This story reminds me of a Jimmy Kimmel segment: https://www.news.com.au/entertainment/tv/jimmy-kimmel-reveals-simple-test-so-many-americans-just-cant-pass/news-story/e4a43b076266459f9a0683bc2c23bc0f
The exact same thing happened to my co-worker in NJ a few years ago. Went to DMV with her Louisiana license and New Mexico birth certificate to get her NJ license. The mid-50’s clerk told her she couldn’t get a NJ license because they don’t accept foreign birth certificates. My friend pointed out the birth certificate was from New Mexico. The clerk reiterated that she couldn’t help her. She asked for a supervisor. Luckily, the supervisor was an immigrant who had gotten citizenship several years earlier and informed the clerk that NM was indeed a part of the US.
What struck me most when I read about this, was that several years ago the District of Columbia re-designed its drivers’ licences because of multiple complaints by DC residents that officials in other states were confused by the word “Columbia” and refused to accept the IDs as valid US licenses. After that experience, I would have expected DC officials to be more on top of all of this!
This happened to my S on several occasions when he had a DC drivers license. One time he was buying beer in NJ. The store was hesitant to accept the license as identification. The clerk called over a supervisor because she wasn’t sure they accepted foreign IDs.
My husband is from West Virginia. A friends boyfriend didn’t know it was a state.
Reading these accounts has me shaking my head in resigned frustration. I know many school systems are giving US geography short-schrift nowadays, but I’m surprised by the number of middle-aged adults who don’t seem able to recognize states as belonging to the mainland, much less AK and HI. I guess this may partially explain why some people didn’t believe 45 was a natural born US citizen. I also suddenly remember reading a post written a number of years ago by a Hawaiian denizen of CC; when visiting relatives in CONUS, some random stranger asked her in all seriousness if they speak English in Hawaii. 8-|
“I guess this may partially explain why some people didn’t believe 45 was a natural born US citizen.”
That’s the first time I’ve heard the suggestion that New York isn’t part of the United States :))
We lived in NM when I was a young child. When we moved to Seattle several adults (including one teacher) complimented me on my English. These were folks born in the 30s or 40s, so geography has been a problem for quite a while.
Then the first time it snowed everyone wanted to know if I had ever seen snow before, and couldn’t believe that people ski regularly in NM.
So what do you think it is? Pretty sure everyone is taught the map of the U.S. in 4th grade or so. Do some people not care? Are they not intelligent? What is it exactly?
Presumably, people who missed the geography segment in elementary school did actually manage to learn to read there and can, you know, look it up on Google.
As in, “Wait, New Mexico is a state? What? Let me Google that before I issue your marriage license.”
Even if they missed a geography lesson in elementary school, and who remembers that anyway?, how is it possible that an adult American doesn’t know that New Mexico is a state? Seriously. Have they never looked at a map, or watched the news, or listened to election returns, or read a book? It boggles the mind.
The same people perhaps who go out and buy iTunes cards because they get a call from the “IRS” telling them that there is a warrant out for their arrest if they don’t pay back taxes they owe. And they are not all elderly and or suffering from dementia. Those scams are covered extensively in the media.
^^That’s a little different. That’s a scare tactic used mostly against elderly people. You don’t have to be frightened into thinking New Mexico is not a state or the District of Colombia is not part of the USA.
At least there’s a possible logic behind the DC snafu. I could see someone thinking, “I’ve been told I need to see a state driver’s license and DC isn’t a state.” I think some people think DC is part of Maryland.
I think the crux of the problem is the acceptance and even encouragement of anti-intellectualism in this country. It infuriates me. But it is true. Even though knowing the 40 states and the U.S. capital is not necessarily an example of “intellectualism,” a large swath of the country feels more comfortable not knowing stuff and ridiculing those of us who are curious and knowledgeable.
@brantly–". Even though knowing the 40 states and the U.S. capital "
That’s the total problem. Too many people know only 40 states instead of the full 50.
Pretty sad state of affairs…
I agree. I’m appalled by Americans’ lack of knowledge about geography and about the rest of the world in general. Talk to most Europeans and they can identify most of the world on a map. Americans? You’re luck if they can find the US. It’s sad.
I travel a fair amount and while I’ve never been all that surprised that the majority of people around the world I’ve met know our president (whoever happens to be in office at the time) I have been shocked at how much many know about our government, down to who the Speaker of the House is or who is the current US Ambassador to the UN. I would bet most Americans couldn’t name 5 foreign heads of state.
(Edited to correct a typo)
It is appalling. We celebrate ignorance, it seems.
Sadly, once at the San Juan, PR airport, I overheard an American asking an airport employee where the currency exchange desk was so that he could convert USD to "Puerto Rican money. "