The Consequences of Not Being Socially Aware

Australian fake news and satire show, CNNNN, is known for its political mockings and parodies. It's no surprise then, that the United States is being for its supposed lack of social awareness. Americans are being interviewed in the streets in the video, and are asked simple questions that anyone who bothers reading the headlines on CNN would know. However, whether they chose to answer incorrectly for humor or not, their responses were often humorous and embarrassing for an American like me. A question such as, "What is the Buddhist monks' religion?" appeared to have stumped some people. I do personally think that this portrayal of America is incorrect; as they must have surveyed many more people before they either found a few people who were either willing to give silly answers or really needed to pick up a newspaper.

Nonetheless, this is not representative of the US educational system, obviously seen because some of the people interviewed in the video may have immigrated into America after their childhood. After attending religious-affiliated, secular-private, and public schools both in affluent neighborhoods and run-down ghettos, I can say from experience that America's educational system isn't too bad. It doesn't shield students from real life issues. Rather, Americans are encouraged to discover these issues on our own if we want to become global citizens. My cousin in China attends school from 5 in the morning to 10 at night in China, not even including homework and food, much less sleep. I doubt he has much time to read a newspaper, but most American students do.

If these people really weren't faking their answers just for 15 seconds of fame or humor, I hope that they'll be alarmed by this video and will pick up a newspaper or watch some real 'CNN' sometime soon. I don't see the relation this video has to the United States (they didn't survey any other countries so this lack of social awareness isn't proven to be only the 'US' problem), but perhaps it's warning all of us, citizens of all countries, to make sure we're more socially aware and educated about current events.