The ignorance factor in America

When did America become an anti-intellectual country? Was it always? I cannot judge from my childhood and adolescence because I spent them in a narrow-minded community that may or may not have represented mainstream America. On the other hand, I spent my childhood and adolescence in a community where education was a priority. We had one of the country's top high schools in my city, so the other high schools were also excellent, just as a way of keeping up. I received a very good education.

Of course, it goes without saying that any society that believes that women and minorities are not entitled to equal rights with white men is not going to produce a nation of educated people because it does not want to. We have come a long way in offering equal educational rights to women (only thirty years ago, women were driven, by harrassment, out of law schools and medical schools), but we have much farther to go in providing equal educational facilities to people of color.

Nevertheless, the strong anti-intellectual streak in the United States seems to go beyond our refusal to educate everyone equally. Political candidates who are well-educated are made fun of. Institutions such as Harvard and Princeton are reviled for being "liberal," and students who pursue liberal arts degrees are looked down on as participants in pure folly, destined to live useless professional lives.

Most shocking is the number of students in our colleges and universities who not only say they have never read a book, but who boast about it. If they have never read a book, how did they get into a university? I meet adolescents--fairly bright adolescents--in my work who say they do not read at all (fortunately, I also meet many who love to read).

Appropriate grammar and syntax have almost departed the English language; even on National Public Radio, the errors are numerous. The frame of reference is a forgotten institution: People seem to me to have little sense of historical context. Every new film, every new political event, every new social trend is viewed as though it has no precedent, as though it hangs alone in the scheme of things.

Americans show continuing signs of ignorance. Ignorance about history, about their own language, about other cultures, about current events, and--most dangerous of all--ignorant about the of mechanics of logic and reasoning, and of the very process of critical thinking. It is getting harder and harder to have a discussion or debate about anything because logical fallacies have taken over almost any rhetoric about anything.

I do not think this worship of ignorance began with religion--I'm not sure how it began--but some religious groups have now exploited it. Once they got their foot in the door of the classroom, they introduced everything from abstinence programs that teach the inferiority of women to "intelligent design."

Then there is that common American response to almost eveything: "I'm too busy." Too busy to read, too busy to keep up with current events, too busy to do fact-finding, to busy to respond to art.

If this trend--contempt for reading, loss of frame of reference and context, lack of critical thinking skills--continues, we will become a nation of completely stupid people with superficial educations and a deep suspicion of anyone who loves knowledge. We are already that, to some degree. People who cannot think for themselves allow others to think for them.