# The Dumbing of America **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [January 10, 2000, 9:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-dumbing-of-america/17404 "2000-01-10T21:34:00Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![Boris\_B](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/fbc32d/32.png) [@Boris\_B](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Boris_B)\ **Post date:** [January 26, 2000, 6:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-dumbing-of-america/17404/61 "2000-01-26T06:05:00Z")
I like the part of Ellison’s interview where he wonders if young readers will think > [@](#): > > “Jeezus, what a smartass mean > fucker.” I don’t have anything against him, but he does seem very generationally-focussed. ---
**Author:** ![AHunter3](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ahunter3/32/368_2.png) [@AHunter3](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AHunter3)\ **Post date:** [January 26, 2000, 8:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-dumbing-of-america/17404/62 "2000-01-26T20:50:00Z")
> [@](#): > > Yeah, the whole “for Dummies” series has always struck me as a bit odd. I remember being > struck favorably by a book title: Juggling for the Complete Klutz. Now it’s gotten a little out of > hand. I always blamed the trend on a (surprisingly excellent) auto book called _Volkwagen Repair for the Compleat Idiot_ or something very close to that, which sold well during the early 70s IIRC. * * * Designated Optional Signature at Bottom of Post ---
**Author:** ![NicePete](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/ee7513/32.png) [@NicePete](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/NicePete)\ **Post date:** [January 27, 2000, 10:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-dumbing-of-america/17404/63 "2000-01-27T22:12:00Z")
Why does anyone think that pompous ass Alex Trebek is intelligent? Why? Because he can read an answer off a card??? He doesn’t write the questions or answer the questions. Thinking Alex is intelligent because he hosts _Jeopardy_ is kinda like thinking Bob Eubanks just got hitched because he hosts _The Newlywed Show_. Personally, I don’t watch _Jeopardy_ anymore because Alex annoys the hell outta me. I find it infuriating when a man whose intellectual credentials (to the best of my knowledge) are that he used to host _Card Sharks_ uses that sniping TONE of his to put down an honest, intelligent contest. OK, I’m done now. * * * Plunging like stones from a slingshot on Mars. ---
**Author:** ![ThereWolf](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/4da419/32.png) [@ThereWolf](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ThereWolf)\ **Post date:** [January 28, 2000, 1:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-dumbing-of-america/17404/64 "2000-01-28T01:16:00Z")
There’s an Op-Ed by William Safire in today’s New York Times titled “Besotted by Potter” that discusses the fact that adults ostensibly were purchasing the Harry Potter books to read to their children, but are now buying it to read for themselves. He quotes Philip Hensher of the Independent newspaper that this is another sign of the (and I love this phrase) “infantilization of adult culture.” Can’t say I disagree with that. By the way, my money’s also on Ben Stein. This is from the bio on his official web site: > [@](#): > > Ben Stein (Benjamin J. Stein) was born November 25, 1944 in Washington, D.C., (He is the son of the economist and writer Herbert Stein) grew up in Silver Spring, Maryland, and attended Montgomery Blair High School. He graduated from Columbia University in 1966 with honors in economics. He graduated from Yale Law School in 1970 as valedictorian of his class by election of his classmates. He helped to found the Journal of Law and Social Policy while at Yale. He has worked as a poverty lawyer in New Haven and Washington, D.C., a trial lawyer in the field of trade regulation at the Federal Trade Commission in Washington, D.C., a university adjunct at American University in Washington, D.C., at the University of California at Santa Cruz, and at Pepperdine University in Malibu, CA. At American U. He taught about the political and social content of mass culture. He taught the same subject at UCSC, as well as about political and civil rights under the Constitution. At Pepperdine, he has taught about libel law and about securities law and ethical issues since 1986. > > ``` > In 1973 and 1974, he was a speech writer and lawyer for Richard Nixon at The White House and then for Gerald Ford. (He did NOT write the line, "I am not a crook.") He has been a columnist and editorial writer for The Wall Street