I didn't think it was possible, but it is getting worse.
I wrote the above-linked blog back when I first started doing this site, and sadly, I think it's even more true today. Blame it on the internet, on free time, on Fox News or on genetic drift, but it cannot be denied that despite the surfeit of information available at their fingertips, people seem to be hellbent on being aggressively misinformed and stupid.
Aggressively.
See, "aggressively" is the key word there. It's acceptable to be misinformed. We all are about some things. It's ok to be stupid. We have all been stupid at one point or another. It's entirely different to embrace these two states of being, and actively work to convert the rest of the world. Once you've started doing that, you've crossed the line into Moron Land. (Sidenote: Did you know that back in the 19th Century when intelligence tests first became popular, they actually characterized people as "imbeciles", "morons" and "idiots" as scientific classifications. Not sure what that says about science and people.)
Way too many people are crossing the line these days. They repeat easily verifiable lies, they refuse to admit that what they've repeated are lies, and they actively protest that their preferred lies should be given preference over the obvious truth. It's like some sort of Bizarro World where it doesn't matter what the facts are, it only matters who has the power to impose their views on the most people.
Then again, that's not really a Bizarro World, that's just the world. It's always been like this in a way. The more I read, the more I see that logic and reason have always been in short supply, regardless of what the people in a certain time believed. I see that what was once hailed as cutting edge science was really a mixture of prejudice and contradictions dressed up in pretty charts. And it actually makes me wonder how much we've progressed today.
In 50 years will all the sacred truths of my generation be lambasted as obvious idiocy? Will our crude attempts at "science" be seen as the babbling and dabblings of the daft? I don't know. But I do know that listening to the idiocy of today is slowing raising my blood pressure to the danger zone. Everyday it is a constant struggle not to be overwhelmed by the type of rage that leads to extended tirades and possible violence.
These people are working my nerves.
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5 comments:
Testing
"In 50 years will all the sacred truths of my generation be lambasted as obvious idiocy?" In a word, Yes!
Don’t see why your generation or mine would be any different from our predecessor’s. Ultimately the science or plain old reasoning will dispel some of our closely held, but foolish notions. I don’t think the buoyancy of black people gets much traction today, but in the past some white guy from a fancy university with credentials to him name would argue that Black people lack buoyancy, or that women cannot run a marathon.
I’m of the opinion that when a person or group of people hold on to some nonsensical idea(s) that defies logic, it’s because there is some self-serving benefit to their closely held illogical belief(s).
I believe that the aristocracy, the ruling class, and the church, view it as in their best interest to have an ill-informed or under-informed general population. If the masses are ill-informed then they become susceptible to economic and social manipulation. With the masses, the ignorance more times than not will go unchallenged thus becomes willful acceptance. But there is something about that miss-information (illogical as it may be) that allows that person to feel good about who they are an what they stand for, which leads to the willful acceptance.
I certainly don’t have the answers and in many ways guessing my way to a suitable analysis that’s beneficial to me.
No worries Bro, the mic is working fine.
I was just checking.
Some ideas have to be enduring, don't you think? I'm curious about which ones.
I know you aren't a Christian, but the enduring nature of a belief in God, particularly in the Judeo-Christian-Muslim God is interesting to me. I would imagine that it will still be quite strong even in 50 or 100 years.
”Some ideas have to be enduring, don't you think? I'm curious about which ones.”
I believe most ideas that are laced with hope can be enduring, and that’s where the church and religion comes into play. To me, the church is in the business of selling hope. Hope for the next minute, the next day, the hereafter and hope for your soul, hope against the devil. As illogical as it maybe, believing in some organized religions is not the worst thing a person can do. Besides, organized religion can bring order and value to a person’s daily existence.
Now, the idiocy of the tea baggers is an example of willful ignorance motivated by hate. They claim the want to reduce the national debt, but loathe the idea of increasing revenues to bring down the debt, or reducing the cost of maintaining an oversize military. These tea baggers will sacrifice their kid’s education, their personal health and well-being, and the benefits available to the senior members of their families, just to get the Black guy out the white house. Talk about stuck on stupid. In addition they keep spewing this nonsense that tax cuts for the rich will spur the economy, that policy was tried over an eight year period, and was such a catastrophe that it yielded us our first Black president. Future generations will find the behavior of the tea baggers abhorrent, kind of how some white folks cringe when they look back at those water hoses and dogs used against people asserting their basic civil rights.
I’m sure that in time science will reveal why we choose to adamantly believe the ideas and thoughts we hold dear. For the most part ideas are mostly transitory, why we hold on to some and discard others is anyone’s guess.
My momma always told me that a white man is willing to sacrifice anything if means hurting a black man...
Now, my momma is pretty radical, but that belief of hers always pops into my head when I see white people clearly going against their own self interest just to spite black people. I don't think she's always right, but she's right way too often for comfort.
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