For a democratic society to work at all, people need to understand what’s going on. They need to be informed of the issues, sure, but they also need to understand the limits of government and, frankly, reality.
That means it needs a well-educated electorate.
That’s what the Founding Fathers envisioned and it’s what we should be trying to create. Unfortunately, at least one key area of knowledge seems to be lacking.
I’m talking about basic civics.
A recent survey from the Annenburg Public Policy Center shows that roughly one-third of adult Americans are unable to name the three branches of the federal government.
…
The survey shows that roughly 50 percent of adults know which party has a majority control of the Senate andd the House of Representatives. Additionally, only 65 percent of U.S. adults were able to name each of the three branches of the government.
When asked about the rights guaranteed by the First Amendment, 74 percent of adult respondents were able to list freedom of speech as being one of the rights. However, four other rights guaranteed under the First Amendment, including freedom of religion, was only listed by 39 percent of the respondents.
Less than a third of Adult Americans listed freedom of the press as being a right under the First Amendment, 27 percent stated the right to assembly, and only 11 percent stated the right to petition the government.
I’m going to point out how strange that is, though, because few are trying to eliminate freedom of religion, but they are attacking freedom of speech.
Of course, maybe if they knew it was a right, they’d go after it, too.
But that’s not all the survey found, just the worst.
This is pretty basic stuff, yet a lot of these folks support things like hate speech legislation and call you ignorant for saying it’s unconstitutional.
I saw this bit at the site where the survey results are that I thought was important:
“Civics knowledge matters,” says Kathleen Hall Jamieson, director of the Annenberg Public Policy Center. “Those who do not understand the rights protected by the Constitution can neither cherish nor invoke them; those who do not know which party controls the House and Senate may misattribute credit or blame for action or inaction.”
She’s not wrong.
It’s why we keep seeing so many people call for gun control and support things like assault weapon bans and even handgun bans. They literally don’t understand the phrase “shall not be infringed.” They don’t see our rights as sacrosanct.
And it’s not just our gun rights, as we can obviously see.
Meanwhile, our educational establishment wants to indoctrinate our kids on things like climate change and whatever cause the alphabet mafia wants to tack onto LGBTQWTFBBQ.
They can’t get the essentials right, and civics is pretty damn essential.
I’m honestly amazed that there were as many with as much understanding as there is considering what a trainwreck our schools tend to be.
I know a number of teachers. They’re hardworking and dedicated. They just want to make these kids educated in the essentials and teach them how to think and understand.
They’re not who I’m talking about here.
I’m talking about the legions of others who see their profession as being about pushing an agenda instead of covering the basics.
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A lot of people simply think that a Constitution written in 1787 (not that they know when it was written) should not be taken seriously today.
Of course, arguably, there's four branches --- the fourth being an unaccountable and increasingly out-of-control administrative state