[FLOMOUSLY]

I have a few friends who think the public at large, are a bunch of idiots. I only agree with them when I'm driving in moderate to heavy traffic. I have often wondered why people have the political or economical views they have, mostly because those views seem so irrational and unexamined by the people who hold them.

The piece below set me straight about this. The interesting part is in the link to John Taylor Gatto's site where he explains the role of the public education system in the dumbing down of the world view of the masses with propaganda. People don't know how to question authority.

Hatha



http://www.strike-the-root.com/probl...re-idiots-meme
The Problem With the 'People Are Idiots' Meme

Column by Paul Bonneau, posted on December 15, 2011 Column by Paul Bonneau.
Exclusive to STR
Claire Wolfe recently wrote a column, People Who Don’t Think. I think she needs to rethink this, heh heh.

I have the utmost respect for Claire. I have some of her books, and she’s influenced me tremendously. However, I believe she may have gone down the wrong path with this idea, which I consider to be both politically and personally “suboptimal.” There are better ways to look at the phenomenon she is describing.

My preferred way of looking at it, is to recognize that nobody can know everything there is to know in the world. So, to compensate, we specialize. We have created a division of labor, which is a good thing. What most people have is expertise in some area or areas in which their ability to think and observe is quite evident. Some are excellent mechanics, some great at sales and other forms of personal interaction, some at science, some at growing things, some at teaching. I’m continually amazed at the variety of things people can do.

Outside their area of expertise, on the other hand, their opinions default to some conventional wisdom, or worldview. Part of what goes on with these worldviews is the operation of confirmation bias--much more than occurs in their areas of expertise. This must be so, otherwise (not being open to the evidence) they would not be very expert in their area of expertise! Mark Twain may have been thinking of worldviews when he said, "It ain't what you don't know that gets you into trouble. It's what you know for sure that just ain't so."

Now, if that is true, why do we wonder that people seem like idiots sometimes? Particularly in fields like economics and political philosophy? These are far outside the areas of expertise of most people! Rational ignorance is one reason for this. When most people speak in these areas, it is their worldviews that are really speaking--worldviews that have been manipulated by the ruling class through the government indoctrination camps some people call “public schools,” and through the operations of the Ministry of Propaganda, and other self-serving institutions.

And why do these seem idiotic to us, particularly? Because economics and political philosophy are within our areas of expertise!

Just think of how much work you have done in this area, to get where you are now. Personally, I spent many years working on political campaigns, only to be disappointed at the bastard I helped get into office. I was treasurer for the Libertarian Party of Oregon for a while, learning about what happens inside political parties. I wrote innumerable letters to the editor trying to counter propaganda. I read quite a few studies and books on gun control and education. I read books and articles on economics. I created and ran the Wyoming Liberty Index for years, in the process reading hundreds of bills produced by the Wyoming legislature. I spent literally decades getting where I am now, and no doubt many of you have done similar things. Is it any wonder the average Joe, who has not invested very much time in this area, sounds uninformed about it? How can we reasonably expect him to be otherwise?

The human race is what it is. There is no point, no profit in being frustrated with it. We just have to interact with people the best we can. We can’t effectively and honestly do that, if we disrespect them by thinking them idiots. They are not idiots, they are just outside their area of expertise.

John Taylor Gatto apparently agrees with me: “The shocking possibility that dumb people don’t exist in sufficient numbers to warrant the careers devoted to tending to them will seem incredible to you. Yet that is my proposition: Mass dumbness first had to be imagined; it isn’t real.” I didn’t believe this when I first read it years ago, but I understand what he’s getting at now.

Now, defective worldviews, which are the real problem here, are not perfectly immutable. They tend to break down when events overwhelm us. There are now a lot of people whose worldviews are breaking. The evidence is all around us with Tea Parties and Occupy movements. People are trying to form new worldviews to compensate for a reality that has whacked them like a 2x4 across the nose. Yes, they make missteps, and yes, the ruling class tries to co-opt them and funnel them into “safe” (for the rulers) paths, but this is just the beginning. It’s bound to accelerate as the empire crumbles and the dollar dies. We need to be ready for that, to help people find better worldviews with the aid of our hard-earned expertise, using tools like the Internet. No, we are not going to turn them all into political philosophers--but we don’t need to. To quote Mark Train again, "Education consists mainly of what we have unlearned."

