Marijuana.com

Suetaz

Why Don't Americans Care?

Do you know who Halliburton is? Dick Cheney? How about Karl Rove? Alas, most Americans don't

By Mark Morford | SF Gate Columnist | October 6, 2004

Let's be honest. Percentage-wise, few people in America really give much of a crap about what's going on in the hallowed halls of politics and power. This is what we in the media and maybe you in the media-consuming audience tend to forget far too easily: This country is simply jam-packed with millions of people who have no time for, or interest in, politics, or media, or environmental policy, or education, or global issues, or which presidential candidate lied his ass off about which aspect of his military career and which Orange Alert is totally bogus and how many soldiers are dying for what imbecilic war.

It seems hard to believe. But the general rule of thumb is that major cities are slightly more attuned due to aggressive media saturation and how issues tend to make themselves known more urgently, more immediately, whereas Middle America is a scattershot conglomeration of the politically apathetic and the actively disenfranchised, full of people far too busy with their lives and kids and jobs and zoning out on "Fear Factor" and "Monday Night Football" to care about following the elitist, ever dire dramas playing out on the nation's gilded stages.

Most Americans, in other words, have no idea what the hell a Halliburton is. Or a Karl Rove. Or a Donny "Shriveled Soul" Rumsfeld. Or a Lockheed Martin. Or a Carlysle Group. Or have any idea that Saddam had nothing whatsoever to do with 9/11. Or that WMDs were never found. Or that President Bush has taken more vacation time than any president in U.S. history. Or that Jesus thinks Dubya is "sort of a dink." Or where Iraq is on a map.

Fact is, in the past decade, TV-news ratings -- cable and network, combined -- has shrunk to a fraction of its former numbers. Newspaper subscriptions have been either flat or dropping for just about as long. Newsmagazines, radio, historical nonfiction: flat or dropping fast. Even the Internet, that vast teeming customizable firestorm of news and info streaming in from all over the planet, even the awesome Net draws far more people to its porn and gossip and shopping departments than any e-news joint could ever wet dream.

Is this unfair? Does it sound elitist and biased? It's not. There have been studies. And reports. And alarming indicators of all kinds telling us time and again that, for example, fully 50 percent of eligible Americans don't even bother to vote (a 15 percent drop since 1964), and many have no idea who's on the Supreme Court or what Congress does, and many can't even point to France on a globe.

Voter turnout, comparatively, in Italy, Spain, the U.K., or Germany? Anywhere from 75 to 92 percent, every time. The sad fact is, the United States ranks 139th out of 172 countries in voter turnout. Wave that flag proudly, baby.

You've seen the headlines. Alarming numbers of American high school students can't even identify the current vice president, much less name a half dozen presidents from history. Far too many citizens can't name the capital of their own home state or recognize their own senators, much less discern how Bush's environmental policy is poisoning their water or how Ashcroft wants to scan their email and tap their phones and suck the pith from their souls.

A recent report by the Organisation for Economic Co-Operation and Development states that upward of 60 percent of Americans ages 16-25 are 'functionally illiterate', meaning they can't, for example, fill out a detailed form or read a numerical table (like a time schedule). A recent Florida study shows at least 70 percent of recent high school graduates need remedial courses -- that is, basic reading and math -- when they enter community college. These are kids who, you can be assured, think Colin Powell is that nasty British dude on "American Idol."

And everyone you know seems to have a parent or a sister-in-law living somewhere conservative and podunk for whom politics and news media is like some sort of impossibly dense morass, alien and strange and vaguely threatening, like a nasty, painful growth on their big toe, best ignored in hopes that it will just dry up and go away.

Maybe this, then, is the most pressing question of our time: How to get the vast majority of Americans to care? To pay attention? To read? To effect change and demand accountability from bumbling spoon-fed leaders who count on voter apathy and force-fed ignorance to cram through their environmental rollbacks and homophobic laws and draconian Patriot Acts? Is it even possible? Are we too far gone?

How to make America more like, say, Europe, where knowledge of current events and political intrigue is not only hugely important to the vast majority of citizens but is also deeply woven into the very fabric of daily life, an integral part of the educational system and the café conversation and the workplace water-cooler chats, and to ignore it is considered, well, irresponsible and even a mite traitorous?

