Assholes, the jealous, and mediocretins. Cemetary Savior, spoke-, Fessie, Treis, etc

[you_with_the_face]

This thread, in spite of it being the rabid monstrosity that it is, was rather revealing to me.

In other threads, we’ve discussed how pervasive anti-intellectualism supposedly is among African-American youth. My opinion is that the notion of black kids equating studiousness with “acting white” has been blown out of proportion. Black kids may call a bookworm a “white wannabe”, but how is this fundamentally different than white kids calling bookworms nerds and geeks? It seems that when black youth are discussed on this board, there are a slew of people who portray behavior among blacks as completely foreign to the mainstream, and that the tendencies that black kids exhibit are rarely if ever displayed by whites. Rhinocerous spittle, I say.

In my experience, it seems that smart kids who are well-rounded appear to be universally liked. “Well-rounded” means being able to talk about a wide range of subjects, participate in a wide range of activities, and be comfortable around a wide range of people. Bookworms often can talk in-depth about academic and often times esoterical subjects, but usually are at a disadvantage in a room full of people who want to talk about fluff like the latest “Amazing Race” episode or the insanity that is Donald Trump’s hair. But sometimes its perfectly okay to talk about non-intellectually weighty subjects. Bookworms who eschew anything not related to an academic endeavor typically think dancing is stupid, sports are only for Neaderthals, and television is an instrument of idiocy. So of course they will have a hard time clicking with their mediocretin peers who enjoy all of those things plus more!

My point is that whether the kid is black or white, the high school environment selects for well-roundness. The jock who can’t read may not get picked on (if only because jocks usually project strength that makes bullying unattractive), but his peers will no doubt snicker about his illiterate ass behind his back. And the bookworm who does nothing but read will also attract some negative attention. But the jock who is the captain of the quiz bowl team will probably be the most popular cat in school. Kids, just like the rest of society, respect people who can excel in many different areas and do it with ease.

[you_with_the_face]

I also want to welcome you, Hippy. I hope to experience more of your pedagogy ( ;)) in the future.

[fessie]

I think that you with the face is absolutely right, and would like to add to the chorus of those who enjoyed Hippy Hollow’s contribution to what has largely been an absurdly lowbrow diatribe.

And I’ll take it one further. The lack of a well-rounded personality is often revealing. Because the qualities that result in areas of weakness can be the same ones that alienate people.

For example, my very bright and extremely popular 9-yr-old boyfriend was not only strong academically, but he had a wonderful sense of humor and could play sports with some skill. Whereas I’d been raised by bright underachievers to believe intelligence was the only quality worth noting. So of course I tooted the only horn I had, loudly and persistently; and of course it failed again and again.

The other thing I noticed in skimming this is that FinnAgain argues in the same manner every time, dissecting statements and attacking phrases individually. Perhaps part of what might well be a genuine misunderstanding here is due to his inability to synthesize posts into a larger general meaning, “reading between the lines” to pick up the intended message. Sometimes the whole is greater than the sum of its parts.

[FinnAgain]

Just one last thing. I apologize for arguing when angry. This was originally meant to be just a rant, and it sorta evolved into a debate, and I lost track of exactly where it crossed.

In any case, if I was that pissed posting couldn’t have been a good thing, and I should’ve known better. In addition, I was prolly a bit too emotional to distinguish where exactly everybody was in the dogpile, so I’m sorry if I ended up acting with a bit of a ‘siege mentality’.

Anybody who feels like continuing this discussion with me is welcome to email me at AgentFinn@gmail.com

[monstro]

@Hippy Hollow

I do think, however, it [intelligence] is admired when students detect it, rather than when it is self-promoted or endorsed by teachers.

I think Americans in general admire intelligence too, but it’s different from the stuff that we’ve been taught is “intelligent”. Engineers have always been respected in our society–moreso than most professionals. I think the reason this is so is because the product of their brain power is tangible and easily detectable. They invent things. That make things run faster and better. They are good with their hands. And most importantly, they are practical. Americans love practicality. (Doctors are praised for the same reasons.)

