Dumbing Down America

[SlySpy]

http://www.berkshireeagle.com/Storie...568624,00.html

Looks like America is regressing back into the dark ages. Excellent...
It's time for Canada to fulfill it's manifest destiny and capture America when all they have left is torches and pitchforks.

Dumbing down America The decision of Congress to cut the budget for the National Science Foundation indicates that Washington's faith-based and fear-based antipathy to science is well on the way to becoming institutionalized. It is bad for the country economically and beyond that it represents another step backwards for a nation that used to pride itself for being on the cutting edge of scientific research and technology. The cut of $105 million from the NSF budget, which left the budget $272 million shy of the total proposed by President Bush, undermines an agency that is at the root of technological innovation in the United States. That kind of innovation is one of the reasons why America became an economic power, and if it concedes technological progress to Europe and Asia, as Congress appears willing to do, it will eventually concede economic status as well. The NSF helped finance research into areas as varied as Internet search engines, astronomy and climate change. It is currently backing, among other projects, the development of an artificial retina to restore sight to the blind being conducted at the University of Southern California. Many mathematicians, computer scientists, environmentalists and biologists depend on NSF funding to do their important work. Congressional foolishness won't stop scientific research, of course, but more and more of it will be done overseas, to the detriment of the U.S. economy. President Bush's opposition to meaningful stem cell research has prompted many American researchers to do their work in Europe or Asia, where science is not inhibited by religious pressure groups. Intel is opening laboratories in China, in part because it doesn't have to pay workers as much but in part because China encourages scientific research with subsidies and doesn't bind it with petty restrictions. European and Asian nations are also putting more money into scientific and mathematical programs at their universities, while America is doing the exact opposite. It's not surprising then, that fewer foreign students are coming to American universities which are no longer at the forefront of education and research. The congressional Republicans who drew up the legislation cutting the NSF budget claimed they did so to hold the line on domestic spending, but given that they found money for the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame's "toddler rock" program and for the Country Music Hall of Fame in Nashville, that argument is transparently false. The cuts are in reality a symptom of the anti-intellectualism rampant in America, a country where too many residents are poorly informed and proud of it. This attitude will weaken America severely in terms of its economy, but there is no price tag on how much it weakens the psyche of a nation that at one time prided itself on its thinkers, its inventors, its scientists, and its open-minded approach to new thoughts and ideas.

[PatrickHenry]

Quote by: SlySpy It's time for Canada to fulfill it's manifest destiny and capture America when all they have left is torches and pitchforks.

LOL. But it is a deliberate policy to reduce the intellectual capacity of the citizenry. It empowers the elites to have an edge on the Joe and Jane Sixpacks of America. They can just tell you, "Trust us. We are smarter than you and we know better. Trust us!" Well, I don't trust them over there in Washington. Maybe I'm too smart for that...
Did you want to talk about this, the dumbing of America generally, or about this little article regarding a funding cut for science education?

[saif]

Quote by: PatrickHenry LOL. But it is a deliberate policy to reduce the intellectual capacity of the citizenry. It empowers the elites to have an edge on the Joe and Jane Sixpacks of America. They can just tell you, "Trust us. We are smarter than you and we know better. Trust us!" Well, I don't trust them over there in Washington. Maybe I'm too smart for that... Did you want to talk about this, the dumbing of America generally, or about this little article regarding a funding cut for science education?

hmmm.... could there be truth behind this.. just maybe.. can you convince me further PatHenry?

[PatrickHenry]

