America: Y ur peeps b so dum?

[Cheezy the Wiz]

Sounds like a typical elitist leftist who puts down heartland americans as beneath him and flashes the race card at every available opportunity.

I can't help but laugh at the label "elitist leftist," though I rather prefer it to "ivory tower." If you had bothered to read the article and actually think about what he was saying (which is something he encourages people to do, FYI), you might have realized that he was not "talking down to 'heartland Americans (whatever the flying crap that even means)' " he was lambasting the rich and powerful who run the country as having created dumb people by creating an cradle-to-grave environment of complicity and simplicity, allowing them to mold them into drones useful for whatever the ruling parties wish.

Do people no longer read One-Dimensional Man? O' tempora.

 

[Snoopy]

Can someone explain to me why FriendlyFire, a poster in Australia, seems to be so unhealthily obsessed with a nation that lies 10000 miles away from where he lives? I don't worry about the state of Michigan and it's up the road a couple hours by car.

It probably has a lot to do with how much Australia sucks U.S. cock and wants to be like U.S. when it grows up.

 

[metatron]

The top 12 colleges in the world are all in the United States.

Nobel prizes in the sciences (excluding economics) per 10 million people, 1945-2009:

Australia: 5.5
U.S.: 9.8

Problem, FriendlyFire?

The U.S. are great at producing a small academic elite. Nobody contested that. FF is making arguments regarding the gros of the general population.
So your argument is somewhat off tune at best, if not a fallacy.

Percent of people ages 25-64 with university degrees:

Australia: 24.1
U.S.: 30.9

Many people don't consider the things American colleges hand to their 22 year old graduates "university degrees". I have no idea how the Aussies see that. But you might very well be comparing apples and oranges here.

Percentage of 25-64 year olds that have attained at least upper secondary education:

Australia: 62%
U.S.: 88%

Yeah, but by European (and probably Australian as well) standards most of the U.S. "upper secondary education" qualifies as little more than a hybrid of a) prison b) a daycare center.

The statistics you cited all fit FF's argument rather neatly: The U.S. have excellent universities, many fake colleges where everone (with a pocketbook) can attend and mostly ridiculous high schools that barely resemble any European idea about the concept of "schooling" at all.
As a result the U.S. have an excellent elite and a rather stupid general population with a misguided academic selfconfidence. The only thing worse than a moron is a moron with a college degree. The U.S. are unsurpassed in producing those.
Congratulations.

Link to video.

Alcoholism is so sad.

It probably has a lot to do with how much Australia sucks U.S. cock and wants to be like U.S. when it grows up.

Australia has drifted away from the U.S. on several rather significant metrics over the last two decades. Gini index for starters.

Edit:
I have to elaborate a bit on that before you paint me as all Anti-American. I appreciate American culture a lot. You know: Arts and stuff. That does not interfere with being iritated by not a single one of your institutions working as it is supposed to do.
Actually the two go along very well. Places that have working institutions have a tendency to produce "art" that is much more like... ABBA?
Anyway... many young Germans love the idea of living in California one day. Mostly for it is considered to be very "cool". Your standard of living or your so called "freedom" are not the reason.
If anything they are the major deterrents that make people end up at home (or in Australia).

 

[Quackers]

LOL how did you get that video of ParadigmShifter - I mean he is drunk right?

 

[BuckeyeJim]

America's ignorance problem isn't some conspiratorial institution from the left or the right. It is a product of a decades long period in America where you didn't need an education in order to be successful. A great majority of the population, especially in today's rust belt, were able to acquire good paying jobs with little education after WWII and for many years beyond that. As globalization and global competitiveness have increased, our ability to sustain low education, good paying jobs have gone away. Uneducated blue collar workers haven't really instilled intellectualism into their children, nor have they pushed their schools. Parents rely too much on schools, and not enough on their own abilities to teach children. Those that have been comfortably ignorant for decades have passed down the ignorance, the lack of education, and prejudices to their children, but those jobs are no longer there. And thus you are left with a nation in an educational and economic malaise.

I think the article is a little hyperbolic and extremely disjointed. It sounds like a conspiracy theory more than anything else. There's really nothing but conjecture presented in the piece. What's more is there is little evidence to suggest that getting a universal healthcare system will make any of us smarter. It's also unclear how ending all of our military endeavors will increase national intelligence. There's also little to verify any factual differentiation between America and the rest of the world. Furthermore, it ignores a long and gross history that have led to pragmatic social issues in our nation: IE, racism, sexism, discrimination etc.

Even if we presume that there's a vast conspiracy to keep people dumb, it's exceptionally easy to escape this Idiocracy on an individual basis. All you have to do is have the will to and desire to buck the commercial status quo. If that's even a bad thing in the first place.

 

[Whiskey_Lord]

Americans have a very poor grasp on history. Especially literary critics.

 

[Theige]

America's poor read dystopian fiction?

Animal farm and 1984 are two of the most popular books on school reading lists are they not?

 

[amadeus]

The U.S. are great at producing a small academic elite. Nobody contested that. FF is making arguments regarding the gros of the general population.
So your argument is somewhat off tune at best, if not a fallacy.


Many people don't consider the things American colleges hand to their 22 year old graduates "university degrees". I have no idea how the Aussies see that. But you might very well be comparing apples and oranges here.


Yeah, but by European (and probably Australian as well) standards most of the U.S. "upper secondary education" qualifies as little more than a hybrid of a) prison b) a daycare center.

