• SoftestSapphic@lemmy.world
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    1 day ago

    This is sensational

    The ratio of citizens who are functionally illiterate in the US is the same as other developed countries

    But yeah American dumb haha

    The article argues we don’t hold children to high standards, and that’s why they have a hard time reading.

    I don’t think enough people understand that if you are under the age of 30 you have lived a life where nothing has ever gotten better, where your prospects are worse every single year, and the amount of problems that will be thrust onto you the moment you graduate will be insurmountable because instead of getting the power and time to fix any of them they will be made into slaves who aren’t allowed to stop working for survival or stop thinking about work for an instant.

    Why would any child want to strive or achieve anything when they realize there’s no path or place for them in this world?

    • yeahiknow3@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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      1 day ago

      Why would any child want to strive to think critically or develop their capacity for higher-order reasoning? Presumably because they’re part of a culture that values that sort of thing. Unfortunately, the US is an anti-intellectual slum so there’s your answer.

      • SoftestSapphic@lemmy.world
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        1 day ago

        I would say it’s pretty smart of kids to evaluate their life prospects and realize this system isn’t worth the effort to train themselves to maintain it.

        You see, it sounds like you come from a country where human life has value, so you can’t really understand this perspective.

        • yeahiknow3@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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          15 hours ago

          It’s “smart of kids” to be illiterate? If you’re in a country with shitty politics, how would being an ignoramus help anything?

          My nation of origin doesn’t determine my values. That’s kind of the whole point of education.

  • yeahiknow3@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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    18 hours ago

    What’s extra distressing is that these averages (the standards we’re falling behind) already represented zero capacity for rational and critical thought.

    Seriously, most people are just confused animals with no abstract thoughts. The syntactic resemblance of their inane chatter to actual language is misleading.