Why are Americans so stupid?

Question

As an American, I'm used to hearing people from other countries and cultures saying that we're all pretty stupid. There's a lot of education and advantages in the United States though, so why does everyone think that Americans are stupid?

Answer 1

Why are Americans so stupid?? Because Americans ARE stupid…you voted in Gorge Bush as President twice, what further proof do you need!?

Comments

nice point!! But he's a nice dude in person I assume.

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Actually, the first time he was elected, he didn't have the popular vote, but in America, we have a very stupid policy called Electoral College: in some cases your vote may not even make a difference. He got elected the second time because more Republicans vote than Democrats, but don't call Americans stupid because of Bush. Many of us didn't vote for him, and some of us weren't even old enough to vote...

Answer 2

Americans being dumb and fat is literally an internet meme now. I mean look at Donald Trump? Look at how popular he is in the last voting. When the top politicians in the whole country is so infamous for being a sexist, buffoon, egomaniac and running for president, probably solely doing it for the money, you will be surprised on how the world view America. People seem to love him for some reason because he is the closest you can get to the reality TV in the boring politics. Continuing on the topic of politic, they voted George W. Bush, twice while at it. Americans seem to like their share of politicians that ruins their country.

People seem to hate on Obama too for some reason, but that is within America as far as an I can tell, considering what he did all this time is getting blamed for what the previous administration has done to the country and doing a really well job in fixing it too. So yes, if the world's see your leaders that represents the whole country as stupid and seeing how the achievements of the current president are downplayed, it's obvious why Americans are seen as stupid as well. Did I mention their gun control? The pro-gun logics for keeping their guns are wonderful.

Comments

The reality is that a majority of Americans agree with you on all accounts. But we are shouted down, marginalized and silenced by the ruthless conservative minority from all angles. We are lambasted in public and viciously smeared in the media for saying anything conservatives don't like (which is often no more than, "I'm a liberal."). Look no further than what they've put the last two Democratic Presidents through, as well as the rest of the world.

Thus, many of us remain silent out of fear or are simply drowned out by the conservatives' outrageous comments that dominate the ratings-driven mainstream media. But please know that the US is extremely politically polarized, and the reasonable 55-60% of us are quietly shaking our heads with disgust alongside the rest of the world.

Answer 3

There’s still about 30% of Americans that don’t have access to broadband internet in their home, and this has a surprising affect on this group’s knowledge about world events and other discoveries. For the most part, it’s the elderly that makes up the largest part of this group. However, with smart phones being so popular, now there are many people that choose to do without another form of internet access, because they can get their basic needs and entertainment through their phone. It’s not a majority of Americans that have this issue, but it’s a large enough amount to make a difference for outsiders to notice their more ignorant opinions and beliefs.

Comments

Your comment is ironic.   Surprising affect?  Are you sure you don't mean effect?  

I'm from the U.S. by the way.

Answer 4

Why are Americans so stupid? Let’s start from their education. Yes, they do have world-class university, taking up the majority of the world ranking as the top university, with the name such as Harvard known throughout the world. That’s great and all but the report from the Educational Testing Service shows a worrying trend. Young adults between the ages of 20 and 34 in America as way behind the rest of the industrialized nations in terms of literacy, mathematics, and technological proficiency. More Americans are going to college and yet the intellectuals are instead falling rather behind. Their education system is a joke.

Half of America, the supposed epitome of the world, score below the minimum standard in literacy, dead last among 22 developed countries. In a country where Coca-Cola can be marketed as a healthy snack and that Vitamin Water can be named so without having any actual vitamins in it. The standardized test for the middle and high school does not leave any tangible result on the students, only leave them with unnecessary stress (meanwhile in China and Singapore...). It ended not become a test of skills, rather going on it for the sake of it. 500th place in the 3rd International Science and Math test is not something to scoff at.

Answer 5

I think Americans are perceived as being stupid because they tend to be pretty insulated from the rest of the world. After all, most books, movies and music enjoyed in America comes from America and is about America. When I travelled through America, I met some awesome people, but when I invited them to come visit me in Australia, the response was always that they prefer to travel within the United States when they go on holidays, unless they’re going to Cancun, Mexico, which most Americans seem to think is still a part of the US…perhaps another reason why people think Americans are so stupid.

