# Why Americans don't follow international news **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [December 1, 2002, 2:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-americans-dont-follow-international-news/139723 "2002-12-01T02:45:46Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 10\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![occ](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/8c91f0/32.png) [@occ](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/occ)\ **Post date:** [December 4, 2002, 9:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-americans-dont-follow-international-news/139723/61 "2002-12-04T21:53:29Z")
This always struck me as somewhat silly. I’d suspect that most people follow news that either (a) takes place within a certain distance from their homes, (b) relates to their home country, and © relates to foreign policy of their particular country. Obviously, if you live in a small European nation, you’re going to pay attention to what goes on two or three hundred miles away in other European nations. Are you paying much attention to, say, Fiji? Not likely, unless Fiji fits into one of the three categories above. Perhaps you could argue that Americans are less “international” than, say, Europeans – but this is largely a matter of geographical distance. Also, I’d disagree with you, considering the large amount of international news that pops up in popular news outlets. Heck, read the main section of the New York Times; far, far more international news than national news. ---
**Author:** ![jjimm](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/ba8739/32.png) [@jjimm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jjimm)\ **Post date:** [December 11, 2002, 2:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-americans-dont-follow-international-news/139723/62 "2002-12-11T14:57:04Z")
> [@](#): > > \*\*Perhaps you could argue that Americans are less “international” than, say, Europeans – but this is largely a matter of geographical distance. Also, I’d disagree with you, considering the large amount of international news that pops up in popular news outlets. Heck, read the main section of the New York Times; far, far more international news than national news. > \*\* Sorry to resurrect a week-old thread, but this comment of **occ’s** bugged me, and this morning I finally remembered this morning to note down the headlines on the UK news. These were the headlines from SKY, the UK equivalent of CNN, in order, at 7am today:[ol][li]Cherie Blair denies financial impropriety.[_]Deteriorating situation in Venezuela.[_]Welfare office in Argentina stormed.[_]Hotel fire in S. Korea.[_]Cleaning up beaches in Spain; EU bans certain ships.[_]Trent Lott in trouble over comments.[_]UK airline strike averted.[/ol]We have two UK stories, one EU story, and 4 stories that relate to the internal dealings of foreign countries. This isn’t anything to do with geographical distance, relation to our home country, nor our foreign policy.[/li] Just thought I’d say, because I am certain that the regular CNN headlines (or any other US-based news outlet) would not have this ratio of international/national news. ---
**Author:** ![Riboflavin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/f1d935/32.png) [@Riboflavin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Riboflavin)\ **Post date:** [December 11, 2002, 10:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-americans-dont-follow-international-news/139723/63 "2002-12-11T22:53:17Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by jjimm \* > \*\*What absolute twaddle. Countries that include both the Taliban and Al Qaeda number in the one. And anybody who doesn’t get the general, hair-split-free answer to that, is ignorant. \*\* In your quote, you neglected to include the first part, to wit “With what country **would you associate** the…” - NOT as you’re claiming now, countries that include both the Taliban and Al Queda. Someone could associate both with, say, Pakistan because that’s where most of the US effort against the two was based, or with Saudi Arabia, where they got a lot of funding, or any of a number of other countries. “What country would you associate these groups with” is not the same question as “What country were both of these groups based in”. Of course, you probably don’t need me to explain that since you knew enough to conveniently snip the ‘associate’ bit so it wouldn’t contradict your new ‘include both’ bit. ---
**Author:** ![Riboflavin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/f1d935/32.png) [@Riboflavin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Riboflavin)\ **Post date:** [December 11, 2002, 10:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-americans-dont-follow-international-news/139723/64 "2002-12-11T22:59:47Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by jjimm \* > Oh, I just saw this:I admit I made an error by quoting the wrong stat. However, the mileage you seem to need to get out of this strikes me as tremendously defensive. > > I’m not saying “ooh, we’re better than you” Yeah, sure, that’s why you throw in the ‘add insult to injury’ bit and your other snide comments based off of a survey that’s not even relevant to to the topic at hand. > [@](#): > > - I’m saying that the mainstream media in the US seems to have an unusually non-International bias, and here is an example. That is all. So why didn’t you cite a source in support of that instead of something irrelevant? The survey you quoted has nothing to do with international news, and is pretty obviously made to get ‘ohh, so ignorant’ results from whoever takes it. ---
**Author:** ![jjimm](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/ba8739/32.png) [@jjimm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jjimm)\ **Post date:** [December 12, 2002, 11:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-americans-dont-follow-international-news/139723/65 "2002-12-12T11:59:24Z")
Whatever, **Ribo**. With your knee-jerk defensiveness you’re accusing me of motivations that simply aren’t true. You’re being pretty damned insulting, too. You’re not acknowledging a criticism of the mainstream US media that has been raised by _other Americans_, not just this European. And I believe you’re being obtuse about the Al Qaeda/Taliban question. Would _you_ answer anything other than Afghanistan? I certainly wouldn’t. Read some Bill Bryson. Au revoir. ---
**Author:** ![verybdog](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/v/49beb7/32.png) [@verybdog](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/verybdog)\ **Post date:** [December 13, 2002, 6:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-americans-dont-follow-international-news/139723/66 "2002-12-13T06:30:42Z")
I think the reason most people in US don’t care about news from foreign countries is that their livelihoods aren’t afffected by it or depended on it. But that will change in time when the economy of US is more and more relying on foreign goods, natural resource, and products. I bet most people in this country know one or two things about Japan (cars) and Saudi (oil) better than that of all other countries which have no direct economic relationship with US. ---
**Author:** ![CalMeacham](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/calmeacham/32/35_2.png) [@CalMeacham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CalMeacham)\ **Post date:** [December 13, 2002, 12:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-americans-dont-follow-international-news/139723/67 "2002-12-13T12:54:12Z")
> [@](#): > > Er, that’s precisely what I said. Where exactly do we disagree? We don’t – I was responding to the many folks who were saying variations of “Oh, Americans just don’t care” 1. Sorry, I missed your post 2. Even if I hadn’t, although I generally avoid posting when someone has gioven the same answer, this is more like one of those “poll” threads, and I had to chime in on this side of the issue. ---
**Author:** ![Fretful\_Porpentine](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fretful_porpentine/32/2873_2.png) [@Fretful\_Porpentine](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fretful_Porpentine)\ **Post date:** [December 13, 2002, 3:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-americans-dont-follow-international-news/139723/68 "2002-12-13T15:36:28Z")
Sorry, I thought you were responding to me because some of the language in your first post sounded a bit like mine. Thanks for the clarification. ---
**Author:** ![Cessandra](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/59ef9b/32.png) [@Cessandra](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cessandra)\ **Post date:** [January 23, 2003, 9:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-americans-dont-follow-international-news/139723/69 "2003-01-23T21:41:43Z")
I wonder if this is unusual: My mid-to-late-90s high school American history class did not cover World War I, Korea, Vietnam, or the Gulf War, and barely touched on World War II. We spent more time learning about immigration at the turn of the 20th century than about all of the events of the rest of the century combined. In my geography class, we learned where the continents are, and each learned about ONE FOREIGN COUNTRY. I learned about Denmark. This does make it fairly difficult to keep up with international goings-on. ---
**Author:** ![Cessandra](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/59ef9b/32.png) [@Cessandra](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cessandra)\ **Post date:** [January 23, 2003, 9:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-americans-dont-follow-international-news/139723/70 "2003-01-23T21:46:16Z")
Oh, and in my high school World History class, we studied the French and Russian revolutions, and nothing else. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-americans-dont-follow-international-news/139723.md?page=3)