Pundits are having a field day dogpiling on poor Caitlin Upton, Miss South Carolina Teen. Asked in competition, “One fifth of Americans can’t locate the United States on a world map; why do you think that is?” her response was rambling and literally incoherent, with non-sequitor observations about Iraq and South Africa. She has since said she froze. Genuine freezing might have been preferable; saying nothing would have been better than what she did say.
I refuse to make fun of her. Personally–and I’m completely serious here–I’m wondering if she didn’t have a sort of mini-stroke brought on by the stress of the moment. It makes sense to me. People who have had strokes sometimes find themselves unable to say the words they’re thinking; instead random words are tossed out. Circumstances such as those that she found herself in would be enough to burst a blood vessel in anyone’s head. They probably did dry runs with her about assorted world topics and her synapses just started spitting out fragments of those replies.
Second, I don’t think that a country that has tolerated seven years of a president so characterized by malaprops that entire 365-day calendars are devoted to them–a president whose town-hall meeting questions are carefully vetted before they’re spoken–gets to laugh too hard at a scared teenager who had a tough question sprung on her. Caitlin Upton has to do her own damage control; she doesn’t have a press secretary to face reporters the next day after a session of babbling incoherence and say, “Okay, what she MEANT to say was…”
And it WAS a tough question, because in thirty seconds she had to try and come up with an answer that was fundamentally upbeat and positive because, hey, that’s what beauty pagents are all about. If someone asked me that question and I had to come up with an off-the-cuff response, it would be this…
“One fifth? I’m surprised it’s that low. On the quiz show “Power of Ten” it was recently revealed that twenty-five percent of surveyed Americans believed that the inventor of the diesel engine was Vin Diesel. The fact is that obesity is not the number one health problem in this country, it’s stupidity. A lot of Americans are stupid. Bone dry stupid. Stupid as a box of rocks. They were born stupid, they were stupid in school, and they became stupid grown-ups. And there’s enough of them out there to have a considerable impact on this country, because morons are running for high office and morons are voting for them and putting them in there. Americans are oblivious to the rest of the world, and if that were not the case, then maybe our leaders might have listened when the rest of the world said, ‘Stay the hëll out of Iraq, you morons.’ Many Americans have a fundamental arrogance that stems from a basic lack of intellectual curiosity. They don’t read. They don’t learn. They don’t think. They tune out with television or computer games or Ipods and obsess about what Lindsay or Britney or whatever other troubled pop tart is up to rather than caring about things that really matter.
Our educational system needs to be overhauled beyond the test-centric mandates of No Child Left Behind. If you give a man a fish, you feed him for a day; teach him how to fish and he will feed himself for ever. Students need to be taught HOW to think, not WHAT to think. More money needs to be spent on programs for kids who are already gifted so that those gifts can be fully realized and brought to fruition. We need to remember that the arts enrich a civilization; that science and scientific thinking is not the enemy; that it is more important to care for poor people over here than blow up poor people in other countries.
The fact that one fifth of Americans can’t find the country on the map pales beside the likelihood that one fifth of Americans probably couldn’t find their own áššëš with both hands and a flashlight. And that stupidity is going to continue to be a hallmark of our country until we work together to remedy the situation from the top down.”
Not an easy thing to sound upbeat about in thirty seconds, is it.
My condolences to Ms. Upton. Now…she needs to strive to be part of the solution, rather than be dismissed as part of the problem.
PAD
• 
I blame chicken meat cloned from genetically augmented chicked parts, done to avoid killing any real chickens.
(If you didn’t see EUREKA this week, that will make no sense to you whatsoever.)
Peter: Yes, there are embarrassingly stupid aspects to our society and culture. We flog ourselves about low standards and lack of commitment to good and well-funded education, as well we should. But, alas, I don’t think we can claim a global monopoly on stupidity. There’s plenty of that to go around the world.
Now, compare some of our bright spots with those of the rest of the world. It was we who went to the Moon several times over, and continue to visit space on a regular basis. Americans created and proliferated computer technology and the Internet. It is an American that just designed a $100 computer that is opening up new horizons to the poorest villages and schools around the world. Some of the most stunning medical achievements come from within these borders.
Yes, it seems no one can top our stupidity. But the same applies to our brightest moments as well. We truly are a land of extremes….
Jasmine – Oh gods yes. I had one grade in high school math where I did poorly. It was strict rote memorization. I have a very good memory, but math is not about that, it’s about learning to use the principles as one would parts of a language. The next year we were taught the how and why of those principles and I did fine as there now was a logic to it all. To this day I still cannot understand why they didn’t teach that second year first.
During an inservice a few years ago our principal shared some things that she learned from a book by someone named Ruby Payne. (I’m not positive on the spelling of her last name – we didn’t see the book.) Ruby pointed out that there are many kinds of poverty, not just monetary. There’s also emotional poverty and spiritual poverty. The parents don’t know they’re short changing their kids because they grew up with the same kind of poverty in their lives.
