"FEMA also been accused by former president Donald Trump, the Republican nominee, and other Republicans of not being able to respond well enough to Helene because it had diverted disaster relief funds to help migrants.

That is not true, because while FEMA administers the Shelter and Services Program, funding for it comes from a separate pot of money funded by Congress for U.S. Customs and Border Protection.

Other false claims that have circulated include that people taking federal relief money could see their land seized or that that $750 is the most they will ever get to rebuild. FEMA has pushed back against the false claims and conspiracy theories, setting up a page on its website to combat misinformation and rumors."

    • CharlesDarwin@lemmy.world
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      2 months ago

      I think our schools should start teaching critical thinking, media literacy and how to spot and name logical fallacies from a very early age and all through the 12th grade. You don’t have to be university-bound to learn this stuff; this should be foundational. It also gives people the tools to be more autodidactic - the poorly-educated talk about how they “did their own research” and others should do this, too. With proper instruction, I would actually think this is a good thing; however, for people who are primed for nonsense and not armored with critical thinking skills, this often does not turn out well. Otherwise, with a properly educated citizenry, I would think “doing your own research” would not have the negative connotation it now does.

      But schooling should be done in such a way that people can, and have the will to, learn new things.

    • Nightwingdragon@lemmy.world
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      2 months ago

      higher learning has been watered down to accommodate all the idiots that don’t want to be there but have to have a degree to join the workforce.

      This. This, this, this, this, this.

      We spent decades telling people, some of which quite frankly have no business in college, that college is literally the only path forward. And then when all of these people show up and find college to be way, way too hard for them, we continued to (and continue to) dumb down the education we provide so more people will graduate with increasingly worthless degrees.

      It’s how we’ve traditionally handled everything in the US. Rather than give people the tools to rise up to meet the standards, we simply drop the standards and then wonder why so many so-called college graduates having no clue what they’re talking about.

      But the graduation percentages are all that matters. Push them through the system for 13 years, give them the same diploma that you give students who actually earned it, and then wonder why employers consider diplomas in general worthless. And the same thing is happening with college degrees now.