Journal, a syndicated columnist for The Los Angeles Herald Examiner (R.I.P.) and King Features Syndicate, and a frequent contributor to Barron, where his articles about the ethics of management buyouts and issues of fraud in the Milken Drexel junk bond scheme drew major national attention. He has been a regular columnist for Los Angeles Magazine, New York Magazine, E! Online, and most of all, has written a lengthy diary for ten years for The American Spectator. He also writes frequently for The Washington Post, The Wall Street Journal, op. ed. and almost every other imaginable magazine. > > He has written and published sixteen books, seven novels, largely about life in Los Angeles, and nine nonfiction books, about finance and about ethical and social issue in finance, and also about the political and social content of mass culture. > > ``` ---
**Author:** ![Rainbowcsr](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/57b2e6/32.png) [@Rainbowcsr](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rainbowcsr)\ **Post date:** [January 28, 2000, 4:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-dumbing-of-america/17404/65 "2000-01-28T16:15:00Z")
I came to the understanding years ago that the producers of movies and television, no matter WHAT they say, do not actually give a hoot about what they produce for us to watch. I mean _ **look** _ at some of the current and not so current television shows. Ren and Stimpy (NOT for kids and we can thank the creators for the whole new slew of cartoons made of bad art which incorporate as much gratuitous drooling in great detail as possible and gross happenings.) Married With Children. DUH! 90210 – I mean, come ON now! Infomercials (MY pet peeve.) Urkel — sheesh! Bay Watch – I mean get a LITTLE realism in there! Riki Lake – Could she present Black people in a WORSE light? WWF – We’ve known for years that it is rigged and now they start dressing up like comic book characters and follow scripts and clog up the television. Who Wants to be a Millionaire? Divorce Court – could they have possibly found a Black judge to sound MORE like a steriotyped _NIGGER_(no racial slur intended)? Ripley’s Believe it or Not. – They tend to stay with the gross, the extreme and such when I have read Ripley’s books and been to his museum and observed the many fascinating, NOT GROSS things he collected all over the world. The Guinness Book of World Records – same as Ripley’s. The MAN show. (Glorified bad taste.) Dumb and Dumber – That sucked really, really badly. Plus about a dozen kid shows where the kid is portrayed as a smartassed, mouthy, parent disobeying, conniving little hero, usually White, usually looking bratty. (Brothers comes to mind – or is it called The Three of Us?) * * * What? Me worry?’ ---
**Author:** ![Bricker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/977dab/32.png) [@Bricker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bricker)\ **Post date:** [January 28, 2000, 4:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-dumbing-of-america/17404/66 "2000-01-28T16:34:00Z")
Rainbowcsr, I am not sure it’s possible to use the word nigger in a way that does not imply a racial slur. While I don’t quail at writing it in this context, and I don’t want Mark Twain banned from libraries because he used it… the fact is, it’s a word that is a racial slur. I wish you had picked another one. - Rick ---
**Author:** ![CatInHat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/9d8465/32.png) [@CatInHat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CatInHat)\ **Post date:** [January 28, 2000, 5:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-dumbing-of-america/17404/67 "2000-01-28T17:12:00Z")
_Scientific American_ has [this](http://www.sciam.com/1999/1099issue/1099gibbs.html) to say about the subject. > [@](#): > > There’s an Op-Ed by William Safire in today’s New York Times titled “Besotted by Potter” that discusses the fact that adults ostensibly were purchasing the Harry Potter books to read to their children, but are now buying it to read for themselves. He quotes Philip Hensher of the Independent newspaper that this is another sign of the (and I love this phrase) “infantilization of adult culture.” > Can’t say I disagree with that. ThereWolf, have you actually **read** these books? If not, maybe you should refrain from these kinds of remarks. I don’t disagree with you about the “infantilization of adult culture,” but I don’t think that Harry Potter’s popularity among adults is a symptom of it. * * * Never attribute to malice anything that can be attributed to stupidity. – Unknown ---