Sadly, when a child shows signs of intelligent life, the impoverished parent will *knock* the child. “What, you think you’re smarter than me?” On a subconscious level the parent knows that if that child rises from the impoverished mentality, the parent will no longer have any control over the child. For some people, control over their kids is the *only* thing they have. If the child gets smart enough to attend college, they will be out of their parent’s sphere of influence.
“Perhaps you have forgotten that television shows, computer games, and the music we listen to on our iPods are in fact works of art?”
I don’t think one can “forget” something that one isn’t willing to agree with. I don’t think that most of the crap that passes for entertainment and music could reasonably be termed art or anything other than…well…crap.
In any event, I was referring to the fact that the very first thing schools cut back on when it comes to budget tightening is the arts…and that the arts are also routinely targeted for censorship by government representatives and politicians. That the arts are woefully underrepresented when it comes to government funding and support.
PAD
A friend of mine taught for 32 years and in that time he made it a point to go to his students’ homes when their parents didn’t show for conferences. He found expensive cars in the driveway, huge televisions in living rooms without furniture. Their lives revolved around how things looked on the outside.
We had students who came to school late for weeks in filthy, stinking clothes. A teacher went to do a home visit and a cloud of pot smoke rolled out when the door opened. There was no electricity and no water. The boys only ate when they were at school. The only geography they knew was related to how to get from home to school. They were operating in survival mode. (They were put into foster care after MANY teachers called CPS.)
My wife and I work in public education (high school level). More reasons public schools are struggling to satisfy our society:
1) Schools have taken the position: “failure is not an option.” Sounds good, but many kids choose to fail, and if you don’t let them they only learn that they don’t have to work to pass.
1a) Stop worrying about dropout rates. The only way everybody can graduate is if the standards are so low that nobody can fail to meet them. We’re basically guaranteeing that only the weakest students are being challenged.
2) Job training vs. academic education. These are not synonymous. Society needs to pick one and stick to it.
3) It’s extremely difficult to convince a teenager that it’s useful to know how to identify a participle, or how to factor an equation. Once a student hits the wall, where the content becomes too abstract or irrelevant, they shut down. Since much of academics is abstract, we should not be surprised when students start to fall behind.
4) We write these kids to death, but it’s pointless. Lengthy, elaborate writing is possible only after the student can conjure a lengthy, elaborate thought. Teachers are being urged to keep lectures and reading assignments short. This reinforces shorter and shorter attention spans. We need to raise the bar, and demand more attention. Otherwise we are creating people who can only think in sound bites.
5) A return to “tracking” is essential. A teacher cannot use explain a concept–in language appropriate to their learning level–to three different groups at the same time. If the teacher speaks in simple terms, the smart kids get bored. If the teacher speaks in complex terms, the weak students get left out.
6) Get rid of the riff-raff, those who show up only to make trouble. One student’s right to attend school stops at the point where that student gets in the way of everybody else’s education. I can’t state strongly enough the amount of class time wasted due to disciplining the same knucklehead day after day. He doesn’t want to be there, he refuses to get with the program, he needs to be removed so that others can have their teacher’s full attention.
Are you saying art is qualified by consensus? That if enough people, or one, or the right person disqualifies as art what you are credited with writing, it isn’t art?
I take it you don’t agree with the Scott McCloud definition, that if an activity isn’t motivated by survival or procreation, then it qualifies as art. Can you define what you refer to as art?
Sadly, when a child shows signs of intelligent life, the impoverished parent will *knock* the child. “What, you think you’re smarter than me?” On a subconscious level the parent knows that if that child rises from the impoverished mentality, the parent will no longer have any control over the child. For some people, control over their kids is the *only* thing they have. If the child gets smart enough to attend college, they will be out of their parent’s sphere of influence.
Chilling but true. Around here it’s called “Taking on airs.”
I’ve been the high school coordinator for Upward Bound for a few years now–it’s designed for kids whose parents didn’t go to college but who want their kids too. What you’d expect everyone in that position to be like–but that’s not the case.
Stop worrying about dropout rates.
The problem is, I could see some schools actually encouraging some kids to drop out, so that their overall test scores would go up.
It’s like how some schools actively discourage lower level kids from taking the SATs so that the school can brag about the high scores they’ll get when only honors level students are taking them.
Job training vs. academic education.
Good point. Not everyone has to go to college. Some can become good plumbers or bricklayers (and make more money than some of us college grads!)
Get rid of the riff-raff,
Good luck on that one. Some of them are now legally considered special ed kids–Behavioral Disordered. Pretty much untouchable unless they really screw up. (I’ll also add that some of my genuine Exceptional Ed kids are among my favorites.)
