Anti Intellectualism is Killing America

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Originally posted by RahlMaclaren:

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Originally posted by G:

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Originally posted by Magonsdaughter:
An interesting read. Applies also to Australia and the UK, but perhaps not yet quite as bad. And I got to say, one of the reasons I rarely post on this board is because the majority of people who now post here fit this category as described "motivated by fear, susceptible to tribalism and simplistic explanations, incapable of emotional maturity, and prone to violent solutions. Sound familiar?" Sure does.

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I'd be interested in who you are referring to. I could guess but my guess would be 1 or 2 people (certainly not a majority) who haven't posted here in a long time.

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Pretty sure this statement was about the posters whom would throw the term "libtard" in as many threads as they could.

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Absolutly, I thought my eyes were playing tricks on me I see it so often. We have more than a couple here who see everything in extremes. Sig and kiki aren't the only ones who's posts I generally don't respond to. There is one who shall remain nameless I have yet to respond to at all.

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Originally posted by THGRRI:

Wow, what happened to the post I quote from you above about the results of positive programs being so dismal in theses neighborhoods?

And Sig the one who Magonsdaugther suggests makes the best argument about anti-intellectualism taking place in America, shows how sometimes the intellectual is clueless. This is why some say the issues cited in the article are complicated, and can't be explained away by saying they are due to anti-intellectualism.

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Yeah, well sig addressed the question while you've been busy patronising Black communities in America.

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Originally posted by JO753:

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Originally posted by Magonsdaughter:
....the majority of people who now post here fit this category as described "motivated by fear, susceptible to tribalism and simplistic explanations, incapable of emotional maturity, and prone to violent solutions.

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It's a lack uv stratejy that keeps the science/skeptic/athiest 'movement' from moving. All they really want to do iz skoff at relijun and woo.

Getting to kidz befor the idea that tradition and authority are more important than lojik formz the foundation uv their thot prosess iz essentail.

The way our early education system works now iz the exact oppozit and viola!, the so called 'civilization' we hav bilt iz chock full uv all sorts uv wakt out nonsens.

If you want to complain about anti-intellectualizm, MD, look at how youv responded to my effort to do sumthing about it. Look how all the suppozed thinkerz here and elswer online hav responded.

/b]

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Sorry I didn't understand that your language stuff was in response to anti-intellectualism.

One thing I see different in the US to Australia, I think, is the power of religion. Religion doesn't tend to drive policy here as it appears to do so in the US, with powerful lobby groups being from the Christian Right although we get the seepage of your cultural norms, but for different reasons.

Societies which have religion impacting on policy basically go backwards in terms of ideas and intellect. Faith shuts down critical thinking and demands dogma. It's very dangerous to allow faith to impact on how a society governs. If you look at some of the darkest periods of human history, they involve rigid dogmas, often religious ones and we can see that now with the growth and spread of fundamentalist ISlam.

Australia is a secular society, much more so than the US, but our distrust and dislike of intellectualism stems from being hedonistic, sun loving, sports crazy, lazy thinking bums more than anything else.

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Originally posted by Magonsdaughter:

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Originally posted by THGRRI:

Wow, what happened to the post I quote from you above about the results of positive programs being so dismal in theses neighborhoods?

And Sig the one who Magonsdaugther suggests makes the best argument about anti-intellectualism taking place in America, shows how sometimes the intellectual is clueless. This is why some say the issues cited in the article are complicated, and can't be explained away by saying they are due to anti-intellectualism.

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Yeah, well sig addressed the question while you've been busy patronising Black communities in America.

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No, she just agreed with you. She then starting spewing a bunch of nonsense. Put simply, the article is crap and I said why and moved on. What concerns me is that after all this time you still don't recognize that Sig never misses a chance to bash America, which says volumes about your judgment.

Go back and reread her opening posts. She rants anti war crap about the 60's and then about central governments not wanting intellectual citizens. In other words our government is behind it. She is nuts and if you can't see it in what she writes I am sorry for you.


SIG

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There are all kinds of reasons why Americans are particularly ignorant: Most of us are far away from any other nation, protected from foreign ideas by two large oceans on either side and a USA-clone up north. We have a history of disdain for learning anything from history, since our "pioneer" meme is to build everything from scratch. And most of us are English-only, inoculating us against any threat of contamination.

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This isn't America, I don't know who she is describing but it surly isn't America, the most diverse nation on the planet.


