some sobering facts about america...

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Mehhh, I'm happy with everything in my life at the moment so I'm not going to complain. I realize there's problems with the U.S. However, I would rather be someone who doesn't complain and does really do anything to change the country than someone who complains and complains about the U.S. but never actually does anything to change it. I also agree with Venom, that was the best part of the video.
 
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Except his "Worst Generation Ever" bit, which outright pandered to the most nauseatingly narcissistic generation to ever live, the real entitlement generation, the real "Worst period generation period ever period"... the Baby Boomers. As far as fighting for just causes... that's debateable and it largely depends whether or not you look at it from our perspective or 'in the times' or even from a foreign perspective. Protip: One of the causes of the Cold War was that Stalin didn't get what he wanted out of the truce, which was a buffer state between Russia and Germany, which is completely understandable because in his lifetime, Germany had waged war on Russia twice.

I accept his idea, but I reject half of his speech. We certainly declined, but it is absolutely by no fault of Generation Y. The youngest politicians are Gen X.

And they call my generation entitled because all we want are the same benefits that we are now going to go broke paying for and never get. No, we're not entitled, what we are is selfish, because we don't want to be the first generation that gets ****ed by baby boomer entitlement and baby boomer hypocrisy.

Despite this, I love my country. Just don't lie about it.
 
He has a point.

Take an average high school student from America. Chances are, his worries are to pass his classes and graduate, have a girlfriend, be invited to parties, and be popular. Take an average high school student from Korea or China. His aspirations are to be the top of the class, receive the highest scores, study all day and all night. Sure there are people that study hard in America, and ones that play in Asia, but looking at the majority of the people, you'll see the problem. Without the thrive and the willingness to be the best, where is the progress? Where can we go but downhill?


Life in America has been so comfortable that people see little need to do well. Schools are set up so that teachers are doing everything they can to please the students. Students are not there to learn, they go there because the law requires them to be there. Many see no value in education because they don't believe they need to excel or be the best to have comfortable life. Even mediocre effort can get you into state school, if not, then community college awaits you with open arms. Even if you don't attend college, high school graduates can also find jobs that pay enough to afford house, cars, cable, smartphones, etc. Worst comes to worst, you can live off of social security and salvation army without even doing anything. It might not be the best life, but certainly livable. However, in Asian countries, because of the limited resources and competition, if you lose in high school, the job that you end up getting does not allow you to buy a car, smartphones, house, n enough food.
 
Yes, America has a lot of problems. That has been stated over and over again. Sadly, it seems we all have vastly different ideas about how to solve them.
 
Luvahgilahsa said:
He has a point.

Take an average high school student from America. Chances are, his worries are to pass his classes and graduate, have a girlfriend, be invited to parties, and be popular. Take an average high school student from Korea or China. His aspirations are to be the top of the class, receive the highest scores, study all day and all night. Sure there are people that study hard in America, and ones that play in Asia, but looking at the majority of the people, you'll see the problem. Without the thrive and the willingness to be the best, where is the progress? Where can we go but downhill?


Life in America has been so comfortable that people see little need to do well. Schools are set up so that teachers are doing everything they can to please the students. Students are not there to learn, they go there because the law requires them to be there. Many see no value in education because they don't believe they need to excel or be the best to have comfortable life. Even mediocre effort can get you into state school, if not, then community college awaits you with open arms. Even if you don't attend college, high school graduates can also find jobs that pay enough to afford house, cars, cable, smartphones, etc. Worst comes to worst, you can live off of social security and salvation army without even doing anything. It might not be the best life, but certainly livable. However, in Asian countries, because of the limited resources and competition, if you lose in high school, the job that you end up getting does not allow you to buy a car, smartphones, house, n enough food.
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Book smarts don't make a country great. America didn't become great by being academically driven. America became great by men and women who strove to innovate, who stopped at nothing to accomplish their dreams. Book smarts are only peripherally related to the skills necessary to be great leaders. The Edisons of a generation.

That is what America is lacking. Regulations and bureaucracy have killed American creativity. We will become Europe.
 
UrshumMurshum said:
Book smarts don't make a country great. America didn't become great by being academically driven. America became great by men and women who strove to innovate, who stopped at nothing to accomplish their dreams. Book smarts are only peripherally related to the skills necessary to be great leaders. The Edisons of a generation.

That is what America is lacking. Regulations and bureaucracy have killed American creativity. We will become Europe.
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That's a good point that we need our Teslas and Editions but how do we systematically create them? That's where academics come in. Yes there are self made geniuses but they are not the rule.
 