I hear private sector managers talk about how some new employees, fresh from college, still have their parents riding shephard for them. Some have called their children’s managers to complain if their kids get reprimanded or treated poorly at work.
I think the NYT even had a front-page article on that phenomenon a couple of months ago. It’s taking the idea of “helicopter parents” to the next chronological step. Awfully silly.
Of course, I say that NOW. My daughter’s only 3. 🙂 I hope I never go that route, though. (In my career, I’ve found that teaching kids of colleagues is either wonderful or nightmarish, with absolutely zero middle ground in between.)
I refuse to become dependent upon a calculator.
HÊLL yeah. I’ve seen students reach for a calculator to multiply something by 10; it makes me weep a bit. (On the inside. Usually.)
Personally, I do various mental math things to keep my brain engaged when I’m bored. When we get near a long break at school (winter break, spring break, exams, etc.), I usually have a countdown on the board — of course, the “time until break” is listed in seconds…
A return to “tracking” is essential.
On the whole, I agree with you (and certainly with your overall point), but you also have to be careful about when and how you apply it. At my first school, the science courses in grades 7-9 were untracked, and that actually was useful: in my ninth grade classes, I could really see the weaker students being buoyed up by the level of discussion when they found themselves in a generally strong class.
(Of course, this being a fairly elite independent school, the “weaker” students were probably pretty good insofar as the potential LA student pool was concerned. I’m not entirely pie-in-the-sky about this.)
And on yet another note … yes, Ruby Payne’s name is spelled correctly. Interesting stuff, too.
TWL
Art being the first thing cut back on amuses, annoys, and terrifies me. It amuses me because there is art in everything. Why learn the rules of English? So you can both communicate, an art unto itself, and appreciate the art of the written word. And usually, it’s the ones who don’t understand/can’t stand art that do the cutting. It annoys me because there’s art in everything, and having rote-repeating drones isn’t what education is about. It terrifies me because if you don’t teach art, and show that Those In Power are cutting art out, the only views the students are exposed to is that of the Administration. The reverend at my son’s school, last year, was talking to the older kids about the ills of the world, and movies came up. As regular listeners know, I work in TV, so I was half listening as I put his backpack on the hook. Then good old Rev(not the esteemed Mr. Black, just to clarify) came out that most of the problems in the country could be traced back to all the (insert negative homosexual term here) in Hollywood who work on TV and the movies. Putting aside from the fact that I despise that word, and putting aside the fact that by implication, he was calling anyone in media a homosexual, and putting aside that I really wanted to disembowel him with the dull end of a spoon, I don’t think anyone should be using that kind of phraseology and expressing those kind of ideas to second- and third-graders. Don’t even get me started on his science lecture that I caught the end of. Those is schools should realize that teaching opinion like that not only provides a narrow view of the world around, but it also risks alienating the students who might have a differing opinion.
Talon reminds me of my in-laws. Not personally, mind you, but the whole “You think you’re smarter than me” could be a mantra in their households. In fact, one Christmas, the grandfather and the great-grandfather were trying to put together a rocking horse for my nephew. Three hours they looked at those directions, with less progress than an arthritic millipede in a shoe-tying contest.(My apologies to any arthritic millipedes reading this.) I went out, had the thing together in half an hour, and did I get thanks, or praise, or anything of the sort? What do YOU think? “God dámņ college kid comes in here, reads the directions and thinks he’s so smart putting that thing together…” So, you know how education was regarded in that house.
“Some beans.”
A very small casserole, said the bird who’d just swallowed a plate. Isn’t thinking important?
“In the U.S., Britney Spears is Britney Spears.”
That’s actually not such a bad thing. I don’t think Bill Gates can sing, and I’d hate to see him in those clothes.
” of course, the “time until break” is listed in seconds…”
I used to call my future wife with the to-the-second amount of seconds left until she was impris-I mean, until we got married. And she still married me. Maybe she thought the kids’d be normal.
Our son proves that theory wrong regularly.
I think one of the easiest ways to start to solve the problems with schools is to let kids know about all of the options that they have. I didn’t do well in high school, I was one of those smart-slacker types who would score “A’s” on the test but when everyone else was doing busy work I’d chat with my friends or doodle. I wouldn’t say it was because I was bored… well, I was, but not with the material so much as how it was presented. So due to my low grades, during my sophomore year of high school I opted for the California High School Proficiency Examen (CHSPE) and left high school. The problem with CHSPE though, is that it’s not that well known unless you’re looking for it. I believe that there are 10 other states that have similar programs, but I could be wrong.