Consider one historical event. I have read several times that people in America in the 1750s and 1760s considered themselves Englishmen and wanted desperately to be accepted by English society. How did this feeling morph into its complete opposite by so many people, in just 20 years, leading to successful armed rebellion? I think it was a shift in worldview. There can be huge, almost impossible-seeming changes to worldviews in a short period of time.

One other huge problem with the “people are idiots” meme that Gatto above alluded to is how seamlessly it feeds into the “people need to be taken care of” meme. He continues, “Once the dumb are wished into existence, they serve valuable functions: as a danger to themselves and others they have to be watched, classified, disciplined, trained, medicated, sterilized, ghettoized, cajoled, coerced, jailed.” If ever there was a meme that supports the state, it is this one.

People do not need to be taken care of! Far from being idiots, people are actually extremely resourceful. We did after all make it to the top of the food chain, somehow--all of us, not just the “experts.” People can learn on their own; children are “learning machines” if you get out of their way. People fix their own problems themselves if you don’t interfere with the process by shielding them from the consequences of their poor choices, thus propping up bad behavior. People can protect themselves by getting a gun and spending a modest amount of time learning how to use it. People can also negotiate with others to do these things.

One final thing wrong with the “people are idiots” meme: When societies are thrown into upheaval, those groups considered snooty intellectuals (e.g., Jews, Armenians, etc.) sometimes end up on the pyre when the less pretentious get thoroughly irritated with them, or when scapegoats are needed. Something to keep in mind, if self-preservation is a concern . . . .

Folks, let’s get off our high horses. Stop falling for divide and rule tactics. Stop looking down on people, and start respectfully and honestly interacting with them and empathizing with them. Don’t expect them to be experts outside their area of expertise. You aren’t either! Just gently explain to them that a worldview based on violence must have something fundamentally wrong with it. (And don’t indulge in frontal attacks! Read Dale Carnegie.) After a while, particularly when their established worldview becomes vulnerable, they may be willing to change it to something more tolerant and less destructive. Something more like freedom.

[greekbeast]

This is my favorite meme (face)...

[TravelMan]

Good post Hatha. I see this as related to cognitive dissonance and simple and complex thinking sociological concepts. Some people choose to think simple. An easy choice to reduce cognitive dissonance in the short term. The choice MSM promotes.

I think the anomie concept also adds insight to the public at large.

From Anomie to Anomia and Anomic Depression
Durkheim's concept of anomie in Suicide refers to: (a) the acute ineffectiveness of society's regulative power, due to painful or beneficial, but always abrupt, transitions, and (b) the chronic lack of social rules limiting man's needs in the world of trade and industry. Durkheim employed the concept to explain differences in (anomic) suicide rates. First, the variations in suicide rates that occur whenever there is an abrupt disturbance in society (e.g. financial crises or divorce) are explained by the acute form of anomie. Second, chronic anomie in the world of trade and industry explains the prevalence of (anomic) suicide as a regular, constant factor in society.

Merton relates the concept of anomie to the sociological study of deviant behaviour. He published his theory first in 1938 and later revised and extended his initial ideas. Merton's main purpose was to set out the social and cultural sources of deviant behaviour and to discover how the social structure can exert a pressure on certain individuals to engage in non-conforming conduct. He distinguishes two important elements of social and cultural structures: culturally defined goals, on the one hand, and the institutionally prescribed means of striving toward these goals, on the other. Cultural goals and institutionalized means do not always operate jointly in society: there may be a differential emphasis on the goals or on the means. Merton describes in particular a social situation in which there is an exceptionally strong emphasis upon the cultural goals without a corresponding emphasis upon the institutional norms. Under these circumstances, human conduct is not guided by the institutionally prescribed means but by the most effective procedure, whether legitimate or not, of striving for the cultural goals. When this dissociation between goals and norms continues, "the society becomes unstable and there develops what Durkheim calls 'anomie"'. Merton's concept of anomie thus refers to a demoralization, a de-institutionalization of means, resulting out of a dissociation between cultural goals and institutional norms.