Verum said:
That's a good point that we need our Teslas and Editions but how do we systematically create them? That's where academics come in. Yes there are self made geniuses but they are not the rule.
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Academics doesn't necessarily lead to innovation and change. It sure doesn't guarantee success in the real world.

(sent from my phone)
 
Verum said:
That's a good point that we need our Teslas and Editions but how do we systematically create them? That's where academics come in. Yes there are self made geniuses but they are not the rule.
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They already exist, but it's bureaucracy that prevents innovation. Just look at how much it costs to research/create drugs in this country, or build a nuclear power plant.

We need to drastically reduce our regulatory environment to give these people the opportunity to work. We have lots of people willing to put in the labor, but our laws aren't allowing them to.
 
i think the FDA's bureaucracy slows down research and innovation.
 
UrshumMurshum said:
They already exist, but it's bureaucracy that prevents innovation. Just look at how much it costs to research/create drugs in this country, or build a nuclear power plant.

We need to drastically reduce our regulatory environment to give these people the opportunity to work. We have lots of people willing to put in the labor, but our laws aren't allowing them to.
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Yeah, who needs protections to keep dangerous drugs from being marketed to unwitting consumers.
 
Luvahgilahsa said:
He has a point.

Take an average high school student from America. Chances are, his worries are to pass his classes and graduate, have a girlfriend, be invited to parties, and be popular. Take an average high school student from Korea or China. His aspirations are to be the top of the class, receive the highest scores, study all day and all night. Sure there are people that study hard in America, and ones that play in Asia, but looking at the majority of the people, you'll see the problem. Without the thrive and the willingness to be the best, where is the progress? Where can we go but downhill?


Life in America has been so comfortable that people see little need to do well. Schools are set up so that teachers are doing everything they can to please the students. Students are not there to learn, they go there because the law requires them to be there. Many see no value in education because they don't believe they need to excel or be the best to have comfortable life. Even mediocre effort can get you into state school, if not, then community college awaits you with open arms. Even if you don't attend college, high school graduates can also find jobs that pay enough to afford house, cars, cable, smartphones, etc. Worst comes to worst, you can live off of social security and salvation army without even doing anything. It might not be the best life, but certainly livable. However, in Asian countries, because of the limited resources and competition, if you lose in high school, the job that you end up getting does not allow you to buy a car, smartphones, house, n enough food.
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Verum said:
That's a good point that we need our Teslas and Editions but how do we systematically create them? That's where academics come in. Yes there are self made geniuses but they are not the rule.
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What? Do you guys genuinely believe this?

First, you cannot "systematically create" those who are like Tesla, Edison and others. It does not work that way -- they just are. It's an internal, neurological trait and way of approaching the world; the extremely high IQ, the creative mind and the innovative spirit -- these are not things that can be taught or made. The most that you can do, if you identify them early enough, is to nurture and support those who possess those minds.

And school, as we now know it and have known it for years, does not do that. If anything, it stifles them, as educational institutions assume that you are the average student, the typical person, just like everyone else. They house you in classrooms based upon your age, rather than your developmental level; they hand out assignments with very specific instructions, where deviation from those instructions is punished with taking off points; they force you to follow a highly structured curriculum, where there is no room for independent, in depth exploration of their interests, acceleration or questioning/debate of the paradigm; and they force you to take standardized tests that ask you to think and show your work in one way, even if another way is more intuitive for you. For the student who truly does have a genius IQ -- or any IQ in the gifted range -- this environment is extraordinarily, academically tortuous, leading many such students in this country to underachieve and/or drop out.

In fact, if anything, it is more difficult for these students in countries that emphasize high scores and high grades above all else; in those countries where humor, play, creativity for the sake of creativity and the like are discouraged to make room for intense memorization. No truly gifted child is going to want to spent hours of their life preparing for a high-pressure test, nevermind engage in some of the practices those countries allow, such as hooking their children up to IVs of substances that are supposed to help them do well.

These students thrive in a system that does not exist in this world, except in the halls of small, highly specialized, usually private schools for gifted students. They thrive, you see, when they are allowed to set their own pace, accelerating and decelerating as needed; they thrive when they are allowed to go into extreme depth in the subjects they are interested in and bypass or brush over those they are not; they thrive when they are allowed to do the work their own way and are given work that both interests and challenges them; they thrive when they are allowed to debte and question what is being taught, even when it makes the teacher want to climb up a wall; and they thrive when they are allowed to do "work" because they actually want to learn that topic, not because it is assigned or because someone wants them to get highest test scores. In other words, they thrive when they are allowed to, within reason, "do their own thing." This is what breeds innovation and creative thought.

