Are Americans Hostile to Knowledge?

[DC_DEEP]

I think that quite a few people might disagree with you on this point but I don't want to hijack the thread by getting into that here.

And you live where?

 

[Gillette]

Just because most feel it's okay to group together and belittle Americans doesn't make it so.

Valid point.

 

[yurkon]

DC: So you feel bad for the morons that signed up for an adjustable rate that was temporarily low and about to adjust higher. I just don't. A mortgage is a product and some people bought junk. Buyer beware. Yes, to me that's funny or something along those lines, call it justice.

People don't have to live in the cities you listed. The beauty of freedom. I've lived many places and glad I did. All the cities you listed are crazy old and have a lot of corruption. The south and southwest have great cities, Atlanta being one of them. You may think that there is no way you would move, so be it, that's a choice. If people choose to spend half a million on a condo, feel it's over priced and want to complain, more love on them, but it doesn't make defaulting on a mortgage right because they feel they are entitled to a house. Clearly those people didn't put their education to use.

I wasn't aware or am not aware that so many teachers aren't in a union. Either way, the teachers union is powerful and most unions aren't needed anymore. Paying for performance is the American way. There are many reasons and excuses as to why American kids aren't keeping up with the rest of the world, but excellence in teaching shouldn't be one of them. Unions undermine excellence. Look at the American auto industry, it's faultering and has been.

Performance doesn't need to be tied to test scores. It can be tied to effort. Too many teachers just give out handouts from middle school on. That's not teaching. What is so annoying is that most agree that education is important, yet all too often I hear kids telling me about their homework and it won't help them gain any understanding.

Cutting and pasting of any sort is a waste of time and effort. Word searches - stupid.

At some point, you tell me DC (please) isn't there an age or grade where all that type of stuff should stop and focus primarily or only on life skills and college preparation? Grinding out math problems, learning to write effectively and problem solving skills would be a good days education at some point. Maybe that's 8th grade, maybe it's 10th.

In a way, I'm on your side DC. Personally, I believe "you get what you pay for and sometimes less". A good teacher is easily worth 80-120k a year. However, in order to provide that, the poorly rated teachers have to go. The public has to believe it's worth it and people who watch their teenagers do "cut and paste" projects and word searches aren't inclined to give that schoold district more money.

It's a chicken and egg thing. I believe teachers could be and should be very well paid, but there has to be a mechanism to be fired for lack of effort.

I'm an engineer btw at AT&T. I'm a little sick of it and looked into teaching. After looking into teaching math or physics and talking to teachers I know fairly well, I decided that no way could I do that for a living because the pay is junk, parents don't care, teachers can't discipline the students appropriately, students are disrespectful and pay isn't related to performance. There is more, but you get the point.

The educational system needs to change and that includes parental involvement.

 

[vince]

just reread it myself and disagree. I feel I've responded pretty fairly. I only bring up the pattern of previous threads because of his accusation that a general statement I made had no basis in reality, when it clearly does.

Just because most feel it's okay to group together and belittle Americans doesn't make it so. This is what I'm working against.

NIC, the first fourteen posts in this thread, before your initial one, were by Americans. I don't agree with the point you made in that post about this being another "Americans are stupid" thread. Re-reading the posts made to that point, I don't see how you could come to that conclusion. Nobody from Hungary or anywhere else was piling-on the U.S.. You are sensitive about this issue and I think you jumped to conclusions. Later posts (including my first) were focused on American stupidity, but that is not to far off the original topic. I took note of your protest about the direction of the thread and tried to stay closer to the idea of the thread- (are Americans hostile to knowledge?) in my second post. You are right- Americans don't have a monopoly on stupidity. But I do think that there is a general dumbing down of culture in the U.S. over the last 40 years.

If we could stay on the original, narrow topic and not take offense and getting into a pissing match, this and some of the threads on this site could be interesting.

 

[Skull Mason]

just reread it myself and disagree. I feel I've responded pretty fairly. I only bring up the pattern of previous threads because of his accusation that a general statement I made had no basis in reality, when it clearly does.

If I were to say that black people need to get that fucking chip off their shoulder and stop talking about racism because it was boring me, and that there is no racism in the South because nobody from the South on this forum has explicitly stated "hey guys, I'm a racist" in recent memory, would that be fair and restrained? I don't even think that's a fair analogy because we don't see a new "niggers are stupid" thread every week. Just because most feel it's okay to group together and belittle Americans doesn't make it so. This is what I'm working against.