http://bellaciao.org/en/article.php3?id_article=4535

Education in the United States has become an exercise in government and corporate brainwashing, used to achieve a citizenry devoid of analytical and free-thinking minds. The purpose, quite simply, is to retain the class warfare structure that has marked American society for decades. Education has become a tool used to make the wealthy richer and the poor more indigent. It is now a mechanism to separate the have nots from the haves, the higher castes from the untouchables. As it stands today, though certainly being eviscerated more and more daily, education is making of the masses impotent creatures of indifference, happily droned into complacency and deprived of a knowledge that once served to curtail the power of the elite that run the nation. The result is the age of corporatism, the age of unfettered and unaccountable power and the control of the masses through media manipulation, societal fabrication and education eradication. As the world slowly passes through the sands of time the people of the United States, those living inside what has become a most hated geopolitical entity, are seeing the result of being dumbed down and of letting incompetents, warmongers, profiteers and deranged zealots run unfettered and unopposed, ransacking the globe, its people and land in the process. Today we see the ramifications of a citizenry that has allowed itself to be made ignorant through its submission to those in power whose purposeful malfeasance continues to destroy the very essence of knowledge that grants freedom to enslaved minds. Iraq and the coming disaster in the Middle East are a consequence to the decimation of education in the United States. George W. Bush is a consequence of the dumbing down of America, to which he owes his very position perched like the vulture he is atop the dying tree of America that has been contaminated by his inept and infected claws smeared in human blood.

More to the point of the original post:
http://www.medzilla.com/fah-4.html

I concur with the current (1996) majority opinion of sci.research.careers, from observation and personal experience, that pursuit of education in science in order to obtain well-paid employment is generally not a good idea. However, there's another thought that's been festering in the back of my mind for awhile, and I think that now would be a good time to raise the issue. Speaking for the U.S., where most of the people with these concerns are posting from, I am concerned that we are in danger of becoming a nation of uneducated, ignorant followers. I am also concerned that this seems to be a part of the unstated goal of some of our country's leadership. Numerous examples exist where formerly outstanding public educational systems have been ransacked for funds, resulting in poor curriculums and students less capable of thinking. Glaring case in point: California, which up until the recent several regimes had an excellent public school system, and which now is mediocre at best (the UC campuses notwithstanding). So, I wonder if by advocating that students NOT select the more demanding fields, we as advisors and mentors are unwittingly playing into some larger agenda, perhaps aimed at "dumbing down" the population. Forrest Gump made it because he was lucky, not because he was stupid. Unfortunately, there are many people who seem to believe the latter. Even worse, the current crisis in science employment tends to support their view. The nagging question is, do you advise people NOT to study demanding curricula because there probably won't be jobs, or do you advise them to do exactly that because their knowledge and abilities will be what we need in order to survive as a country/world/species? Frank Heasley, Ph.D. Principal FSG Online biotech-jobs

[PatrickHenry]

This is a funny one that draws attention to the more general problem of the dummies in our households and school systems: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/articl...NGIL68MT61.DTL

