Why Americans Are So Ignorant -- It's Not Only Fox News...
And yes, they did use that picture.
http://www.alternet.org/tea-party-and-right/why-americans-are-so-ignorant-its-not-only-fox-news-there-are-some?paging=off
Why Americans Are So Ignorant -- It's Not Only Fox News, There Are Some Understandable Reasons for it
Sure propaganda, government secrecy and Fox News have a lot to do with it. But there are broader societal pressures as well.
April 8, 2013
Consortium News / By Lawrence Davidson
April 8, 2013 |
In 2008, Rick Shenkman, the Editor-in-Chief of the History News Network, published a book entitled Just How Stupid Are We? Facing the Truth about the American Voter. In it he demonstrated, among other things, that most Americans were: (1) ignorant about major international events, (2) knew little about how their own government runs and who runs it, (3) were nonetheless willing to accept government positions and policies even though a moderate amount of critical thought suggested they were bad for the country, and (4) were readily swayed by stereotyping, simplistic solutions, irrational fears and public relations babble.
Shenkman spent 256 pages documenting these claims, using a great number of polls and surveys from very reputable sources. Indeed, in the end it is hard to argue with his data. So, what can we say about this?
One thing that can be said is that this is not an abnormal state of affairs. As has been suggested in prior analyses, ignorance of non-local affairs (often leading to inaccurate assumptions, passive acceptance of authority, and illogical actions) is, in fact, a default position for any population.
To put it another way, the majority of any population will pay little or no attention to news stories or government actions that do not appear to impact their lives or the lives of close associates. If something non-local happens that is brought to their attention by the media, they will passively accept government explanations and simplistic solutions.
more...
http://www.alternet.org/tea-party-and-right/why-americans-are-so-ignorant-its-not-only-fox-news-there-are-some?paging=off
jerseyjack
(1,361 posts)Choice 1. Obama and the Congress.
Choice 2. K Street and their puppet masters.
Brigid
(17,621 posts)Choice #2.
Billy Pilgrim
(96 posts)Even today it's the most influential medium.
Uncle Joe
(58,459 posts)as an institution share primary responsibility.
Television's goal in its' first half century was in appealing to the lowest common denominator for maximum viewing results, that formed the bedrock.
Elimination of the Fairness Doctrine removed the last vestiges of television journalistic integrity during the news hour.
Americans over this same time span spent many hours of the day absorbing this corporate supremacist, consumer identified mindset propaganda.
While education could've certainly taught critical thinking, the ethos of a good education was greatly undercut by the power of television's "popular persuasion," that goes for movies as well.
We might explain this as the result of faulty education; however, there are other, just as embarrassing, moments involving the well educated. Take, for instance, the employees of Fox News. Lou Dobbs (who graduated from Harvard University) is host of the Fox Business Network talk show Lou Dobbs Tonight. Speaking on March 23 about gun control, he and Fox political analyst Angela McGlowan (a graduate of the University of Mississippi) had the following exchange:
McGlowan: What scares the hell out of me is that we have a president . . . that wants to take our guns, but yet he wants to attack Iran and Syria. So if they come and attack us here, we dont have the right to bear arms under this Obama administration.
Dobbs: Were told by Homeland Security that there are already agents of Al Qaeda here working in this country. Why in the world would you not want to make certain that all American citizens were armed and prepared?
Despite education, ignorance plus ideology leading to stupidity doesnt come in any starker form than this. Suffice it to say that nothing the President has proposed in the way of gun control takes away the vast majority of weapons owned by Americans, that the Presidents actions point to the fact that he does not want to attack Syria or Iran, and that neither country has the capacity to come and attack us here.
This would only be embarrassing to the "well educated" if it were a mistake as opposed to a deliberate attempt to manipulate the public.
As for geography being an issue, i don't believe much heed was paid toward Canada or Mexico.
Thanks for the thread, babylonsister.
Thinkingabout
(30,058 posts)The likes of 9/11 is really stupid. It is not reasonable or sensible.
OnyxCollie
(9,958 posts)Converse: The nature of belief systems in mass publics
http://wikisum.com/w/Converse:_The_nature_of_belief_systems_in_mass_publics
A great majority of people neither adhere to a full, complete set of beliefs which produces a clear ideology nor do they have a clear grasp of what ideology is. This is measured by a lack of coherence in responses to open-ended questions. Ideology of elites is not mirrored by the masses and voter revolt to a political party does not reflect ideological shifts.
Converse analyzes open-ended interview questions to measure conceptualization of ideology. He concludes that the liberal-conservative continuum is a high level abstraction not typically used by the man in the street because of response instability and lack of connections made between answers. There is no underlying belief structure for most people, just a bunch of random opinions. Even on highly controversial, well-publicized issues, large portions of the electorate do not have coherent opinions. In fact, many simply answer survey questions as though they are flipping a coin.
Though some political sophisticates do structure their opinions in a larger ideological framework, such structure is rare. This level of political sophistication (one's "level of conceptualization" is correlated positively with the respondent's level of education, degree of political involvement, and amount of political information.
Key points: Most people do not have strong belief systems; that is, they do not think ideologically. A minority of people have fixed preferences and answer survey questions consistently, but most simply give random answers. Most people do not interpret politics through an ideological lens.
The Nature of Belief Systems in Mass Publics
http://politicalbubbles.com/The_Nature_of_Belief_Systems_in_Mass_Publics_Converse_1964.pdf
Flying Squirrel
(3,041 posts)"In any case, Bartels believes that people learn critical thinking in informal settings such as museums and by watching the Daily Show with Jon Stewart."