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Have you ever seen Jay Leno do his "Jaywalking" bit. He goes out into the street and asks people at random questions like what countries border the U.S.
He gets a lot of blank stares and some very wrong answers. He claims that he never has to interview more than 10-15 people to get some major league stupid answers.
I saw another segment where a man on the street asked several people if they could name a country that starts with the letter U. Well, there is Uganda and Uzebekestan, but these people didn't even guess their own country: the United States.
Why? Discuss.
Last edited by Zekester; 12-26-2009 at 03:57 AM..
Reason: spelling
You will see that people come to this thread and they will justify the ignorance of the US toward the World.
I find that pretty sad. I live in Europe and I am very interested in other countries.
I would say that people who have never left the US, or even their own state, are naturally more ignorant than people who have travelled the world.
The world is changing and the US has lost their Nr. 1 status, so I guess you`ll have to start interacting with other countries and cultures.
In some discussions I tried to provide some knowledge about the political situation in my country, but some posters insisted they knew more about my country after reading one, biased, news article about the situation.
Some people just don`t want to be informed, and rather live in a bubble.
Also, I have learned on CD, that many people try to break down complicated issues into something very simplistic. E.g. you see a lot of generalization about other countries and cultures.
You will see that people come to this thread and they will justify the ignorance of the US toward the World.
I find that pretty sad. I live in Europe and I am very interested in other countries.
I would say that people who have never left the US, or even their own state, are naturally more ignorant than people who have travelled the world.
The world is changing and the US has lost their Nr. 1 status, so I guess you`ll have to start interacting with other countries and cultures.
In some discussions I tried to provide some knowledge about the political situation in my country, but some posters insisted they knew more about my country after reading one, biased, news article about the situation.
Some people just don`t want to be informed, and rather live in a bubble.
Also, I have learned on CD, that many people try to break down complicated issues into something very simplistic. E.g. you see a lot of generalization about other countries and cultures.
Why? Perhaps you could blame our public education system which puts priority on social programing over reading and math. Perhaps you could blame lax parenting brought on by ever increasing intrusion of the government into people's lives dictating how parents can or cannot disipline their own children. Then again, many european nations are no bigger than most states in our country. I wonder how many people in european nations know about our individual 50 states? People like you love to bash on America. In this case, keep in mind that the majority of American public school teachers are liberal members of the Democratic party and many belong to a teacher's union. If you think Americans are so stupid, go ask them why they don't teach their students properly. Perhaps we need to put conservative non-union teachers in charge of our nation's education system to correct the problem.
Have you ever seen Jay Leno do his "Jaywalking" bit. He goes out into the street and asks people at random questions like what countries border the U.S.
He gets a lot of blank stares and some very wrong answers. He claims that he never has to interview more than 10-15 people to get some major league stupid answers.
I saw another segment where a man on the street asked several people if they could name a country that starts with the letter U. Well, there is Uganda and Uzebekestan, but these people didn't even guess their own country: the United States.
Why? Discuss.
Because when they were in school they were too busy learning how to put a condom on a cucumber.
You will see that people come to this thread and they will justify the ignorance of the US toward the World.
I find that pretty sad. I live in Europe and I am very interested in other countries.
I would say that people who have never left the US, or even their own state, are naturally more ignorant than people who have travelled the world.
The world is changing and the US has lost their Nr. 1 status, so I guess you`ll have to start interacting with other countries and cultures.
In some discussions I tried to provide some knowledge about the political situation in my country, but some posters insisted they knew more about my country after reading one, biased, news article about the situation.
Some people just don`t want to be informed, and rather live in a bubble.
Also, I have learned on CD, that many people try to break down complicated issues into something very simplistic. E.g. you see a lot of generalization about other countries and cultures.
you mean, people breaking down complicated issues into generalizing that americans are ignorant?
Have you ever seen Jay Leno do his "Jaywalking" bit. He goes out into the street and asks people at random questions like what countries border the U.S.
He gets a lot of blank stares and some very wrong answers. He claims that he never has to interview more than 10-15 people to get some major league stupid answers.
I saw another segment where a man on the street asked several people if they could name a country that starts with the letter U. Well, there is Uganda and Uzebekestan, but these people didn't even guess their own country: the United States.
Why? Discuss.
I found the video Leno put together in 2009 of "The Best of" these segments:
I've been all over the world and people are generally not all that well informed on a lot of subjects no matter where you are. The worst ones are those that generalize and make blanket statements about things.
I would say ignorance is the new retarded, but it's pretty old..
BTW, those Leno skits are hilarious, mostly because a lot of the people getting interviewed claim to be college students.
Why? Perhaps you could blame our public education system which puts priority on social programing over reading and math. Perhaps you could blame lax parenting brought on by ever increasing intrusion of the government into people's lives dictating how parents can or cannot disipline their own children. Then again, many european nations are no bigger than most states in our country. I wonder how many people in european nations know about our individual 50 states? People like you love to bash on America. In this case, keep in mind that the majority of American public school teachers are liberal members of the Democratic party and many belong to a teacher's union. If you think Americans are so stupid, go ask them why they don't teach their students properly. Perhaps we need to put conservative non-union teachers in charge of our nation's education system to correct the problem.
When I wrote my post, I had in my mind the adults that are not familiar with the rest of the world.
No one is hindering you or any other adult to become educated on other countries.
It is very easy to blame your school system, but I don`t think its the main reason.
Honestly, I did not really learn that much in my school, but I am just interested now in what is going on in the world.
Also, the OP was talking about the whole World, not just Europe.
And I wonder, what has the size of a country to do with anything?
Italy might be a very small country from your perspective but it has more history and more culture than the biggest american state.
Culture, history, people, politics etc. are not bigger or more interested because of the size of a place.
I also think it is very ignorant to always compare Europe, that consists of many countries NOT states, with the US.
I know you have 50 different states, but then a country in Europe has different states, also. E.g. Germany has 16 different states, do you know much about them?
I know some things about the states of NY, California, Texas and so on.
So again, who is hindering you to learn about the World? Why blame it on the educational system?
Is your media paying attention to the world?
Who is hindering YOU, sailordave, to learn about Malaysia or about Slovenia or about Peru?
Because when they were in school they were too busy learning how to put a condom on a cucumber.
No one is hindering adults to learn about the World. It is too easy to blame it on the school system.
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