True, part of why they care so much is because America is the foremost bully on the block and it pays to know what makes the bully tick. And whine. And kill. In short, as the theory goes, most Americans don't give a damn because we're on top and we own everything and have more nukes than anyone and we're never the ones getting invaded. It's our unofficial motto -- America: We Don't Have to Care.

And this very column is frequently slapped with the accusation that it merely "preaches to the choir," and if I really want to affect minds I should consider tempering or sanitizing my opinions for a more "moderate" mainstream readership, as if the nation was chock-full of opinionated, well-read, temperate thinkers ready to be gently informed of new ideas, when in fact this group is but a fraction, a sliver, far overshadowed and overpowered by the real majority in America: The detached. The disinterested. The intellectually lazy.

So, what's the solution? It is as simple as dramatically changing the way we educate our children, our population? Is it desanitizing our vacuous history textbooks and making media studies and political science and current events as mandatory to the educational diet as macho sports and bad lunches and playground kickball?

Or maybe it's a new national draft? Will that galvanize the rest of the populace sufficiently? How about Iraq devolving even faster into Vietnam 2.0? Is it 10,000 dead U.S. soldiers and nary an imprisoned terrorist or fresh barrel of oil to show for it? How about five bucks a gallon? Ten? Is it legalizing pot and banning guns? What will it take?

[Suetaznote: Is this why pot isn't legal yet? Because not enough people care?]

Maybe another massive national catastrophe? Maybe a 9/11 cubed, and cubed again, something unthinkably horrific and unleashed upon the innocents and the children and the puppies, something that so jars and infuriates and undermines our desperate empire that even the cold-blooded neoconservative Right can't possibly leverage our sorrow and pain for its own political gain? Very possible. After all, nothing like a little hard-earned apocalypse to make you consider voting independent.

Or maybe it's something entirely different, maybe some sort of potent, unimaginable spiritual enlightenment that looks like revelation and smells like Vishnu and sounds like harmonic convergence and tastes like Buddha and has nothing whatsoever to do with fundamentalism or Christianity or Bush's angry homophobic flag-wavin' God. The mystics say we're very close. They claim the next decade will offer, to those who care to participate, one helluva transformational vibrational wallop. Possible?

Whatever it looks like, we can rest assured we're still not out of the dark, dank woods just yet. Our national apathy is well protected, our intellectual ignorance secure and our fears well fed and carefully, perpetually reinforced by the Powers That Be and the fact that the overall 50 percent voter turnout never moves by more than a point or two, usually downward.

And the Establishment, it only smiles knowingly, and nods, and says there there now. It'll be all right. Just go back to sleep.

[Suetaznote: Is this true? When you consider how many outspoken activists there are fighting for Marijuana legalization, they are a very small percentage of the population. Is it apathy that keeps more people from fighting for legalization, or is it fear of recrimination for speaking out? Or is it both, and which is it more of, apathy or fear? Any comments?]

__________________

 

Cassius

Apathy.

People love to tell each other at the water cooler what they think about things, as long as they don't have to go out and DO anything about it.

__________________

{ Cassius, Your Humble Narrator }
{ Posting Guidelines | Erowid Drug Information Resource | instantfilehosting.com }

Silva Haze J

I think that people are scared to speak out, because if you read the article about October 5th, 4 marijuana activists speaking out for legalization were arrested. Now, if we have the right to assemble and protest, and freedom of speech in a peaceful manner, then why do they arrest us? That's my point of view and why I keep quiet. I also think apathy plays a major part for a lot of people, because there are so few now, they just think, "Well I'm one person, one person doesn't make a difference." Which if you think about it, if all those "I'm just one person" people got together, there'd be a lot of people fighting for legalization. But a lot of what that guy said is true, a lot of things need to be changed in America, and the people need to do something about it, mainly by voting for a candidate who they share their views with, not just voting for Democrats or Republicans, which a lot of people do and don't even know what the guy stands for.

Hiz Highness

I agree that many things need to be changed, I disagree that the main avenue to bring about this change is voting. Remember, last presidential election it didn't matter who a majority of the American people wanted for president.