A student writes a paper about the practice of clitorectomies in her "anthology" class, a class she took last semester. She is still upset about what she learned. I have known about clitorectomies for a long time, and the practice upsets me, too, but I am also upset about how it is possible for a student to take and pass a college anthropology class, and still not be aware of the name or meaning of the class she has just completed. It is so surprising, in fact, that I think it must be a simple typographical error. When she makes the same error four more times throughout her paper, however, I'm left with the impression that she was not taught, or did not learn, the meaning of the prefix in the word "anthropology," and probably not the suffix, either. When I return the papers, I ask her what class she was referring to in her essay, and she says "anthology." I ask what grade she got in the class. She says she got an A. On another paper in the stack I am returning, a student has written that he sometimes fears he is "slipping into the ibis." I know just how he feels. Rather like a student a few years ago who wrote about her fear that we were nearing "the claps of civilization." In another class, I use the word "negligee," but the looks on student faces suggest bewilderment. When I ask them if they know the word, they don't. I am mystified. Even though I am well aware of the fact that the size of the average person's vocabulary has plummeted over the past couple of generations, "negligee" would never have struck me as an obscure word. The vocabulary of the typical eighth-grader has declined from around 25,000 words to 10,000 words, a three-fifths decline in the ability to make sense of the world through language. Now I know that one of those lost words is "negligee," at least for many of my students. I make up a brief current events/vocabulary quiz. It's something I do periodically as a means of trying to stay in touch with the audience I try to reach each week. From my students' answers, I learn that Russia is a city in Germany, as is "Belgim." A city in Iraq is "Haidi." Another city in Iraq is "Quate." Only three of 31 students can name a city in Spain, but in a valiant attempt at guessing, one student says that Argentina is a city in that country. Buffalo is a city in Canada, and Jordan is a city in Israel. A city in Brazil is "Chilie." Asked to name the state that borders on California to the north, one student writes "Ohio." Only nine out of 31 know who John Kerry is. A couple of students think he is an actor, and one thinks he is a serial killer. None knows Karl Rove, our shadow president, though one student ventures the guess that he must have something to do with "Rove versus Way," the famous Supreme Court case. Only two can identify the British prime minister; many guess that post is occupied by Prince Charles. To close out the quiz, I ask my students how often they read a newspaper. Most don't. Ever. One student writes: "I never read a newspaper. I don't have money to wast (sic) on it." I have been writing about student ignorance for more than 20 years. The first piece I wrote on the subject appeared in Newsweek, and it prompted lots of media attention, including a segment on "60 Minutes.'' The media attention helped fuel the "cultural literacy" movement that swept education circles during the late '80s and early '90s. Once all of the symposia had been conducted, the seminars completed, the papers written, and the meetings held, it turned out that nothing whatsoever was done to institute reform, or to restructure curricula. Educational bureaucrats were not able to come to a conclusion as to what a baseline knowledge might be, what cultural heritage might be worth imparting to the average high school grad. Thus it is that none of my students knew where or what Appomattox was. Thus it is that Hiroshima and Auschwitz are slipping from national consciousness. Thus it is that not a single student could identify Robert Frost, arguably the greatest American poet of the last century. Thus it is that students leave high school without an interest in the wider world they inhabit. Last year, just as we were in the process of invading Iraq, one of my students thought that Al-Jazeera, the Arab news network, was "Ben" Laden's brother, Al. Lately, with the weather warming, I have seen students wearing T-shirts emblazoned with the words "Voting is for old people." Given their lack of knowledge of history and current events, perhaps it is no tragedy that a majority of young people don't bother to vote. But what happens to a democracy when so many people opt out, when fewer and fewer people bother to inform themselves of what is being done in their names? Can a connection be drawn between a know-nothing electorate and a know-nothing president? And what kind of nation presumes to export democracy by force of arms, and then fails to practice that system of government within its own borders? It is appalling when students graduate from our high schools with such an inadequate understanding of their history or heritage. It should shock us that students can be awarded a diploma without even knowing where in the world they are. As long as we graduate so many people ignorant of so much, we can be fairly sure they will live in a world where they learn geography only after they have been shipped overseas to fight, and perhaps die, in countries whose names they never heard mentioned when they were in school.

Some who criticize the modern education establishment in America will find at its roots the philosophy of John Dewey. I haven't studied his works, which are voluminous, or his critics (and there are many), but I would think that some of our social engineering could be laid at his doorstep.

The deliberate dumbing of America is a topic that conspiracy theorists find congenial. I confess that there seems to be some logic there, but I am not well versed in its convolutions.

[Scribbler1]

One of the things I find most striking is that a lot of people hold the opinion that "foreign" scientists (engineers, doctors, etc.) are stealing the jobs of Americans. Strangely enough, quite a few of these people have no interest in science nor do they encourage it in their kids, and they still maintain the U.S.A. is NUMBER 1 in anything you might want to bring up.
These people neither know or care that the budget for scientific education is disappearing. They are sheep and the sheep will most assuredly cause the demise of the United States.

[rcne]

Scribbler1, I agree to a point. We as a nation with all the resources at our disposal could and should be able to have an outstanding educated nation.

But the PC policies created in the last 20 years of not allowing anyone to fail ( pass Johnny on) and the labeling DH, LD ADD kids has made it OK to do less. After all 'its not your fault' right.

The kids of then - are the parents of now - so what hope do todays kids have.

No, I'm not saying its all the parents fault. Its them and the educational systems fault.

How many of you had the opportunity to attend an advanced or gifted class? How many of you were or knew someone in the 'special' classes.

America has been in the process of dumbing down for decades. And the cultural elite love it - easier to control the masses.

[Scribbler1]

I completely agree. I have always said life ain't fair and sometimes you lose. In school some people are great students, some are good but struggle and others just don't "get it." Pushing a poor student through to spare him a blow to the self estem was and is a moronic approach to education. It cheats the poor student as he knows he will pass regardless of the amount of effort, it cheats the good student out of any well deserved recognition for his hard work and it cheats the teachers because they will ALL be tarred with the same brush when the argument is made that some educators do not make any effort to reach the failing kids knowing they will pass them anyway.

