America: The Know-Nothing Country

Via NY Transfer News * All the News That Doesn't Fit

Let 'em eat DVDs... They're dumb and happy and they'll 
defend to the death their right to stay that way.


Agence France Presse via Times of India - June 10, 2002
http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/articleshow.asp?art_ID=12599482


AMERICANS HAVE NO APPETITE FOR WORLD NEWS: REPORT

WASHINGTON, June 10 (AFP)--Short of wars or major crises,
international news stories still largely fail to pique the interest
of Americans, despite the superpower status of their country,
according to a survey made public Sunday.

And the September 11 suicide attacks, which have shown that conflicts
overseas could now easily boomerang against the US, appear to have
changed little in that attitude, according to the study by the Pew
Research Center for the People and the Press.

"There is no evidence its (the public's) appetite for international
news extends much beyond terrorism and West Asia," said the authors
of the study who polled 3,002 adults between April 26 and May 12.

The researchers have detected only a modest rise in the percentage of
Americans who follow international news very closely since 2000 -
from 14 percent to 21 percent.

Meanwhile, a solid 61-percent majority continued to follow
international news only when people saw events they deemed relevant
to them. To be sure, 39 percent of those surveyed paid very close
attention to the war in Afghanistan and 38 percent followed West Asia
violence. But from there, it was practically all downhill.

When tensions between nuclear-armed India and Pakistan flared up for
the first time in January, only 23 percent of the public cared enough
to pay heed. The political convulsion in France triggered by the
success of ultra-right-winger Jean-Marie Le Pen in the first round of
the presidential elections was hardly a blip on the US public's radar
screen -- only six percent said they paid attention to it.

 
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nytmed-06.12.02-07:24:40-29608