A comment my brain goes back to all the time came from Joe Willingham over at Porphyrogenitus:
Somebody needs to do a study of learned (both in the one and two syllable versions of the word) stupidity, as opposed to the natural kind. Liberals today believe things that are remarkably stupid, such as that all people are equally intelligent at birth, or that there is no such thing as intelligence, or it there is then differences in intelligence are socially determined and have nothing to do with heredity. That all differences between the sexes are socially constructed. That social classes are the result of a sort of conspiracy and could be abolished if we voted in the right government. That all "cultures" are equal in value. That the reason the Third World is poor is because of the machinations of the corporations and the US government. That we kinda sorta deserved the attacks on 9-11 because we've hurt the Muslims' feelings with our insensitive attitudes.
Waitresses and truck drivers are smart enough not to believe such patent absurdities. The amazing thing is that the majority of English and social science professors and journalists do believe them.
This quote popped into my head again this morning when I read Amy Alkon's slaughter of a HuffPo post, some piece of crap that says that we are all terrorists deep down.
Only an intellectual could say something so stupid.
Posted by Sarah at January 4, 2008 09:16 AM | TrackBack"Only an intellectual could say something so stupid."
Oh, I am so going to steal that from you and start using that as a snappy comeback, if I ever have the chance. That is so true and succinct. I wish I could have pulled that out of my hat in my university years where I was surrounded by "intellectuals" but it didn't seem that many had an ounce of common sense.
Posted by: CaliValleyGirl at January 4, 2008 10:12 AMThere's an old insult that goes, "Were you born that stupid, or did you have to study?" Increasingly, it seems that true stupidity requires having to study.
This phenomenon is closely related to The Smart-Talk Trap; see also this.
Posted by: david foster at January 4, 2008 10:34 AMJust choc full of great lines today, aren't you?
:)
Do you know the difference between ignorance and stupidity?
You can fix ignorance.
Posted by: Stephen Macklin at January 5, 2008 08:48 PM