wow just wow

[ceagle]

a full college course subset of sociology, all crystallized chillingly into one video:

Comments

[sabotlours.livejournal.com]

That was pretty incredible. Talk about being relevant for our times!

[hastka.livejournal.com]

I don't know about "college course" but it definitely is excellent information... interesting that they don't teach more about this type of subject in schools. ;-P

[mondhasen.livejournal.com]

I liked the premise, but I wish he was more illustrative of how to liberate a stupid person.

[scruff-e-coyote.livejournal.com]

This YouTube animated video you found outlining "Bonhoeffer's Theory of Stupidity" is indeed chilling, yet enlightening! Thank you so much for finding it and posting the link for it here.

Over the previous five years of nonsense, where critical and independent thinking seemed to be thrown out the window, I came to a similar conclusion about humankind, coining the term "social autism" to explain those who have seemingly lost the ability or desire to accept facts from professionals or be able to reason out fact from fiction on their own. This is not to be confused. of course, with "mental autism" which is the serious and permanent medical neurodevelopmental disorder.

[ashetlandpony.livejournal.com]

I'll crystalize it even further.

To a greater or lesser degree, we are all stupid.

Including, I daresay, the narrator of this video, whose supercilious lecturing tone throughout clearly conveyed to me that he somehow imagines himself a superior form of life. Interesting, isn't it, that it's always "those people" who display stupidity, never ever Moi?

I'm actually honest enough to admit that I often do display stupidity. My own life choices have demonstrated this to me unequivocally time and time again. Given that we're all stupid to some degree, then, it would appear the ones you really have to watch out for are those who lack any self-awareness of their own stupidity, which I'm sorry to say now appears to be the overwhelming majority of our species.

[ashetlandpony.livejournal.com]

The sad irony (and mankind's true intellectual defect) is that we only ever seem to recognize our stupidity in retrospect. I admit, that's true of me. I'm never intentionally stupid. Just the opposite: I always strive to make the smartest decision about whatever. I think that's true of most people. We can only recognize our stupidity when we see the consequences of our past decisions and reflect on negative outcomes, and if we actually have the potential for intelligent behavior, we adapt our thinking and responses so we don't make the same mistake again. So people who have displayed stupidity in the past can learn to do better, but only if they have the capacity for self-reflection, which as I said previously is today an exceedingly rare trait.

[ashetlandpony.livejournal.com]

This may be at least a partial solution to the problem. Trouble is, few today appear capable of it.

https://c-eagle.livejournal.com/503532.html?thread=4523756#t4523756

[mondhasen.livejournal.com]

I think my typical response to my stupidity is "It seemed like a good idea at the time." As time hurries on, I start to see where some well intended, well thought out, decisions, may not have been the best. I can find myself caught up in the moment, based on prevailing thoughts and currents, only to see afterwards, like some Twilight Zone twist, that there was more going on than I reasoned. But it is prevailing thoughts and currents, and attitudes, that direct us daily, and my own Pollyanna attitudes can only protect my outcomes just so much.

[ashetlandpony.livejournal.com]

Another problem with this analysis is that the concept of stupidity itself is subjective. There is no objective measure of it. Thoughts or acts that make one person appear stupid may be regarded by another as perfectly sensible.

For example, there are over a billion people who do not believe in the principle of cause and effect. Islam teaches that everything is preordained by God. "It is written" doesn't mean just citing a passage of their scripture, it's a statement of how they believe the universe fundamentally works. I can't understand how anyone with eyes that can see and a brain that can think can be so stupid as to reject the simple concept that one thing leads to another, but there we are. Are strict Muslims really stupid, though? To a billion people, I am the stupid one for not understanding the obvious power of the divine will.

So it's really all a matter of perspective. How can one really judge who's stupid and who isn't? To me, it has to be outcomes. If someone's notion leads to seriously bad outcomes, no matter what their original high-minded concept may have been that lead to that disaster has to be regarded as stupid. But again, we can only make this determination in retrospect, after we see the results of the allegedly "smart" person's idea.

So if the criteria for determining stupidity are always changing depending on perspective, what real use is the whole concept? Little that I can see, except perhaps as a convenient means to justify the vilification of people who don't share one's own ideas. That, in my opinion, is a dangerous logical slippery slope that can also lead to oppressive, fascistic systems. Like, stupid people are dangerous, so why don't we remove all the stupid people from society and put them in camps, or even exterminate them? I hear a lot of talk like that nowadays from allegedly "smart" people. Similar vilification of "the other" also took place in Germany in the Thirties. See where I'm going here?

So, maybe judging people as stupid and regarding them as lesser beings isn't a very smart idea, after all. Just a thought. ;)

[hastka.livejournal.com]

I was thinking about this earlier today... or at least something related to it. If you sit in a room in a training session or something, you always hear about how "THEY" (other people) are stupid or annoying or whatever, but in reality if that was really the case, all anyone would have to do is take that training class and suddenly the world would be one gigantic conflict-free in-group.