Merton finds an example of such a disjunction between goals and norms in American culture in which an emphasis upon the goal of success, monetary success in particular, occurs without equivalent emphasis upon the institutionalized means to strive for this goal. Persons facing this social situation then exhibit five possible modes of individual adaptation according to whether they accept or reject the cultural goals and/or the institutionalized means. These modes of adaptation are, according to Merton, differentially distributed over the different social strata of society, depending on the accessibility of legitimate means and the degree of assimilation of goals and norms in each stratum.

The first possible mode of adaptation is conformity: both the goals and norms of society are accepted. The other four categories can be considered forms of deviant behaviour: (a) innovation: the institutional means are rejected and replaced by other means to achieve the culturally prescribed goals, a type of adaptation which Merton considers especially prevalent in the lower social strata; (b) ritualism: the individual holds on to the institutional means in spite of the fact that the cultural goals cannot be reached, the category of deviant behaviour which Merton expected to be most common in American society; (c) retreatism: both society's goals and norms are rejected, a form of deviant adaptation which Merton believed to be the least common; and (d) rebellion: the rejection of prevailing norms and goals and the substitution thereof by new values, a mode of adaptation which is a potential for the formation of subgroups set apart from the rest of the community

[exsmoker]

I agree that 'people are idiots' is wrong. I don't completely agree with the cause of the problem being that everyone has the wrong worldview, however, and if that was correct the problems would go away.

First of all, any individual has greater abilities than any group. A group or organization is inherently stupider and slower than the individuals that make it up. This is caused by imperfect communication. Compare the slowness of speaking and writing with the massive amounts of neurons forming highways in our head.

This leads to the second part. The problem of everyone not having the proper world view is like saying that the problem with the large group is that each member of the group isn't programmed properly. Yes you could flash program each individual and the inertia would make the group move in the right direction for a while. But eventually it would circle around and do the opposite of what it was originally intended. So the problem isn't the programming of each individual, but their functioning.

Each individual needs to be "supercharged" or "purified" in order for the larger groups of them to behave the way we would like to see. This is an inner (esoteric) transformation. Basically being born again. On a mass scale, this would be called the second coming of Christ. It's basically a fundamental change inside each individual which makes them "perfect".

[newshep]

The true idiots are the ones that can't for 2 seconds attempt to view things from a different angle.

[Gofthooxdix]

The most ignorant man in the world, is a man only educated in one area.

100 years ago one man was a father, a farmer, a doctor and a mechanic. And still had the time and energy to put towards his political views.

Now we have Corporate College grads who have been told they are educated. But in reality they are specialized in an area so small, they have limited themselves drastically. And they call that an education. NO. It is a brain laundry, and it is laughable.

[Inenuedbabnor]

The true idiots are the ones that can't for 2 seconds attempt to view things from a different angle.

It has been said that the mark of an educated person is the ability to honestly entertain an opposing viewpoint without feeling the need to adopt it as his own. I've found that a great number of people are unable to do that. Is it because the things they "know" have been installed in such a superficial manner that only under the most guarded circumstances they are able to maintain these belief systems, that they feel they must be preemptively defended at all times?

[JennaJJxoxoxo]

Bill Burr is awesome.

[DYjLN8rF]

Interesting thread. My view is that 'the people are idiots' meme is just another social engineering play designed to subtly encourage entrenchment and overconfidence in distorted belief systems. The play tends to be aimed at those that aren't idiots; people that represent varying levels of latent threat to the establishment. The bad guys like to feed egos. They are selling the superiority product and the product is flying off the shelves.

dys

[deackatera]

there is also a spiritual angle on this..... theres a blindness that goes beyond reason.

[Soassesaisp]

there is also a spiritual angle on this..... theres a blindness that goes beyond reason.

I'm reminded of Gonzo's post about God not being subject to err.

Or human race of Dinosaurs.