What Americans do not love are scientists and academics who emerse themselves in esoterica. Americans will eat up piles of BS from their politicians, media pundents, and spiritual leaders (including Oprah), but when a scholar takes the floor, suddenly their BS detectors are set to ultra sensitive. I think this is unfortunate, frankly, because voices of insight and wisdom are often tossed out along with the quacks and loonies. But this is understandable if you consider the values of this society.

Being an intellectual has historically been the domain of the leisure class. Americans pride themselves on being hard-working, meat-and-potatoes kind of people. I think most of us equate a whole lot of book learnin’ with trying to be something we aren’t, culturally. Consequently, we tend to view studious scholars as uppity phonies. Combine this with our supposed spirituality and you get a heavy dose of anti-intellectualism.

FinnAgain, I’m glad you’ve got a cooler head now, and I hope this thread won’t discourage you from posting in the future.

[eleanorigby]

Lawks a mussy-sumthin’ good came out of this disaster!

I’ve been following, but askeered of putting in my 2 cents.

(and why the hell I am typing like a redneck hayseed circa 1920, I don’t know)…maybe it’s the anti-intellectual in me.

I agree with Hippyhollow (and am surprised that Garnder wasn’t brought up before, oh well) and also you with the face --excellent points.

And Finnagain --nice to see a calm, reasoned response. I’ll say one thing–you are a fight to the death kind of guy!
:eek:

Rgiby–(high test scorer, but humbled in math)

[EddyTeddyFreddy]

@Hippy Hollow

[slight hijack]EddyTeddyFreddy, I’m only a temporary resident of the state until I finish school. Then I will likely return to my native Texas… but the Bay State isn’t a bad place to live, at all…

Heh. You plan to go back to Texas when you graduate.

Heh.

But the Bay State has its charms.

Heh.

And maybe you’ll stay just a little while to check out the places and things to do you didn’t have time for.

Heh.

And hey, here’s a good job, with congenial colleagues, why not take it just for a year.

Heh.

Or two, or three, or…

Heh.

I dunno the statistics on this, but a whole lotta people who come to Massachusetts for an education wind up staying here.

Heh.

Welcome to Massachusetts!

[FinnAgain]

Since this thread is already bumped (I figured it wouldn’t be) I just wanted to add another piece of data. I know, I know, I’m trying not to post here, but I just wanted to answer a couple points.

Hippy Hollow, without getting further into a debate here, I wanted to point out that I know, and knew, that teachers singling me out was not a good thing. Nor did the students doubt the teacher’s assesments. When my tenth grade English teacher read my paper to the class and there were audible gasps when she finished, I tried to hide in my chair. When one of the students asked, full of incredulty “Did someone our age write that?” the teacher replied that yes and not only that, someone in the class had written it. I tried to scrunch myself up as small as possible (this was hard for a six foot tall guy). It took about five minutes after class for the other students to figure out that none of them had written it, and to start calling me a teacher’s pet and a show off (never mind that I didn’t ask to have my damn essay read to the class). In math classes I’d be one of the first to raise my hand when we were given a problem and after making the mistake of telling a friend of mine that I was acing all the tests without studying, word about that got around the school and I was mocked for that too. I got into the John Hopkings CTY program, and was mocked for that. Hell, problems started as far back as second grade when we were first tested for the gifted & talented program, and other kids would harass me because I got into the program and could leave the classroom at any time and go to the G&T room, while they had to stay in class. For better or worse, I was pretty clearly different than most of the other students, and that caused problems.
Strangely enough, I got along very well with all the other intelligent kids in the school, and a good few of the ‘jocks’ , ‘preps’, and ‘skaters’.

