How do you deal with sheer stupidity.

In My Humble Opinion
1

I work with an extremely stupid kid and I am not being mean. Ask anyone that works with him and they will tell you the same. It is so bad that everyone at work acknowledges he can’t learn what is required of him and they have all given up explaining it to him. It took him longer than anyone in my two years on the job to learn how to do the basics of the job and he is a stock boy. A stock boy! It is not rocket science.

He is not retarded in the stuttering and the slow talking sense but in a different kind of way. He can talk fast but it is as if he is never thinking about what he is saying. Then when we tell him that he is wrong, he will not understand why. He will think it is because we misunderstood the point he was trying to make, which we didn’t, we understand his point very clearly. It is just that he changes his point as he goes along and then tells us that this is what he was talking about in the first place. I guess if he changed his point of view to ours (without admitting he changed his mind) it would be better that what he actually does.

I once made the mistake of telling him that he changed his mind and that he was originally wrong. He goes back to defend his original opinion and the cycle continues.

This is what the conversation would sound like:

Me: What would you do if your girlfriend cheated on you.

Kid: I would hit her (he was more graphic, but there is not point for me to be.)

Now the people at work get start calling him a wife beater.

Kid: No, I would never hit girls, come on (this is where he believes he was misunderstood and changes his opinion.)

Me: You just said you would hit her if she cheated on you (this is where I try to make him see he changed his mind and was wrong in the first place.)

Kid: Well, if she cheated then yea… (this is where he starts the circle all over again.)

Me: So then you would hit girls.

Kid: That’s not what I’m saying man.

He is out to destroy logic as we know it. I can not do anything about him. Every time he talks about something as dumb as beating down girls everyone just passes it off on his stupidity. We all feel sorry for him until we talk to him, then we hate him. I don’t know how to deal with something like this because normal people change their attitudes when confronted on a daily bases about their behavior. I am convinced he is a lost cause. I am still stuck working with him.

My latest strategy is to talk to him as little as possible.

Have you ever had to deal with someone really stupid? How would you go about dealing with real idiots that you have no choice but to put up with daily?

2

I worked for a supervisor that among other things:

Threatened a cow worker with one of the plastic serrated knives from IIRC wendys. You can cut someone with one of those. complaint #1 to management.

“wrassled” with guys on the shift, despite the need to answer phones and be undisturbed to actually handle a call without trying to breath, or get to the computer, then he tried laying hands on me when I objected to how he was wrassling with th eguys and he should watch out for injuries from putting them into a nelson [i think it is called, arms under the victems arms and back around their necks, forcing the head down] to show me it didnt hurt… I was not amused. Complaint # 2 to management.

He had a tattoo on his neck of a dotted line with ‘cut here’ printed above it.

He was convinced that to cross from south to north in the Bering Strait you keep the Southern Cross over your left shoulder.

It was called going down south because sea level is lower at the equators [ok, in the broadest general sense that the earth is an oblate spheroid…but he was serious that the world was a perfect sphere, and there was less water depth at the equator…]

If the outlet was not turned off at the fuse box, or an appliance plugged in, electricity leaked out of the little holes. [ok, maybe at the quantum level…but :rolleyes: ]

When it devolved to a discussion pertaining to certain aspects of nuclear power generation plants [people glowing in the dark :smack: ] I gave up, brought in my certification package and resume, tossed them at him and told him to shut the frell up if he didn’t have any experience in the field. Also complaint #3 to management because he spent 2 hours on hold with a reference librarian [poor lady!] trying to refute me instead of doing his job, and devolved to the reason that people glow in the dark when working a nuke plant was because everybody knows that radioactive stuff glows, and we were exposed to radiation on the job…

This was a national alarm service call center, by the way… we handled alarm systems for about half the east coast [not counting canada, and we didnt do south of the mason-dixon or west of ohio…] over a period of about 1 week after I got put on his shift.

3

There are stupid people in the world, I don’t like it but I can’t do anything about that, I choose to let it amuse me more often than not. If the situation is not dangerous it may really be funny. If I have to and I can, I just leave.

When it gets bad I repeat the following:

Grant me the serenety to accept the things I cannot change,
The courage to change the things I can,
And the wisdom to know the difference.

It’ll get you through a really hard night. It is the most wise thing I have ever learned!!!

4

It sounds like he might be related to ** Maureen**'s assistant
The world’s full of them.

5

If I don’t have to deal with incredibly stupid people, I simply don’t.
If I have to, I deal with them as little as possible. I say what I have to say, and then get out of the conversation. I’m not even graceful about it.

You have my sympathy, but why would you want to initiate a caonversation like the one you described if you know Stock Boy is a tool?

6

It sounds like he may have a learning disability, based on how long he took to learn the job. Just try to be nice to him, but you don’t have to chat excessively with him if it always tends to go down to the level you described. When it gets like that, just try to remind yourself to keep your mouth shut and try to think about something else, or talk to someone else. Unfortunately, you will get nowhere by trying to show him where his logic is faulty. I know how frustrating it can be, but you have to learn how to balance treating him like a human being with keeping yourself sane.