**Author:** ![John\_Bredin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/96bed5/32.png) [@John\_Bredin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Bredin)\ **Post date:** [January 29, 2000, 6:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-dumbing-of-america/17404/68 "2000-01-29T06:15:00Z")
Ripley’s Believe it or Not and the Guiness Book of World Records as symptoms of the dumbing of America? Umm, can you say P.T. Barnum? Before he got into the circus business, he operated the so-called “American Museum” in New York City, which was predominantly if not totally a display of freakish objects, the encased remains of deformed persons and animals, and other “exotic” oddities. It wasn’t exactly the Smithsonian Institution, to say the least. Barnum’s museum was one of the biggest tourist attractions in New York City for decades! In the Nineteenth Century, mind you. So a desire in the public, or a significant segment thereof, to see disgusting oddities isn’t a product of “morally-decaying” modern society, not by a long shot. ---
**Author:** ![Chrissy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/858c86/32.png) [@Chrissy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chrissy)\ **Post date:** [January 28, 2000, 9:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-dumbing-of-america/17404/69 "2000-01-28T21:32:00Z")
You know what though? Nevermind… You’re exactly right. America must be the most modernized country with all the best technology and yet we still seem to be the dumbest people around. If I knew I could be a millionare by knowing famous actors tallest to smallest… hell I would have dropped out of school a long time ago. LOL. America come to think about it…is a joke * * * Thoughts by Chrissy “What you think is what you think…but what I think is how it is.” -me’00 ---
**Author:** ![ThereWolf](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/4da419/32.png) [@ThereWolf](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ThereWolf)\ **Post date:** [January 28, 2000, 10:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-dumbing-of-america/17404/70 "2000-01-28T22:34:00Z")
CatInHat (interesting that I’d get into a debate on books for children with someone with a name such as yours), I read about 50 pages of one of the books (Chamber of Secrets) when I purchased it as a holiday gift for a 12-year-old cousin. It’s imaginative and, for that age level (in fact, if you look at [Amazon.com](http://Amazon.com), you’ll see they state that the reading level for this book is Ages 9-12), it would be a good read. Much the same way John D. Fitzgerald’s “Great Brain” books were when I was that age. I’m also encouraged by the fact that it has shown that kids can be as enthralled by reading a (300+ page) book as they can by, say, the latest Pokemon. However, it is a product geared toward preteens and young teenagers. I’m not going to turn this into a “what is literature?” debate, but the age of the protaganist and many of the other supporting characters, the sophistication of the prose, and the “Good vs. Evil” plotline all point toward rudimentary reading and reasoning skills. As the Safire article says, this is no Huckleberry Finn, with its social commentary and adult themes. It’s not even Toy Story, where at least there are inside jokes geared toward adults that will go over the heads of the younger viewers. It’s a simple fantasy story written at a child’s level to stir a child’s imagination. ---
**Author:** ![RobRoy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/7ba0ec/32.png) [@RobRoy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RobRoy)\ **Post date:** [January 30, 2000, 1:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-dumbing-of-america/17404/71 "2000-01-30T01:21:00Z")
> [@](#): > > Originally posted by CatInHat: > \*\*_Scientific American_ has [this](http://www.sciam.com/1999/1099issue/1099gibbs.html) to say about the subject. > > ThereWolf, have you actually **read** these books? If not, maybe you should refrain from these kinds of remarks. I don’t disagree with you about the “infantilization of adult culture,” but I don’t think that Harry Potter’s popularity among adults is a symptom of it. > \*\* Agreed. (not to say it isn’t happening, but reading Harry Potter et al has little to do with it - I would posit the worse trend of psuedo-gerondizing - to coin a term - where yuppies think that cigars, big cars, suits and other “adult things” make them responsible adults). To the list of “chilren’s” literature, add: Lewis Carrol Mark Twain Robert Louis Stevenson CS Lewis JRR Tolkein (the Hobbit was for children - the books that followed were for adults) etc. ---
