I put this in GQ as there may be an actual answer, though if the Mods want to move it to Cafe Society, Great Debates, or even the BBQ Pit so be it.
I really like game shows. Especially ones that involve answering trivia questions. But whats the deal with contestants on shows like "Who Wants To Be A Millionaire’ and “Are you smarter than a Fifth grader”?
Do the producers intentionally try to put people on who are of below average knowledge, or is that really the make up of America? I can forgive some ignorance of current events, and I give great leniency to ignorance of some media things (like not knowing something about a movie or television show). But other than that people on these 2 shows, for the most part, really come across as truly fucking stupid. Like they lived their entire life in a box, hid behind the door while the brains were being handed out, etc., etc…
Then I see shows like Jeopardy where everyone is quite intelligent. I know Ken Jennings did fairly well on A.Y.S.T.A.F.G. but had to bow out on the last question.
Usually I only sit and scream at my TV on election night. But some of these game shows are frustrating the living shit out of me. Is the average American *really * this fucking stupid or is it just who the producers are putting on for the rest of us sheep to watch?
Yes, they really are that stupid. I had to help a woman figure out how many 4oz bags were needed to make 16ozs. I bet less than 50% of Americans know there are 100 Senators, and less than 10% could describe how the electoral college works in even a basic way.
In television, the goal is to make money. You do that by convincing advertisers to buy commercial time because people they want to reach will be watching the show. You get and keep those people by putting something entertaining on the air. A representation of average people is not the most entertaining thing you can put on your show. Extreme and unusual things are more interesting.
That’s something to keep in mind. Beyond that, stupid is a very, very vague term. It can mean people who lack common sense, aren’t up to date on current events, or a ton of other things. The U.S. educational system doesn’t stack up well compared to other developed countries according to some measurements, but then again, the West is not most of the world.
I think this is a really interesting question and look forward to finding out what the factual answer is. If I might be allowed to piggyback on the OP’s question, I’m curious about other countries as well: are there other countries, aside from possibly America, where the average citizen is stupid? Inquiring minds want to know.
my opinion based upon about less than 60 minutes of viewing over a few shows. A.Y.S.T.A.F.G. is not a meaningful test for an adult.
Those kids are learning to learn and teachers and students are finding aptitudes and interests. You just keep stuffing their heads with facts. They learn to accept and retrieve information and how to reason and problem solve. Much of those facts outside of interest or aptitude of the child aren’t remembered a few years later. Not valid to measure intelligence of an adult compared to fact spewing from kids.
based on watching a few hours of Who Wants To Be A Millionaire, i think it is more reasonable for facts that an adult should have learned and retained along the way. though the show would be trouble at some point for a person who wasn’t culture intensive about fictional books, movies and tv.
I agree and request that, for purposes of this thread, we not be so nit picky. The last few episodes of fifth grader involved cheerleaders that probably know where their vagina is but couldn’t tell you what a vagina actually is. Get it?
Yes, the average American is amazingly stupid. Bill Maher loves to do monologues about this, I’m sure you can catch them online somewhere. Jay Leno has repeatedly said that he doesn’t edit his “Jaywalking” segments or look for stupid people on purpose. He usually just takes the first bunch that comes along.
That being said, what is “smart?” I’m nearly autistic when it comes to multiple choice standardized tests, but I (without looking it up) can’t tell you how many bones are in a human body, how many teeth the average person has, or name the parts of a vagina. I failed math classes about 6 times in my life (algebra 1 3 times, algebra 2 once, trig once,) but I have taught SAT level math for several years, and I could probably get a perfect score on that section now.
What makes Americans stand out, imho, is that we don’t care about what we don’t know, and we don’t care what you think about us if we can’t answer your trivia questions.
I attend a nursing program at a community college. Our school is #2 in the state for the percentage of its graduates who successfully pass the NCLEX test their first time to get their RN (#1 being Rush University).
All I can say is I never, ever want to get sick again. If we’re the cream of the crop, I’d hate to see the curds and whey.
Is it possible to define what you “should” know without relying on inherently subjective criteria? I’m sure there is an extreme baseline of information necessary for survival (e.g., know to watch out for cars, how to hide from velociraptors, not to eat yellow snow), but most lists of what you should know are judgment-laden.
While I can answer all sorts of political framework and related questions, I don’t have more than a rudimentary knowledge of sports; put a list of teams in front of me and I doubt I’d get more than 60 percent correct just naming what sport the team plays. While I can probably tell you what era a Dead concert recording was made within a few minutes of listening, I’m beyond unaware of mainstream celebrity facts and gossip. Joan and who made what? Is American Idol still on? I have no clue.
Ask me the right questions (or wrong, as the case may be) and I’ll easily come across as stupid, unless you keep Marley’s post in mind.
But then again, why shouldn’t I prioritize the above knowledge gaps and close them? Can one say that talking about sports and celebrities isn’t a major part of being part of society? Can you say that that gap is any better or worse than not having a political and scientific awareness?
There’s a French WWTBAM clip which illustrates quite nicely that American’s don’t have a monopoly on stupidity. Leno would probably find the same sort of thing wherever he was.
I have no scientific basis whatsoever for saying this, but it’s my belief that the average American knows far less of what might be called “common knowledge” than he or she did a generation or so ago.
You can always find individual areas in which people are more or less ignorant than the person standing next to him/her. But there used to be a sort of baseline of knowledge that all but the most resolutely stupid could call forth when asked. I think that baseline has dropped precipitously in the last several decades.
There is a reason to be nitpicky. My IQ may only be 148 or so, but there are questions on Millionaire that I don’t know. And there have even been questions on Fifth Grader that I’ve forgotten the answer to. I don’t think it’s fair to call the contestants stupid.
I do know that stuff like Jaywalking will leave out the people who answer correctly. I’m pretty sure that Fifth Grader selects for less intelligent people, and Millionaire is, up until the hotseat, based on speed of recall, rather than actual knowledge, and there’s a certain amount of luck involved.
Now it is only fair to point out that in this regard the US does not lead the world.
It would be nice if the world’s super power were all individually super intelligent. But it’s probably more reassuring that you are just human like the rest of us.
Humans may be the most intelligent life form on the planet (discounting the claims of white mice and dolphins of course), so can you immagine how dumb some of the others are?
It’s not trivia that’s the problem, it’s that Americans don’t understand enough about the political system, statistics, economics, or science to even begin to make a decision on who to vote for and what policies to support.
Many issues are not black and white, but you should at least know that the US has a relatively low tax burden as compared to other countries, that it’s the only industrialized country without UHC, that it’s workers have the least vacation time of any industrialized country, how marginal tax rates work, and that the earth is not 6 fucking thousand years old. Oh, and maybe understand that airplanes don’t use their god damn wheels to move forward. It would also be nice if Americans had at least some grasp of geography. Is this really too much to ask?
It’s as though the masses are being fed stupid pill or something