To wrap this response up, I will leave you with outside links to show you a few more things:

a) Traits of the highly and profoundly gifted child and the difference between a 'bright' and gifted child (or, the short version).
b) No Child Left Behind and The Gifted Student and TIME's Are We Failing Our Geniuses?
c) Edison was a poor student and taught himself most of what he knew. Einstein was a poor student, too, despite being advanced -- viewing his case through what we know now. The Education Of Steve Jobs (and, more broadly, Why do so many talented entrepreneurs drop out of school?

(Plus, as an added note, not all talent is academic. Though it is a subjective opinion, I feel our country is a more rich place thanks to the comedic and artistic talents that we allow).
 
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Honestly, I'd rather live in the United States than a lot of other places.

Not that I think America is the greatest country ever with no faults at all, I do feel annoyed at people who think the U.S sucks so much who live in the US. If they hate it so much, just move! Noone is forcing them to live in that country...
 
The sad thing is that China is a better representative for free market capitalism than us. We have too much bureaucratic micromanagement that stifles innovation in our businesses, profit and success have a negative stigma for a large section of our population, and the Social Security/Medicare entitlement programs will eventually collapse under their own weight.
 
having a high iq or being book-smart is over-rated. eq and social intelligence are much better indicators of success in life.
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despite the video, at the end of the day, there are a few other places i would rather be than america. the only exceptions are : western europe, canada, australia, and maybe brazil and argentina.
 
KnuxNole said:
Honestly, I'd rather live in the United States than a lot of other places.

Not that I think America is the greatest country ever with no faults at all, I do feel annoyed at people who think the U.S sucks so much who live in the US. If they hate it so much, just move! Noone is forcing them to live in that country...
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Have you ever lived anywhere else to know what it's like? And just because you criticize the country doesn't mean you don't love it. Criticism and action lead to change while being complacent doesn't....

I suggest this blog post (as someone who has lived, not just vacationed, outside of the states it is pretty spot on). http://postmasculine.com/america

As for "live somewhere else"... Sort to burst your bubble but you can't just move somewhere because you want to. Lol. There are things called visas and work permits that prohibit that 🙂

For others... How is our system not allowing creativity?
 
NatrixCaelicola said:
For others... How is our system not allowing creativity?
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First, it is not just "our system" -- and, in my posts, I am specifically talking about the educational system -- that is stifling creativity, particularly from those in the gifted and genius ranges; but educational systems all over the world, for most of our history. If anything, it is better now that it was previously as, if you are lucky enough to live in an area with plentiful gifted funding and/or wealthy enough to afford private gifted education and/or have a family that is willing to allow one to sign out of the system early, there are alternatives.

Next, it is important to clarify that, for the typical student in a typical, middle to upper middle class area, the school system is an acceptable one to be a part of it. Is it ideal? No, not in the least and, as with anything, there are flaws; but, one will find themselves in an intuition full of people like them and full of staff who are trained to deal with students just like them. It was built for them and with them -- and their developmental, educational and social needs -- in mind. It can meet their needs, though it likely will not go above and beyond that.

When I criticize the educational system, I am mainly criticizing their handling of the highly intelligent student, the students with IQs similar to those of Einstein and Edison and Steve Jobs and all of the others who weren't close to being that successful -- with many even dropping out or underachieving -- but who went through the same school system. A school system full of those who are different from them, devoid of those who were trained to deal with students just like them and that was set up without them -- and their developmental, educational and social needs -- in mind. It fails at meeting their needs, often causing damage instead.

To understand why this is, you need to understand what giftedness is, as it is more than just a number on an IQ test. It is a whole set of emotional, behavioral, social and academic traits and the needs that arise as a consequence. These students are not just different in their intellect; but in the way they feel, think and experience the world. This is so much so, in fact, that some school districts give gifted students IEPs (Individualized Educational Plans) as they recognize that giftedness is a special educational need and that, if you do not adapt the curriculum to it, the students will do poorly.

Here are a few links explaining the traits of the gifted child: link, link, link. And here are the differences between gifted and bright children.

Once you understand that, you should understand why the educational system is so horrid for such a student. In the typical educational environment, as I explained in a previous post, everything is set to a particular structure and, while that structure may work great for the typical student, for the student who is driven by an intense amount of curiosity, independent thinking, accelerated and asynchronous development, creative and abstract thinking and other traits, they just end up not "fitting". They end up unhappy, stunted and with their creativity stifled.