In any case, I was doing poorly in high school to start, and I only got worse as time went on. It wasn’t for lack of learning the material, rather how it was taught. I needed a way out of the system, but all anyone ever seemed to think was that I just needed to take summer school and focus to get the better grades (Although by the end of my second year it was pretty clear that it would take a miracle for my to finish high school in four years the normal way, even with summer school, or, at least it was clear to me). The way I found out about CHSPE and other alternatives was through other students who were in my same position. Although the staff and counselors were aware of the other options, none of them talked to me about any of them. In fact, after discussing my plans to take CHSPE, she was reluctant to help me out of the system (she actually said “But you’re one of the good ones,” which is flattering, but holding me inside of a system that I’m failing at is hardly helpful).
Point being, there are a lot of kids like me who just don’t do well in high school the way that the system is set up, and there are actually options for us to get out of it. However, these options aren’t talked about or presented to students. I think it would be a boon for students in a similar position to where I was to have pamphlets or flyers about these options, or maybe a counselor to discuss the pros and cons regarding them.
Or maybe I just don’t know any better because I lack a high school diploma.
:shudder: Parents like campchaos scare the crap outta me.
James Kochalka: Perhaps you have forgotten that television shows, computer games, and the music we listen to on our iPods are in fact works of art?
Luigi Novi: I think they’re arguably works of art, but as a matter of opinion. Not fact.
My question to Peter also applies to you. How do you define art that you can disqualify as art anything presented to the public?
I am seriously perplexed that the Van Halen song “Jump” appeals to anyone, but it would never occur to my to say it isn’t art just because I don’t like it. To me it’s simply art that has no apparent merit.
Isn’t it the point of asking those kinds of questions to weed out the winners from the losers in a contest? In a post game wrap up, she came on the Today Show and said “what I meant to say was…” well, why didn’t she say it in the first place?
The inablity to utter words you are thinking is called aphasia- maybe she experienced this.
or,
Some people just suck at public speaking is all.
I blame chicken meat cloned from genetically augmented chicked parts, done to avoid killing any real chickens.
No, no, no. The hormonally injected chickens (and cows, for that matter) are why we’re getting 6 foot tall 14-year-olds with C-cups.
Nothing new here. Back in the twenties and thirties they talked about “the gentleman’s C,” meaning a C was a good grade for a wellbred man since it showed you weren’t a moron but that you didn’t think too much either.
Anna Quindlen wrote an interesting essay about reading a decade or so back that covers a lot of this. She pointed out that the importance of reading is that it’s important to Get Ahead and Succeed, not that learning or reading for their own sake might be worthwhile pursuits.
As for knowledge of the rest of the world, there’s a Canadian show, “This Hour has 57 Minutes” that I understand is devoted to asking Americans questions about Canada such as “Would Canada get more respect if they removed the hockey puck from the Canadian flag” and people answering in complete seriousness.
If she was thinking “I don’t know why 1/5 of Americans can’t find the US on the map,” then saying what she was thinking wasn’t an option, and it’s no more aphasia than anyone else has experienced.
> That the arts are woefully underrepresented when it comes to government funding and support.
Too right. But whose fault is that? When one hears of people complaining about taxes one of the first lament is how the government wastes money on the arts and grants to arts groups and that sort of thing. It’s that sort of short-sighted thinking which has seen the National Gallery (and museums in general come to that) go from free admission to a paid one years back.
As for society needing to decide whether schools are there to educate, or to prepare for a job and then stick to it, I say thee “why?”. When I was in high school one had the choice of taking general courses which gave a decently rounded arts/sciences education, or take vocationally-oriented ones with an eye to the trades. One could even take one stream, and select a couple of electives from the other. Best of both worlds. Haven’t they got that option any more?
All of us are to blame.
Name the top 3 football players in the country.
Name the top 3 actors.
Name the top 3 music stars.
Now name the top 3 scientists.
Speaking of math, in my 7th grade math class, we were taking a test or quiz and the guy next to me– let’s call him T.J., because I think it was T.J.– leaned over and asked me the answers to certain problems.
So I gave him answers. Made up off the top of my head answers, that is. I figured it might teach him a lesson. Even at that age, I never quite got why one person would copy what another wrote down, or verbally ask for the answer. How do you know he or she wrote down– or would verbally give you– the correct answer?
Anyway, the teacher saw this interaction going on and questioned us about it afterward. I told him exactly what I’d done and why. And as near as I remember, he gave me tacit, retroactive approval. I know I didn’t get into any trouble at least. No doubt he compared our two papers and saw that our answers to the problems were different.
I also think (and probably thought at the time) it was the kind of thing he’d appreciate. He was a young teacher and overall, a fun one. He would issue “Get out of jail cards” that would presumably allow those of us who earned them avoid homework assignments from time to time; or provide us with similar perks. After the hostages were taken in Iran, he changed them to “get out of embassy cards.”
Such was his sense of humor.