By necessity, we're all seen as "stupid" to somebody else from time to time, even if they're objectively wrong.

I've noticed from time to time I'll also have little blips of feeling like I "did something wrong"... for example after confronting somebody in a maybe rude way, or overdisclosing a little, or something like that.

I think by definition it's only possible to be stupid in hindsight, if you're halfway smart... because as you say in your other post, the alternative would be that you would detect that you're about to be stupid, and therefore avoid it.

Honestly if you dig deep enough the whole discussion is a little bit flawed because it's not like "stupidity" is one concise condition... it's generally kind of a pejorative catch-all.

I think your point about self-awareness, and for that matter a reasonable amount of empathy for others, seems to be really what's missing the most these days. Like I recently was in a chat group in telegram where they were talking about such and such who "came in just to deliberately offend [some trans people in the channel] and then blamed them for being too sensitive, and isn't that just worst kind of trolling?" (etc.) Well, come to find out, after hearing some stories from other people who witnessed it, it really DOES seem like the person made some comments that were more or less innocent, if maybe a little insensitive, and the ensuing drama created its own little escalation to a point where everyone was offended and arguing with each other.

TL;DR: If people would just stop and think a bit more, and find ways to resolve problems without resorting to labeling or namecalling, etc., I think the world would be a better place. :-P

But for sure "stupid" does also capture a lot of what happens with certain people throughout the globe. :-\ And there are aspects like "showing them facts, but they don't have reason so they dismiss the facts as irrelevant." At some point you get into "whose facts are more valid" so I dunno.

At the end, maybe the only best solution is to just stay home and not interact with people. ;-)

[ashetlandpony.livejournal.com]

You know, the more I watch this video, the more I'm struck by the dehumanizing language used to describe "stupid people." Even the way the "stupid people" are drawn in caricature makes them appear less than human. Was this necessary? I believe Bonhoeffer's ideas could have been presented in a much more objective, scholarly manner than this. Instead, the videographer – clearly intentionally – used distinctly pejorative language and imagery to get his points across.

All in all, I have to confess I actually get a pretty sinister vibe from this video. I get that he's trying to show how otherwise regular folks can be turned into ideological bots who support despotic, genocidal political leaders, but ironically, when he not-so-subtly implies that society would be better off without a certain group of people who he believes are undesirable, he's in essence making an argument in favor of what is simply a different flavor of the despotic fascism he ostensibly opposes.

History is unambiguous in this regard: no matter what side of the political spectrum it comes from, dehumanization of "the other" is always the first step on the path to genocide.

Don't go there.

[c-eagle.livejournal.com]

Your thoughtful entries along this entire thread are excellent and appreciated and really sum things up rather fairly, thanks!

One of the things I also feel is a bit of a problem in the well-intentioned concept that Bonhoeffer summarizes, is the problem with using the term "stupid" to describe the group and individuals. Its epithetical tone unfortunately leaves room for (as you denote) reverse definitions, i.e. Who is to decide what or who is stupid, when I think his intention was to show that it should never (for example) be considered appropriate to throw rocks through windows of innocents.

So right about the video-editor's choice of graphics also!

[c-eagle.livejournal.com]

Totally agree. I can just guess that maybe he didn't have time to complete that part of the equation before his life was taken.

Though as I hinted at, we did 'go there' in later years, as I saw through Sociology studies in college.

As I noted below to @ashtelandpony , one of the drawbacks of this early treatment of the concept was that he calls the troublesome people/group "stupid" For the sake of better clarity (hopefully) and less subjectivism, let's call them "ethics deny-ers", which additionally removes the self-punishing of ourselves for non-heinous stupid mistakes which we all make once in a while.

Anyhow, Sociologically the interactive choices with one of these errant people, are:
1) Discussion
2) Detour
3) Defense, and
4) Declarations

Discussion is probably the only way to truly 'liberate' someone from problematic thoughts that can harm themselves and others. Standards vary from place to place, but some basic tenets are usually recognized by those with consideration in a culture.

Detour is where we just throw our arms up and walk around them if we can, because we've determined that it's futile to reason.

Defense is usually physical altercation when an unethical entity doesn't back down.

And Declarations describes that in each society, a body of laws is decided by something (whether courts or the people or some entity "in charge") that attempts to keep the ethics deny-ers in check and therefore keep the society running as harmoniously as possible (in a benevolent society, though that is not always the case in a hazily motivated government). But that's going off course a bit...

I get the feeling that Bonhoeffer just didn't have the time to refine his thoughts further before he was snuffed out, but social studies have explored such things further... If only it was a required course for kids in grammar school, and not some elective in college :|

[allaboutweather.livejournal.com]

It really is. There are quite a few geniuses who were great at math but had zero social skills. Some people go to college to get worthless degrees while some go straight into a trade and learn sought-after skills. Does it make the latter stupid for not going to college? No. Not only that but everyone's great at a few things and clueless at others.

Yes, dehumanization is one of the first steps to much worse things....