BREAKING NEWS — 13 percent of Americans are stupid ignoramuses
Alright, that may be a tad harsh. Or… no. Is that overly generous? You decide.
According to a new 46-country survey, as reported by Reuters, “[t]hirteen percent of Americans have never heard of global warming even though their country is the world’s top source of greenhouse gases”.
My reaction to this report has come in two successive stages:
1) That’s terrible. Americans are stupid. 13 percent is how many million? Their educational system sucks. The industry-funded propaganda, pushed on an ignorant public by media outlets that either believe the lies or avoid the liberal label by presenting two sides of the issue even when one side is a pack of lies and the scientific consensus is clear, is working.
2) Maybe that’s not so terrible. Some Americans are stupid, perhaps many millions of them, but at least, if the survey results are to be believed, 87 percent of them have heard of global warming. That’s not too bad. Considering an educational system that sucks and all that industry-funded propaganda and those irresponsible media outlets. Maybe the truth is getting out. Maybe there is hope yet that the world’s worst polluter will reverse course and take positive steps to deal with the climate crisis. Sure, Bush is a know-nothing, do-nothing president, but some of the states are acting progressively, and there’s always Arnold. California is where it’s at, right? So, yeah, okay, not bad. For America.
Pardon my optimism. I may not be in my right mind this evening, but, well, I can’t be negative all the time. Even on global warming.
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23 Responses to “BREAKING NEWS — 13 percent of Americans are stupid ignoramuses”
You know, that 13% should not be allowed to vote (just kidding, just kidding), but I wonder how high this percentage is in other countries.
the results might surprise you.
“Read the link MvdG!”
Just did:
That means 9% on average NEVER heard of it.
The U.S. tops that with 4%, which is sad, but I wonder about the specifics: what countries had even more lousy numbers?
“The industry-funded propaganda, pushed on an ignorant public by media outlets that either believe the lies or avoid the liberal label by presenting two sides of the issue even when one side is a pack of lies and the scientific consensus is clear, is working”
Well actually that doesn’t support it as working, because if they haven’t heard of it, they haven’t heard the BS from the people trying to say it doesn’t exist either.
[...] Combine this with the depressing survey telling us that 13% of Americans have never even heard of global warming, and we’ve got the makings of yet another political brouhaha. [...]
I would also like to add that it doesn’t make them stupid ignoramuses. Ignorant without a doubt, but many people are either too busy with their own lives, a legitimate claim for anyone trying to both raise and family and enjoy life, or are simply fed up with the news which is very repetative. Even this site has become stuck on Iraq and international issues and has recently stopped posting on just about anything else a moderate might be interested in.
Add to this there is little anyone can do RIGHT NOW with knowledge of the deaths of soldiers, or the crisis in Darfur. The elections have come and gone and in the meantime, those of us without disposable income and the free time to attend a protest or rally for our favorite cause might be focused on our day to day. While in this digital age its certainly easier to get access to news than its ever been, I will not call someone stupid just because they don’t have an awareness of whats going in Burma or even what Brittany Spears’s baby is called.
Ignoraymusses? That’s redicyoulous. By the way: what’s Reuters and what are countries?
Joe,
you know damn well that Reuters is a coda branch.
I though Reuters are what they use to steer boats.
No Joe. It’s a coda branch. The main rival of coca cola.
Sam I’m going to go out on a limb and say that many of that same 13% that have NEVER HEARD of Global Warming probably DO know what Britney’s baby is called.
No free time? No free time is not knowing the presidential candidates almost 2 years before elections. Not having ever heard global warming is like being American and not knowing there’s a war going on.
Lynx: I strongly believe that quite a big part of the population of whatever country is simply too lazy to think about matters like global warming, politics, etc.
Really, they willingly choose to be stupid.
O, and I estimate that percentage to be quite bigger than 13%
Actually I’d disagree. I know people that don’t own a TV, and use their computers simply to type up resumes and whatnot. People sick of the news in general, people that live in the boonies, or work on oilfields in Alaska. Basically people that engage themselves in the here and now with little time for worldly issues. I’m glad I know them, and while the Global Warming thing is quite staggering, to have not heard of it you’d really have to be cut off from just about all news, tabloids included.
Remember, its not having heard about it if I get the article, not heard and just don’t give a crap which is a different sort of person.
Sam,
What about the Amish?
I’d wager there were up to a dozen Amish that could name neither Brittany’s baby nor Tom and Katie’s.
Given that, according to the 2000 Census, only 80.4% of adults over age 25 had a high school diploma, and 17.9% spoke a language other than English at home, I think this statistic is pretty good.
Personally, I suspect that about 15 to 20% of the country are people who we wouldn’t be surprised to see on “Cops”, and I’m not surprised at all that they’ve never heard of “global warming”.
And at any rate, this was an “internet poll” with 25,000 respondents, which creates a serious flaw in the methodology, whatever it was (which the article doesn’t describe). Obviously, it’s limited to those with internet access. In North America (U.S. and Canada), according to Internet World Stats, 69.4% of the population are internet users. In Central America, only 15.9% of the population are, and in South America, it’s 16.9%. The odds are that the average internet user in Latin America is more highly educated, relative to his or her countrymen, than the North American user is. In other words, if you only polled the richest and most educated 15.9 to 16.5% of the U.S. population, our numbers would certainly look much better.
By the way, that Reuters article repeats the idiotic and foolish charge that President Bush “pulled the United States out of Kyoto” in 2001. The United States was never IN the Kyoto agreement, because the Senate UNANIMOUSLY advised the president not to sign it, and said that they would not ratify the protocol. President Clinton knew that when he signed it, but signed it anyway, against the advice of the Senate and knowing he would not obtain its consent (funny, I never heard the left complain about HIS imperial presidency and refusal to listen to Congress on that point). Because the Senate never ratified it, and was not going to regardless of which party was in charge, there was really nothing for President Bush to “pull out of”. The president, of course, has no power to bind our nation to a treaty in the absence of the advice and consent of the Senate.
I don’t know or care about Britney’s baby.
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