**Author:** ![RobRoy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/7ba0ec/32.png) [@RobRoy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RobRoy)\ **Post date:** [January 30, 2000, 1:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-dumbing-of-america/17404/72 "2000-01-30T01:24:00Z")
On thread - I think that most Americans don’t engage in as informed a political discourse as Europeans. This is purely anecdotal, as I’m sure Euro-loosers don’t make it here as much as educated professionals. However people from Europe that I have met and know tell me that they usually don’t have very interesting conversations about politics etc. with Americans compared to Europeans. ---
**Author:** ![Sam\_Stone](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ecccb3/32.png) [@Sam\_Stone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sam_Stone)\ **Post date:** [January 30, 2000, 6:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-dumbing-of-america/17404/73 "2000-01-30T06:06:00Z")
You guys have to lighten up on ‘Who Wants to be a Millionaire’. If you want to have a game show that gives away a million dollars at least once in a while, and you’re going to have 15 questions, then they’d better be pretty easy. If you have a 90% chance of getting any given question, your chance of winning the million would be about 20%. If you’re only 50/50 on each question, then they’d only give away the million once every 33,000 contestants. Since you’re drawing the questions from a wide base of subjects, to give the person maybe an 80% chance of knowing the answer the question’s going to have to be fairly easy, no matter who the contestant is. This is the reason for the lifelines, and for the the first five questions being pretty easy. Without that, they’d either never give away the million, or the questions would have to be so easy that we’d get really tired of seeing them. Unless you think that the contestants are drawn from some pool of specially-stupid peoplle, I’d say they got it about right. One of the reasons the show is addictive is because it’s an achievement to get into the big money, and doesn’t happen every time. And the million might only be given away once every 10-20 episodes or so. And I don’t know about you guys, but there’s usually a question or two that trips me up, and I’m very good at trivia. For example, I didn’t know that stupid “Duck Duck Goose” question. Never heard of the game before. ---
**Author:** ![system](https://global.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/original/2X/e/e489c3b7d8fce19c4b355dd4fc3f88cc39c34b87.png) [@system](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/system)\ **Post date:** [January 30, 2000, 6:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-dumbing-of-america/17404/74 "2000-01-30T06:46:00Z")
Bricker: I don’t agree that a person is dumb because he doesn’t know some of the answers on “Millionaire” or because he hasn’t read as many books as you. There are plenty of individuals who add a great deal to the U.S. who have had little or no post-high school education. Maturity plays a large role in dumb vs smart. Plenty of my own colleagues are book smart but outside their field of endeavor they would fit into your category of dummies. Besides when someone like yourself holds themselves to be superior to the dummies, it reminds me of the old saying: " If you are so smart, how come you’re not rich? ---
**Author:** ![Bricker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/977dab/32.png) [@Bricker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bricker)\ **Post date:** [January 30, 2000, 4:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-dumbing-of-america/17404/75 "2000-01-30T16:29:00Z")
> [@](#): > > Originally posted by skelton4947: > **Besides when someone like yourself holds themselves to be superior to the dummies, it reminds me of the old saying: " If you are so smart, how come you’re not rich?** Well, since I must admit I do hold myself out to be superior to dummies, I guess I should respond. There are two unstated assumptions in that question: that the dummies _are_ rich, and that I am not. I would contend that, in general, the dummies are _not_ rich. As to myself – I guess it depends on what you mean by “rich”? - Rick ---
