{"id":26777,"date":"2015-02-09T16:09:46","date_gmt":"2015-02-09T21:09:46","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/admin.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/?p=26777"},"modified":"2015-02-09T16:09:46","modified_gmt":"2015-02-09T21:09:46","slug":"dare-to-be-stupid-bigotry-means-choosing-to-limit-your-mental-capacity","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/2015\/02\/09\/dare-to-be-stupid-bigotry-means-choosing-to-limit-your-mental-capacity\/","title":{"rendered":"Dare to be stupid: Bigotry means choosing to limit your mental capacity"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

The correlation between bigotry and stupidity has been widely observed but also, I think, largely misunderstood.<\/p>\n

Consider, for example, the recent illustration of this correlation from the great state of Vermont<\/a>, as summarized by Doktor Zoom:<\/p>\n

Here\u2019s a sweet little story of Democracy in Action. A bright eighth grader writes to her state legislator with an idea for a law: Vermont doesn\u2019t have an official Latin motto, so why not adopt one? And for that matter, make it a reference to history? Neato!<\/p>\n

So state Sen. Joe Benning \u2014 a Republican who was actually trying to do a good thing, which he has probably learned to never try again \u2014 introduced a bill to adopt the motto \u201cStella quarta decima fulgeat<\/em>\u201d \u2014 \u201cMay the fourteenth star shine bright.\u201d Because Vermont was the 14th state, see? Benning noted that when Vermont briefly minted its own currency, it was engraved with \u201cStella Quarta Deccima,\u201d so the phrase had real historical cachet.<\/p>\n

And then Burlington TV station WCAX put the story on its Facebook page<\/a> with the headline, \u201cShould Vermont have an official Latin motto?\u201d and all Stupid broke loose when morons thought that Vermont was knuckling under to a bunch of goddamned illegal immigrants.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Charles Topher<\/a> collected some of the most vivid examples of the\u00a0xenophobic backlash:<\/p>\n

\"vt-dumber\"<\/a><\/p>\n

There were hundreds<\/em> of similar responses. All just as angry, aggrieved and resentful toward some vague, imaginary Other. Hundreds of examples of hundreds of Vermonters expressing the same jaw-dropping ignorance and stupidity.<\/p>\n

The correlation between bigotry and ignorance\u00a0seems obvious here. Hundreds of eager volunteers have stepped forward to demonstrate their own defiant combination of the two.<\/p>\n

One theory to explain this correlation, then, would be to say that bigotry is an expression of ignorance. Or, in other words, to say that ignorance\u00a0causes<\/em> bigotry \u2014 to say that those who are ignorant\u00a0will tend to be hateful (or, more precisely, that those who are ignorant will tend to be fearful and that those who are fearful will tend to be hateful).<\/p>\n

If we accept that theory, then we must commit ourselves to education. Education is the antidote to\u00a0ignorance, and therefore education could be the antidote to bigotry.<\/p>\n

But what if what we\u2019re seeing here from these angry anti-Latinists isn\u2019t simple ignorance? What if it is, instead, actual rank stupidity?<\/p>\n

The distinction matters. Ignorance, after all, is a universal aspect of the human condition. None of us can know everything<\/em>. Our essential human finitude means, for all of us, that the number of things we don\u2019t know will always exceed the number of things we do.<\/p>\n

But we have evidence here that these Go Back to Latin-land commenters are displaying something more serious than simple, innocent ignorance. Their anger, grievance and resentment prove that cannot be the case. That emotional investment shows us that this is a subject about which they claim to be concerned \u2014 a matter that they have given\u00a0their attention and focus. If their anger is genuine, and they are truly concerned, then we cannot conclude that their enduring ignorance is simply a matter of inexperience \u2014 of not knowing any better. It must be, rather, an inability<\/em> to know any better \u2014 an inability to perceive, comprehend and absorb the clear facts that are right in front of their nose.<\/p>\n

That means what we\u2019re seeing here is not ignorance, but stupidity. Education can be an effective way of banishing ignorance, but stupidity is impervious to it. Education may be a remedy for bigotry caused by\u00a0ignorance, but it will prove useless against bigotry resulting from\u00a0stupidity.<\/p>\n

The good news, though, is that there\u2019s another possible explanation, another theory to explain the correlation seen here between bigotry and ignorance\/stupidity. It could be the case that cause-and-effect flow in the other direction. The stupidity we\u2019re seeing here could be an expression of the bigotry on display.<\/p>\n

Or, in other words, it could be that bigotry\u00a0causes<\/em>\u00a0stupidity.<\/p>\n

I think there\u2019s evidence to support this alternative theory \u2014 evidence provided by the very same indignant Vermonters making the audaciously stupid comments about the state\u2019s proposed Latin motto.<\/p>\n