"The kids of then - are the parents of now - so what hope do todays kids have."

Very little, unless those of us who do know the score push our own kids.

"America has been in the process of dumbing down for decades. And the cultural elite love it - easier to control the masses."

I'm so glad to see another person say that. I have said for some time that an uneducated population is one which asks no questions and automatically believes the "smart" people. Thet are also much easier to control politically.
I don't say this lightly or as some conspiracy theory, but as someone who has watched education practices and "reforms" which have gone so far beyond the bounds of common sense and reason it boggles the mind. Things like "social promotions" which were obviously guaranteed to fail even before they were implemented. And THESE programs were devised by the PARENTS of the "kids of then" which one would assume had some grasp of reality passed down from THEIR parents. My Baby Boom generation produced more than its share of idiots, but the people in charge of the educational system in the U.S. back then were from the PREVIOUS generation and usually posessed more than a little common sense.
It only asks the question, "what possible benefit could come of these programs?" There MUST be something there that enhances the educational process, even with all the idiotic aspects there must be a shred of good, right?
Not that I have seen, which then begs the alternate question, "WHO could possibly gain ANYTHING from these ridiculous proposals?" Those who would seek to more easily influence the masses comes to mind.
It's as though the thought of Johnny's self esteem and ego making it through school undamaged only to find he is a well adjusted loser who is too dumb to hold a McDonalds job never occurred to ANYONE! Some people missing that could be expected, but NO ONE seeing the long term damage from making Johnny feel good about himself seems impossible.

[Technosoul]

What is interesting in all this is that most kids can remember lots of things that are not part of normal education. They can remember each word of a complex rap song with ease (and some of those songs do not just use simple words). Other kids could tell you every detail about all the Star War movies or the Lord of the Rings movies, or anything you want to know about the books about Harry Potter. Other kids know more about computers then do the average teacher. And when it comes to being an expert Mall Rat, you can bet your credit card most teen girls know the names of each and every brand of clothing and what is hot or not. Kids are indeed fast learners but they learn about what they can relate too, what perks their interest the most. I even learned that there is only one ring in the Lord of the Rings, which was a bit confusing.

Learning what one needs to know to be part of their "world" around them.

Back in the 1950s we learned more in school because we had little outside of the class room from which to learn from, other then some books. Of course some boys knew more about cars then they did about history, but all and all we did not have much to learn about from our old black and white TVs or those movies we saw, no computers to fool around with, not even a Pak Man game at the local 7-11 and even such chain stores were seldom seen. For the most part busness paid little attention to teens until they learned that kids had more money to waste away on those old 45 rpm records and "Elvis". Then busness started targeting the teen market and the "new teaching" started and continues from outside the classroom, and that skillfully done distraction I think could have drawn their eyes away from the blackboards which were, let's face it, a bit of a bore.

Perhaps what we need in our educational system are thinkers like they have on Madison Avenue, who know how to create interest and know how to sell ideas. Who can make anything popular sounding or interesting.

Technosoul.

[tusaki]

Quote by: Technosoul ... I even learned that there is only one ring in the Lord of the Rings, which was a bit confusing.

"Three Rings for the Elven-kings under the sky,
Seven for Dwarf-Lords in their halls of stone,
Nine for Mortal Men doomed to die,
One for the Dark Lord on his dark throne,
In the land of Mordor where the shadows lie.

One Ring to rule them all, One Ring to find them,
One Ring to bring them all, and in the darkness bind them,
In the land of Mordor, where the shadows lie."

Thats at least 3 + 7 + 9 + 1 = 20 rings

[Technosoul]

One ring called reincarnation, One ring called resurrection, One ring called eternity. One ring for the marrage of technology and soul, Hmmm? Okay, lots of rings but in the movie that teenager kid only had one ring which was a symbol for a lot of different supernatural and/or spiritual aspects about the magic, the magical writings of the word. So I am still confused, but even confusion runs around in a circle like a chicken with no head, in the "ring design". Mary go 'round the Roses.

