Yet another study that demonstrates the rank ignorance of the average American when it comes to important matters:
Only one in four Americans can name more than one of the five freedoms guaranteed by the First Amendment (freedom of speech, religion, press, assembly and petition for redress of grievances.) But more than half can name at least two members of the cartoon family, according to a survey.
The study by the new McCormick Tribune Freedom Museum found that 22 percent of Americans could name all five Simpson family members, compared with just one in 1,000 people who could name all five First Amendment freedoms...
The survey found more people could name the three "American Idol" judges than identify three First Amendment rights. They were also more likely to remember popular advertising slogans.
It also showed that people misidentified First Amendment rights. About one in five people thought the right to own a pet was protected, and 38 percent said they believed the right against self-incrimination contained in the Fifth Amendment was a First Amendment right, the survey found.
That's just depressing. And people think we need to encourage more people to vote? My buddy Jeff and I had a discussion about this a couple weeks ago, about whether there should be a test required before you can vote in this country. And while I understand that historically such tests were used to deny blacks the right to vote, that isn't the case now. And frankly, ignorance is ignorance regardless of skin color.
I also understand the argument that such a test could become politicized. But how about at least requiring that a prospective voter should be able to pass the basic citizenship test given to immigrants who want to become US citizens? We require a test before you can cut hair in this country, for crying out loud, you should at least know a few basic facts about our system before being allowed to participate in it as a voter.
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I was kind of surprised that only half could name more than two Simpsons. ;)
I would be curious to know how many members of Congress could answer correctly.
I am currently reading Amar's "America's Constitution" and he continually talks about how the national government will be made up of the more enlightened men from around the country. I keep wondering why he would think this. I am even more discouraged now.
BillySixString wrote:
I am currently reading the same book. I think you ask an excellent question. I've suggested in the past that when it comes to matters of education policy, a legislator should not be allowed to tamper with the standards if they can't pass the AP test in that subject themselves. The bottom line is that it takes knowledge to make good decisions. Of course, some halfwits will call that "elitism", but it still remains true.
I took a civics course in which we studied the entire Constitution. Do high schools have civics courses any more? If so, what are they teaching?
" My buddy Jeff and I had a discussion about this a couple weeks ago, about whether there should be a test required before you can vote in this country."
There you go sounding elitist again ;)
I could have easily told anyone four if not all five of the First Amendment rights, but I actually don't know the names of any of the American Idol judges. Does this mean I have to turn in my American citizenship now?
Does this mean that I can't own a pet?
While I think requiring a test is incredibly dangerous, I do think that people who are not interested in politics and have no idea about the issues should voluntarily stay home on election day, for their own good and that of the rest of the country.
By the way, I don't see this as a bad sign. It tells me that the first amendment rights are taken for granted. That's a good thing. It means we must be doing a good job protecting them.
At my public high school where I just graduated last year, there was no civics course. We had... either two or three years required for history. I'm not sure. In my senior year, I did take a Political Science elective for half of the year. We studied the Constitution, but that was the boring part. It was an election year, and everyone looked forward to going completely offtopic and yelling at eachother.
So, no, civics is no longer required in our public schools.
Matthew said: By the way, I don't see this as a bad sign. It tells me that the first amendment rights are taken for granted. That's a good thing. It means we must be doing a good job protecting them.
It is a very bad sign, if people don't know what rights they have how do they know if we are or aren't doing a good job of protecting them or not?
The trouble with tests is that they don't discriminate equally among idiots. Some demographics have the resources to cram the night before the test and they can pass before they forget everything, but other demographics aren't so lucky.
Also different people are stupid about different things, and the test-maker can subtly bias the results by slanting the questions towards issues that he thinks are important. (A test might ask about the 1st Amendment but not the 2nd, or vice versa.)
So I think we should let stupid people vote. In an ideal world, they'd all vote for random stupid reasons and they'd cancel each other out.
The problem in the US is that one party is better at presenting random stupid reasons than all the other parties. So they're getting a disproportionate share of the idiot vote. But I think the solution is for the other parties to start catering to idiots, too. (Obviously they'd continue to talk intelligently about the issues; they just need to make stupid arguments in addition to that.)
Ed is being elitist for pointing this out....
Surveys like this don't depress me. There is no such thing as an unbiased survey. The results say more about how the survey was written and conducted than they do about the people interviewed or their knowledge.
dansroka wrote:
That doesn't seem to make much sense in this case. If you ask someone to name the 5 freedoms guaranteed by the first amendment, they either know them or they don't. There is no bias in that.
How about a test to qualify for having children?
I think it's all overridden by that popular item in the Bill of Rights, the right to be stupid (I think that's amendment 0).
I guess to have a real smart society, don't teach evolution, don't teach algebra, just teach Simpsonology and sports statistics and test on those subjects. Scores will rise. And be sure to welcome immigrants to take care of real business.
I'm less concerned with ignorant voters than with an ignorant president. Shouldn't a presidential candidate, at minimum, be required to exhaustively understand the Constitution and all of its imperatives? And if he or she should ever, even slightly, deviate from the protective oath, I think impeachment should axiomatic and swift -- there should not be the slightest wriggle room for tampering with the enshrined civil protections of the Amendments.
About elitism: things have gotten turned wrong side up; ignorance and crassness should be driven out into clear view and humiliated mercilessly; elistists should be proud of their higher sensibilites and the masses should be ashamed of themselves for their intellectual and cultural barbarism.
Ed said "If you ask someone to name the 5 freedoms guaranteed by the first amendment, they either know them or they don't." (sorry, I don't know how to quote)
Sure. My point is just that the story did not describe the methodology of the survey, so I read their conclusions with a grain of salt. The way the questions are written and the way they get asked could easily skew the results. For example, if a survey asked a series of questions about pop culture (like "name the 5 members of the Simpsons family"), then asked "name the 5 freedoms guaranteed by the first amendment", there'd be a higher likelihood of people getting the first ammendment question wrong, since they were "primed" for pop culture references. Unless the methodolgy is explained, the results are interesting, but non-conclusive.