As to T.J., I’ve no idea whether he learned not to take somebody’s word for the answer to problems on a math test. I don’t recall if he came back for 8th grade, but I know he didn’t continue on into the high school.
Rick
P.S. Scavenger, in answer to your questions:
The top 3 football players: Don’t know or care.
Top 3 actors (in terms of salary or talent?): No idea. I can name three that I think have the best talent, but that’d be my opinion.
Top 3 music stars: Same as above– by salary or talent? Current? I couldn’t honestly say; don’t know enough about them. Of all time? Benny Goodman and the Beatles would definitely be on the list.
Top 3 scientists: Stephen Hawking would definitely be on the list of current scientists. Dead scientists would include Sagan, Feynman and some former patent clerk named Al something or other.
Still, your point is well made.
Rick
Scientists aren’t entertainers working in the public eye, and they don’t hire publicists to say “LOOK AT ME!!!!!”
Not a good example you’re using, Scavenger.
I understand what you are trying to say, but it’s a bad example that you used.
Name 3 people you’ve never met or are likely to meet that don’t have publicists or work in the entertainment field.
Name 3 of the people who work at a gas station in a city you don’t live in or visit.
Name 3 firemen that have saved someone’s life that haven’t been on the news.
Maybe when corporations stop trumpeting the corporate banner rather than the human being(s)behind the study and research of new inventions and the like, that’ll help make scientists more visible.
Besides, if the church knew who these scientists were, they’d probably have them killed as heretics and such. “You’re research goes against what the bible says, you must die!”
Scavenger,
Not really the best example. I don’t follow lots of things in some areas of pop culture, but I can still name tons of people from those areas. Simply watching the news or the “news” channels on cable will get total crap stuck in your brain.
Posh & Becks, Paris, Brittney and whatever twit of the moment gets wall to wall coverage these days. I can tell you more about some rap stars then I have ever wanted to know to begin with and I own zero rap CDs and can’t stand 99.9% of the stuff. If something is everywhere, you would have to be a total idiot not to pick up on at least some of it.
Jerry, I don’t know about being a total idiot, but maybe just not very observant.
As for the scientist thing–I’d throw Gates, Jobs, and Dodson into the mix. Part of the problem, though, is generally the research is done on behalf of or for corporations, thus the corporations are the ones people hear about, not the individual scientists.
As for knowledge of the rest of the world, there’s a Canadian show, “This Hour has 57 Minutes” that I understand is devoted to asking Americans questions about Canada such as “Would Canada get more respect if they removed the hockey puck from the Canadian flag” and people answering in complete seriousness.
Um, actually it’s “This Hour has 22 Minutes”.
While “Talking to Americans” is one of the skits that appears from time to time, it’s not the focus of the show. In fact, that skit was halted for a while after 9-11, as it was felt to be in poor taste. Most of the show’s time is spent making fun of Canadian stereotypes…
” I don’t think one can “forget” something that one isn’t willing to agree with. I don’t think that most of the crap that passes for entertainment and music could reasonably be termed art or anything other than…well…crap.
Are you saying art is qualified by consensus? That if enough people, or one, or the right person disqualifies as art what you are credited with writing, it isn’t art?”
No. And no. But thanks for suggesting something that didn’t remotely relate to what I said.
PAD
“I don’t think that most of the crap that passes for entertainment and music could reasonably be termed art or anything other than…well…crap.”
I’ve given up on trying to classify what is and isn’t art. If the creator considers it to be art, then I’m willing to call it art. It may be bad art, so “art” and “crap” aren’t mutually exclusive. Not that it matters, usually the people who make most of our entertainment aren’t even trying to call it art, they just want to make something that’s entertaining on some level.
I certainly agree that more education would improve the situation. If that happened, then even the people who just want to make crappy entertainment would probably accidentally make it less crappy because that knowledge of art was rattling around in their heads.
I;m not sure how or if this applies, but it’s true. A friend of mine is a professional scientist, dealing primarily with cloud particle density and how that demonstrates global warming and pollution. He has been published and earns a living as a scientist.
And he is abominable at addition and subtraction. When we play games, I always have to check when something is added or subtracted — and I usually wind up correcting him. So it’s possible to be very intelligent in the advanced elements of a field and fairly lacking in the basics of that field. (I’m told by some editor friends that there are plenty of great authors who can’t spell if their lives depended on it.)
You said “I don’t think that most of the crap that passes for entertainment and music could reasonably be termed art…” but withheld a definition of art. Thank you for making my suggestion — which gives you a point of reference from which to provide a definition of art if you feel like it — relevant regardless of its remoteness from what you are thinking.
James, I’m really hoping the opposite situation isn’t the fact, being people who can spell suck as authors. Really.