One ring on the finger, one ring in a bell, and one ring around a coon's tail - but when the phone rings it's must have something to tell.

Was this the topic? The rings of the tree, each an age in the history of treedom, one half ring as a halo for Mary, one ring as a halo for the moon for those foggy nights, and the ringed rim of a glass from which we drink of they mystery school, who spiked the wine?

Technosoul.

[Scribbler1]

Quote by: Technosoul Was this the topic? Technosoul.

It sure wasn't THIS! Unless they are replacing the three "R"s with the three "Rings" in school I don't see this as having a lot to do with "dumbing down" America. :rolleyes:

[Samildanach]

The main worry is at what point does the population get so dumbed down that they believe whatever you tell them? I believe a significant portion of your population is at that point now. At some stage it will reach a critical mass and you won't be able to reverse the trend.

[Anniee]

http://www.cantrip.org/gatto.html

http://www.johntaylorgatto.com/

There are some links from the award-winning public school teacher who wrote "Dumbing Us Down." Even the left should enjoy him because he doles out a fair share of blame to corporations as well as the planned failure inherent in the Prussian method of mandated government schooling we employ. The first link is one of my favorites, as it encapsulates some of the problem in an easy-to-grasp nutshell. The second I'm still exploring, I would like to find one particular collection of his writings but no luck yet.

Really Gatto deserves his own series of threads but since I can almost never access this board and lose all continuity anyway, nevermind.

To the above poster: I'd argue critical mass of that sort has long since been reached. (I see it more on the left but it's on the right and among Libertarians too.) Point being it's spread like a cancer through the population and I doubt there's any way at this point to reverse the tide in numbers big enough to make much difference. Enjoy the bread and circuses while they last.

[Technosoul]

Quote by: Scribbler1 It sure wasn't THIS! Unless they are replacing the three "R"s with the three "Rings" in school I don't see this as having a lot to do with "dumbing down" America. :rolleyes:

You are correct, I responded to someone making a quote from a message I made, which quote being out of context sort of led into this detour. But in a way that was what my message was about (sort of). That the media detoured education because they found out kids had money to spend, which resulted in distraction from homework time and the education of kids about what to buy to be popular. This as I recall took place in the late 1950s and early 1960s when teenagers had more free cash to spend then many of the adults who had already ran up their charge accounts, at our culture's prime time in production activity. Teens were starting to spend big bucks on movies, and places like the local record store, fast food hamburger hangouts, and for things like fancy hubcaps for thier cars. Suddenly we had a whole teen culture and the marketeers were soon pouncing upon that new source of cash flow.

At the same time that teen culture started to create new words for their own use, and often parents did not even know the meanings of such words. "Pad" instead of "home" and "Short" as a name for a car that was lowered. And simple words for longer words, such as "hood" instead of "neighborhood". If you were going to be cool you had to learn all those new words and terms which continued to surface at a rapid pace. So we saw a strange kind of self-educational process evolving within the teen subculture. That alternative education got you an useless degree in what we now call 'street smarts'.

And suddenly (if I can add a pun for fun) the RING of the school bell was no longer LORD.

That is to say, the teen culture became the counter culture during the hippy revolution, not only were kids not going to be manipulated by school teachers but also they no longer wanted to be manipulated by the capitalistic marketeers who wanted to sell them all that stuff on TV. So they dropped out, smoked pot, and in effect became dumber relative to what we might think of as normal education.

So I thought I would add those and these comments to the topic because it was suggested that it might be some sort of ligh level Washington or Industral plot to keep kids stupid so we can have a cheap work force. To keep the human resources populated with burger flippers and clerks and stockers for Malls, truck drivers, and what have you, But I think the facts are that those lower end jobs are vanishing and they do know we need better skilled workers to keep up with the times. So I think kids are still smart, but they just know more about the Lord of the Rings then they do about Bagdad or some seldom used word (as used for examples). Although a few of us old hippies know a lot about Bagdad the Sailor Man we cannot expect kids to know as much as we need back then. (oops, joke, please do not qoute that line).