The way to win legalization is to get people fired up about it. Get people out on the street talking about it, holding rallies, and yes . . . being arrested. Bring camcorders, inform the news organizations, and let main-stream America see a bunch of organized cannabis users who aren't harming anyone filling up the prison cells. Let the Americans realize that their hard earned tax money is going toward incarcerating harmless people, and ruining their lives.

If we keep toking in secret and voting in hope of a better tomorrow we will never get anywhere. That is the path that will see you arrested alone, incarcerated alone, and erased from public memory.

If we are arrested while standing up publicly our arrests will be viewed by thousands, perhaps tens of thousands. You'll wind up in jail either way, but at least this way your existence is known, and you didn't go alone. This way you can to sleep at night knowing you stood up for something you believed in, and didn't wind up getting arrested while fear of punishment has you hiding in your own home.

-HH

JTP

How to make America more like, say, Europe, where knowledge of current events and political intrigue is not only hugely important to the vast majority of citizens but is also deeply woven into the very fabric of daily life, an integral part of the educational system and the café conversation and the workplace water-cooler chats, and to ignore it is considered, well, irresponsible and even a mite traitorous?

Castrate us?

If these "oh so smart" Europeans are so educated and astute why have they sucked hind tit for the last two or three generations? Why do they have to abandon their national sovereignty just to compete economically? Why do they have unemployment figures roughly double that of the US? The arrogance of some Europeans is not backed up by reality.


A recent report by the Organisation for Economic Co-Operation and Development states that upward of 60 percent of Americans ages 16-25 are 'functionally illiterate', meaning they can't, for example, fill out a detailed form or read a numerical table (like a time schedule).

BS. Somebody go to www.oecd.org and show me where this statistic came from. I couldn't find it.



True, part of why they care so much is because America is the foremost bully on the block and it pays to know what makes the bully tick. And whine. And kill. In short, as the theory goes, most Americans don't give a damn because we're on top and we own everything and have more nukes than anyone and we're never the ones getting invaded. It's our unofficial motto -- America: We Don't Have to Care.

Oh, I get it now. Mark is pissed that America is not a pussified as Europe. We need to get invaded more .


Or maybe it's a new national draft? Will that galvanize the rest of the populace sufficiently? How about Iraq devolving even faster into Vietnam 2.0? Is it 10,000 dead U.S. soldiers and nary an imprisoned terrorist or fresh barrel of oil to show for it? How about five bucks a gallon? Ten? Is it legalizing pot and banning guns? What will it take?

What a kook. There is no draft, the talk of the draft was result of Democrats and nothing but Democrats, we have nowhere near 10000 dead in Iraq and the only place in America paying $5 a gallon for gas is Kalifornia. - go figure.


And everyone you know seems to have a parent or a sister-in-law living somewhere conservative and podunk for whom politics and news media is like some sort of impossibly dense morass, alien and strange and vaguely threatening, like a nasty, painful growth on their big toe, best ignored in hopes that it will just dry up and go away.

Funny stuff. Everyone that doesn't share his "enlightened" views is confused by the podunk politics of the conservative hinterlands.

I guess this got posted here cause Mark mentioned marijuana once?



Don't worry all you liberal European wannabes, "Hope is on the way" .

 

smokin in cali

I'm a medical smoker in the central valley of California. This is probably the most conservative part of the state. You can feel the eyes of law enforcement and your fellow citizens on you everywhere. I follow local marijuana events, and support those that support the cause. I do write letters to our local paper about marijuana reform, and a couple of them have been printed, but I always stop short of admitting my use. It makes me feel like a coward. And that makes me angry. If I live in a free country, why can't I express my opinions without fear of investigation or arrest? Is that freedom? I could really care less about what the Law would do to me, personally. I mean, when you get down to it, some of the most respected people in history were incarcerated at one point or another: Martin Luther King, Jr., Galileo, Gandi, Jesus, the list goes on and on. Remember, these people didn't just go against the mainstream, they were punished for breaking real laws, regardless of how inane and ridiculous those laws seem to us today. But I'm not alone in this. I have a wife and kids, a house, pets, bills, all of which could be taken from me quite easily by over-zealous moral crusaders out there to save me from myself! O how I wish I could just walk outside and scream, "I smoke pot! It doesn't hurt me and won't hurt you, either! Leave me in peace!"