SIG

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PROMOTERS OF ANTI-INTELLECTUALISM
But NO nation with a strong central government wants intellectuals, because they ask awkward questions. And just as certainly, no CORPORATION wants to foster intellectualism either, since intellectuals are less easily influenced into going into debt to buy shit they don't need, and (again) they ask awkward questions.

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This is all anti government and anti corporate and has nothing to do with anti-intellectualism. It's anti Americanism based on completely fabricated facts that come from the mess she calls a mind. Wow Magonsdaugther, wake up. Here is a good one for you.

SIG

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Using that meme, they can cause you to assuage your unhappiness/fear/uncertainty by buying their crossover vehicle (which makes you a confident explorer, because that's how its shown on TV), or their light beer (which makes you part of the fun crowd, because that's how its shown on TV) etc. Politicians do the same thing, of course, by manipulating fear.

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Yep, a nut off on a rant.

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Originally posted by THGRRI:

No, she just agreed with you. She then starting spewing a bunch of nonsense. Put simply, the article is crap and I said why and moved on. What concerns me is that after all this time you still don't recognize that Sig never misses a chance to bash America, which says volumes about your judgment.

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Dont mind a bit of America bashing when it's due. Then credit when its due, like marriage equality.

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Go back and reread her opening posts. She rants anti war crap about the 60's and then about central governments not wanting intellectual citizens. In other words our government is behind it. She is nuts and if you can't see it in what she writes I am sorry for you.

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Sig and I have agreed and disagreed over the years on a number of issues. On this issue, I agreed with what she said. She has strong views, but she isn't nuts. That's just you not able to tolerate disagreement.

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SIG

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There are all kinds of reasons why Americans are particularly ignorant: Most of us are far away from any other nation, protected from foreign ideas by two large oceans on either side and a USA-clone up north. We have a history of disdain for learning anything from history, since our "pioneer" meme is to build everything from scratch. And most of us are English-only, inoculating us against any threat of contamination.

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This isn't America, I don't know who she is describing but it surly isn't America, the most diverse nation on the planet.

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I don't think she was talking about your diversity, but your inward focus. Something I have observed when talking with Americans on the Internet. I think its because America is so large, so powerful that the rest of the world kind of recedes as places of little importance. Theres an odd parochialism that occurs. Of course meeting Americans outside of America is another story, naturally.

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SIG

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PROMOTERS OF ANTI-INTELLECTUALISM
But NO nation with a strong central government wants intellectuals, because they ask awkward questions. And just as certainly, no CORPORATION wants to foster intellectualism either, since intellectuals are less easily influenced into going into debt to buy shit they don't need, and (again) they ask awkward questions.

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This is all anti government and anti corporate and has nothing to do with anti-intellectualism. It's anti Americanism based on completely fabricated facts that come from the mess she calls a mind. Wow Magonsdaugther, wake up. Here is a good one for you.

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On this issue I agree. I think governments have a vested interest in keeping populations compliant and unquestioning. So do corporations for that matter.

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SIG

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Using that meme, they can cause you to assuage your unhappiness/fear/uncertainty by buying their crossover vehicle (which makes you a confident explorer, because that's how its shown on TV), or their light beer (which makes you part of the fun crowd, because that's how its shown on TV) etc. Politicians do the same thing, of course, by manipulating fear.

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Again, if you know anything about advertising, you'd know that in marketing degrees you are taught to exploit, and even create fear. It's a great tool. Think how much of consumerism is based on fear. None of this is new, it's just that you appear to have never heard this before.

There was a great TV series on here, 'The Gruen Transfer' where a bunch of advertising execs got together to desconstuct advertising and marketing campaigns and they very, very forthrightly talked about these issues.

http://www.abc.net.au/tv/gruentransfer/theshow.htm

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Originally posted by Magonsdaughter:

Again, if you know anything about advertising, you'd know that in marketing degrees you are taught to exploit, and even create fear. It's a great tool. Think how much of consumerism is based on fear. None of this is new, it's just that you appear to have never heard this before.

