Is this why everyone thinks America is stupid?

[Mammon]

*Edit: I did laugh a lot about this

Edited August 26, 2007 by Mammon

[DragonMaci]

I personally believe that US American...

Wtf? That "US" is a bit redundant in this case! The silly woman!

... so many people that don't have maps...

They also can't read then! America is clearly labeled in big text!

... should help South Africa and Asian nations...

Of course she just had to put that bit of altruisim in there.

...so we can build up our future.

Helping other nations will not help build up the future of America you moron!

[Moebius]

Thanks for the play by play.

[Capitalism Forever]

Oh, she did give the answer--only she didn't give it verbally, but by demonstration. Her answer is that many Americans can't find America on a map because they've been educated in public schools that fail to teach them the basics of how to read and write--or even to speak--and instead see it as their mission to indoctrinate them in altruism.

[softwareNerd]

... fail to teach them the basics of how to read and write--or even to speak--...

Or even think. In that clip, she's trying to think, trying to think, ... there's just nothing there.

OTOH: She's surely below the average public-school educated kid.

Edited August 26, 2007 by softwareNerd

[Inspector]

OTOH: She's surely below the average public-school educated kid.

Don't be so sure about that...

[softwareNerd]

Don't be so sure about that...

Well, the high-schoolers I know aren't that bad -- if one considers the circumstance of being put on the spot.

My wife's theory is that this girl is probably in the bottom 20% that couldn't locate the US on a map, because she comes across as a teenager making a lame excuse for herself.

[DavidOdden]

Oh, she did give the answer--only she didn't give it verbally, but by demonstration. Her answer is that many Americans can't find America on a map because they've been educated in public schools that fail to teach them the basics of how to read and write--or even to speak--and instead see it as their mission to indoctrinate them in altruism.

Brave argument, I wonder if it will be validated. Remember that in the US, many children especially those of "active" parents go to private schools. You're gambling that her moronic answer is due to her going to a public school and not a private school. So we can wait and see if your gamble paid off.

[Thales]

I'll defender her. That's a stupid question. It's ridiculous to confront someone with a question like that cold on stage. She was rambling because she had no answer, it was unreasonable to expect her to have an answer and that was her way of getting through it. I just don't believe this is the way she is 24/7. She also may have had some stage fright. Let's face it, being in such a situation can make your mind freeze up, so I give her the benefit of the doubt on this one.

Edited August 26, 2007 by Thales

[DarkWaters]

I'll defender her. That's a stupid question. It's ridiculous to confront someone with a question like that cold on stage. She was rambling because she had no answer, it was unreasonable to expect her to have an answer and that was her way of getting through it. I just don't believe this is the way she is 24/7. She also may have had some stage fright. Let's face it, being in such a situation can make your mind freeze up, so I give her the benefit of the doubt on this one.

I think we should also note that pageant contestants are generally expected to give vacuous, altruistic answers.

[Antonio]

Well, the high-schoolers I know aren't that bad -- if one considers the circumstance of being put on the spot.

My wife's theory is that this girl is probably in the bottom 20% that couldn't locate the US on a map, because she comes across as a teenager making a lame excuse for herself.

Her theory is probably in the right direction. Remember, this is a pageant. Some of these people who get into the pageant circuit are obsessed. Their lives are fully enmeshed with the contests and preparing for them. As contestants go to higher levels, they go beyond standard local beauty pageants to including supposedly thoughtful questions like this in order to satisfy feminists and advocates of so-called political correctness.

So my guess is that she was more prepared for the local and regional circuits and not ready for this kind of question, which is admittedly complex because it requires the contestant to come up with a philosophical or policy answer. For instance, a correct answer could have addressed how the public school system (and private too actually) has strayed from basic education to subjects like altruism, environmentalism, etc. and how it has failed to teach kids the importance of paying attention to a serious media. Plus, she could have gone into how the media, including the press, plays to the lowest common denominator, creating a vicious cycle that's dumbing down the nation.

That, however, would have been asking a lot of her.

Beyond the contestants, pageant moms can be downright crazy. Entertainment industry parents, sport parents and others who are obsessed with their children's niche skills or interests can be irrational too.

This reminds me of a talented local athlete whose entire life is controlled by her parents. Granted, she is a world champion runner, but her entire teenage life is controlled, down to her sleeping hours, how much she eats and what times she eats - everything - in order to time her Cycadian rhythms and her blood sugar makeup and other factors they believe make her a better runner. Though she is excellent and quite a sight seeing how fast she is, and her dedication is admirable, I wonder if the individual is whittled away when they are controlled by handlers.

[DragonMaci]

Oh, she did give the answer--only she didn't give it verbally, but by demonstration. Her answer is that many Americans can't find America on a map because they've been educated in public schools that fail to teach them the basics of how to read and write--or even to speak--and instead see it as their mission to indoctrinate them in altruism.

It is a shame she did not know she gave the answer.