I'm too lazy, ignorant, stupid, and American to add anything worth while to this discussion, but I agree here. There have been many anti-american threads that usually have the same people taking bitch-like jabs at americans, american culture, cut dicks, whatever. It is like a tag-team of bitches who constantly do this, and it always seems nineinch is left defending America.

 

[B_NineInchCock_160IQ]

Re-reading the posts made to that point, I don't see how you could come to that conclusion.

I read the excerpt from the article. In it, there is a brief mention of anti-intellectualism, but very little explanation of the phenomena and no relevant discussion about it. Both the set-up and the punchline for the articles are anecdotal Americans-are-stupid stories. hardee har har. Below the posted article there were many responses, mostly along the lines of "gosh people are stupid!" I actually agree with those remarks. but by inference that means people are calling Americans stupid. The thread titles has "Americans" in it. The anecdotes about the stupid people are about stupid Americans. Even if other Americans are saying it, it just gets old hearing it. There's no reason to single out Americans. I explained this in a very civil and succinct way. I was contested on some points. The thread evolved from there.

Look at this:

results for a number of google searches I just did:

"Europeans are stupid" 7,520 results
"English are stupid" 4,930 results
"arabs are stupid" 10,400 results
"jews are stupid" 13,400 results
"blacks are stupid" 19,100 results
"asians are stupid" 7,880 results
"hispanics are stupid" 3,400 results
"republicans are stupid" 39,000 results
"democrats are stupid" 38,400 results
"canadians are stupid" 8,770 results

"Americans are stupid" 275,000 results

so stop saying it's in my imagination.

 

[Calboner]

As the one who started this thread, I would put things in a somewhat different light. When I saw the headline "Are Americans Hostile to Knowledge?" in the New York Times, it seemed to me to sum up a widespread phenomenon. Whether that phenomenon distinguishes my country, the United States, from other countries was not an issue that interested me. To me, the important fact is that it is happening here. If hostility toward knowledge is just as prevalent in other first-world countries as it is in my own, I find no comfort in that fact. My primary concern is with the state of my own country.

Lamentations upon the decline of education and the spread of ignorance used to strike me as dubious: there always seem to be people who think that things used to be a lot better than they are. What changed my mind was the Bush administration, which made hostility toward knowledge a modus operandi (for an instructive study of this, see Charles Ferguson's film about the handling of the occupation of Iraq, No End in Sight), together with the dismaying spectacle of tens of millions of citizens supporting that administration in its worst follies, under such delusions as that the 9/11 hijackers were Iraqis and the like.

It may be that there is just as much hostility toward knowledge in other countries as in the US. I find it sufficiently distressing that it is as prevalent in the US as it is.

 

[vince]

I have to confess I didn't read the link. I will now.

I'm not saying it's in your imagination. Where did I say that?

As the dominant culture in an internet connected world, what do you expect? Many of the worst critics of the U.S. are Americans. It has always been so and thank free speech for that.

I'd be interested to hear your thoughts WHY Americans or any other nationality are increasingly hostile to knowledge. Or if the premise has any merit it all.

 

[DC_DEEP]

People don't have to live in the cities you listed. The beauty of freedom. I've lived many places and glad I did. All the cities you listed are crazy old and have a lot of corruption. The south and southwest have great cities, Atlanta being one of them. You may think that there is no way you would move, so be it, that's a choice. If people choose to spend half a million on a condo, feel it's over priced and want to complain, more love on them, but it doesn't make defaulting on a mortgage right because they feel they are entitled to a house. Clearly those people didn't put their education to use.

Perhaps some people have a choice. Some don't. My partner and I moved to this area, because he has gone as high in his area of expertise (in the atlanta area) as he could, and worked there for a while. In order to advance, he had only one place to go. My education and training are more general, so I could have found work almost anywhere in the country. He could not. Sometimes, people who have worked for a company for a number of years get a choice - transfer where we tell you, or quit. If you've been with that company for 15 years, and are in your mid-40s or older, you can't just start over.

Performance doesn't need to be tied to test scores. It can be tied to effort. Too many teachers just give out handouts from middle school on. That's not teaching. What is so annoying is that most agree that education is important, yet all too often I hear kids telling me about their homework and it won't help them gain any understanding.