**Author:** ![system](https://global.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/original/2X/e/e489c3b7d8fce19c4b355dd4fc3f88cc39c34b87.png) [@system](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/system)\ **Post date:** [January 30, 2000, 5:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-dumbing-of-america/17404/76 "2000-01-30T17:19:00Z")
## Rick: I hate to answer a question with a question but one is called for here. Other than people who have trouble answering the “Millionaire” questions, what do you mean exactly by dummies? Please give me your definition. Perhaps we may even agree. Fearlessly we fought the frenzied foe ---
**Author:** ![Bricker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/977dab/32.png) [@Bricker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bricker)\ **Post date:** [January 31, 2000, 5:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-dumbing-of-america/17404/77 "2000-01-31T05:47:00Z")
> [@](#): > > Originally posted by skelton4947: > \*\* > > Rick: I hate to answer a question with a question but one is called for here. Other than people who have trouble answering the “Millionaire” questions, what do you mean exactly by dummies? Please give me your definition. Perhaps we may even agree. > \*\* As I alluded to in the OP, the ‘dummies’ that irritate me are the ones that seek to make a virtue of their lack of knowledge. Someone who can’t program a VCR doesn’t bother me, someone who doesn’t care that they can’t program a VCR doesn’t bother me, but someone who is _proud_ of the fact that they can’t program a VCR irritates me beyond belief. I wanted to discuss the apparent trend in this country that ignorance is a quality to be praised, rather than corrected. Even with respect to the Millionaire questions – it’s not the people on the show who miss the questions that I am holding myself out as superior over. It’s the producers who have decided to ask easy questions in the belief that people don’t wish to hear questions to which they don’t know the answers. In short: for the purposes of this thread, dummies are those that embrace and cherish their ignorance, as opposed to those that seek to reduce their ignorance. And I aver superiority to them. - Rick ---
**Author:** ![CatInHat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/9d8465/32.png) [@CatInHat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CatInHat)\ **Post date:** [January 31, 2000, 9:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-dumbing-of-america/17404/78 "2000-01-31T21:06:00Z")
> [@](#): > > Originally posted by Bricker: > Someone who can’t program a VCR doesn’t bother me, someone who doesn’t care that they can’t program a VCR doesn’t bother me, but someone who is _proud_ of the fact that they can’t program a VCR irritates me beyond belief. I wanted to discuss the apparent trend in this country that **ignorance is a quality to be praised, rather than corrected.** (emphasis mine) Rick, I think you have it. * * * Never attribute to malice anything that can be attributed to stupidity. – Unknown ---
**Author:** ![Bricker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/977dab/32.png) [@Bricker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bricker)\ **Post date:** [January 31, 2000, 11:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-dumbing-of-america/17404/79 "2000-01-31T23:59:00Z")
> [@](#): > > Originally posted by CatInHat: > Rick, I think you have it. Um… could you be a bit more specific? Do I have the correct view, or the ignorance? 🙂 - Rick ---
**Author:** ![system](https://global.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/original/2X/e/e489c3b7d8fce19c4b355dd4fc3f88cc39c34b87.png) [@system](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/system)\ **Post date:** [February 1, 2000, 1:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-dumbing-of-america/17404/80 "2000-02-01T01:36:00Z")
Bricker: Just read your response. Once again, there are many aspects to _smart_ vis a vis _dumb_. In my day my parents and those of my friends encouraged us to learn to play an instrument. (in my case piano). In recent years, I’m convinced that that trend has decreased markedly. In my profession (ob-gyn), to find the time to read the variety of books that so many of you read, is most difficult. I hate opera and would flunk on Jeapardy if that was my topic and would do poorly on literature. I don’t feel that that would put me in the category of Dummy. IMHO, the parent is the initial and prime source for encouraging a WELL ROUNDED education. The teachers and the individual’s peers play an important part. The Media is probably the most destructive element encouraging the dummies to stay that way. Teachers get horrible pay. The not-necessarily-bright professional athlete gets a tremendous amount of money. But as one of my colleagues said to me: Who would pay to watch you do surgery vis a vis a pro football or basketball player? I don’t know anyone, however, who is PROUD that they don’t know something. * * * Fearlessly we fought the frenzied foe [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-dumbing-of-america/17404.md?page=3) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-dumbing-of-america/17404.md?page=5)