To make matters worse, my family wasn’t rich, and the town I grew up in was very status conscious. It was not rare, at all, for 16 year olds to be given $30,000-$40,000 cars as gifts by their parents. I heard more than one student complain that they ‘only’ got an expensive Japanese car, and not a BMW. I didn’t even have a car. In order to be able to socialize at most parties, you had to be able to afford/bring cocaine. Etc…

And the reason I’m sure it was my highschool enviornment and not me, is that less than a month after I graduated I went to college and started taking summer courses. Certainly not enough time for me to change my personality, right? If I was a jerk/asshole, then something like 20 days couldn’t have changed who I was. And yet, lo and behold, for the first time girls liked me, there weren’t random people throwing basket balls at my head for no reason, people wanted me around, they got my jokes and laughed at them. When I spoke in class, people wanted to talk to me after class or study with me, nobody tried to push me down flights of stairs. etc…
And I’d done nothing different.

[Sauron]

@FinnAgain

Hippy Hollow, without getting further into a debate here, I wanted to point out that I know, and knew, that teachers singling me out was not a good thing.

I’m going to answer your anecdotes with my own, but I wanted to preface this by saying it sounds to me like your school’s teachers and administrators didn’t have a good handle on the attitudes and mores of their student body.

When my tenth grade English teacher read my paper to the class and there were audible gasps when she finished, I tried to hide in my chair. When one of the students asked, full of incredulty “Did someone our age write that?” the teacher replied that yes and not only that, someone in the class had written it. I tried to scrunch myself up as small as possible (this was hard for a six foot tall guy). It took about five minutes after class for the other students to figure out that none of them had written it, and to start calling me a teacher’s pet and a show off (never mind that I didn’t ask to have my damn essay read to the class).

This is one of the reasons I made my opening statement, above. I had a similar situation happen to me in ninth grade, when our English and lit teacher asked us to write a short story. She read mine to the class. I was horribly embarassed, but several of my peers came up to me later and said they really liked my story. If I was called a teacher’s pet, I wasn’t aware of it.

Hell, problems started as far back as second grade when we were first tested for the gifted & talented program, and other kids would harass me because I got into the program and could leave the classroom at any time and go to the G&T room, while they had to stay in class.

Our school system didn’t test for the SAGE program (Special Abilities/Gifted Education) until seventh grade, but I qualified at that time. We weren’t allowed to leave our classes “at any time” to go to our SAGE stuff – we had established hours during the school week. Some of our teachers didn’t like this, but by and large the other students thought it was fantastic that we could get out of class legitimately.

For better or worse, I was pretty clearly different than most of the other students, and that caused problems. Strangely enough, I got along very well with all the other intelligent kids in the school, and a good few of the ‘jocks’ , ‘preps’, and ‘skaters’.

Maybe this is part of the disconnect I’m having. Our school wasn’t terribly large (around 800 students); our town had around 5,000 people in it. Our social groups weren’t large enough to stand on their own – the “jocks” weren’t numerous enough to be their own clique. They bled over into the “preps” and the “smarties” and the “nerds” and the “Jets” and the “Sharks” and God knows who else. You’d have maybe one person who was in a given group who wasn’t somehow connected to another group. Made stereotyping pretty difficult.

And the reason I’m sure it was my highschool enviornment and not me, is that less than a month after I graduated I went to college and started taking summer courses. Certainly not enough time for me to change my personality, right? If I was a jerk/asshole, then something like 20 days couldn’t have changed who I was. And yet, lo and behold, for the first time girls liked me, there weren’t random people throwing basket balls at my head for no reason, people wanted me around, they got my jokes and laughed at them. When I spoke in class, people wanted to talk to me after class or study with me, nobody tried to push me down flights of stairs. etc…
And I’d done nothing different.

Sadly, I know for a fact you’re making this part up. The fine documentary film “Revenge of the Nerds” proved conclusively that the smart geeks stayed geeky and picked-upon long into their college careers.

[Knowed_Out]

I just got one quest FinnAgain, now that you’ve seemed to have calmed down. You’ve been lashing out at those who said you were bragging, asserting that they insulted you. Suppose they never said it, and only mentioned that it was ironic that your post was the same thing boastful parents typically say. Would you have seen their point?