AN ERA OF ANTI-INTELLECTUALISM

Intellectual is a nasty word in America, almost as bad as some vulgar words often used here.  It's better to be called an asshole than an intellectual.  To common stock Americans the two words are almost synonymous, and often used together, like in "asshole intellectual."  Common sense, however, is a highly revered term, and the insinuation is that people who have this common sense are smarter than intellectuals.  Common sense people believe that intelligent, well-educated people are devoid of common sense because they don't know how to do mundane but practical things. To some extent, this is true because intelligent people are smart enough to find ways of getting around the common sense things. This high intellect person might have a Ph.D. in physics but can't even find the air filter on his car engine.  A dumbass can, so that means he's got common sense.

Philip Wylie, the great sociologist, once decried common people as "no good, common son of bitches."  He pointed out all the bad things common people do but pointed to their one great asset - the ability to occasionally rise above the commonplace.  Common sense is in actuality a hotel for ignorance, so we'll call it The Hollow Head Hotel.  If you want reservations to stay there, you'd better start well in advance because the line is long.  Commonality is in itself a vulgarity, could well be the nastiest word in the English language.  Ignorance is blissful only to the ignorant, but they revel in it . . . and now, it has actually taken over government in this country.  Look out world, the hollow heads are at the wheel.

Ignorance can be treated, but stupidity can't.  The saying that there ain't no cure for stupid actually comes from stupid people, and we have a lot of them around.  We can excuse them to some degree because their ignorance is justified.  What to do with them is another question altogether.  As for the ignorant, the cure is through actually learning something . . . and you can forget learning through common sense.  Most of these people are ignorant due to their reliance on common sense.  So, I can change an air filter on a car motor, work at a factory job, even learn a respectable labor skill, but what then?  What sort of world view can a person like that have?  What kind of participant in the democratic process can a person like be?  Well, a common sense one.

Here's how this sad scenario plays out:  Common people just elected a lowlife to the presidency and sent a flock of fools to Congress.  Even common sense should've told them what a mistake this was, but they didn't see it.  Practical sense, therefore, does not equate with the concept of common sense.  It's just stupid sense, or ignorant sense.  We've never really appreciated our intellectuals in this country, but now we've ushered in a new era of anti-intellectualism, and the results will not be good.  But this presents a challenge to people who are smart, have good educations and can claim to be an intellectual.  What do they do now?  They are now the forgotten class in America.  They need a home where their points of view are accepted and appreciated . . . or are at least tolerated.  They won't find that here.