Some of you reading this may hate me for what I'm about to say, and honestly that's okay with me. A few of you might actually read through my explanation and change your mind. Some of your won't. Either way, I'm going to say it.
I hate stupid people.
Now before you go getting all defensive, offended or start bashing me for saying something so heartless, allow me to elaborate a little. And just bear with me, chances are if you're upset right now, you're completely misunderstanding how I personally define a 'stupid person'.
To start, a stupid person is not someone with mental retardation. Mental retardation isn't in any way really the fault of the person in question. They were either born that way, or due to some outside influence became that way. Retarded people (I'm not saying that in any derogatory way) are actually rather lovable. I do whatever I can to help out or accommodate anyone with mental retardation whenever possible. To make a rather simplistic analogy, to me, people with mental retardation had their CPU's messed with. While they may have been outfitted with the newest five gigahertz, six core processor, some manufacturing defect (genetic cause) or power surge (external influence) took that amazing piece of biological engineering and dropped it quite permanently to the state of an old IBM 486. How can you possibly hate someone that has no control over their disability? Really now.
Perhaps you might grant me that, and still be upset since there are those with lesser intelligence but aren't retarded in some way. I've got no problem with these people either. These people I classify as 'dumb'. To use that same analogy as above, they didn't get the 5ghz, 6 core processor. They got a 2ghz single core. That's not their fault either! They were just built that way. I do admit though that my patience with 'dumb' people is a bit shorter than it is with retarded people. But it's still pretty significant. Most 'dumb' people even try their best to upgrade that CPU of theirs, going to college and learning trades. Major bonus points! Even people who are satisfied with their level of mental processing power are alright in my book.
So if my hatred for stupid people doesn't involve the mentally retarded, or the mentally slow...who does it apply to? That's simple. Stupid people can be of any intelligence level, even super geniuses can be stupid people. To qualify as a 'stupid person' you only need to meet three criteria :
1. Have some level of ignorance in any field or subject
2. Be aware of your ignorance in that area and
3. Want to remain ignorant for whatever reason
That's it in a nutshell. People who intentionally remain ignorant for various reasons. They know they're ignorant, and that this ignorance is probably causing some level of problems or stress for someone even possibly themselves. Yet despite this, they choose to remain ignorant. Now choosing to remain ignorant isn't as easy as it might seem. It takes real dedication to be stupid. I'll give a VASTLY EXAGGERATED example, just so you'll know where I'm coming from.
Susan is a stupid person. Why she's stupid is because of her religious beliefs. Her religion states that the Earth is flat, the center of the universe, and only a mile or so thick at its thinnest point. She's seen pictures of the Earth being round, learned about it in school, has read in the papers where volcanic shafts have been measured being hundreds of miles deep, and has met people from Asia...the other side of the world. And just to make it even more preposterous, lets say she's even been on one of those special tourist flights into the upper atmosphere and seen for herself that the world was round. Yet even in the face of all this evidence, she insists the world is still flat and thin. And regardless of what everyone else in the world says, it's still the center of the universe. She chooses to remain ignorant because becoming enlightened would violate her religion.
Now do I hate her because of her religious beliefs? Goodness no. She has the right to follow her religion until the end of time, and I fully support that. Why I hate her is because she refuses to allow any flexibility in her beliefs to compensate for this annoying irritant called Reality. When I say I've flown around the world twice (which I have) she insists it's not possible and that the plane actually just flew to the edge of the Earth and turned around without me noticing, then flew to the opposite edge, turned around again, and continued as though it had gone 'around' the world.
Now I admit, this is a very extreme and silly example. But it gets the point across. Stupid people suck. If you 'know' or believe something, and someone can irrefutably disprove your belief or knowledge, you should do the smart thing and adjust your knowledge or belief to now match what is provable to be true. NOT sit there and stubbornly hold onto your now antiquated and incorrect information just because doing so makes you comfortable.
Now what happens if you have a belief, someone disputes it and provides proof, and you hold onto your belief for as long as it takes you to find your own proof that this person is right or wrong? Well then I'd say you're a scientist! Lets look at Susan again. She hears in school that the world is round, hears it again years later on TV, and sees pictures of a round Earth while in college. Yet she still believes the world is flat, it just happens to be a disk...you know...to explain how it looks round from space and all. She's stupid. But what if she only holds onto the belief because she hasn't seen it for herself, and admits she MIGHT be wrong? That's NOT stupid. That's skeptical, but not stupid. Later on, she takes that flight, sees the round Earth and adjusts her beliefs. Then even though she held onto that belief for years in the face of overwhelming proof, she has redeemed herself and is not stupid. She's just mistrusting of proof provided by someone that doesn't believe things like she does. A very 'scientist' sort of way to think.
Now do you see why I hate stupid people? They sit there and blab on about their 'truth' on one subject or another, even though you and others can prove them wrong. And you HAVE proven them wrong. Yet they still sit there and just say that the proof is wrong, not because they can prove it wrong, but because it JUST IS. So to all you stupid people reading this, be prepared for my patented angry mob to come for you. Torches and anvils-on-a-stick wielding non-stupid people shall come....oh yes...they shall come.