[Capitalism Forever]

Brave argument, I wonder if it will be validated. Remember that in the US, many children especially those of "active" parents go to private schools. You're gambling that her moronic answer is due to her going to a public school and not a private school. So we can wait and see if your gamble paid off.

It isn't a very big gamble, is it? She wouldn't display such a poor level of education if she had gone to a good school--and the reason parents choose to send their children to private schools is usually that the private schools are much better than government-run ones. I mean, they certainly aren't cheaper, are they?

Of course, some people will just remain stupid no matter how good an education they get. Schools can teach you how to think if you choose to, but they cannot teach you how to choose to think. But this girl certainly doesn't look like a moron-by-choice. As softwareNerd has observed, she is making a visible effort to think--and I think her thought process actually produces what might well be the best answer in her context of knowledge. I can imagine her thinking like this: "Why can't people find the U.S. on a map? Well, since I am one of those people, why can't I find the U.S. on a map? Because we don't even have a map at home, for one thing. So I'll mention that. And we didn't look much at maps in school either because the teachers kept yapping about the poor people in Africa..."

[Capitalism Forever]

For instance, a correct answer could have addressed how the public school system (and private too actually) has strayed from basic education to subjects like altruism, environmentalism, etc. and how it has failed to teach kids the importance of paying attention to a serious media. Plus, she could have gone into how the media, including the press, plays to the lowest common denominator, creating a vicious cycle that's dumbing down the nation.

That, however, would have been asking a lot of her.

LOL, explaining all that in a coherent fashion, on the spot without any preparation, would have been asking a lot of me ! It's much easier to give a good, all-encompassing answer to a question in writing than extemporaneously in front of a live audience.

And I agree with Thales, it's a very stupid question to ask in that context. The purpose of such questions is meant to be to find out a little about the contestants' personality, but this question seems much more like an invitation for her to say something altruistic and anti-American. I am actually glad she didn't do very well at that.

[DavidOdden]

It isn't a very big gamble, is it? She wouldn't display such a poor level of education if she had gone to a good school--and the reason parents choose to send their children to private schools is usually that the private schools are much better than government-run ones.

It is a gamble, because the reason parents choose to send their children to private schools is that they think the private school will be better. For example, it may do a better job of instilling Christian values (most private schools are religious). Parents also move to new houses so that they can send their kids to a better public school district. But that's not the point -- the point is that whether or not a child went to public school is a fact that has to be researched, and not deduced from the nature of a stupid question. Here is my argument that she had to have gone to a private school. Her answer was totally incoherent, rambling and clueless. She had never been prepared properly by her teachers to answer such questions with grace, as is expected of beauty queens, so she had to suppress the urge to say "What the hell kind of dumb unanswerable question is that?", and instead she had to ad lib a poor quality save the world type answer that a kid who had gone to public school would have gotten down pat.

So, as I say, deductive inferences are not gonna help us learn whether she actually went to a private school or a public school.

[Inspector]

Well, the high-schoolers I know aren't that bad -- if one considers the circumstance of being put on the spot.

I had dismissed that idea because she has already advanced to the national level in pageants. You'd think she'd be used to it by now.

The high schoolers I've talked to - both now and back in high school - don't have an answer to a question like that. Even many of the bright ones. They simply haven't been taught anything even close to the knowledge required. Have you been following what TOS has been saying about education? I've found it to be very spot on. They have a bunch of random facts, but no real knowledge. Their education is all sound and fury, signifying nothing.

My wife's theory is that this girl is probably in the bottom 20% that couldn't locate the US on a map, because she comes across as a teenager making a lame excuse for herself.

She certainly did come across that way, but I don't think it necessarily means she's in the bottom 20%; I think the next 60% still wouldn't have an answer, either.

Oh, and to the original poster: People in Europe, statistically speaking, are just as ignorant. It's just that they keep their ignorant classes under the rug more like good little peons.

[~Sophia~]

Oh, and to the original poster: People in Europe, statistically speaking, are just as ignorant.

Having gone through a public system in Poland (up to 10th grade), public system in USA (11&12 grade) and then public University in Canada - I grade USA public system the lowest. This was shocking for me to discover considering the status of America in the world - not what I expected to see. From my experience, an average European after high school has a lot greater basic general knowledge.

When it comes to geography specifically - I find that people in Europe generally tend to have a different attitude toward the rest of the world than young Americans. I would call it looking out instead of looking in. Kids in Europe are very interested in learning about other countries and other languages (it is not unusual to master more than two aside from your native one). The close proximity of many nations make such knowledge very practical. Kids travel a lot more too.

In contrast, the attitude which I encountered while attending high school in US was - Who cares? I live in the best country in the world. I am not interested in learning about THEM. (Most people did not know which continent Poland was on and actually thought that Canadians still travel by dog sleds).

Edited August 26, 2007 by ~Sophia~

[aequalsa]

...and actually thought that Canadians still travel by dog sleds).

