Europe

If you hear, let's say, Somalia, normally people would know it's roughly somewhere east in Africa, Uruguay somewhere in South America etc.

I've traveled a lot and only from Americans I've heard them say about countries they've "never heard of it". When I say I'm in Czechia, they just call it Chechnya, when I say I'm Dutch they love to mix that up with Denmark for some reason, etc.

Their excuse is always the same too: their school sucks. Dude, we didn't learn this stuff in school neither. It's common interest about the world around you, watching the news, etc. Half the countries you "don't know" were bombed by you.

When you put it into perspective: how many Europeans can correctly locate & name countries adjacent to them within their own continent and globally?

Practically all of them. Seriously.

Yes and no, I guess.

Theres some grade A morons in Europe as well. But I guess on the whole Europeans have better base education compared to the Americans. Doesn't help that Americans keep speaking of "Europe" as a whole, while Europe speaks of multiple different European countries as individuals.

how many Europeans can correctly locate & name countries adjacent to them

Nearly all, seriously, because nearly all have been to some school for at least a few years.

I will say that I know all 50 US states and there's really no reason why I should, as a European.

Most Americans always have had a shitty education, but the last few decades it really went down a toilet

Geography isn't the only thing they're bad at, it's just a funny obvious one, especially when they need their point out the country they're invading this time

And yes, pretty much all Europeans can point out heit neighbouring countries, most of them can pretty much point at any county on a map or a globe, because w received an education

My partner was telling me the other day about an American guy she saw on TikTok complaining that people from Europe don't know enough about American geography.

I grew up in the UK in the '90s, where almost every cultural touchpoint was from the US. Cartoons, music, movies, it was all American. As a result I almost certainly know more US state capitals than I know European, and can confidently point out the locations of at least half of the US states on a map. Maybe even more.

But, like, why? Why do I need to know that shit? Why should I care?

I don't know the names of any of the counties, or municipalities or whatever it is that subdivides France, and that's the closest non-UK country to where I'm currently sitting. Hell, I don't even know what they call those subdivisions.

So to answer the original question; fuck knows.

Yes.

There's an old series of videos by Rick Mercer of Canada that does some similar cherry-picking of US residents responding to questions. They're all done as a joke (Rick Mercer is a comedian) but they're a surprising amount of accuracy to them. Mercer even interviews some US politicians in it and gets them to say some ridiculous things about Canada that show their lack of knowledge on foreign matters.

The US education is well-documented as an ineffective system but it's not homogeneous across the country so I don't think anyone would be correct to make any broadly-sweeping claims about how knowledgeable US residents are. Just know that some of them aren't very bright and some of them are politicians.

People who only ever think within their country and, related to that, don't know any geography beyond their borders exist everywhere. Hell, that's the majority of the world. You just don't see their gaps in world knowledge in the English-speaking world, because, well, they don't speak English. And in my opinion, as long as you don't have any responsibility towards the world, it shouldn't be reprehensible to be ignorant towards the world.

However, I can imagine that the average European has a higher minimum knowledge about world geography than the the average American. And I think the biggest reason for that is the worldwide reach of US mainstream media. In European countries you passively get more exposure to the rest of the world - especially US music, movies, etc., but not only that. E.g. football fans will at least hear about countries and cities all around the world. The US media on the other hand, although it is definitely widening, is still much more egocentric, again, especially because they are the mainstream.

Well, I can point out all the continents and most countries on a map (approximately), even subdivisions (states etc.) in many western countries. But anecdotal evidence doesn't really help that much for this question, IMO. Just go look up some statistics.

Like you mentioned, many of those videos are doctored to make common Americans look stupid. I would even venture a guess and say that some of them are straight up fake with people probably being paid to act as stupid as possible.

As for Europeans' ability to place countries on a map, I believe it varies in the same way it does in America. Some will be super sharp at it, others, probably most, will know some and then blank on the rest. Few will be entirely ignorant about geography.

I have a flags of the world app that I use once in awhile to train myself to recognize flags from different countries. There is an option to also try and place flags on the map and you work your way through one continent at the time. I absolutely fucking suck at placing flags in Africa and Polynesia. I have gotten to a point where I recognize most of their flags, so there is that, but I am still hopeless with the map part. I have a few blind spots in Asia and South America too. I am pretty strong with Europe, the Middle East and Central Asia at this point.

For me, I started practicing with the app years ago exactly because I realized how terrible my geography skills were even inside Europe. Later on it became a matter of rebellion when the Ukrainian war went into full swing and I wanted to give a big fuck you to the invisible wall that still stands between western and eastern Europe. Many people I know have always been geographically blind to eastern Europe, but that seems to be something many of us have worked on in recent years.

Now it is just a longterm goal for me to take some time once in awhile to practice. Can't hurt to learn some basic bitch geography.

Ironically, the one thing I'm worse at placing than African countries, is American States, but they also aren't a part of my flag app, so I haven't actually practiced them. Similarly haven't practiced the German States since I was in 7th grade so I only know a couple of those and blank on the rest.