by Jim Coufal
Some years ago I wrote about the overuse of the word “stupid,” and how it can be a discussion stopper. But sometimes a sharp word can be a discussion starter. Stupid is defined as “not intelligent,” and commonly taken as such. I’m not saying any individual American is stupid, but that America en masse is, in the sense of another definition of stupid, that is, not sensible or logical.
I once attended a grief/bereavement group as a newbie, looking to see how it fit. I remained quiet and observant until a moment came when participants seemed confused. So I asked, “Have you ever looked into how the people of other countries and cultures deal with grief?”
There was a moment of silence, then a long-time member said, with more than a bit of petulance, “Why should we? We’re Americans!”
This little incident seems a great example of American belief in our exceptionalism, our arrogance, our bad education, and to be bold, our stupidity. It has been said that there comes a time in dealing with offensive people one must become offensive. Since stupid people are offensive, I take the chance of being offensive.
Why are Americans stupid? Because of the things we let happen and don’t do anything about as long as we have our six-pack, the NFL, and some nachos. I’ll list some of these things below, starting with our health service.
A report of the Commonwealth Fund found the U.S. spends more money on health care compared with other industrialized countries, and gets less bang for their buck. A 2000 World Health Report ranked the U.S. health “system” 37th in the world, and it hasn’t gotten any better. This includes ranking in such areas as cost, efficiency, equity, and overall health of the citizens. As for life expectancy, Japan, Sweden, Australia, Canada, Spain, Norway, the E.U., and Cuba have longer ones.
The Commonwealth Health Report found that in 2011, the U.S. spent $8,508 per capita in health care expenditures, while the United Kingdom, which had the highest health care ranking system, spent $3,405 per capita. The countries with the best health care systems (and many other systems) were largely the democratic socialist countries, like the U.K., France, Canada, Norway, Sweden, Finland, and others. Most Americans gag over the word “socialism,” confusing it with communism coming from corporate propoganda, while paying more and getting less. Stupid.
The World Health Organization reported that 32 of the world’s 33 developed nations had universal health care, not always government provided. Guess who the lone exception was. Yes, the U.S.
Continuing on health for a bit more, a 2013 report of the International Federation of Health Plans found that Nexium, the “purple pill,” favored by Larry the Cable Guy for acid reflux, cost $200 for U.S. patients, and the next highest country by charge was Switzerland at $69. while in the Netherlands the charge was $23.
We allow paid-for legislators to pass laws that allowed AstraZeneca to file a restraining order against a generic manufacturer of Nexium, blocking it from selling it in the U.S., according to the Wall Street Journal. The recent Epipen scandal, which occurred while the CEO of the company involved got a huge bonus, is but another example. There is an enormous amount of data available for many other cases, but these examples indicate how our health system is less concerned with patient welfare than it is with profits and control, with legislation protecting the pharmaceuticals, hospitals, and insurance companies.
We just bend over and take it.
How about education? Space allows only a few examples. In a test of 24 countries looking at people 16 to 65, the U.S. scored below average in the three skills measured; literacy, numeracy, and problem solving. A UNESCO study found 90 countries had literacy rates of 90 percent-plus, the U.S. was 84 percent. An OECD study testing the level of math/science knowledge for 15-year-olds put Singapore at No. 2, South Korea 3, Japan 4, Finland 6, Canada 10, and the U.S. No. 28.
We’re behind while a Harvard study found students in Latvia, Chile and Brazil making academic gains three times faster than American students, while those in Portugal, Hong Kong, Germany, Poland, Lichtenstein, Slovenia, Columbia, and Lithuania are improving at twice the rate of U.S. students.
We get farther behind while we sit back and let it happen. Stupid.
We bemoan the debt U.S. college graduates leave school with. Many countries—Argentina, Denmark, Finland, France, Greece, Norway, Scotland, Turkey, Brazil, Germany—have free higher education. Some, like Germany, even offer free education to foreign nationals. Yes, they pay higher taxes in a pay-as-you-go way, and capitalist powers in the U.S. use scare tactics to make democratic socialism a fearful thing. Stupid.
Our military spending is not the highest in the world but it is 19.3 percent of the budget. This doesn’t consider the $8 million per day given to Israel, mostly for military spending, used to colonize Palestine and terrorize its citizens, plus the cost in money, lives, and good will spent by the U.S. making war on Israel’s enemies. Since 1949, the U.S. has given more than $112 billion to Israel. But we can’t afford national health care, or paid sick or maternity leaves, or require paid vacations, as many other countries do. Stupid
The U.S. does lead the world in a number of categories. Our incarceration rate per capita is the greatest in the world, not because our crime rate is the highest but because we imprison more types of criminal offenders, including non-violent and drug offenders, and keep them in prison longer. And we privatize the prisons, creating a powerful lobby for more prisoners. Also, more than half of the 671 million obese people in the world live in 10 countries, and America tops the list. Great number ones.
