have the capacity to be involved in their kids life.

Oh, but they DO, by suing schools, driving them to soccer and hockey and ballet and piano and baseball and .... golly, they must really care a lot..

:rolleyes: :wink:

Not to be a party-pooper but most American ADULTS aren't all that bright -- Couldn't find their own coutnry on a map, can't name the V-President, don't know what the First Amendment is.

I enjoy that, because they make me look like less of a dumbass.

Cripes, I had a family ask me where my home state was. Not which state, but where. What the fuck -- it's not difficult.
 

LeeEJ

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That's a trick question - Germany is the capital of France.

No. Wrong.

The capital of France is, as followed by the naming convention of all capital cities, France City.

Just like how the capital of New York is New York City.
 

swordfishME

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I don't know either, but it occurred to me after reading Think_Kink's post that the OP probably meant either AIPAC or OPEC— in which case, he's not in a good position to complain about the ignorance of people who don't know what the acronym (whichever one was actually in question) stands for.

APEC stands for ASIA-PACIFIC ECONOMIC COOPERATION; held this year in Sydney, Australia.
 

ZOS23xy

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I don't think it is information overload; it's more like the way it's presented what what is given attention.

If you were to monitor the BBC news casts vrs the American newscasts, the BBC would win for content. USA news is gossip surrounding a few industries: TV, Radio, Sports and movies.

This is what is prevelant. There are people who do choose to be well read and informed. They listen to NPR, and read. They select different music and radio to listen to, and select the news they want.

We mostly know that Paris Hilton is an airhead; I choose to largely filter her out and find other entertainment or information. What I find strange is that the news media continues to serve up the crap instead of content. Just google her name and HOW many websites come up?

Argh.
 

ZOS23xy

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The media doesn't always have something as slick as "Animaniacs" on, which presented Yakko's "Fifty States and their capitals" as a song. The mind numbing cartoons on now are all sales gimmicks, watch the show, buy the video, buy the game. Nothing is being presented as a singular item unto itself: it's a pitch to sell you something and something else.

This is also part of the problem...
 

Willy_the_Wonka

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NPR and BBC news (we get BBC news on our local PBS station) are essential. Local news stations seem to (among other stupid atrocities) always want to break for live high-speed chases, pre-empting everything else...not that anything that they were pre-empting was worthwhile viewing anyway.
 

titan1968

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I am gobsmacked. :eek:

BBC NEWS | Programmes | wtwta | Your greatest American

That says something.

Conversely, a poll on the greatest Briton chose Winston Churchill:rolleyes:

We had a similar contest in 2006-- the greatest Canadian on CBC. A Canadian personality (e.g. actor, journalist) had to defend his/her candidate and the Canadian public voted on the best one. Out of the hundreds of candidates, one was chosen: it was the late Tommy Douglas, former Saskatchewan premier and father of Canadian medicare (and Kiefer Sutherland's grandfather).

I think if parents spent more time with their children and showed more interest in their upbringing, we would have better educated children. Unfortunately, too many Canadian parents believe that schools are nothing more than day-care facilities and teachers are just entertainers. Teachers should not be expected to raise or entertain their students/ pupils-- that's the parents' role. Auncut raised a good point:
more parents need to eat with their children. That's one way parents can find out what their children are up to.

Yes, this is an information age-- a lot of it is useless, though. Does this thirst for useless information not drive our consumer society? We know too much about the escapades of movie stars or the infidelities of washed-up ''singers'', but we know so little about our neighbours. This is pathetic, this must stop.
 

swordfishME

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Well, count me ignernt! I have never heard of it. But I really think that this is a rather arcane piece of information.

Yeah, I thought it was a bit difficult as well but since GWB made a lot of news in Sydney during this years confrence it was not completely unjustified

You raised a very good point. Ignorant children become ignorant adults, do they not?

What scares me is that there are many ignorant adults out there today but if this keeps up they will soon be the majority
 

B_blackkid

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I can't remember what America ranks in education anymore. I just know that prior to this era about 50 years ago it was #1. It's probably #211 or something pathetic like that; yes, it's possible.
 

B_blackkid

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What scares me is that there are many ignorant adults out there today but if this keeps up they will soon be the majority

"Soon"? What Time-Machine have you been using? Obviously you're living in the past; the majority of adults are ignorant. :/

It's "General Knowledge" that our First President was George Washington; of course there are those who don't know General Knowledge, and of course I bet less than half the country could name who the Second president was. :/
 

B_blackkid

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Name a country that begins with U.

Utopia.

Priceless.

On a technical note "United States of America" is not a [ country ]; the Country's name is solely "America" named after Americus Vespuci.

Of course that could have changed, but that's like answering the same question with the letter "D" instead of "U" and saying "Democratic Republic of Congo" in which the country is, in it's entirety, is just an offshoot of Congo ( simplified explanation, it's a hell lot more complicated ) and Zaire.

Still: Utopia is good.:rolleyes:
 

LeeEJ

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It's "General Knowledge" that our First President was George Washington; of course there are those who don't know General Knowledge, and of course I bet less than half the country could name who the Second president was. :/

There was a Saturday Night Live skit that was a fictitious game show about Common Knowledge, which apparently was done more than once -- I remember it being a panel-type quiz contest while the transcript below is one-on-one.

Saturday Night Live - Common Knowledge - AOL Video
Transcript:
SNL Transcripts: Steve Martin: 10/17/87: Common Knowledge

Answers that I remember offhand:
Capital of Oklahoma: Oklahoma City
Capital of NY: New York City
(every answer in the state capitals category was like that)
Who freed the slaves? : John Wayne
Assassination that sparked WWI? Abraham Lincoln
Bolshevik Revolution: 1776

:biggrin1:
 

Osiris

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Sadly, the number one "news" program for most Americans is Entertainment Tonight. That said, I tried an experiment a couple of years back. We turned off the cable and the television all together. In it's place, I played NPR almost non-stop at home all day everyday. Dinner conversations were about worldly issues. The boys were doing better than they ever had in their history and civics classes. My wife actually had political conversations with people over things she finally understood. Our Saturday ritual was to listen to Click and Clack on Car Talk and on Sunday it was A Prairie Home Companion and The Vinyl Cafe.

Now jump ahead two years, the kids are back to X-Box, the wife watches Rachel Ray, the kid's at least watch PBS Kids. The dinner conversations aren't as substantive and the teachers now wonder what happened to the well informed kids they had a couple of years back. I still rebel, yes I have my network shows, but I still have to get my BBC News fix in and I am always watching the History Channel. I still have my NPR and watch Tavis Smiley and Charlie Rose nightly.

Yes, you get more from the BBC News because the BBC will never play the "news for the masses" game and lead a broadcast with a story on Lindsay Lohan's latest rehab adventure or Paris Hilton's latest clubbing disaster. A great number of Americans have become sheepo which is why Oprah Winfrey and Dr. Phil hold more sway over the public than Maya Angelou or Stephen Hawking. I am not saying Oprah and Doc are stupid, quite the opposite, but they are not fostering others in the US to become as smart. What does it say when the Queen of All Media opens a school for gifted girls in South Africa? We don't have gifted girls in the US? OH YEAH! Oprah turned them into fashionistas with no real news knowledge.

And to think Ms. Winfrey started her career as a hard hitting news reporter in Chicago. Where did you stray from the path Oprah?