David Masciotra has an interesting read concerning the failure of American public education, as reflected in the rise of right- wing know- nothingism (most acute in supporters of neo- fascist hairball Donald "Rump" Trump):
... Two-thirds of Americans cannot name a single Supreme Court justice, and half are incapable of identifying all three branches of government. Forty-two percent of the public does not believe in evolutionary biology, while 24 percent believe that the sun orbits the earth.There's much more at the link supporting Masciotra's point. Suffice it to say, readers of this blog already know the low regard in which we hold the Stormtrumpers and other manifestations of right- wing doltishness, and we follow Masciotra's view that to coddle or comfort them in their ignorance serves not only to reinforce their behavior, but avoids confronting and addressing the root of the problem. But the point he makes about the failure of public education is an important one, since a prevailing intellectually lazy attitude toward acquiring basic knowledge needs to be reversed if we're ever to have a successfully functioning democracy.
Nearly a quarter of Americans read below the fifth-grade level, which helps to explain why only 29 percent read a newspaper, and why 24 percent of Americans do not read even one book a year.
To divorce the abysmal state of education from the downward turn of American politics straight into the sewer is to deny the connection between drinking battery acid and vomiting.
The philistines and modern-day know-nothings are on the march, and they all seem to show up at the Trump rally. In a recent essay, when I pointed out that Trump’s supporters are delusional to blame Mexicans and Muslims for their problems, and that when searching for suspects responsible for their hardships, they would have more luck with a mirror, many liberals condemned me as a “snobbish” and “heartless.” While the former is possibly true, the latter is not. Compassion does not necessitate lying to people in order to coddle and comfort them in their own self-destructive behavior. (our emphasis)
(Photo: We rest our case.)
2 comments:
The know-nothingism has always been here and plays into manufacturing suspicion/hatred of "elites" and cosmopolitans (i.e., those who read above a 5th grade level and can name one SCOTUS justice). The surprising thing is that there is still such a learned/stupid divide, given all the easier means to become educated and informed. I guess it is also all the means to become misinformed that is the problem.
Exactly. There's an entire industry out there =cough= right-wing media =cough= Fox "News" =cough= dedicated to that.
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