But, I can't. So I'll keep writing my letters and spreading the word to those that will listen. I'll keep on smoking in the back room of my house, in the dark, with the windows closed. I'll keep a low profile. But, when enough of us can come together to protect one another, I'll be there, adding my voice to the many.

Stephanie S.

Interestingly, the US has the 2nd highest GDP in the world, the 2nd highest GDP per capita in the world, and has the same overall as Canada.

Regarding voter turn out, see, the US is a real democracy. We don’t have to vote if we choose not to. Voting is compulsory in Australia at all federal elections for all eligible persons.
It’s difficult to make statistical comparisons on societies that have such widespread differences in how their governments operate. How can one compare say, Englands political system vs the US? We don’t support the idea of royalty (save certain pop stars). While taxes suck, the US takes a lot less money from their citizens than most other countries in the world.

Yes, we have flaws. We have a lot of people in prison that don’t belong there. We have a real problem with kids literacy. The fact about that is there are Huge numbers of English Language Learners in the US. A study done at UCLA found that an alarming number of incoming freshmen were being require to take remedial English classes. I saw a letter written by a freshman at UCLA who was the valedictorian of her class and excelled greatly in high school. She was being required to take remedial English and didn’t understand why. I wish I had a copy of that letter so you could see. While she conveyed her message, her spelling, grammar and basic writing mechanics were totally flawed. The study found that the problem went all the way back to early elementary school when students begin to develop a foundation of literacy. As it turned out, this particular student came to the US and entered public schools a s a Vietnamese speaker in 3rd grade. The Language Centers in the brain are most active up until around age eight, give or take. She missed the basic foundations of the English language at the most crucial time in her development.

Was this the fault of US schools? Nope. I have personally taught a class that consisted of 90% English Language Learners. The obstacles they face and the teachers fact to increase students’ literacy are mind-boggling.
In California alone there are more than 100 languages spoken among students in the Public schools.
We’re working on it.....well, I’m not. I have to meet Bush’s No Child Left Behind Act requirements and take another TEST to prove I am a qualified teacher. But schools are indeed working to develop strategies to increase and promote appreciation of and value of literacy in their ELL populations.

Statistics are often skewed and so are the opinions that follow them. But if you are interested in Democracy and how it really is applied in various counrties, visit IDEA. Holding elections does not a democracy make.

peace

__________________
"See, in my line of work you got to keep repeating things over and over and over again for the truth to sink in, to kind of catapult the propaganda." —George W. Bush, Greece, N.Y., May 24, 2005 (Listen to audio)

StewScum

I am not going to vote because i would rather not have any of the candidates as president, but since that isnt going to happen, i would try to put in a vote for a Democrat, but since i live in Texas, my electoral votes are obviously going to bush. Why bother?

__________________
Life is like a pot of stew, if you don't stir it up every once and a while, all the scum rises to the top -Still Life with Woodpecker by Tom Robbins.

Suetaz

Posted by Hiz Highness:
Thank you for keeping the thread on topic HH and for understanding the point of the article. I agree with this, but the question is, why isn't it happening?!

There was supposed to be a large rally in DC on Monday and only 'several dozen' protesters turned out. That's why a dozen arrests were made. If thousands had've turned out, they couldn't possibly arrest them all. When the protesters were arrested in NY at the Republican convention, the police made themselves look bad and this needs to be done a lot more. If Americans keep allowing their civil rights to be squashed, where is that going to get us?

Do Americans care about getting Marijuana legalized, or not?

What are Americans willing to do towards getting Marijuana legalized?

Is it fear or apathy that keeps people from becoming activists?

Stephanie S.

What is the topic of this article? Since the title is WHY DON'T AMERICAN's CARE? I thought it was about Americans caring. Then I saw mention of "TV-news ratings -- cable and network, combined -- has shrunk to a fraction of its former numbers"

and

"fully 50 percent of eligible Americans don't even bother to vote"

and

"recent report by the Organisation for Economic Co-Operation and Development states that upward of 60 percent of Americans ages 16-25 are 'functionally illiterate'"

This article is about apathy? People not voting? Illiteracy? All of the above?

peace