Petteri Sulonen
Forum Pro
First, let's keep it in perspective. One reason American invincible ignorants are so visible is because they speak English. The French ones, for example, are rarely noticed on the English-speaking Net simply because they haven't bothered learning English.Yes -- that's what frightens me. :-(Why do I keep getting the feeling that there seems to be more
people afflicted by this phenomenon (per capita) in the US than in
any other Western nation......???
Second, it is true that there are certain traditions in American culture which make invincible ignorance more socially acceptable than in many other cultures. For example, anti-intellectualism. (It's quite striking to Europeans that many Americans considered the fact that, say, Al Gore or John Kerry were clearly and obviously intelligent as points against them rather than in their favor.)
There's a strong negative connotation associated with being a "brainiac." I believe this is connected to the American variant of Christian Fundamentalism: one of its epistemological tenets is that the truth, by nature, is easily accessible to everyone through "common sense," and therefore anything that conflicts with "common sense" must be false. Bob uses this type of argument quite often.
Conversely, if you look at American heroes, you'll find that they quite often embody this anti-intellectualism: the rags-to-riches self-made millionaire, the gutter-to-the-top athlete, the Sergeant York type simple-guy-from-the-farm-to-war-hero. American popular imagination ranks the athlete higher than the scientist, the fiery lay preacher higher than the theologian, the courageous fighter higher than the cool-thinking strategist. Even the best-loved American novelist is loved not so much for his books but because he was a red-blooded shït-kicking Amurrican who just happened to write some damn good books. (Papa Hemingway, of course.)
And, of course, there is the fact of growing illiteracy and the large number of people who are poorly educated, and must feel inferior about it. It's quite a natural human response to compensate by telling yourself (and others) that education isn't everything it's cracked up to be, and subsequently looking down on those limp-wristed unpatriotic geeks who like smelly cheeses, use words like "nuanced," and may even speak a furrin language. And, of course, politics and the market being what they are, it pays to cater to this mindset.
Petteri
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Me on photography: [ http://www.prime-junta.tk ]
Me on politics: [ http://p-on-p.blogspot.com/ ]
