“And yeah, you... sorority girl. Just in case you accidentally wander into a voting booth one day, there are some things you should know, and one of them is: There is absolutely no evidence to support the statement that we're the greatest country in the world. We're seventh in literacy, twenty-seventh in math, twenty-second in science, forty-ninth in life expectancy, 178th in infant mortality, third in median household income, number four in labor force, and number four in exports. We lead the world in only three categories: number of incarcerated citizens per capita, number of adults who believe angels are real, and defense spending, where we spend more than the next twenty-six countries combined, twenty-five of whom are allies. None of this is the fault of a 20-year-old college student, but you, nonetheless, are without a doubt a member of the WORST-period-GENERATION-period-EVER-period, so when you ask what makes us the greatest country in the world, I don't know what the fuck you're talking about! Yosemite?”
Starting strong with some sexism, gotta love that. Let’s just dismiss the girl asking the question because she’s not what you think an intelligent woman looks like. We don’t really rank literacy by that metric, it’s measured by the percentage of the population which is literate. In that regard, the United States comes in at a healthy 99%, and bear in mind North Korea is counted as 100% so the definition of “literacy” is debatable. I don’t know how you rank a country’s math and science, but I’d love to read those statistics. Life expectancy is measured by various different organizations, but most of them agree that the United States lies around 25-30th place. Not great, but not 49th.
178th place in the infant mortality column actually goes to Mali, but the United States is very close, coming in at spot number 34 in terms of lowest infant mortality being the lowest score possible. We do lead the nation in persons incarcerated, that much is true. The next line I imagine is a comment on organized religion, which is again false; only 60 percent of Americans believe that religion is an important part of their life, making us one of the least religious nations on the planet.
In terms of defense spending, yes, we do spend more than anybody else. However, in the next 26 countries you do not see 25 allies. You see Russia and China, direct adversaries of ours; you further see Saudi Arabia, Israel, Colombia and Afghanistan who, while friendly to the United States, do not share an official defense treaty with America (excepting the de facto defunct rio treaty with Colombia). Then we have India, Brazil, the UAE, Algeria, and Singapore, nations who, while still on good/friendly terms with the US, also do not have military ties. So the point about the rest of the nations being allies of ours falls flat on its stupid face.
He then goes on to say that none of this is the fault of the student, and then tells her that she is part of the worst generation ever. So if none of this is her fault, how is she the worst generation? Wouldn’t the generation responsible for said issues be the worst? Or is it a trait of a well-educated populace to blame all their problems on people who, by their own admission have only been able to vote for 2 years, at best?
“We sure used to be. We stood up for what was right. We fought for moral reasons, we passed laws, struck down laws for moral reasons. We waged wars on poverty, not poor people. We sacrificed, we cared about our neighbors, we put our money where our mouths were, and we never beat our chest. We built great big things, made ungodly technological advances, explored the universe, cured diseases, and we cultivated the world's greatest artists and the world's greatest economy. We reached for the stars, acted like men. We aspired to intelligence; we didn't belittle it; it didn't make us feel inferior. We didn't identify ourselves by who we voted for in the last election, and we didn't scare so easy. We were able to be all these things and do all these things because we were informed. By great men, men who were revered. The first step in solving any problem is recognizing there is one. America is not the greatest country in the world anymore.”
We stood up for what was right and fought for moral reasons? Please, show me the war we entered for moral reasons. We didn’t enter WWII to stop the Holocaust, mind you. We only entered that war after we’d been attacked. Or is he referring to such glorious, righteous wars as the Spanish-American war? Or perhaps when we forcibly exterminated the majority of the native population of our country in an act of war, was that a moral war?
We continue to strike down immoral laws and pass moral ones at a more steadily-increasing pace than ever before, largely because of that generation the narrator seems to hate so much. We never beat our chests? I’m sorry, we’ve been beating our chests ever since this asshole’s generation was born after their parents fought World War II, it’s not a new phenomenon. We continue to build great things and make ungodly technological advances, in fact at a faster rate than ever before! What used to take us 10 years to develop and advance now takes us 5, and soon it will be reduced to 1, and then 6 months, etc.
We still explore the universe. We just created an Ebola vaccine, and we continue to lead the world in both economics and the arts (in many aspects). We “acted like men” is a stupid thing to say because it doesn’t really mean anything. A country cannot “act like men”, and insinuating as much is absolutely ridiculous. Intelligence today is more appreciated and cultivated than ever before, with “nerd culture” being a thing that is accepted by the mainstream. And the speech from there devolves into a series of buzzwords and attempted cynicism mixed with a nice dose of misogyny and revisionist history.
Edited by Cappin' Pissflapps, 21 October 2015 - 05:58 AM.