I felt so bad for that girl. It reminded me of the Great Books class I took in college. The final was one of those nightmare finals you see in movies but never expect to see in real life: an oral final, where you’re grilled by three teachers in front of the class. I’d read the material, been there all semester, and everything. I knew everyone else’s questions, but when it came around to me I completely blanked and stumbled through it. I frankly don’t know how I passed.
As for the education system, I agree completely. The very existence of standardized testing boggles my mind.
“You said “I don’t think that most of the crap that passes for entertainment and music could reasonably be termed art…” but withheld a definition of art. Thank you for making my suggestion — which gives you a point of reference from which to provide a definition of art if you feel like it — relevant regardless of its remoteness from what you are thinking.”
Didn’t do that either. However, if it’s any consolation, it could be easily said–based upon your track record on this board–that you’ve transformed obtuseness into an art form. So you can take some pride in that, I suppose.
Done with you now.
PAD
You have to feel badly for the kid based on the fact that in today’s Youtube world a public screwup can become international sport. But in the unlikely event that I ever got the chance to speak to Miss South Carolina I’d tell her that she could actually use this to her advantage. Nobody is going to remember the winner of this contest but they’ll remember her. That they may remember her as a ditz is a disadvantage only if she IS a ditz–I’ve heard that she is actually a good student and my experience has been that the young ladies in these pageants tend to be far from the stereotype of the dumb model. Use the perception to her advantage. If I were here I’d give a speech on, say education–and boy, would there be press around to lap THAT up–I’d start out by showing the tape of my humiliation, make a self depreciating joke about it, and then wow them with a decent, well thought out speech. Take a few questions from the crowd–if I didn’t drool they’d think I was a genius.
She could kill on the public speaking circuit. As Sarah Silverman says, “When life gives you AIDS, make lemonaids.”
When you refer to a definition of art, and withhold its definition, any plausible guess to that definition is removed from the realm of arbitrariness, and becomes reasonable. And therefore relevant. Unless you feel like attributing to me what you’ve said, or the withheld definition of art you refer to, you don’t seem to haven’t disqualified anything I’ve said.
I never refuse to rephrase for clarity if someone brings something obtuse I’ve said to my attention. If my saying something obtuse bothers you, you have the option of bringing it to my attention. Until you cite something I’ve said you are unable to parse, whatever obtuseness of mine you refer to simply isn’t my problem.
Enjoy your holiday.
I’d feel bad for the girl, except that she is an absolutely shining example of how messed up the U.S, and to a smaller degree Canadian, educational system is.
The fact of the matter is, most American students can’t locate their own country accurately. I’ve met some who can’t even put it on the correct continent.
It also seems to shine a light on how messed up western “culture” is. When we look to beauty queens and celebutantes as bright examples of achievement we get what we deserve.
Posted by Rick Keating:
Sadly, the first or second day of philosophy class my freshman year in college (at a private university, not a public school), the teacher said he was taking us next door to the library, to teach us how to use the library. I excused myself, telling him I’d learned how to use the library in 6th grade.
I’d cut the teacher a little slack here. I don’t know how well funded the library you learned to use was, but the teacher probably thought the university library was something new for his students. Even a star high school quarterback still benefits from being coached to play college ball. (What? You don’t like sports metaphors?)
Steve Campbell,
If the teacher had brought us over to the library for a quick overview of how book are cataloged in university libraries (which is not the Dewey Decimal System), then I might have agreed with you. However, he wanted to go over basic library skills with us. Again, I learned these skills in 6th grade, and I’d hope the rest of the class had also learned them long before starting college.
That a teacher of a college philosophy class felt the need to review basic library skills with his freshman students should give everyone pause. After all, it’s not like research papers and reports start in college.
And for those who believe all research can and should be done over the Internet, this took place long before “google” was a verb, and maybe even a word.
Again, if the teacher had focused on the differences between the Dewey Decimal System and the system university libraries use (the name of which escapes me at the moment), and assumed we knew the basics, then I might concur with your sports metaphor. As it stands– for me at least– the metaphor was more analogous to explaining to the star high school quarterback what a football was.
I suppose the teacher could have let the class he believed needed help with the library figure it out on their own, so the fact that he took the time to teach them what he thought they needed to know is a plus for him. Still, I find it… unfortunate that he felt a need to spend an entire class hour on the subject.
Rick
My school requires a passing, MLA formatted research paper each year of high school to graduate, and I’ve had a number of former students come back and tell me that they were among the very few, sometimes the only ones, that had any clue how to do research.
We’ve been fighting for several years to KEEP this requirement. The trend is to have seniors do a “senior project” which is often not even academically oriented (help out at a senior center, build a park a gazebo, etc.), and while I’m not saying that these aren’t worthy projects, it’s ridiculous to believe that these prepare them for college.
I’m sorry, guys. I can’t accept any of the above, including Mr. David’s remarks. She was a freaking bimbo. You can look at all the Miss America speeches given over the last forty years and they aren’t any better.
