Oh dear, your school system sounds awful! Unfortunately, the Italian one isn’t much better. It is underfunded and understaffed too, and the curriculum so outdated! Education there is compulsory, but the majority of students just can’t be bothered to study. They do what they must to get a good grade, and forget everything they’ve learned 10 minutes later. We need schools and teachers that know how to engage students and encourage them to learn and develop critical-thinking skills.

Yeah. I think it’s especially hard in America to deal with. We’re very… backwards, in a lot of ways. Anti-science, anti-intellectual, as if knowing things makes us “too good”, “too uppity” for the common man. What these people miss is that in a compulsory system, EVERYONE would get this education (with only minor outliers, like my sister, who was too sick to attend). Herd immunity works with education, too! 😛 Critical thinking courses should definitely be part of a high school curriculum before Uni, and the science courses could spend more time on functional human anatomy.

Plus, we’re such a really, really big, spread-out country that the political system is divided by necessity between state powers and national/federal powers, so states individually can control what they teach and how much money they have to spend teaching, which is a mess in itself. In the end, schools get chronically underfunded, and people suffer. Not many of us on the bottom ever have a chance of getting out and seeing firsthand how other countries’ systems work… so too many believe the lie that it’s worse elsewhere, and that it isn’t worth trying to improve because we’re the best there is already. But we’re the ones who need it most! The only solution is to work to find time to educate yourself here. No one will do it for you unless you’re very lucky.

Bebetaian, amen! I wish there were more people like you, who prefer to inform others than taking advantage of them by selling them dangerous nonsense. But I also blame the school system. If they made science lessons more interesting, then people would know how their liver works and wouldn’t be so easily fooled.

I especially despise certain elements of the industry I work in because it’s religious, and religion breeds a whole lot of false or dubious-at-best claims. I’ve seen everything from the dangerously fraudulent (like wearing citrine will cure diabetes) to “make this herbal concoction and boost your liver!” … no. No. There is NO substantiated evidence for that, and just because herbs are “all natural” does NOT mean they are safe to take! Auugh! St. John’s Wort can cancel out your birth control! A lot of herbs interact with warfarin and other meds! IF YOUR LIVER FUNCTIONS, YOU DON’T NEED A BOOST! JUST DRINK SOME PLAIN WATER! Do you even understand how a liver works? I mean, ffs, you can cut a healthy liver in HALF and grow BACK the other half! That’s how good they are at their job! x.x

::laughs:: I get so much hate for that stance, but I really couldn’t care less. I’d rather you be safe and informed than for me to be $10 richer.

If you’re sweating, you’re probably too hot. Don’t give yourself heat exhaustion! And especially don’t push yourself to stroke! And as always, drink lots of water.

Allison, thanks. It is very silly indeed. It angers me that there are so many businesses making money by taking advantage of people this way. *sighs*