7

I just had one of those last night at 10pm. I really wasn’t ready to have this idiotic telephone dialogue:

Me: Hi, I’d like to sign up for the 6:15am spin class.
Girl at Gym: Okay. That’ll be $2 dollars.
Me: Okay. I’ll pay cash in the morning.
Girl at Gym: We have to put it on your account because you’re signing up early.
Me: No problem. I’ll square my account in the morning with cash.
Girl at Gym: Yes, but I have to charge your account now.
Me: Right. And I’ll square it with you in the morning.
Girl at Gym: But I have to put it on your account.
Me: Yes… and I’ll pay my account charges in the morning. Cash.
Girl at Gym: So you want me to sign you up for the spin class?
Me: Yes please… :dubious:
Girl at Gym: Then I’ll have to charge your account.
Me: :smack: Yes. Fine. Charge my account. :rolleyes:
<hang up and shake my head muttering as I go off to bed>

8

I argue on internet bulletin boards about it. :smiley:

In real life, I try to ignore it.

9

We treat our unit clerk with loving kindness and only give her familiar tasks. Asking her for an opinion or having a conversation about anything remotely abstact just isn’t done. She can be confused to tears if this happens. Ask about her dog. Compliment her hair. She feels loved. Going about her life is drama enough—a bigger dog attacked her little dog and she is still “Dromadized”. 3 years ago and she will tell you the story happily is you ask. When I was first hired, I made the error of 1) taking her seriously and 2) asking if being dromadized meant she only had one hump.

10

I usually ask them “What are you? Fucking stupid?”

11

How is the mental capacity of their sexual partner relevant and what’s it your business who they are fucking?

12

Birds of a feather, I suppose.

13

So you guys know Keith, too? He’s in my physics class.

14

What are you… :smiley:

15

I have one of those in my class. I can’t figure out how she keeps passing the lab portion of the classes. Not only is she stupid by not knowing the material properly, she’s actually dangerous in the lab.

Either she doesn’t understand basic safety protocols, or she doesn’t care. I’ve warned her, and the profs, when I see something happening, but nothing seems to change. I just make sure to stay far away from her when she’s working with specimens. She’ll kill a patient with a mistake someday, I’m sure of it.

16

Just because they don’t fit your drooling, stuttering stereotype of mentally retarded doesn’t necessarily mean that they aren’t. It’s unfortunate that they aren’t as intelligent as you, but perhaps a bit of compassion might be in order.

Just a thought.

17

I’ve got to agree with threemae. Keep things simple and within the person’s limitations. You’ve got limitations of your own, I’m sure.

Look, a few years ago, I worked with a computer tech who was simple, sweet, and none to bright although she was a reasonably competent tech. She was also a devout Christian. I happened to be in the tech support area when she was fussing because she’d been listening to country music rather than the local evangelical radio station while she was driving to work and was wondering if it was a sin. I assured her it couldn’t be (in my opinion) and pointed out that some of the most beautiful music in the world was written to give glory to God, pointing out Bach as an example. Her response was “Who’s Bach?” My response was to wish that a hole would open up beneath me and make a mental note not to discuss classical music with her again. :Shrug: She wasn’t interested in or knowledgable about classical music; I’m not especially interested in or knowledgableabout country music. It’s not that big a deal to me.

One of my vices, and, to some extent, it is a vice in my book, is my membership in Mensa. I joined reluctantly, because I’d known too many arrogant, obnoxious Mensans before I got taken in by a bunch of cool, fun-loving ones. I don’t ever want to become the kind of obnoxious twit who put me off the organization. People have different heights, hair colors, and degrees of intelligence. One of the best friends I’ve ever had is mildly mentally retarded. She’s still a sweet, kind person and one of the best people I’ve known. One of the biggest jerks I’ve known is, you guessed it, a Mensan. (Actually, I can think of at least one other one.) Their degree of niceness has nothing to do with their relative amounts of intelligence.

For what it’s worth,
CJ

18

Well? What’s Cecil look like?!

19

I once hired a temp to test some wireless phone whith which we were having a supplier quality problem. He was cheerfull, polite to a fault, but he had had some neurological problems as a baby. It took me about three hours to get him to learn a test protocol that took about 5 to 7 minutes to run per phone. By the end I was ready to put my head through a wall , having first ripped out all my hair , but he was so earnest and polite I swallowed any expressions of frustrations I had.

Well, the “temporary” quality problem didn’t go away quite as quick as we had hoped. In fact, it got a lot worse, and we ended up having him work for almost 2 years. He tested over 60,000 phones. Individually. Doing exactly the same 5 minute test protocol.

He would come in happy in the morning, and leave pleased and satisfied. He performed an absolutely crucial service that kept our whole system product line alive by keeping tons of bad sets from reaching customers. And he tested his last set with as much determination, care and attention as his first.

You could not make subtle jokes or cultural reference with / around him, and every task had to be explained in excruciating detail, slowly, one step at a time, with frequent repetition. Any signs of exasperation would send his anxiety level to the stratosphere. He was very good at faking understanding and simulating interested listening, which fooled a lot of people. But he just never got bored doing a repetitive task, was always cheerful, and he had a work ethic to make John Calvin proud.

He was a real godsend. I would have been really hard pressed to find someone who could do his job as well as he did for even 2 months on end.

I am please to report his girlfriend / then fiancee / then wife cared for him a great deal, and he was devoted and loyal to the death to her. He supported her by temping when she was going through lawschool, and I’m sure she will be able to make sure he will be OK.

So moral of the story: it is possible to be a fine human being without a 100 IQ, and if everyone was “above average” in intelligence, there would be even more unhappy people frustrated and alienated by their job, or a shortage of people willing to perform some still very important functions.

20

Lakai, it sounds like your best bet is to keep conversations with him work-related, and not to go off on hypothetical “What would you do?”