Right now I'm reading a book called "The Dumbest Generation... aka Don't Trust Anyone Under 30".
This book that I'm reading, ironically is about how our generation doesn't read books anymore. It talks about with all the technology and gadgetry that is at our disposal, we're actually becoming dumber as far as knowing history, writing, civics, politics, etc.
Teenagers actually gloat about not knowing who's running for president, but yet they know who won american idol last season. When they're confronted about this phenomenon they state "American idol is more important".
Technology is fantastic, but it's killing our abilities to write, spell, put together sentences, etc. When was the last time you actually had to find out how to spell a word? When I was younger, I had to look up words in the dictionary, now I don't even own a dictonary, except for the computer, hehe. BUT with microsoft office, you just click spellcheck and the problem is fixed. No longer do you have to proofread your essays before you turn them in you just wait for office to show you that gree squiggly line and you're that much closer to an A.
This book is hitting me twice as hard, both as a member of the targeted generation and as a black person. You know the joke that says if you want to hide your money from a black person, hide it in your books because black people don't read. Well I'm determined to break from that stereotype.
The book talks about the internet and how even with probably a million+ books at our disposal we'd rather use the internet for instant messaging, youtubing, and myspacing. There are those who claim that not reading books is just a cultural shift because things are changing, the youth's attention spans are quickening and they have no time to sit still for 2-3 hours to read a book.
You would think that all the testing and challenges academically in this generation that students would be more intelligent, but if they used the standards of measurement for intelligence for this generation that they used for the previous generation, then our IQ would be about an 80 when compared to the previou generations. What's the big difference you might ask between this generation and the previous generation? They read more, all other variables were kept constant.
It's not school and class that really makes us better writers, testtakers, speakers, it's the books. They improve vocabulary, sentence structure, reading ability, and comprehension. This is important on I don't know... the SAT, LSAT, GMAT, GRE which all have reading comprehension sections and some sort of writing section.
The crazy part is, we spend hours and hours in front of the t.v. paying money for cable and electricity when books are for the most part free at the library, and there are billions of periodicals and magazines online for free.
I'm not telling anybody this to say that i'm better or I'm such a well read individual because to be honest, I just started reading for leisure over the summer and I'm reading more and more everyday. Another sad fact is the author classified reading as any literary work, you could've read a comic book, and our generation still didn't want to read.
Please don't let us 30 year olds and younger go down in history as "The Dumbest Generation", pick up a book once a month; enhance yourself!
-Roderic
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
Posts
2 comments:
Good on you for wanting to break that stereotype. I am breaking the stereotype of teenage ignorance, as well as adult ignorance, because I keep up with President-Elect Barack Obama's plans after Inauguration Day and the American Idol contestants of seasons past. I like to expose myself to as much as possible like that.
With that same logic, I read articles, as well as literary classics, alongside magazines, blogs, textbooks and comics. I watch a ton of television and film too. I firmly believe the current generation is just too limited. They like something, they stick to it. It's how we get stereotypical nerds and stereotypical dropouts at school. It's how stereotypes exist at all, huge masses of people choosing to live this or that extreme when the world is so much bigger.
People just need to be more willing to explore other areas of knowledge and be more open-minded. Otherwise, both sides think the other side is ignorant, in other words, dumb.
Michael.
There is a book entitled... "The deliberate dumbing down of america" by Charlotte Thomson Iserbyt that you may be interested in. Very good read. You should also check out the documentary "Zeitgeist" which I mentioned in my blog post about the shoe being thrown at President Bush, because it touches on our educational system in America.
Post a Comment