Are Americans Just Stupid?

[Angrboda]

If you're frequently wrong, being anti-intellectual is a winning strategy. Also, if you hold beliefs that are hard to defend, anti-intellectualism is a winning strategy. Anti-intellectualism becomes a matter of rational self-interest, and something of a self-perpetuating one. If you encourage people to be anti-intellectual, more people will be frequently wrong or hold beliefs that are hard to defend, thus increasing the trend toward anti-intellectualism. I don't know that it's necessarily a vicious cycle, but I think it can feed off itself.