My Frustration...

Matthew P. Black
8/31/2006
Introduction to American Government
My greatest frustration with my fellow Americans stems from a creation of a "culture of ignorance" that has stuck with this country far before its culmination. It is a human habit to generally take a path with the least resistance, to live in a simple day-to-day routine that takes no thought, and to elect politicians to make the decisions so the voter doesn’t have to. And why should the populous make a decision, when they can have family, television, radio, or even the internet tell them what they can and cannot believe in? I personally have a grandfather who has never once doubted anything he has heard from his favorite AM Talk Radio personality, but my grandfather is not alone. There is an incredible ease with falling into a trap of watching loud men on CNN or Fox News to send Iran to the Stone Age or believe the Iraq War was a sham. I cannot even begin to describe the frustration that I build up concerning the ignorance we as a country hold concerning the thoughts and ideas of the rest of the world.

Who or what is to blame? It’s easy to tag the ignorance on the federal government, or even better, the President. What faith or interest from the American masses can arise from a President who fumbles words on a regular basis or reelecting men who graduated from high school years before the first desegregation movements of the early 1950's? The majority of the population lies between the ages of 18-60, and yet we look to those even older as our guides for the future. In my opinion, we as an American society can only begin to prosper when we come to the realization that we can no longer rely on our grandfathers’ opinions on the course this country should take in the 21st Century. The country, even the world, has changed dramatically from when some of the ‘senior senators’ were first elected, and there is only so much longer we can still look at these relics for advice as to what course the country should take.