Stupid?

We have a tendency to use euphemisms for sensitive subjects. A fear of offending those that fit into a category, no matter how appropriate it may be. To that I say no more. I’m talking about the word stupid. It carries a lot of baggage. It’s often used as a pejorative, but that’s not how I’m using it here. Nor am I judging anyone. I’m just highlighting a fact of life, and the cultural norms we’ve adopted to convince ourselves that objective reality is different than it seems. It’s not.

The fact is we have a lot of stupid people in this country. It’s one of the things that makes us exceptional. But it’s time to stop coddling stupid people, laughing off their benign confidence, or worst of all pretending we aren’t surrounded by them. I’m not talking about the people who believe in Jewish space lasers or think leftists eat babies. Those people are certainly stupid, but their stupidity is an undiagnosed clinical psychiatric disorder. They suffer from delusions and need immediate medical attention. No, I’m talking about the pervasive kind of stupid that runs through our electorate, fixated on inane debates and illusory policy. The faceless swing voters that media glorifies. This piece is for them. It’s never too late to read a book, a newspaper, anything that informs you about the world you inhabit and can’t be gleaned from your everyday routine. Life is too short to not even try.

If you’re against Critical Race Theory but have no idea what it is and somehow think it’s the basis of your local school curriculum then you’re stupid.

If you think reading about slavery is going to upset your child’s fragile notions of equity and fairness any more than the privilege they do and will experience in their daily life then you’re stupid.

If you think the Trump Putsch was a historical aberration or a peaceful protest or orchestrated by Antifa or patriotic then you’re stupid.

If you think immigrants or black people or women or anyone else that doesn’t look like you is the reason you’re stupid it is in fact evidence that you are.

If you think politicians, people with a preternatural desire for adoration, are looking or talking down to you then you are stupid and it’s probably deserved.

If you think the country club and private jet crowd who bankroll the Republican Party, right-wing think tanks, and special interest groups care one iota about your nationalist tinged populism then you’re stupid.

If you think the same people care about your religion then you’re stupid.

What’s the matter with Kansas you ask? A lot of stupid people live there and everywhere, and they aren’t shy about showing you how stupid they are. Just wait until the next election. It’s time we talked about the country we live in and not the one in our imagination. Let’s have that conversation. Let’s diagnose the real problem.

There is an over-quoted passage from TS Eliot’s poem entitled “Hollow Men” that goes “This is the way the world ends, Not with a bang but a whimper.” Now when I think of that passage I imagine the whimper coming from a clueless face – confused eyes, a slack jaw, utter incomprehension.