She is supposed to look good in a gown and a bikini. She isn’t supposed to represent anything else. Quit judging her like she was a human being upon whose life your own life depends.
Thomas E. Reed: “She is supposed to look good in a gown and a bikini. She isn’t supposed to represent anything else.”
Just because she looks good “in a gown and bikini” doesn’t mean she isn’t capable of anything else. And just because she so obviously froze while speaking publicly doesn’t mean she’s a bimbo. A lot of very intelligent people are poor public speakers.
Regardless of how she is represented in a pageant, Caitlin Upton is a human being, and to quote a poet whose name escapes me (and I don’t have time to look him up at the moment), human beings “contain multitudes.”
As an aside, were I Caitlin, I’d’ve simply stuck with the first part of the answer she gave: if people don’t know geography, perhaps they don’t have enough maps. Obviously, these people should get maps and learn to use them.
How does that criticism not apply to any artist?
“I contradict myself? So I contradict myself. I am vast, I contain multitudes.”
Walt Whitman, “Song of Myself.”
PAD
I thought that was Whitman. I actually read that poem in high school (as opposed to being assigned to read it and blowing it off, as some of my fellow students did). Unfortunately, I was in a hurry to get to work when I posted. Otherwise I’d’ve looked it up.
I should’ve known you’d know, however, Peter. 🙂
This is going to be lengthy.
The problems with why there are so many dumb kids out there are:
#1 Too much TV.
There are more tv’s then people in a house. People watch more than 4 1/2 hours a day of tv.
Look at these stats.
Percentage of households that possess at least one television: 99
Number of TV sets in the average U.S. household: 2.24
Percentage of U.S. homes with three or more TV sets: 66
Number of hours per day that TV is on in an average U.S. home: 6 hours, 47 minutes
Percentage of Americans that regularly watch television while eating dinner: 66
Number of hours of TV watched annually by Americans: 250 billion
Value of that time assuming an average wage of S5/hour: S1.25 trillion
Percentage of Americans who pay for cable TV: 56
Number of videos rented daily in the U.S.: 6 million
Number of public library items checked out daily: 3 million
Percentage of Americans who say they watch too much TV: 49
Number of minutes per week that parents spend in meaningful
conversation with their children: 3.5
Number of minutes per week that the average child watches television: 1,680
Percentage of day care centers that use TV during a typical day: 70
Percentage of parents who would like to limit their children’s TV watching: 73
Percentage of 4-6 year-olds who, when asked to choose between watching TV
and spending time with their fathers, preferred television: 54
Hours per year the average American youth spends in school: 900 hours
Hours per year the average American youth watches television: 1500
Number of murders seen on TV by the time an average child finishes elementary school: 8,000
Number of violent acts seen on TV by age 18: 200,000
Percentage of Americans who believe TV violence helps precipitate real life mayhem: 79
Number of 30-second TV commercials seen in a year by an average child: 20,000
Number of TV commercials seen by the average person by age 65: 2 million
Percentage of survey participants (1993) who said that TV commercials
aimed at children make them too materialistic: 92
Rank of food products/fast-food restaurants among TV advertisements to kids: 1
Total spending by 100 leading TV advertisers in 1993: $15 billion
Percentage of local TV news broadcast time devoted to advertising: 30
Percentage devoted to stories about crime, disaster and war: 53.8
Percentage devoted to public service announcements: 0.7
Percentage of Americans who can name The Three Stooges: 59
Percentage who can name at least three justices of the U.S. Supreme Court: 17
http://www.usatoday.com/life/television/news/2006-09-21-homes-tv_x.htm
http://www.csun.edu/science/health/docs/tv&health.html
http://www.showbuzz.cbsnews.com/stories/2006/09/21/tv/main2032136.shtml
http://publications.mediapost.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=Articles.showArticle&art_aid=35192
#2 Video games
Playing video games may mean spending less time reading or doing homework, according to new research on video games and children.
http://www.kff.org/entmedia/entmedia102803nr.cfm
http://www.webmd.com/parenting/news/20070702/playing-video-games-may-zap-homework
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2007/07/070702161141.htm
http://www.kidsource.com/kidsource/content2/video.games.html
http://www.cwrl.utexas.edu/~tonya/VideoGames/3.html
#3 They don’t read very well, or at all, because of the above. Half of all children are below average, and teachers can do only so much for them.
http://www.readingrockets.org/article/104
http://www.opinionjournal.com/extra/?id=110009531
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/10/19/AR2005101900708.html
#4 I know that most of you think that everything that happens in life is Bush’s fault, but maybe, just maybe, parents need to look at themselves in the mirror and take some responsibility.
My wife and I both work, but we sit with my daughter and help her with homework and make sure she reads at least a half hour a day. Hëll at bedtime i read comics to her (she’s into transformers). We also limit the amount of time she watches tv, even on weekends.
