Wednesday, May 3, 2006

Lost

As if we needed more proof, here comes yet another test demonstrating that Americas young 'uns have, on average, the IQ of dirt. Ladies and gentlemen of the jury, I present the following evidence:

* "...nearly two-thirds of Americans aged 18 to 24 still cannot find Iraq on a map..."

* "...less than six months after Hurricane Katrina devastated New Orleans and the Gulf Coast, 33 percent could not point out Louisiana on a U.S. map..."

* "...88 percent of those questioned could not find Afghanistan on a map of Asia..."

* "...63 percent could not find Iraq or Saudi Arabia on a map, and 75 percent could not point out Iran or Israel. Forty-four percent couldn't find any one of those four countries..." (emphasis added)

* "...Inside the United States, "half or fewer of young men and women 18-24 can identify the states of New York or Ohio on a map..."

* "...Forty-five percent said China's population is only twice that of the United States..."

I rest my case.

3 comments:

VamPus said...

Well, try to ask the same to people from Europe and you'll probably have the same findings.

Europeans tend to think they're smarter because they can name more than 10 countries in Europe. Ask them to name more than ten states in the US... People in general are idiots. And they have the vote. This is why we drink. Well, I'll drink for both of us..

Before the Flood said...

"People in general are idiots"

Indeed they are....about 90 per cent of the population are outright idiots.

However, a practical solution to this would be a tax on stupidity. This would gain almost unanimous support. The socialists/socialdemocrats (whatever the difference may be)would embrace it, as they would with any taxation. It would gain endorsement by the right wing because it would give people an incentive to cut their taxes by doing something for themselves - namely lift the shroud of ignorance. Everybody gains it seems. Although the socialdemocrats may argue that the money is needed to fill up swimming pools and that staying stupid protects the welfare society.

Agile said...

I fully second the two commentators above.

Have you ever chanced upon the late night chat shows on Norwegian TV? They run competitions all the time, in which viewers are invited to participate via sms, at a price of NOK 10,- per message. The questions they pose are usually so easy you seldom use more than 1 second to come up with it off the top of your head. Yet most of the time it takes ages for someone to get it right, and in the meantime, literally hundreds of citizens with NOK 10,- to spare, have paid to display their personal stupidity across all regions of our wide-stretched country...

80-90% of people are idiots, it's true. I've been proclaiming that very fact to various people for years, much to some bystanders' dismay, and rarely to my own full advantage.

Ahh, the pangs of being a martyr for truth...