Zonie63
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From: The Old Pueblo
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ORIGINAL: fucktoyprincess
This was prompted by subspaceseven's thread on Rick Santorum http://www.collarchat.com/m_4242162/tm.htm
Why is it that Americans, as a group, are anti-intellectual? It is one of the few places in the world where I have lived and worked where being smart means you are looked down on, bullied, etc. Smart people are generally viewed with suspicion and hatred, rather than admired.
I'm not sure that Americans are necessarily anti-intellectual. I think that American culture tends to be more pragmatic and practical, rather than valuing learning for the sake of learning. In other words, there has to be some goal or practical purpose involved with learning. Very often, students might ask "How will this class help me later on in life?" There has to be some sort of lucrative reason for studying something.
One might also commonly hear someone say, "If you're so smart, why aren't you rich?" That mentality is also very much a part of our culture. Strictly speaking, money is valued far more than intellect. But I don't think that's a uniquely American phenomenon; it seems to be world-wide in today's global economy.
I also don't think that smart people are bullied just because they're smart. I think that some kids tend to bully those they regard as weak, but that stuff usually ends around age 14 or 15. If they're hated, it may be more out of jealousy than suspicion.
On the other hand, I have noticed that some people tend to get testy and defensive if they're held to certain standards. A lot of people want to get by doing half-ass jobs, and they might get upset if called on it and asked to do the job correctly. This is definitely something that's descended upon our culture, although historically, American culture has been characterized as having a strong work ethic. The laziness (whether intellectual laziness or other types of laziness) seems to be more of a recent phenomenon, encouraged by more contrived cultural influences which seemed to evolve during the 1950s and 60s and have been with us ever since.
I consider the diminishing of the American work ethic to be far more disturbing than any perceived anti-intellectualism which might exist.
Traditionally, American culture might exalt and praise men like Thomas Edison or Henry Ford - men who didn't have much formal education yet succeeded immensely. Or perhaps a self-educated man like Abraham Lincoln - born in a log cabin, did his homework by candlelight on the back of a shovel, became a country lawyer (but a tough wrestler, too), and ultimately became one of America's greatest Presidents. This is what American culture once was - not necessarily intellectual but not overtly anti-intellectual either, not like it has become in recent decades.
Another aspect is that America was founded on very strong anti-monarchist, anti-elitist underpinnings, so the "educated" are often seen as Ivy League rich kids born with silver spoons in their mouths. So I read "anti-intellectualism" as being "anti-elite." That doesn't mean that Americans hate smart people, but we might tend to be against the arrogant, puffed-up pride of Ivy League elitists who think they know what's best for everyone else. There's a difference between being "smart" and a "smart ass."
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It has led to a society that elevates the average, and wants their leadership to resemble them. Utterly bizarre.
Not so bizarre. People want to be led by those who understand them, can realize their needs, and knows what the average person goes through in life. So often, we hear criticisms of politicians being "out of touch." They're so high up there in their ivory towers that they can't possibly know what it's like for the great unwashed down below.
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If you were a company in whatever industry would you pick the most average person in the company to run it, or do you pick someone who is talented.
It would depend. Just because someone is talented doesn't mean they'd make a good business manager. Leadership often involves picking the best people for the best job, but that doesn't always mean the person in the role of leader is the best at each job.
The best coach may not be the best player, and vice versa.
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And why, as Americans, so we feel talent is completely divorced from being smart? And given the complexity of the global economy and the global geo-political situation, why is it that we think politicians don't need to be smart to be effective in their roles?
I don't know that we think politicians don't need to be smart. I guess it might largely depend on how one defines "smart" in the first place.
Even if a politician may not be smart, he/she still has access to tons of smart people, experts on every subject under the sun who are on the government payroll - or work in academia or some think tank which is highly respected and whose utterances are often viewed as the word of God. The individual politician may just be a figurehead, while they have a whole slew of experts and eggheads to tell them what to do. That's also another aspect of our political culture which is quite prevalent, since we often value the opinions of experts in just about everything we do.
We even see this in common political arguments, which often come down to "My expert is better than your expert." In some ways, our popular/political culture can sometimes be the polar opposite of anti-intellectualism, as each side in any argument has its own set of experts cheered on by their adoring fans.
I've known people who might be considered "anti-intellectual" on the surface might be easily influenced by some documentary they saw on TV (or even YouTube). They might listen to some guy who sounds highly educated, may even have a PhD or credentialed in their field, who can come across as very erudite, reciting their facts in capsule comments and using pictures and graphs, etc. So, they might say, "You should listen to this guy. He's an expert. He knows what he's talking about."
That's also very common, although I wouldn't consider it to be anti-intellectual, but quite the opposite, since a large part of our culture values erudition and expert opinion - even if most people don't really want to take the time to do the work and study the subject themselves.
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In many ways the American public gets the government it deserves. And it is sad.
I agree with this completely, although I don't know if it's because Americans are anti-intellectual. I think it's more a matter of laziness and a deteriorating work ethic. A lot of people (even intellectuals) just tend to slide by, not putting in their best effort, and oftentimes, this is just as true when it comes to studying the candidates and issues at every election.
Another thing that just came to mind is that, by and large, we Americans tend to have a rather short attention span. There's also a tendency towards superficiality - style over substance. A lot of people don't have the time or inclination to discuss anything of any deeper meaning or significance in our society - beyond their own particular self-centered pet issues which revolve only around themselves and not for the nation as a whole.
We've also been a "buy now - pay later" nation for so long that we never really did realize what would happen when the day of reckoning was finally upon us. It's not just when it comes to government debt, but also in dealing with any potential consequences of our actions, whether political, environmental - or whether our way of solving a crisis today might lead to an even bigger crisis 20 years down the road.
The politician who actually tells the people the truth, that there might be consequences for what we're doing, that we might have to buckle down and work harder, that we might have to go through some lean times today so that our future may be better - that's a politician who won't win any elections. People don't want to hear stuff like that. They want to hear from politicians who offer instant gratification and promise that everything will be alright. I've been noticing this in politics for most of my life - people always seem to go for the quick fix, a temporary solution which might sweep the problem under the rug for a while and make people think that the problem has been solved.
As to how it got this way, I've been trying to figure that one out for myself. I don't think that it's because Americans are not educated or anti-intellectual. That may seem evident on the surface but I think that's too pat an answer.
It's probably more rooted in an ingrained resistance to anything that might disturb or disrupt our tranquility. Americans have been socialized and raised to believe that we must maintain our stability, tranquility, and preserve and protect our way of life. This was common during the Cold War, when people thought that everyone was out to get us. That mentality has been driven into Americans for generations so some of our thought patterns and processes may be somewhat skewed because of this. Fear and mistrust became familiar patterns to us.
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RE: Why Are Americans Anti-Intellectual? - 
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