[farmarrl]

there is also a spiritual angle on this..... theres a blindness that goes beyond reason.

Yep. We are in a spiritual battle.

This goes along with this thread perfectly -

There's something wrong but you're never know what it is. (VERY enlightening, but sure to read all five parts)

http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com...ics-dilemma-1/

[Zptmsemk]

The bible says if you eat from the tree of knowledge of good and evil you will die. What if that's how all knowledge works because that's how we've been trained to use our brains? Look at the human brain.



It kind of looks like a tree. They even call teh base of the brain...the stem.

Then the serpent says if we eat of the tree we will be like gods. The serpent could represent the reptilian brain, which david icke talks about.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Triune_...tilian_complex


of course, knowledge isn't everything. Would you like it if a doctor who's read all the books about surgery but never touched a scalpel to operate on you? So more important than knowledge is experience, but of course, our ability to experience things is limited by law, finance, emotion.

but information is readily available through the internet, books, etc. So it's much easier to gain knowledge. it makes me wonder if we're not purposefully being led down the wrong path. for example, every knows seeing isn't necessarily believing

http://www.clipaday.com/videos/how-c...helicopter-fly

The secret to the helicopter is that the taper recorder operates at the same speed as the rotors on the helicopter. The eyes have a visual speed too. What if what we see was being manipulated in a similar manner? Kind of like this....




So I guess the real question would be how do we go back to eden and eat from the tree of life?

[grosqueneen]

i know one thing you just cant fix it ... i dont care how hard you try it cant be done

[carline]

i know one thing you just cant fix it ... i dont care how hard you try it cant be done

"(Stupid) is all about a state of mind." --AG Eric Holder

[whimpykid]

Bill Burr is awesome.

I found nothing funny about that. He is sucked into the Eugenics and Environment propaganda. Even though he thinks it is funny, IT ISNT.

[emexiagog]

What if what we see was being manipulated in a similar manner? Kind of like this....

What, How so?

I'm confused.

[Ceriopal]

What, How so?

I'm confused.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Computa...theory_of_mind


The bible says there's another tree, a tree of life. What happened if adam had eaten that instead of the tree of knowledge? Is it possible to still eat from that tree?

[Alina20100]

What if the human brain is actually a mushroom? A fungal colony that has made its home inside our heads. What then? Lol

I think it's seriously unhealthy to look upon ones own people as idiots or sheep.
The only winners are the shepherds and fleecers.

[Mediconlinee]

I tend to agree with the author of the piece in the OP. Most people I know make their living from one area of knowledge they have, so they devote most of their attention to maintaining that knowledge or skill. This is what our education system has taught them is how to get along in the world. So, when they engage in conversations about things outside their area of expertise, they are generally lost. Unless, they have been exposed to the propaganda machinery in our society--the mainstream media, which fills them in on areas outside their area of expertise. Mostly with lies, pretenses, and other kinds of make-believe.

The people who think other people are idiots are usually the misfits in our society. People such as myself, and many other people on this forum. We are people who have not abandoned our ability to do critical thinking. We can see through the propaganda, and we condescend upon those who are unable to penetrate through the tissue of lies. We accuse them of being intellectually lazy, or being 'sheeple', and we point out their 'willed ignorance'. And we summarize our frustration with them by considering them to be idiots. I know, because I have these attitudes. When these people have power over me, they tell me I need to have an 'attitude adjustment'. I laugh, and I pretend to go through with it--but I wouldn't want to damage myself so severely to give up an attitude that keeps me liberated if nowhere else but inside my own head.

I know that the widespread existence of these 'monoskilled' people is the foundation of our 'national security' and that anyone who doesn't fit this profile is an enemy of the state by virtue of being able to do critical thinking. I have read accounts of three lists maintained by Department of Homeland Security. The Red, Green and Yellow lists. On the red list are the leaders of the opposition to the government--people who can influence others. These people will be disappeared, never to be heard from again. On the green list are names of people who express doubts about the government policies. These people will be sent to 're-education' camps for an attitude adjustment, and if it doesn't pass muster, they will never be heard from again. And on the yellow list are all the idiots who will be left alone.

Hatha