Now why the Bush budget is cutting back on funding for science in schools is something worth different comments. It seems they start cutting at the art classes, the music classes, then widdle their way into the science classes and perhaps other "shop" classes.
They want to concentrate all the effort of the big three "R's" as Bush continues to recomend. Do all three R's start with the letter R? hmmm? Reading, righting, and rythmatic? Not sure - what were those words again? Republican Republican and Religion?

But why do we not have good funding for all those classes and a great educational system? They got some of our votes because they promised us they would make education number one on the spending agenda, and what do we get instead, an idea about testing kids - now come on Uncle Sam, put your money where your mouth was.

Technosoul.

[Rave7pt0]

I think the state of education in the US is sickening, but I don't agree with you guys about the elite purposely dumbing us down to control us. That's crap. You guys should read Pedagogy of the Oppressed by Paulo Freire. It explains that the oppressed and the oppressors don't necessarily know their situation.

[rcne]

I think its more of human nature, why try to achieve more when all basic needs are covered. Why think, when you are comfortable.

The elite don't have to have a sinister plan, they just need to provide the basics and entertainment to retain power.

I think the PC focus on self esteem, and the helping hands in school has harmed this nation more than we realize.

There will always be those who excel and those who don't. The achievers are being reined in. Money is available for the LD's to mainstream, but very little is available for those bright students.

As a result most bright students learn how to coast through school. Colleges are also effected with this attitude. Everyone who comes to class gets a passing mark - hurray for higher education.

The give-me culture has us in a state of decadence. We will fall, sooner or later. We can't compete on an international level.

[Scribbler1]

Quote by: Rave7pt0 I think the state of education in the US is sickening, but I don't agree with you guys about the elite purposely dumbing us down to control us. That's crap. You guys should read Pedagogy of the Oppressed by Paulo Freire. It explains that the oppressed and the oppressors don't necessarily know their situation.

You say that theory is crap based on what, the opinion that : "the oppressed and the oppressors don't necessarily know their situation?"
The situation is I'm sure a lot more complex than simply control but after decades of this idiocy I see nothing done by otherwise intelligent people to fix things, especially when we have a ready made solution at hand. That is of course to reverse those ridiculous changes and do it the way it was done before. No "feelgood" programs, no social promotions and a return to the expectation that schools are there to teach and NOT nurture. It's not too tough to figure out when you see the problems with today's kids getting worse and the parents of those kids are the initial products of these radical changes, that those changes are mostly responsible for the situation.
The question then is why isn't something done about it. Personally, I hear a lot about the problems but see NOTHING being done to remedy the situation which leads me to believe that someone WANTS the situation to continue. Ask yourself WHY anyone would want the status quo and the answer should come pretty easily.

[Scribbler1]

Quote by: rcne I think its more of human nature, why try to achieve more when all basic needs are covered. Why think, when you are comfortable. The elite don't have to have a sinister plan, they just need to provide the basics and entertainment to retain power.

And when the "elite" see that what they are providing is detrimental to society and do nothing to correct it, it would certainly INDICATE a sinister plan, would it not? I think you are letting the powers that be off the hook a little too easily.

[Technosoul]

Again, why the reduction in the school budget for science classes? Why do schools in poor neighborhoods have to struggle just to get enough books to pass around where as wealthy neighborhoods often have "state of the art" classrooms. Why is it many students never learn about some of our famous poets and other writers? Why is it they ill-informed about other countries on the global map?

My wife works for the public school system and sometimes must bring home their school work for grading purposes, and she works in a highschool. I cannot believe some of those papers they write, some of the papers are really "poor" and next year they will all be out job hunting as they could not go on to collage with that level of knowledge (my opinion). And yet some of the school books being used in that school have tests at the end of each chapter that even I find "difficult" to do.
(which is not saying much as you might note by some of my postings here).

Oddly spelling is not as important as it used to be if you own a computer with "words for windows".

Here is a test for you all to answer. I will check back and grade any responders later.

Question: You are stranded in the wilderness just before dark in a snow storm, but you spot a abandoned cabin and inside it you see a fireplace, a candle on a table, and a wood burning stove. But you only have one match .... and so which one would you light first?

This is only a test.

Technosoul.