I linked to a few good articles that explore why the educational system fails our most intelligent and creative citizens, of which this and this are, in my opinion, the most important.

anewbeginning said:
having a high iq or being book-smart is over-rated. eq and social intelligence are much better indicators of success in life
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You're correct; however, I still believe we need to meet the educational needs of all students, which is why gifted eduction funding is so important.
 
Luvahgilahsa said:
He has a point.

Take an average high school student from Korea or China. His aspirations are to be the top of the class, receive the highest scores, study all day and all night.
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...in hopes of being accepted to a top American college to please their parents.


I kid, I kid. Kinda.
 
I want three minutes of my life back. That was ****ing ******ed.
 
Praefectus said:
The sad thing is that China is a better representative for free market capitalism than us. We have too much bureaucratic micromanagement that stifles innovation in our businesses, profit and success have a negative stigma for a large section of our population, and the Social Security/Medicare entitlement programs will eventually collapse under their own weight.
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👍 Peter Schiff said, "China gives communism a good name and we give capitalism a bad name."

The guy in the video is right in his general message, and in my opinion, the decline is due to complacency and abdication of personal responsibility. Loving the US' essence and founding principles as I do, I thought the video would anger me, but overall he's right.

Of course, the rant had a skew which is not supported by reality, and was rife with straw men. E.g. that there is a "war on the poor", and the citing of faulty statistics such as infant mortality and life expectancy rates.
 
Starlightembers said:
Once you understand that, you should understand why the educational system is so horrid for such a student. In the typical educational environment, as I explained in a previous post, everything is set to a particular structure and, while that structure may work great for the typical student, for the student who is driven by an intense amount of curiosity, independent thinking, accelerated and asynchronous development, creative and abstract thinking and other traits, they just end up not "fitting". They end up unhappy, stunted and with their creativity stifled.
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I had a bit of luck in that I got into Montessori school, but at that time they only went through 1st grade-what they managed to teach in that time was crazy. We were doing full sentence deconstruction and learning conversational Spanish (something I was hopelessly behind in because I only attended for most of my first grade year and most of the kids had been going since pre-school). Lessons went something like "OK, for the next hour or so, doing something math related." We would stop the day's lessons to dissect a dead corn snake someone found on the playground. I can only imagine what it would have been like to have a full education in that environment. Sadly, I was back to the regular public school system the following year-they did their best to keep me engaged, including moving me ahead a grade, but I honestly never really felt all that challenged and so just kinda glided through. Even college so far hasn't been all that massive of a challenge (now that I'm actually serious about it, I completely blew it off my first time around in favor of partying), it really makes me look forward to med school when I can be challenged on a regular basis.
 
America is on the decline and the reason why is a whole lot scarier than regulation and big government. The fact is that it doesn't take a genius to realize that there is a good chance that thanks to the evolution of mass media, transport, and international pseudo-monopolies that we may no longer have an understanding of what is a nation anymore.
 
UrshumMurshum said:
They already exist, but it's bureaucracy that prevents innovation. Just look at how much it costs to research/create drugs in this country, or build a nuclear power plant.

We need to drastically reduce our regulatory environment to give these people the opportunity to work. We have lots of people willing to put in the labor, but our laws aren't allowing them to.
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We should always strive to avoid unnecessary regulations, but in no way are they cause of any of the problems you've just listed. Drug companies have not been ratcheting down research because it costs too much to go through the FDA. They see enormous profits annually and are sitting on huge piles of cash, just like most major employers. An argument could be made that smaller researchers could enter drug market without paying the FDA fees, but if we're seeing fewer drugs through the pipeline from the larger companies, it stands to reason that the problem is the market itself.

Similarly, nuclear plants have not been built in decades not because they're not allowed but because they aren't economically feasible. No company capable of building nuclear plants chooses to do so because despite being profitable in the long run and environmentally safer, coal plants will pay off the bonds necessary to build the plant in a fraction of the time.

No amount of deregulation will change these facts, but I'll give you a hint as to what offset this problem in the past and what could do so in the future: it begins with 'government' and it ends with 'spending.' A nation's greatness does come from its citizens and from their spirit, but no nation in history became great without big government projects as well.
 
Eileron said:
Sorry, as someone who's spent several years living in Asian countries, this is not the average, it's a perpetuated stereotype about Asian nations and people that aggressive Asian-American parents love to support. The vast majority of people are not obsessing about their grades to any significant degree more than American students because in either country the average student doesn't have a realistic shot at going to the top schools.

