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Ignorance May Be What Takes Us Out [1]

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Date: 2023-04-24  

Lazy Brain Syndrome?

IGNORANCE MAY BE WHAT TAKES US OUT

Only 45% of adult Americans can name a Supreme Court judge.

Only 37% know who their representative is in Congress.

Only 57% can name the Vice President of the US.

In Presidential elections only about 50% of eligible voters actually vote even though they registered to do so. (2020 was the exception with 61%)

Given these sobering statistics regarding people’s willingness to actively participate in maintaining our democratic republic and lack of basic knowledge about how it works, I believe an observer can imagine the difficulties in its prolonged effectiveness. If you have ever watched some of the late night talk shows, Jimmy Kimmel for example, and their interviews on the street testing people’s knowledge about their government, it can be both humorous and concerning to behold.

We tend to believe most people are like us to a certain extent. I write about politics and current events on a national blog so I probably pay closer attention than the average person to these subjects but it is concerning to me when I get in a conversation with someone at the dog park for example, and they start spilling their opinions on political going’s on and it’s obvious they are just parroting something they heard from their chosen news source. Rarely is it fact based or even slightly informed by real circumstances. Consider that over 60% of Republican voters still think that 2020 election was rigged. I am not sure how we get people out of their ignorance.

This is not a new phenomenon fueled by social media as some like to argue. It’s been going on much longer than this. I mean look back in our lifetime, the Viet Nam and Iraq wars. Those couldn’t have happened without an uninformed, less than thoughtful public willing to remain in the dark. When George Bush was re-elected in 2004 it was a sobering reminder of how susceptible people are to their own ignorance of the actual reality of their circumstances. Both magicians and people who run political campaigns have something in common, they are adept at distracting their audience.

This is a problem that needs to be resolved ahead of any resolution of the current issues that face America such as gun violence, social injustice, public corruption, climate change and all the many other social ills that plague humans. Without some consensus as to the origins of these and possible solutions that require cooperation among the various tribes toward a common version of reality; where existential threats to our common wellbeing are at risk and possibly our survival, some will certainly die in the dark of the ignorance of the many.



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[1] Url: https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2023/4/24/2165704/-Ignorance-May-Be-What-Takes-Us-Out

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