Just post something ๐
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More (not so) fun facts:
54% of American adults read below a 6th grade level.
21% read below a 5th grade level, which is considered functionally illiterate.
High immigration numbers don't fully explain it either, as first gen immigrants only make up about 1/3 of those with low literacy.
No, all this is is a perfect example of an article that shows how people like yourself and so many others in this thread are so frustrated with online discourse and other issues that they will take any excuse to feel justified about it, despite not reading or understanding the original study. Also, the fact that so many here are not realising the study has been misquoted and taken out of context to form a viral narrative is equally concerning.
So really what this has shown to me is most of the people in this thread lack the exact type of comprehension skills and scepticism that they themselves would proudly complain other people seem to lack.
All I hear is "mental gymnastics to justify low literacy rates and add virtue signaling on top of it."
Seriously, don't you have anything more prescient to manufacture outrage over? Like for instance the fact that the education system is systemically failing in its duty, and also being systematically defunded, degraded, and dismantled? Or the resurgence of right-wing extremism that that degradation enables, as well as the return to power of fascist insider-trading nepo babies? At the very least, how about climate denialism and the anti-vax movement, both of which are predicated on low literacy rates?
But no, I'm the one being offensive by suggesting society should do better? As if the students being failed by the education system aren't being disadvantaged by that systemic failure? As if my pointing out that as a society we should expect better is what's really disadvantaging those students?
Sure, buddy...
If you understood the article, you'd understand that countries with the highest literacy rates in the world scored 35-45% values in similar metrics. But you didn't want to understand the article, you wanted to be angry. "Buddy".
Are you suggesting that it's okay just because other countries have high rates of illiteracy? Or are you saying that the metric is flawed, and that that obviously means the US doesn't have an illiteracy problem since the research methodology was flawed?
Either way, I hard disagree.
The metric isn't flawed, you just don't understand what the metric is saying, and the "article" is severely misleading about what the study actually found. There is not even a single source that links the results of the study to a "6th grade reading level" - that was entirely made up.
My point was other countries with high rates of LITERACY also scored similar amounts or amounts that were only marginally better, because the test taken was quite high level, and the methodology was flawed, it's a bit of a double whammy.
This is genuinely taken out of context because it's perfect outrage clickbait.
Okay, once you get your own argument straight without contradicting yourself then maybe I'll take you seriously?
So is the whole world as illiterate as the US, or is the US as literate as the rest of the world? Because you seem to be saying one or the other and I still can't figure out which...