Parents have to be held accountable and quit making excuses or placing blame. Abortion is legal in this country. If you can’t take care of a kid then why have one? If you choose to have a child, then take care of it. I know some people work 2 or more jobs, i know some are single parents but if you kept the child then you will have to sacrifice for 18 years and make sure that the kid receives the adequate attention required. Liberals parade that children are choices that they make. Well, you make a choice to bring a kid to this world, then make sure that as parents your “choices” have the tools needed to be productive and intelligent citizens when they turn to adults. Some parents have more then one kid when they know they can’t afford it, thus putting them into more of a bind. A month ago I was at the state fair and there was a woman at a pro abortion booth signing some petition. What struck me as funny is that she had 5 children and I asked her if they were all hers. She replied yes. I couldn’t help but snicker at that. Her children were wild bunch, I kid you not. It’s the same parents that want the government to take care of their children. If you feel that you are responsible enough to make the child, you should be responsible to care for the child. I do not see why my tax dollars have to support your children. Birth control is available for FREE in all states. This may sound cold and harsh. But…it’s not the child’s fault. The child did not ask to be brought into this world. Their slacker parents did.
Be responsible.
http://www.ed.gov/parents/academic/help/citizen/citizen.pdf
None of us is born acting responsibly. A responsible character is formed over time. It is made up of our outlook and daily habits associated with feelings, thoughts, and actions. Responsible people act the way they should whether or not anyone is watching. They do so because they understand that it’s right and because they have the courage and self-control to act decently, even when tempted to do otherwise. As part of being responsible, children need to respect and show concern for the well-being of other people. Respect ranges from using basic manners to having compassion for the suffering of others. Compassion is developed by trying to see things from the point of view of others, and learning that their feelings resemble our own. Respect for others also includes the habit of treating people fairly as individuals, regardless of race, sex, or ethnic group. As we mature, respect includes realizing that not all our obligations to others, such as caring for a family member who is sick, are chosen freely. And it includes tolerance for people who do not share our beliefs or likes or dislikes, as long as they do not harm others. These habits are especially important because many of the wrongs people commit result from indifference to the suffering they cause.
Courage is taking a position and doing what is right, even at the risk of some loss. It means being neither reckless nor cowardly, but faring up to our duties. It includes physical courage, intellectual courage to make decisions on the basis of evidence, and moral courage to stand up for our principles. Courage does not mean never being afraid. It can involve trying to overcome our fears, such as a fear of the dark.
Self-control is the ability to resist inappropriate behavior in order to act responsibly. It relates to all of the different aspects of responsibility mentioned so far, including respect and compassion for others, honesty, and courage. It involves persistence and sticking to long-term commitments. It also includes dealing effectively with emotions, such as anger, and developing patience.
People with self-respect take satisfaction in appropriate behavior and hard-won accomplishments. They don’t need to put others down or have a lot of money in order to respect themselves. People who respect themselves also view selfishness, loss of self-control, recklessness, cowardice, and dishonesty as wrong and unworthy of them. As they mature, if they have learned the lessons of responsibility, they will develop a good conscience to guide them.
We are always teaching our children something by our words and actions. They learn from seeing. They learn from hearing. They learn from overhearing. They learn from us, from each other, from other adults, and by themselves.
All of us acquire habits by doing things over and over again.
http://www.parentstv.org/PTC/publications/release/2007/0905.asp
A new Parents Television Council study of Family Hour programming conclusively shows that children watching television during the first hour of prime time are assaulted by violence, profanity or sexual content once every 3.5 minutes of non-commercial airtime. During the 2006-2007 study period, almost 90% of the 208 television shows reviewed contained objectionable content.
It is the parent’s responsibility to raise their children – no one else’s. While schools are funded to teach children how to read, write and do arithmetic, I don’t believe it to be the school’s responsibility to raise these children. Parent’s need to stop relying on the government to raise our children. Parents must become more involved with their children’s lives. The schools should provide an environment in which children can learn and enjoy the learning process.
I know some of you have made some points about parent responsibility but those that are just saying “no child left behind is a joke” or “it sucks” should realize that if parents did their jobs of educating their children at home and making sure they’re reading and writing instead of playing video games and watching tv, then we wouldn’t need any government program for education.
Joe V.
Wow. He tied Bush into this too? Let it go, PAD, otherwise see a psychologist to deal with your Bush obsession.
So let us sink another drink
Because it will give me time to think
If I had the chance
I would ask the multitudes to dance
–Billy Idol, Song of Dancing with Myself
I think when it comes to any national discussion of being unable to express coherent thought, Bush’s name just readily comes to the fore.
PAD
I do not want the multitudes
When I think about you I touch myself
–The Divinyls, I Touch the Song of Myself