Younger Americans are more likely to say the United States of America is racist and sexist, and half of the youngest generation thinks that Barack Obama had a bigger impact on American history than George Washington, a new study revealed Tuesday. The results also showed a terrifying decrease in American patriotism among younger generations.
“Younger Americans are less patriotic, they’re less excited about America’s history, they’re less excited about the exceptionalism of the United States. That, I think, is a crying shame,” Nick Adams, founder of the Foundation for Liberty and American Greatness (FLAG), told PJ Media in an interview on Monday.
“This poll details alarming anti-Americanism and an almost total dearth of any knowledge or appreciation of basic civics, especially among millennials and Generation Z.”
The poll revealed that more than half of Americans under age 21 think Barack Obama had a greater impact on American history than the first president, George Washington. Among those referred to as “young millennials” or “Generation Z,” 49 percent of those between 14 and 17 said Obama had a bigger impact than Washington, and 55 percent of those between the ages of 18 and 21 agreed.
Meanwhile, more than 60 percent of those in the Silent Generation (age 73 and older), the Baby Boomers (54-72), Generation X (38-53) and older millennials (22-37) rightly said Washington had the larger impact. After all, Obama only had two terms in office, partly because Washington set the standard for all later presidents — with the exception of Franklin Delano Roosevelt.
While younger millennials have a unique weakness for Obama, older millennials proved most likely to say that America is a racist and sexist country. Tragically, roughly half of all Americans said America is sexist (50 percent) and racist (49 percent), but the numbers proved even worse among older millennials.
Fully six in ten older millennials said America is sexist (60 percent), and even more said the country is racist (63 percent). Slightly less than half (46 percent) said America is more racist than other countries.
When asked if patriotism is a good thing, more than 90 percent of Baby Boomers (92 percent) and members of the Silent Generation (93 percent) said yes, while even 85 percent of Generation X agreed. Far fewer older millennials (78 percent) and younger millennials (73 percent and 71 percent) agreed. Older millennials proved the least likely to say they were proud to be Americans.
“If America is going to continue to be the exceptional nation on this earth, the young people today who are going to be entrusted with the future of this great nation, they have to know what makes America great and what makes it different from every other country in the world,” FLAG founder Nick Adams argued.
“They don’t necessarily think it’s great and they certainly don’t understand that it’s very different from other countries,” he lamented. Adams insisted that younger Americans need to understand “why the Constitution is the best political document ever written.”
Tragically, however, “they couldn’t tell you what the Declaration of Independence says, what the Federalist Papers are, and they couldn’t name four out of the five rights enumerated in the First Amendment.”
The First Amendment is “the bread and butter of American exceptionalism, acknowledged on both sides, and 84 percent can’t tell you about it,” he said. This “shows a country in peril.”
Tragically, more than 80 percent of every generation failed to identify the rights in the First Amendment (with 89 percent of millennials between 18 and 21 unable to do so). Vast majorities also failed to identify when the Constitution was ratified or who wrote the Federalist Papers.
Perhaps even worse, however, nearly half of Americans under 37 said America’s future should be driven by socialism rather than capitalism. Only 17 percent of the Silent Generation, 30 percent of Baby Boomers, and 39 percent of Generation Xers preferred socialism, while 47 percent of older millennials, 47 percent of middle millennials, and 50 percent of those aged 14 to 17 preferred socialism.
“So essentially, you have young people in America embracing — or at the very least not distancing themselves from — something that is the antithesis of the American idea,” Nick Adams told PJ Media. “Believing in socialism is about as anti-American as you can get.”
“When you start looking at the effects of socialism on culture — striving for mediocrity as opposed to greatness — they are antithetical to the American idea,” he explained. “All the things that are hallmarks of a socialist society haven’t happened here. People who are successful have always been admired. People that are individuals and don’t want to conform are considered brave.”
“Culturally, America repels socialism, but these guys want to give it a big hug,” Adams quipped.
“We need to make sure that every child in this country has a heart beating for America,” he argued. “Every child in this country need to be not just lukewarm about their nation, but on fire for it. We need to make sure that every child knows and appreciates the Constitution, the Declaration of Independence, and the Federalist Papers.”
They need to know that “the day they were born in America is the day they won the lottery of life. We have to work on severing these new links to socialism and other ideologies that don’t fit with American exceptionalism, and we do that by getting in there as early as possible.”
Adams argued that this polls should be “a huge wake-up call” for the conservative movement. Many conservatives are rightly concerned about college classrooms, but they need to start educating kids far earlier.
“By the time any student sets foot on a college campus, the indoctrination that began on the first day of elementary school is well and truly complete,” he argued. “We need to educate them in elementary and middle schools, even before high school. To think that we’re going to fight it on college campuses is just a fantasy.”
Follow the author of this article on Twitter at @Tyler2ONeil.
Join the conversation as a VIP Member