Bemoaning the State of Things
Every year or so one of those polls comes out telling us how many more Americans can identify [insert pop culture reference here] versus how many can identify [insert historical, governmental or news reference here]. Well, it’s that time again. Zogby International did the polling, on behalf of a new game show, “Gold Rush.” Just over 1,200 Americans were polled, and the margin of errors is +/- 2.9%. Some of the results (mainly just for their scare value):
- 60.4% knew that Bart is Homer’s son on “The Simpsons”. A combined 20.1% could name one epic poem attributed to the classical poet Homer.
- 56.6% knew that Harry Potter is J.K. Rowling’s wizard creation. 49.5% knew that Tony Blair is the current prime minister of England.
- 77% could name two of Snow White’s seven dwarfs … 24% could name two Supreme Court justices (of those, Justice Thomas was the top pick, followed by Scalia).
- 73% could name the Three Stooges, while just 42% knew the three branches of the American government.
- 60% knew that Superman hails from the planet Krypton … 37% knew that Mercury is the closest planet to our sun.
“Also worth noting is that some topical issues appear to make an impression on Americans both in real life and in fiction. According to the ‘Gold Rush’ poll, more than 67% of those questioned correctly named President George W. Bush as the world leader who had signed a secret order authorizing the National Security Agency to eavesdrop on U.S. citizens and foreign nationals.”
What scares me about that is that there’s 33% or so who thought some other world leader could sign a secret order authorizing the NSA to eavesdrop on U.S. citizens …
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8 Responses to “Bemoaning the State of Things”
That’s probably the 33% who don’t know who our president is.
Americans as a whole are not that smart, they really aren’t. sorry.
Sometimes it’s terrifying to sit and think of ourselves as a democracy. Churchill’s quip about democracy being “the worst form of government, except for all the rest” fits nicely here.
Fortunately we can pass that quiz!
Well, those 33% are either completely ignorant or rather clever and informed. The Echelon system has long been a unifed way for our allies to spy on American citizens and pass suspicious information directly to the NSA. So a little stretching of the statment could lead us to rightfully conclude that other governments do spy on us via the NSA.
Of course, this was back in the day when the NSA followed the letter of the law regarding spying on Americans…
I wonder if Michael Stickings is old enough to remember the poll conducted by the Ontario New Democratic Party where the brewmaster of Carlsberg (often seen in commercials with an old fashion beer wagon hauled by nicely decorated heavy horses) scored much higher in name recognition than the premier of Ontario.
Speaking of ignorant populaces, has anyone read “Harrison Bergeron”?
I’m sure thousands have .
PING:
TITLE: Americans Know Their Pop Culture
BLOG NAME: Liberal Values
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