The U.S. also has the greatest number of guns per 100 residents in the world, a variety of sources showing between 89 and 113, 39 percent of households own a gun, with 270 million guns owned. We suffer about 14 firearm deaths per 100,000 people, by far not the greatest in the world, but highest among developed countries, many of which have gun ownership rates near that of the U.S.
It’s not difficult to pick up the paper or look online to see we have what the CDC calls an epidemic of gun deaths, an epidemic which can’t be studied by the CDC because U.S. legislators caved to the NRA, et. al., making the research illegal. With all of the gun ownership in the country, where are all the “good guys with a gun” to stop the carnage?
I’ll mention just a few reasons why we’re stupid. Renowned linguist and social commentator, Noam Chomsky wrote about “media control” in 1991. Among other things, he noted, “The United States pioneered the public relations industry. Its commitment was ‘to control the public mind.’” He described how the public relations industry was an outgrowth of successful propaganda from World War I used to convince isolationist and pacifist Americans it was necessary to enter World War I. He said, “And it taught a lesson: State propaganda, when supported by the educated classes and when no deviation is permitted from it, can have a big effect.” This is especially true when the media is controlled by wealthy corporations and individuals with federal legislators on their payroll. We are aghast at “brainwashing,” but we are brainwashed. Stupid.
We are easily brainwashed because we are atomized and stand alone. Unions once gave the “little man” power to negotiate with the bigs. We have let ourselves be convinced that unions are bad and the cause of our troubles. We are divided into black and white; Christian, Jew, and Muslim; into social and economic classes, without equal powers. We settle for fluff and misinformation so as to feel comfortable.
Or you can just contribute to America’s stupidity as we become a second rate country that doesn’t live up to its stated values.
We think we are a democracy, but we are an oligarchy. Much of our problem is because of the takeover of the media and governments at all levels by wealthy individuals and corporations noted above. How bad is this mind control? A 2012 study by Princeton and Northwestern Universities found that America’s government policies reflect the wishes of the rich and powerful interest groups, rather than the wishes of the majority of the public. They concluded, “Our results provide substantial support for theories of Economic Elite Domination and for theories of Biased Pluralism, but not for theories of Majoritarian Electoral Democracy or Majoritarian Pluralism.”
In other words, we are no longer a democracy, we are an oligarchy. The widely acknowledged income and wealth inequities really do matter. Those who have the gold make the rules. And the main tactics used by the media and demagogues are to create fear—especially of the “other”— and division, and to put belief above science.
It’s fairly common to rail against incumbent office holders. Yet, while all the above and more goes on, a Gallup study found that in 2012, while Congressional approval averaged 15 percent, 90 percent of House members and 91 percent of snators who sought re-election won. Gallup concluded that people hate Congress but generally like their Member of Congress—who must not have had anything to do with any of the above. That’s holding their feet to the fire. Stupid.
So what can you do to stop being brainwashed, to stop being stupid?
First, recognize that the media, and especially the Internet, very often doesn’t describe reality, but describes what they want you to believe is reality. For example, do you know at least seven separate research studies found that Fox news watchers actually know less than those who don’t watch any news?
This doesn’t absolve the other networks, but is a prime example of creating a reality that doesn’t exist.
This means checking the plausibility and reasoning—not passively accepting information, repeating it, and making decisions based on it. It means shaking off apathy. Is means recognizing that passing lies, misinformation, and half-truths on—as on Facebook or Twitter—clearly adds to the problem. Recognize that you can ignore the facts, but they won’t go away; science should trump opinion, even if you love the opinion. But it often doesn’t.
Get involved, and this is more than voting, as important as it is. It means writing and telephoning legislators and all government officials and demanding election laws be changed so they don’t continue to favor the rich (i.e., getting rid of Citizens United). Calling legislators and all government officials to task when they allow the rich, corporations, and lobbies to write legislation. Uniting with others—in unions, marches, occupations, sit-ins, and other ways—to multiply the power of your voice and theirs. These things have accomplished much, like women’s rights, and civil rights, and they did it without guns.
Or you can just contribute to America’s stupidity as we become a second rate country that doesn’t live up to its stated values.
Jim Coufal of Cazenovia is a part-time philosopher and full-time observer of global trends. He can be reached at madnews@m3pmedia.com.