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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.
The irony is if you're smart enough to read a nyt article you should be smart enough to realize what a rag it is. Unless you support genocide I guess.
1/3 of it being caused by immigration is an angle I'd never thought about that actually makes me feel a tiny bit better
see the thing is that I've already misjudged how dumb the average person is. I give too much credit to people.
same thing with people being assholes. I just kind I've assumed that people generally want to not be assholes. nope, absolutely not, wildly incorrect. the average person doesn't give a fuck about anything but themself at that moment
Me read biggly. Me top smart person in country.
You know what's even better?
The next generation isn't going to be able to read nor focus on anything for more than 60 seconds, and after it comes to pass there still won't be any meaningful regulation of social media either.
TL;DR
TL...π¦πΏοΈ
Tldr
I've studied this a little before (at graduate school) and I don't think we know exactly why, mostly because it's a ton of factors and none of the different camps in academia seem to agree on one.
Your standard Lemmy user may appreciate that late stage capitalism probably is the biggest factor, since poverty and illiteracy are hand in hand. The professor I RA'd for, for instance, just did projects that gave families money and they just did better. It was really that simple, since a ton of this is in the home, even before starting preschool.
But others have argued that there's also an anti-intellectualism in our culture (even before MAGA, kids go "ew nerds") and even more say it's pedagogy. That includes theory, like whole word vs phonics (my advisor spoke of the reading wars of the 90s like he had PTSD lol) as well as practice, like memorization vs reading for reading sake.
And, of course, the government under Bush Jr. really did the opposite of research by enacting the bipartisan No Child Left Behind which fucked both poor folk with contextless "accountability practices" while pushing soulless memorization.
Sorry for a long rant, just, y'know in 2025 onwards it's easy to forget that education has been routinely fucked, usually by conservatives. I can always explain more though, just don't want to make this comment too long, lol
They were supposed to bring critical thinking to the high schools and conservative parents in the US threw a shit fit because they truly believed their kids would no longer believe what they did. We never got critical thinking in high school and most people don't get an introduction to it until college.
Critical thinking should start in kindergarten and by third grade children should be able to create a simple opinion based on facts they understand. We are doing such a disservice to young people it isn't funny.
I'm not sure if it played out quite like that originally, though I guess there would be some people's parents thinking that way, especially in 2026. Keep in mind, NCLB was bipartisan.
In 2003, though, I read that the reality for a majority of schools is a bit more stupid, they don't understand testing and statistics at the federal level and designed a system of accountability that promoted teach-to-the-test methods, which is mostly memorization. That's because low performing schools (read: poor schools) got punished for not meeting an arbitrary test score, so it was a go to survival tactic.
Conservatives still get their desired result, though, which is an education system with minimal critical thinking practiced. Perhaps it was a poison pill, or something, given it's made Americans by and large even dumber since then (and we were already doing bad for other reasons and Reagan).
Nyt is 7th grade reading level btw nothing impressive but people are quite poor at reading
this is quite upsetting to read
OP is apparently not part of the hyper-literate educated elite.
Are you highly intelligent but not part of the global elite cabal of pedophile baby eaters. You should try suicide.
This statement is kind of glossing over things:
"If you can read a New York Times article..."
It's not that most people can't read the words, and possibly understand the basic surface level of what it says. But at the "6th grade level "they're sometimes failing to recognize sarcasm/tone, potential biases, implied meanings, and the greater context of things not directly stated in the article that would impact the full understanding.
Yes! It's actually an important distinction to make between being able to read the article and being able to comprehend it and then furthermore being able to contextualise it.
Interestingly, I believe this is somewhat similar, but also a bit of a digression so forgive me lol. I am autistic and many people I interact with don't notice unless I tell them. My report actually says, that, particularly with verbal social interactions, although it can appear that I understand everything I'm actually only getting that kind of "surface level" information - hence I can miss social cues and such. I can get along okay with that surface level information because I can still participate in the conversation with the bare bones.
I think this is somewhat similar to how some people can read - they can read the words, get the general gist but they miss a lot of the implications that aren't directly stated. This is why you get a lot of people who can regurgitate kind of "headline news" but don't actually understand the issue being discussed - they understand the formed sentences but not the full picture. I'm not sure if that makes sense but that's how I am starting to understand the difference that some people have between reading and comprehension. And how it explains that sometimes someone can sound like they might know what they are talking about - until the conversation gets to a certain point.