The statistics you cited all fit FF's argument rather neatly: The U.S. have excellent universities, many fake colleges where everone (with a pocketbook) can attend and mostly ridiculous high schools that barely resemble any European idea about the concept of "schooling" at all.
As a result the U.S. have an excellent elite and a rather stupid general population with a misguided academic selfconfidence. The only thing worse than a moron is a moron with a college degree. The U.S. are unsurpassed in producing those.
Congratulations.

I post a graduation rate and you say it's because American schools have low standards. That's pretty pathetic.

 

[madviking]

America's ignorance problem isn't some conspiratorial institution from the left or the right. It is a product of a decades long period in America where you didn't need an education in order to be successful. A great majority of the population, especially in today's rust belt, were able to acquire good paying jobs with little education after WWII and for many years beyond that. As globalization and global competitiveness have increased, our ability to sustain low education, good paying jobs have gone away. Uneducated blue collar workers haven't really instilled intellectualism into their children, nor have they pushed their schools. Parents rely too much on schools, and not enough on their own abilities to teach children. Those that have been comfortably ignorant for decades have passed down the ignorance, the lack of education, and prejudices to their children, but those jobs are no longer there. And thus you are left with a nation in an educational and economic malaise.

QFT.

Living in a really cosmopolitan and technologically advanced region, our schools and our parents are better than the norm. So you see parents pushing kids to do well in school and go to college to get advanced degrees. However, what is the case in NoVa isn't the case in Montana, which is a problem for national rankings; it hides the really good school districts in the mass of average districts.

 

[FriendlyFire]

I post a graduation rate and you say it's because American schools have low standards. That's pretty pathetic.

So you've "cherry picked" the OED education statisics that you want and just ignor the rest ?

Metatron arguments make a lot of sense. Its not like these problems havent been in the media and been discussed to death. US overall standard have been falling.

Australia not immune its own host of education problems either. The trend towards private schools, under funding and the rising cost.

 

[Disgustipated]

"no racial differences in mental functioning at age one, although a racial gap begins to emerge over the next few years of life ... The observed patterns are broadly consistent with large racial differences in environmental factors that grow in importance as children age."

the reason whites do better in school (usually) is because their richer.

You spelled They're wrong. Sorry, being a spelling nazi. I have no room to talk because my writing skills aren't great. But my math and science skills are the best. I went to an inner city high School (Las Vegas High school on 7th street) and I lived on 10th street yet I aced all my AP exams. Proof that money has nothing to do with intelligence. If money=intelligence why is Paris Hilton so dumb?

 

[metatron]

I post a graduation rate and you say it's because American schools have low standards. That's pretty pathetic.

So you were busy running over FF with your rather crude argument when some joker backed into your car in an equally crude fashion.
Wow.
Life is unfair.

If money=intelligence why is Paris Hilton so dumb?

Is she?
It's an honest question. She's annoying as hell, naive probably and has made some arguably poor and misguided livestyle choices, yes.
But is there some public knowledge about her actually being stupid?

 

[BuckeyeJim]

Is she?
It's an honest question. She's annoying as hell, naive probably and has made some arguably poor and misguided livestyle choices, yes.
But is there some public knowledge about her actually being stupid?

About as much public knowledge as there is to conclude that Americans are dumber than Australians and Europeans. But that doesn't stop people from going on disconnected rants does it?

 

[amadeus]

So you were busy running over FF with your rather crude argument when some joker backed into your car in an equally crude fashion.

That's right -- I hit FF dead on with facts and you're a crappy driver.

 

[metatron]

facts

No you tried to "hit him dead" with your implied interpretation of facts that are totally meaningless for they are (however you may disagree with my interpretation in particular) a comparison of apples and oranges.

About as much public knowledge as there is to conclude that Americans are dumber than Australians and Europeans. But that doesn't stop people from going on disconnected rants does it?

I merely offered Amadeus an alternative interpretation of his precious facts. You haven't provided any facts regarding Ms Hilton's intelligence so far.

 

[Cheezy the Wiz]

That's right -- I hit FF dead on with facts and you're a crappy driver.

I can drive. I'm an excellent driver. Not wearing my underwear.

Spoiler :

 

[Formaldehyde]

Here's a relatively decent comparison of education levels in various countries:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/news/datablog/2010/dec/07/world-education-rankings-maths-science-reading



It appears that Australia cleans the US's clock. The math score is particularly appalling.

 

[Snoopy]

U.S. may be low, but perhaps say, 1% of the population are more literate than 50% of the Australian population, in which case the U.S. is achieving better results. Perspective matters.

 

[jono256]

It appears that Australia cleans the US's clock. The math score is particularly appalling.

It doesn't seem there's much difference between industrialised countries, with most of them in a 30 points range out of more than 550, that's about 5% at most.

What about the stated goal of the curriculum and teaching methods?
The UK has a more practical system than France, allowing you to drop a lot of courses to concentrate on science, for example. In France you have to study philosophy and history/geography even if you choose to do sciences, it's also much more rigid, the teacher talks and you write it down all day.

I wonder if that is a general latin vs anglo thing.

 

[Formaldehyde]

It doesn't seem there's much difference between industrialised countries, with most of them in a 30 points range out of more than 550, that's about 5% at most.

The difference between 500 and 520 is huge. it is the difference between having a good educational system and a mediocre one. And 487 in math is downright embarrassing. You can't claim to be #1 when you are actually #25.