There was a great TV series on here, 'The Gruen Transfer' where a bunch of advertising execs got together to desconstuct advertising and marketing campaigns and they very, very forthrightly talked about these issues.

http://www.abc.net.au/tv/gruentransfer/theshow.htm

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Those videos are not available to me outside Australia, but there is another series about fear, advertisement and war - The Power of Nightmares.
www.metacritic.com/movie/the-power-of-nightmares-the-rise-of-the-polit
ics-of-fear

It is in three parts. The first is here
www.dailymotion.com/video/x20su5f_the-power-of-nightmares-1-the-rise-o
f-the-politics-of-fear-bbc-2004_news

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at www.mediafire.com/folder/1uwh75oa407q8/Firefly

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This isn't America, I don't know who she is describing but it surly isn't America, the most diverse nation on the planet.

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Diverse? Not really. I think the best description of America "at home" is intolerant, and the best description of America abroad is deadly.

Yep, Americans are "tolerant of diversity" as long as that diversity extends only to tasty ethnic foods, cool costumes, and pretty music. But let Americans touch REAL diversity - where people DON'T think America is the best nation in the whole world, disagree with some of it's fundamental practices (or where Americans disagree with someone else's fundamental practices), and ESPECIALLY where these "diverse" people are poor AND have a different skin color in addition to having a fundamentally-different viewpoint of life here in the good ole USA, and that "tolerance" disappears faster than frost in June.

America, diverse???


HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAAHA!!!


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You can't build a nation with bombs. You can't create a society with guns.

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MAGONSDAUGHTER
Originally posted by THGRRI:
No, she just agreed with you. She then starting spewing a bunch of nonsense. Put simply, the article is crap and I said why and moved on. What concerns me is that after all this time you still don't recognize that Sig never misses a chance to bash America, which says volumes about your judgment.

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Mag
Dont mind a bit of America bashing when it's due. Then credit when its due, like marriage equality.

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That’s because you are coming at this from a simplistic point of view. Just as your article on anti-intellectualism does in suggesting differing philosophy's and points of contention, can be summed up as stupid vs. smart. This is a global issue but you see it as an American issue? Let me explain it to you. In this thread I speak about religion and cultures being at the root of much of society’s problems. They are false barriers we have created to separate ourselves from each other. These barriers are influential in our development of self, and based on these identities we create ideologies. My god tells me so, therefore it must be true. It takes in some cases thousands of years before these prejudices begin to give way to more rational ways of thinking. That’s what has happened here. I’m happy to say one more religious taboo is done away with in America.

It also gives hope to others around the world.

Huge crowds for Berlin Gay Pride after historic US ruling

http://news.yahoo.com/huge-crowds-berlin-gay-pride-historic-us-ruling-
171617336.html

Celebrations of Marriage Equality Around the World

http://www.advocate.com/world/2015/06/27/celebrations-marriage-equalit
y-around-world

The landmark ruling that made same sex marriage legal in the United States was cheered around the planet.

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Thg
Go back and reread her opening posts. She rants anti war crap about the 60's and then about central governments not wanting intellectual citizens. In other words our government is behind it. She is nuts and if you can't see it in what she writes I am sorry for you.

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Mag
Sig and I have agreed and disagreed over the years on a number of issues. On this issue, I agreed with what she said. She has strong views, but she isn't nuts. That's just you not able to tolerate disagreement.

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Sig posts America is clueless as to what is going on around the world because we are, to use her words “far away from any other nation, protected from foreign ideas by two large oceans.”

Really, this is 2015 not the 1800’s.

She contradicts this notion herself in thread after thread complaining America is involved in everybody else’s business. I would add, anytime Sig strays from what she cuts and pastes it turns into an incoherent rant that jumps from subject to subject. You really need to learn how to recognize subjective and hateful posting Magon.

This is not about me disagreeing with Sig. It is about Sigs’ history of being mulishly anti American. Therefore her motives for agreeing with any concepts that show America in a bad light should be understood as biased, as well as offered up without proper forethought. She is constantly assailing our way of life because she is a communist. She lies and distorts things. You do not appear to be receptive to this truth even though her posts to G in this thread contain not but. To deny why she is posting what she is, is akin to you burying yoor head in the sand. Talk about anti-intellectualism. And for you to speculate what she means when she posts just so you can argue with me is sad. I give an example of this in what follows.

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SIG
There are all kinds of reasons why Americans are particularly ignorant: Most of us are far away from any other nation, protected from foreign ideas by two large oceans on either side and a USA-clone up north. We have a history of disdain for learning anything from history, since our "pioneer" meme is to build everything from scratch. And most of us are English-only, inoculating us agains

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