The difference is, though, that that top 10% of Chinese people is the same in number as over 30% of the US population. It's easy to focus on the top hundred million and forget about the other billion people who work in factories and agriculture their whole life. But if you're looking at majorities...
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I want to give you a medal. I second this notion. Proportion guys. Percentages. I guess it just goes to show just how far behind we are in math. :xf:
 
NightGod said:
I had a bit of luck in that I got into Montessori school, but at that time they only went through 1st grade-what they managed to teach in that time was crazy. We were doing full sentence deconstruction and learning conversational Spanish (something I was hopelessly behind in because I only attended for most of my first grade year and most of the kids had been going since pre-school). Lessons went something like "OK, for the next hour or so, doing something math related." We would stop the day's lessons to dissect a dead corn snake someone found on the playground. I can only imagine what it would have been like to have a full education in that environment. Sadly, I was back to the regular public school system the following year-they did their best to keep me engaged, including moving me ahead a grade, but I honestly never really felt all that challenged and so just kinda glided through. Even college so far hasn't been all that massive of a challenge (now that I'm actually serious about it, I completely blew it off my first time around in favor of partying), it really makes me look forward to med school when I can be challenged on a regular basis.
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Maybe you're just intelligent... Or gifted or whatever the correct term is.

Anyway, I doubt that Montessori is the answer. A lot of my family members and their friends are teachers and they are all unanimous in that students from Montessori schools, when reintegrated into schools, are the lowest performers. The best are the home schooled kids, just with some social deficits.
 
NatrixCaelicola said:
Maybe you're just intelligent... Or gifted or whatever the correct term is.

Anyway, I doubt that Montessori is the answer. A lot of my family members and their friends are teachers and they are all unanimous in that students from Montessori schools, when reintegrated into schools, are the lowest performers. The best are the home schooled kids, just with some social deficits.
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I don't know how valid what you're saying is as your family members are not credible sources. I'm sure there have been some case studies on this.

home schooled kids also do not have as many social defects as people believe them to have. While at first they may have time adjusting. On a whole, home schooled kids readjust just fine. They go to great universities and do great things.

Coming from someone who went to a Montessori.
 
NatrixCaelicola said:
Maybe you're just intelligent... Or gifted or whatever the correct term is.

Anyway, I doubt that Montessori is the answer. A lot of my family members and their friends are teachers and they are all unanimous in that students from Montessori schools, when reintegrated into schools, are the lowest performers. The best are the home schooled kids, just with some social deficits.
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Gifted is the term used in legal documents to define high IQ students and is also the most commonly used terms among both professionals and layman; however, as seeing that so many seem to be offended by the use of the word gifted as a descriptor of this demographic, there is some push to change it to something that doesn't make people put up the defensive ("All children are gifted!" "You just think you're better" etc)

Next, before I address Montessori, I want to point out that comparing the majority of students--the typically developing/neurotypical students--to a gifted student is flawed. What works for said typical students tend to fail horribly for the gifted student and vice versa, thus the trend of underachievement in gifted students. We know what works for gifted students, it's just near impossible to get it implemented.

Furthermore, though I could be wrong and am open to correction, I don't think the intent of NightGod's post was not to push Montesorri as the answer, per se; but just to comment that it was a much more productive and happy environment for him/her than the typical educational environment as, per Montessori guidelines, one is allowed to move forward at their own pace and it is expected that children are capable of being challenged. Thus, his/her development, including his/her creativity, were not stunted and he/she could work at that advanced of a level, instead of being held back. Had (s)he been able to continue there, their educational experience would have likely been more positive. It was an anecdote, not an evidence-based debate.

As for Montessori itself, though there is argument within the gifted community as to if it is a right fit, the fact that they perform lower in a typical environment after switching does not mean it is an ineffective educational method. The Montessori method and the typical method are vastly different and, when you force a child to switch, they are undoubtedly going to struggle (the same goes the other way around--many Montessori schools do not allow students to transfer in past pre-K or K for that very reason) to adjust. If you removed grade point averages and just looked at qualitative assessments of where the child is, I doubt you would see them lagging. NightGod's experience in a Montessori school is not atypical--they frequently have students working high above what one would expect.
 
Exactly, just sharing an anecdote and a bit of wistful thinking on wishing that our education system was a bit more supportive of the innovative/genius thinkers that are discussed in this thread.
 
TheGloaming said:
Mehhh, I'm happy with everything in my life at the moment so I'm not going to complain. I realize there's problems with the U.S. However, I would rather be someone who doesn't complain and does really do anything to change the country than someone who complains and complains about the U.S. but never actually does anything to change it. I also agree with Venom, that was the best part of the video.
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you are saying you are better than someone who doesn't do anything about it because you also don't do anything about it?

:laugh: :laugh: you also must be more beautiful because every morning you look at yourself in the mirror and tell yourself that repeatedly.
 
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