Wait...Don't you?

[Thales]

Having gone through a public system in Poland (up to 10th grade), public system in USA (11&12 grade) and then public University in Canada - I grade USA public system the lowest.

You really can't compare university to public school. The universities in America are of a much higher caliber than is the public school system in terms of what is demanded academically. However, there is no doubt that the public school system in America is abysmal. It's mind destroying and geared toward group think. It's probably the biggest engine of destruction of America and all it stands for, thanks to modern "intellectuals." I have no idea how they get away with such an abysmal product, but parents let them get away with it. At one time, 50+ years ago, it is said to have been good, but around 1960 things started going bad and have, more-or-less, progressively gotten worse.

[Mammon]

It isn't a very big gamble, is it? She wouldn't display such a poor level of education if she had gone to a good school--and the reason parents choose to send their children to private schools is usually that the private schools are much better than government-run ones. I mean, they certainly aren't cheaper, are they?

Of course, some people will just remain stupid no matter how good an education they get. Schools can teach you how to think if you choose to, but they cannot teach you how to choose to think. But this girl certainly doesn't look like a moron-by-choice. As softwareNerd has observed, she is making a visible effort to think--and I think her thought process actually produces what might well be the best answer in her context of knowledge. I can imagine her thinking like this: "Why can't people find the U.S. on a map? Well, since I am one of those people, why can't I find the U.S. on a map? Because we don't even have a map at home, for one thing. So I'll mention that. And we didn't look much at maps in school either because the teachers kept yapping about the poor people in Africa..."

Yeah but, if the private schools taught that earth is 6000 years old and Dinosaurs were killed in Noah's flood and that Katrina was the fault of the fact that we don't stone gays in this country... then does it matter if it's private or public?

Actually, I think she does look like a moron-by-choice. This is a beauty pagent for teenagers, and this girl comes from the South. They only thing she probaly cares about it looking good. Which explains her answer, she was probaly told and trained to say something about the Third World and the Iraq War to make herself look like she cares about much broader things then, "what color lipstick looks the most trendy?" But the question was one that dealt with the entire reason she acts the way she does. A fifth of the country can locate their own country on the map because a fifth of the country are morons who choose not to become more educated. What does she say? Because they don't have ****ing maps. That's like saying 1/5 of the country can not drive because they don't have cars, not because they don't know how and have the skill.

This isn't to say that all beautiful women from the south are this dumb. A lot of them do, however, take after this model -- If I look good, nothing else will matter.

Edited August 27, 2007 by Capitalism Forever
No profanity please

[Thales]

Actually, I think she does look like a moron-by-choice.

Keep in mind we're only looking at a small snippet of a person's life. I don't know about you, but I've done some embarrassingly dumb things in my life. Pressure situations can bring out behaviors that are not always the best, and it's quite likely she felt under a great deal of pressure.

The bottom line is I think you're deducing way beyond the evidence.

[Capitalism Forever]

Actually, I think she does look like a moron-by-choice. [...] This isn't to say that all beautiful women from the south are this dumb. A lot of them do, however, take after this model -- If I look good, nothing else will matter.

Out of curiosity, do you think that she BOTH looks like a moron by choice AND looks good?

[Mammon]

Out of curiosity, do you think that she BOTH looks like a moron by choice AND looks good?

Well you can't tell who is moron by their physical appearance, although in some cases they throw out some warning signs. But the second she opened her mouth it was obvious. She IS pretty though, I'll give her that. If thats what you mean? She looks good in the flesh, is easy on the eyes. Do avoid the confusion brought up by using the same word, I'd say, judging from the clip she appears to be a moron.

Thales said I deduced wrong. But this is all the information avaible to me. So, until further evidence is shown, I'll conclude she is a moron or at the least had a very very stupid "brain-fart" moment completely televized.

[K-Mac]

Bottom line is this...you know you're going to be asked straight forward questions in the interview portion of a pageant and if she won Miss. South Carolina, she should have plenty of experience in the interview portion of pageants. (You don't just win a state pageant in the Southern US without working your way up.) She answered the way she did because she is either (1) a complete idiot like the 1/5 of Americans who can't find the US on a map or (2) she got a sudden moment of stage fright, drew a total blank about what she was supposed to be doing and couldn't remember the question she was answering. I was in a few pageants and musicals when I was a preteen and early teenager and I can tell you that the latter happens to the best and brightest of us; however, I can also tell you from experience, that many of the girls/women in these pageants are complete idiots. My mom and I had fun with it, but many moms and daughters were completely stupid or psycho about it.

[gags]

She answered the way she did because she is either.... or (2) she got a sudden moment of stage fright, drew a total blank about what she was supposed to be doing and couldn't remember the question she was answering.

I think this is likely what happened. At the end she tries to save herself and throws out the stock pageant answer which includes some crap about making the future better. In any event, she has a nice smile.