When they say "If you can read a New York Times article" do they literally mean just READ the words and understand them individually, or do they mean read and possess the ability to apply critical thinking skills to what you just read?
It's your ability to spot potential author bias, leading language, context outside the article that might point to inaccuracies or omissions, tones like sarcasm, etc.
They can read the words at the most basic level, but are missing a lot of the actual meaning.
I think they must also mean comprehension.
I read a little about how they determine "levels" of reading ability, and while vocabulary is part of it, higher level reading also considers sentence complexity, the ability to identify concepts, make inferences, pick up on the theme or tone, consider the author's biases, etc.
Ahh, thank's for looking that up! It makes me me feel... slightly better? Although it doesn't make me feel great that there are so many people out there with just enough reading skills to be dangerous (applying their own biases, etc).
Exactly. Or just enough to read an opinion piece, but not enough to consider conceptual flaws in the argument or the author's intent/biases.
The other end is concerning too. I sometimes get the sense that even well-intentioned "elites" in politics/journalism/media come up with solutions for stuff that would work in their bubble, but are a complete disaster when applied to the general public because the nuance is lost.
I see you've written words that I can read, but I have no clue what you're trying to say... so idk, can't answer your question (I think it's a question at least, there's definitely a question mark at the end)
Vocabulary vs reading comprehension.
(If your comment is a joke, ignore me and chalk it up to Poe's Law)
Iβll take the win, I get to be elite at something
You were always elite in our hearts, Shortstack
If you're curious as to the level various books are rated as, you can look them up on AR Bookfinder
The ATOS Book Level is more helpful than the Lexile score - a Book Level of 4.3 (for example) means that a child should be able to read and comprehend that book by the 3rd month of Grade 4.
(The full site is a subscription thing - kid reads book, does 10 question test on book. Kid consistently shows they've understood the books they've read and the site recommends books of a higher level. The catalogue is free, though.)
That's not really a good scenario for a modern democracy to find itself in for reasons that are unfortunately already very clear
Don't worry chatgpt will fix this, they'll explain all the hard concepts for us dummies with only a bit of advertising and corporate propaganda injected.
I think one way we see this play out frequently is watching people debate issues unproductively with obviously zero theory of mind for their opposition due to one or both parties involved having poor communication skills.
So wait, do I struggle to make friends because I read two gewd or cause Im a asshole?
I've always wondered why the old timers across the globe have always pushed education this hard with the youth. This is why. The consequences of proud ignorance are catastrophic.
adults where? all across the globe? not a bubble.
how about the 50% that canβt read live in a bubble, not the other way around?
This is why Trump resonates with so much of the country. They can understand him.
Those boomers were much more upset about school integration than I really understood.
Can't read the New York Times? Probably because it's behind a pay wall.
Have they tried to create a free account, or log in?
You can gain access to limited free articles, news alerts, select newsletters, podcasts and some daily games.
Honestly, the education backsliding is one of the tragedies that will be take us generations to fix an education is the best defense against propaganda
Is it backsliding or has it always been this bad?
Definitely backsliding.
We used to teach phonics, now a lot of schools use some bullshit called three-cueing which literally teaches kids to guess words they don't recognize.
βBy the 1990s and early 2000s, research began to conclude that phonics was the necessary method of teaching reading to children, with an American congressional panel in 2000 concluding that the essential components of reading instruction were "vocabulary, comprehension and phonics". Programs began to re-incorporate phonics around this time, although three cueing remained a part of curriculums in the approaches ofΒ balanced literacyΒ andΒ whole language.[1][4]Β As of 2020, an estimated 75% of American teachers used three cueingβ
There's a reason why Republicans are constantly cutting school funding, and pushing idiotic policies that basically force school resources to get diverted and underperformers to be passed regardless of readiness.
It's backsliding It's the constant war for defunding education that Republicans fight as soon as they get in
Might have something to do with society being overrun to hell with demands for attention from worthless trash text that wastes our time while begging for money. Like the New York Times, for example.
Give kids a reason to learn to read, stop making it a gateway to an onerous burden, then we'll talk.