Submitted without comment. Just a question: What do you think? I'd love to hear from non USA Americans?

[DrPepper12]

This is a "poll of polls" that aggregates the data over a set time period which in this instance is 2012-2022

[DryGermanGuy]

This is just sad. What else could you say? I have posted this before, but all American elite universities are struggling to find American students for their PhD programs. 90-95% of participants are foreigners. The damage was done in the school system. 🤷‍♂️

[DrPepper12]

As an educator, I agree with you there but like everything else in America, you have to focus on who profits from the problem, not who suffers.

[loveslongnails]

Would you say that most people responding read this as teaching something in the Arabic language, as opposed to English? :)

[DrPepper12]

No. I think that Americans are just patently ignorant and arrogant about the very suggestion that they didn't invent EVERYTHING. It pisses me off a lot tbh. I'm surrounded by people so ignorant of history, language, art, economics, culture it's like your shouting into the wind. I really have to look hard for intelligent conversation

[loveslongnails]

Sorry to hear that. Fortunately, I seem to have a lot of very intelligent and well-informed people in my circle, but there's plenty of stupidity to go around! LOL

[menina]

I'm not surprised by the answer. The people who responded probably don't know what Arabic numerals are.

[menina]

Thank you for the MHO.

[Lynx122]

"lol" that's all you can say :)

[DrPepper12]

But these people vote and their vote counts as much as ours!!

[Lynx122]

Yep, but I firmly believe that when you empower the population people will get better. In Switzerland people can vote on specific policies that affect peoples lives like raising the retirement age of women to 65 like mens retirement or something like that and people have to make decisions that weigh the situation of our pension system which is difficult everywhere because of the shrinking populations against working more etc. So people have to think about these things more deeply and you get a lot of information along with the ballots to cast your votes on where both sides state their case for why they are for or against the new law.

I think it's the feeling of not being heard not being empowered not mattering that makes people check out and think why should I know anything about these things it doesn't matter anyway. And then they also tend towards extremes and they vote out of emotion to vent all those feelings of being unheard instead of what's actually best for the country and the future it was the same with the Brexit vote. Sure some people were racists or were just lied to but a lot of voters felt powerless and this referendum was their big chance to stick it to the man but instead they stuck it to themselves in the end. It's more an indictment about the years of government before the referendum than it was about the EU.

But if people regularly get a say on important matters they will notice that they're making important decisions and they need to be responsible and be informed and understand things even if they're complex. At least that's my experience but I know it's more complicated to empower people in a bigger country but I believe the effort would be worth it.

[DrPepper12]

TY for one of the most cogent intelligent responses I've ever seen here!