Those comments, please note, aren\u2019t just a little bit<\/em> stupid. This is an astonishing breed\u00a0of off-the-charts stupidity. It\u2019s the kind of stupidity that makes you wonder how it\u2019s possible that these people are able to tie their own shoes, to feed themselves or to cross a busy street without getting killed (presuming, for the sake of argument, that Vermont has any busy streets). And yet most of these people, in other contexts, seem surprisingly capable of intelligent behavior.<\/p>\n

What we see here, in other words, is the kind of stupidity that we might expect from people with a diminished mental capacity, yet it comes from people who otherwise show that they do not have a diminished mental capacity. What they\u2019re displaying, then, is not a lack<\/em> of mental capacity, but a rejection<\/em> of it. They are choosing to be stupid \u2014 choosing to behave as though they were stupid.<\/p>\n

Thus it seems that bigotry is not the product of diminished mental capacity. Rather, bigotry forecloses mental capacity. It constrains and limits it artificially.<\/p>\n

That means, in turn, that education is not the antidote to bigotry. The opposite is true. Bigotry is the antidote to education.<\/p>\n

You may be wondering why I described this as good news. I think it\u2019s good news because it means that bigotry is a consequence of a moral choice. And that means that bigotry can be cured by making a different choice.<\/p>\n

We shouldn\u2019t over-simplify this. The chosen stupidity of bigotry is, like all choices, conditioned and qualified and shaped by a thousand variables \u2014 education, ignorance, environment, nurture, experience, lack of experience, etc. And, like all choices, it is shaped above all by prior<\/em> choices.<\/p>\n

But we shouldn\u2019t over-complicate this either. Those choices still matter. Bigotry, hate and resentment are always an option, but they are never the only<\/em> option.<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

What we see here, in other words, is the kind of stupidity that we might expect from people with a diminished mental capacity, yet it comes from people who otherwise show that they do not have a diminished mental capacity. What they’re displaying, then, is not a lack of mental capacity, but a rejection of it. They are choosing to be stupid — choosing to behave as though they were stupid.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":141,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-26777","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"yoast_head":"\nDare to be stupid: Bigotry means choosing to limit your mental capacity<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"What we see here, in other words, is the kind of stupidity that we might expect from people with a diminished mental capacity, yet it comes from people who otherwise show that they do not have a diminished mental capacity. What they're displaying, then, is not a lack of mental capacity, but a rejection of it. 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A former managing editor of Prism magazine, Fred worked in the parachurch nonprofit world for a decade and then for a decade in the newspaper biz. He began blogging in 2002. In 2003 he began writing a review of the best-selling Left Behind series. Eight years later he still hasn\u2019t finished reviewing the second book of that series and the experience has left him a broken shell of a man. Fred knows the difference between the possessive \u201cits\u201d and the contraction \u201cit\u2019s,\u201d and he is acutely bothered when others mistakenly confuse the two, yet he himself just kind of instinctively types the apostrophe whether or not it belongs there. Some feel this is his greatest hypocrisy, but those who know him better know better. He\u2019s guilty of much greater hypocrisies. Jesus loves Fred far more than Fred loves Jesus, but he at least has the decency to recognize the unfairness of that lopsided relationship and he has long wished that he were better at maybe kind of sort of doing something more to correct that some day. A Baptist, an amateur, a Gen-Xer, a Gemini and a Mets fan, Fred lives in Southeastern Pennsylvania with his wife and two teenage daughters. You can reach him via email at slacktivist at hotmail dot com.\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/author\/fredclark1\/\"}]}<\/script>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Dare to be stupid: Bigotry means choosing to limit your mental capacity","description":"What we see here, in other words, is the kind of stupidity that we might expect from people with a diminished mental capacity, yet it comes from people who otherwise show that they do not have a diminished mental capacity. 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A former managing editor of Prism magazine, Fred worked in the parachurch nonprofit world for a decade and then for a decade in the newspaper biz. He began blogging in 2002. In 2003 he began writing a review of the best-selling Left Behind series. Eight years later he still hasn\u2019t finished reviewing the second book of that series and the experience has left him a broken shell of a man. Fred knows the difference between the possessive \u201cits\u201d and the contraction \u201cit\u2019s,\u201d and he is acutely bothered when others mistakenly confuse the two, yet he himself just kind of instinctively types the apostrophe whether or not it belongs there. Some feel this is his greatest hypocrisy, but those who know him better know better. He\u2019s guilty of much greater hypocrisies. Jesus loves Fred far more than Fred loves Jesus, but he at least has the decency to recognize the unfairness of that lopsided relationship and he has long wished that he were better at maybe kind of sort of doing something more to correct that some day. A Baptist, an amateur, a Gen-Xer, a Gemini and a Mets fan, Fred lives in Southeastern Pennsylvania with his wife and two teenage daughters. 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