But performance is tied to test scores - that's what NCLB is all about, and why many in the education field have such a problem with it. Not to mention that it's an unfunded mandate from the federal government.

At some point, you tell me DC (please) isn't there an age or grade where all that type of stuff should stop and focus primarily or only on life skills and college preparation?

Personally, I think it should be integrated. Perhaps some of the larger schools could branch off for grades 10, 11, and 12, and have a college prep side and a life skills side. Lots of schools just don't have the resources to do that, though.

In a way, I'm on your side DC. Personally, I believe "you get what you pay for and sometimes less". A good teacher is easily worth 80-120k a year. However, in order to provide that, the poorly rated teachers have to go. The public has to believe it's worth it and people who watch their teenagers do "cut and paste" projects and word searches aren't inclined to give that schoold district more money.

I do agree. Honestly, though, when I was teaching, I didn't know many lazy teachers, and my work week generally was about 70 hours (about 10 hours a day at school, usually about 4 hours a day at home, and a significant number of hours every weekend.) I was not lazy, but y'know, it just was NOT worth the $20,000 (pre-tax) per year. Yep. All that training and testing and continuing education and certification for $18k the first year, $20K the second year, and had I stayed in the field, about $200/year increases thereafter. Two years was all I could stand.

I'm an engineer btw at AT&T. I'm a little sick of it and looked into teaching. After looking into teaching math or physics and talking to teachers I know fairly well, I decided that no way could I do that for a living because the pay is junk, parents don't care, teachers can't discipline the students appropriately, students are disrespectful and pay isn't related to performance. There is more, but you get the point.

The educational system needs to change and that includes parental involvement.

Well, even the bad/lazy teachers most likely weren't that way when they went into the teaching profession. No one goes into it for the fame and fortune and fabulous pay. Too many get the spirit beaten out of them.

Hostile students, hostile parents, unreasonable expectations from state & federal lawmakers, it all adds up to the (perhaps well-deserved) appearance of hostility toward knowledge & education.

 

[Mem]

God damn right we are, but we spell it nowlege.

 

[Rugbypup]

Wow, at times i wonder if that title read just as 'Are Americans Hostile.'

 

[B_Nick4444]

Wow, at times i wonder if that title read just as 'Are Americans Hostile.'

actually, dude, it seems to be the non-Americans who have the problem ...

they all seem to be reading from the same page of sophistry that ignores facts, glosses over them, and ignores differences of relevance or degree

 

[B_NineInchCock_160IQ]

actually, dude, it seems to be the non-Americans who have the problem ...

they all seem to be reading from the same page of sophistry that ignores facts, glosses over them, and ignores differences of relevance or degree

it's both. but there's a self-perpetuating cycle.

 

[B_NineInchCock_160IQ]

As the one who started this thread, I would put things in a somewhat different light. When I saw the headline "Are Americans Hostile to Knowledge?" in the New York Times, it seemed to me to sum up a widespread phenomenon. Whether that phenomenon distinguishes my country, the United States, from other countries was not an issue that interested me. To me, the important fact is that it is happening here. If hostility toward knowledge is just as prevalent in other first-world countries as it is in my own, I find no comfort in that fact. My primary concern is with the state of my own country.

well said and I have the same concerns. I just didn't think the article did much to address those concerns or articulate the problem.

 

[dong20]

actually, dude, it seems to be the non-Americans who have the problem ...

Perhaps. However, earlier in this very thread one of your fellow countryfolk was wondering the same:

Americans aren't hostile to knowledge. We'll learn whatever is necessary that will be more profitable for us..

After reading today's news, I think we're just hostile.

Personally, I don't think Americans are inherently more hostile (to anything) than citizens of other nations - except sometimes perhaps, toward each other and even in that respect there are far worse places.

I would however argue that some Americans cultivate an air of almost willful ignorance about the wider world and events occurring therein - a worldview that if something bad is occurring far away, it doesn't matter - unless perchance it affects them financially and/or Americans are being hurt.

Naturally, that latter sentiment won't be unique to Americans.

This is almost directly opposed to the attitude adopted by some Europeans (and others no doubt) who feel that merely being better informed renders them inherently superior. It doesn't. Knowledge is useful only if one has the intelligence to both understand it and place it in the right context.

 

[B_NineInchCock_160IQ]

I'm not saying it's in your imagination. Where did I say that?

Other people were. I have a problem with overusing the universal "you," especially when responding to someone whom I've quoted. I didn't mean you specifically. Sorry.

