That is a very fair point - this is quite possibly an issue right across "the West" (which can include NZ in this case). I've noticed it in Ireland, in France,

That is a very fair point - this is quite possibly an issue right across "the West" (which can include NZ in this case). I've noticed it in Ireland, in France, in Germany. Even the Scandos seem not to be immune. I'll have to think about it some more. I will say this though - America is at the vanguard of anti-intellectualism, and has been for quite some time. Mark Twain commented on it frequently, for example. And even so, the last couple decades have seen the dismissal of deep / nuanced thinking grow far worse, even as "bipartisanship" also rapidly got bad enough to bring us a lot closer to civil war than I expected in the 90s. One last point - it's weird that this would happen even as everyone gets nerdier. People all use computers, watch LOTR and Harry Potter, cosplaying and conventions are all normalized... It's not what I'd have expected.