Hey! Americans aren't stupid take that back.

Are we as American a literate country or are we a country full of illiterate unintelligent stupid Americans? Literacy is very important in our world and is also very important that a majority of a country is literate. But what is the definition of literacy? The definition from Princeton of literacy is “the ability to read and write”. I myself find this very true; however, Chris Hedges seems to have a very different view of what literacy is. Chris’s view on literacy seems to me to be more of a how many books do you read? I myself highly disagree with this argument. Why do I say that? I say this because I myself have not read a book in probably a year, but does this make me illiterate?
Chris seems to judge a person on whether he or she is literate based on if they make good or bad decisions. Bashing people for getting into mortgage trouble, voting based on how charismatic a person is, and on whether we eat fast food or not. I have a hard time trying to wrap my mind around what Chris is trying to say right now. Is it that the reason why so many Americans get themselves into financial problems because they’re illiterate? Is the fast food industry largest consumer the illiterate? I believe that Chris is over exaggerating the fact that America is illiterate. Yes there are people that get into trouble with credit cards and mortgages because they don’t read the fine print, but is that because they’re illiterate or is this because they simply don’t read it. What I would like to ask Chris is where he got all of his data concerning America with we are literate or how many books we have purchased. All of his information seems like it came from a highly unreliable source. To give Chris credit I do believe our presidents are dumbing themselves down for the elections but at the same time it would make more sense someone campaigning to do this. The attention span of many has dropped and we as Americans can no longer pay attention (Carr would also agree with this) and with this who would want to listen to someone who explains how he’s going to do something. Instead Americans want answers and only answers.
Though I highly disagree with many of Chris’s opinions I do see some truth in it. We as Americans seem to be living in the fast paced world and now instead of having an elaborate story, we want the cut and dry part. In my opinion aside from the fact that we have a short attention span I can’t see anyone that would have any opinions that would agree with Chris.