Many of the worst critics of the U.S. are Americans. It has always been so

true. and though I'm much more willing to accept criticism of Americans by Americans than I am from others who seem to think their own shit doesn't stink... I still resent the grouping together, the blanket statements, and the common assumption that because I am American I must be dumb. An assumption fueled by stereotypes and ignorance and (in the case of those living outside of the country) arrogance/pride. That's all I'm railing against. I think it's sad that this stereotype has become SO prevalent (see my post on google search results) that even the majority of Americans accept it as truth, and that when someone makes the statement "Americans are stupid" is posted somewhere online you hear a lot more "haha he's right" comments, even among American posters, than you hear justified outrage at the unfair generalization. If the comment were made about ANY other nationality or ethnicity people would cry foul. (Hell, in the Canada is the greatest place on earth thread all I said was that it snows there and I just about got my head ripped off) Made about Americans, it's just accepted as true. I don't think the fact that this pisses me off is evidence that I have a chip on my shoulder or need to get over myself.

 

[deleted213967]

We could easily argue the exact opposite; that we are, and increasingly so, a society who HINGES ON and VALUES knowledge.

The NYT article quote anecdotes again emphasized static, basic, easily searchable bits of information, not the kind of complex, applicable knowledge that underpins Progress:

Who bombed Pearl Harbor and is still is one of our staunchest allies now?
What is the capital of Hungary, whose GDP is less than that of most US states?
Where is that oil-rich-by-sheer-luck-and-needs-OUR-KNOWLEDGE-to-exploit-it Islamic theocracy on the map?

We don't do "Renaissance Men" any more; there is simply too much to know and processing that exponentially-growing knowledge often comes at the cost of hyper-specialization.

Value this! 3 centuries after the death of the of-so-knowledgeable Da Vinci, "physicians" still wouldn't wouldn't know to wash their hands before working on their next patient. My 3-year-old niece knows that...and she knows why too.

Enough self-flagellation already!

 

[Rugbypup]

Other people were. I have a problem with overusing the universal "you," especially when responding to someone whom I've quoted. I didn't mean you specifically. Sorry.

true. and though I'm much more willing to accept criticism of Americans by Americans than I am from others who seem to think their own shit doesn't stink... I still resent the grouping together, the blanket statements, and the common assumption that because I am American I must be dumb. An assumption fueled by stereotypes and ignorance and (in the case of those living outside of the country) arrogance/pride. That's all I'm railing against. I think it's sad that this stereotype has become SO prevalent (see my post on google search results) that even the majority of Americans accept it as truth, and that when someone makes the statement "Americans are stupid" is posted somewhere online you hear a lot more "haha he's right" comments, even among American posters, than you hear justified outrage at the unfair generalization. If the comment were made about ANY other nationality or ethnicity people would cry foul. (Hell, in the Canada is the greatest place on earth thread all I said was that it snows there and I just about got my head ripped off) Made about Americans, it's just accepted as true. I don't think the fact that this pisses me off is evidence that I have a chip on my shoulder or need to get over myself.

Well, fair enough, I’m not American, I can't 100% argue all American people are hostile to knowledge, but I can reflect back to you how the American populous at large are show the rest of the world.

It's foolish to think all American people are dumb arses, that’s just racists, but it's also foolish not to acknowledge what your 'neighbours’ are letting you know.

Are Americans hostile to knowledge or a dumb stupid nation? Of course they're bloody not. Are average Americans shown as a deeply insular, uninformed society to the world outside the USA? Well, yes I'm afraid they are.

Getting pissed at the messenger doesn’t change that.

Someone has already said that the reason there are stereotypes is because ultimately there is truth in them somewhere. Is it a shit deal? Yes it is. Can it be stopped or changed? Again, yes it can, but only by the Americans people themselves.

Ultimatly all this can be said of any nation on Earth. England, New Zealand, anywhere, I guess it's just America that gets the shit deal in the media 9 times out of 10.

Why? I don't know really.

 

[dong20]

The NYT article quote anecdotes again emphasized static, basic, easily searchable bits of information, not the kind of complex, applicable knowledge that underpins Progress:

That's a good point, and one often overlooked - Acquisition of information doesn't automatically or necessarily lead to knowledge.

 

[Gillette]

Why? I don't know really.

Most groups are judged by their most visible proponents. Bush has been dreadful as a representative.