Comments

That is a fair assessment,  we are isolated and somewhat self absorbed.  But...like any generalization, it obviously doesn't apply to everyone...although it might apply to me ;-)

Answer 6

When you compare Americans with a lot of developed European countries, it’s no wonder people think they’re stupid. A lot of Americans speak only English (or “American”) and are quite proud of that. I recently met a 10 year old German girl who spoke fluent German and Spanish, quite good French and not bad English. Yet she was determined to keep practicing and learning both English and French until she was as fluent in those languages as she was in her native German. You meet Dutch backpackers and they speak excellent English, generally in addition to two or three other languages. Even the English can usually get by in a foreign country with passable school taught French. Yet, you arrive at almost any immigration post in South America and you can practically guarantee, you’ll find an obnoxious American yelling at the Spanish-speaking border control officer that they should be able to “speak English!”

Comments

Totally agree to this reason of why are Americans so stupid. Americans get blinded by their No.1 in world's economy, they are quite contented with themselves, and when they call others dump and stupid, they are actually the people who are all of that for real!

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In all fairness, most elementary and middle schools don't offer foreign language. Many high schools don't require it, and it is hard to fit in extracurriculars (yes foreign language is an extracurricular, though I agree it is stupid) with all of the required classes we are forced to take.

Answer 7

Why are Americans so stupid?? Well, I don’t quite like this question. It shows no respect to us Americans at all. But I have to admit that some Asians guys in my class are smarter and cleverer than us. Guess it’s the difference of the way of education, but it doesn’t necessarily mean we are stupid :/

Comments

I realize that "cleverer" is an acceptable adjective, but it sounds stupid.  Making stupid sounding forum responses only lends credit to the generalization that all citizens of the ol' USA are stupid.  I realize your comment wasn't intentionally stupid sounding, but I can find four faults and I'm sure others can find more.   "don't quite like" vs. "don't like",  "to us" vs. "to", "cleverer" vs. "more clever",  "of the way of" vs. "in the way of"... lastly, you've use contractions throughout your post, but in the last sentence you chose to spell out "we are" instead of "we're".    Don't defend our intellect with poorly chosen words and bad sentence structure.    (I'm sure someone cleverer than me can pick apart my reply too ;-)

Answer 8

American arrogance tends to give off the impression that Americans are stupid. It’s aggravating to hear so many Americans brag about the United States being the greatest country in the world, but they never have any specific reasons why. There might be some things that the United States has a lot of power over, but the general quality life is really lacking when compared to a lot of other countries. It’s okay to have pride for your country, but there’s no reason to brag. It just annoys everyone else and makes them think you’re overcompensating, especially when most Americans can’t even name half their presidents.

Answer 9

I hate to sound mean, but the answer to why are Americans so stupid has actually been researched by the Educational Testing Service, which found that young people from the United States (between the ages of 20 and 34) are a long way behind in literacy and numeracy, when compared with other developed countries. A big factor is the poor education system, where students seem to spend the majority of their time playing sports, attending pep rallies or playing on their phones. According to USA Today (commenting on the education system in the United States): “After two years in college, 45% of students showed no significant gains in learning; after four years, 36% showed little change.”

Comments

You say it is because of the poor educational system, then go on to blame the students. Common Core and  No Child Left Behind in my opinion as a student and the daughter of a teacher is the reason our education is terrible, not the students. I sat in my mom's class of second graders when i had the day off once and observed her class. The amount of material they expected the children to learn was huge and they hardly allow any transition time or time to play and socialize. My mother hardly is allowed time to read to her class, which should be the most important skill to build at that age.  They also expect young children and teenagers to sit focused on complex material for long periods of time. In middle school, most of the 80 minute classes are dedicated to test prep, instead of actual learning and building of skill. Everyone is expected to be at the same level and able to learn at the same speed and to be able to understand the same things. I hardly have time for sports, I've had a total of two pep rallies all year (with no more to come) and if you are caught on your phone it is taken for the day, though we are all so pressured by frequent test and insane grading standards that we don't play on our phones. Do not blame the youth of the nation for being stupid when there is so little we can control.

Answer 10

When talking about why are Americans so stupid, there's another issue I want to bring up is the huge number of people suffering from obesity in America. Whilst this should have nothing to do with how smart or stupid the population is, in actual fact, fat people are assumed to be that way because they are lazy, and lazy people are assumed to be stupid. Remember that movie ‘Wall-E’ with the overweight humans who travelled around in flying chairs so they would never need to walk again and were basically a big dumb herd of cows? That’s how a lot of people view Americans. Not nice. Not fair. But that’s the fact.