Dimmer Bulbs
by Jonathan Penton

Our society totally mis-defines the concept of intelligence. True, there are people who learn faster than others, and this is often reflected at work, at school, at play, and in IQ tests. But we know that if one makes it into college, learning speed is less useful than hard work. And by the time one gets to the workplace, learning speed becomes almost irrelevant, taking a far back seat to social skills. True intelligence, or the only intelligence that matters, is not measured by how fast one learns, but by how well one understands and interprets the world around them. This sort of intelligence is not innate, but a discipline. Its opposite, stupidity, is not a characteristic, but a choice.

Scott Adams (the Dilbert guy) once noted that we're all stupid some of the time. He gave an example: he once took his pager to be repaired, failing to observe that there were no batteries in it. Another example: say someone is parked in a parking lot, facing west. The exit to the parking lot is also to the west. There is no car in front of this hypothetical person, so he or she can pull directly out and to the parking lot's exit. Instead, he or she will very likely back out of his or her spot and drive all the way around a line of cars to get out of the lot. Daily stupidity. It's everywhere. And in my somewhat limited experiences with mentally retarded people, I find that they aren't any more likely to make these sorts of stupid errors than anyone else.

But nowhere is the difference between true intelligence and true stupidity more evident than on the Internet. For example:

Someone posted a poem to alt.teens.poetry.and.stuff titled "Charles Darwin Was a Gay Homosexual." It rattled and rhymed about Darwin's alleged sexual appetites and how he had sex with his brother. Someone asked the author what the poem was about. He replied, saying that he guessed Charles Darwin was a great man, since he discovered America and all, but he, the poet, didn't like Darwin much because he was a gay homosexual.

So the poet gets flamed. The idiots reading this thread fail to see any satire or mockery whatsoever in the poet's words, and instead assume that the guy not only doesn't like gays, but believes that Darwin discovered America. The poet is forced to explain that he is joking, and apologize for not being more clear.

So I call his antagonists out, calling them morons for not recognizing the joke. The universal response is "I know people who really do think like that." That's right, folks: these imbeciles wanted me to believe that they knew people who thought Charles Darwin discovered America.

Guys, if you're going to read something, read it all the way through, and don't toss out the bits you don't understand. That is the very definition of stupidity.

Like I say, it's everywhere on the Internet. Take another example: Landover Baptist, a vicious parody site that lampoons Southern Baptists. This site routinely says terrible things about blacks, Latinos, gays, Catholics, and the poor. There's no big sign on the front saying "THIS IS A PARODY," so they get hate mail by the sackful.

BUT WAIT! There's more. In any given month, Landover Baptist is likely to claim that they control the nation's bread supply, that they own half of Iowa, and that ten-year-old girls are getting pregnant by smoking marijuana. They offer a large number of homes for sale starting at two million dollars, and display a picture of their church that is obviously a very expensive hotel. They show pictures of their staff which were clearly generated with a face-morphing program. No humans have ever looked like the ones that attend Landover Baptist.

My point: the people sending hate mail to Landover Baptist are very, very stupid. They are sincerely convinced that the folks at Landover are trying to convince them that tampons are "Satan's little fingers" and Menudo means "pig intestine's cooked up in a broth as an offering to Satan." Get real, guys!

Welcome to the Internet, where people who have never exercised their brains before 1997 are now running around claiming to be experts on every subject, and critiquing everything they read. Folks, English is not like Japanese -- it is not a physically beautiful language. The only reason to read it is to understand it, and if you can't be bothered to understand it, you might as well stop reading it. Go out and buy yourself a clue!

What's that? You never started reading before you got on-line, and you are now concerned that you might be an idiot? That's good. Admitting the problem is the first step to recovery. Take this simple test. Go to http://www.co.jyu.fi/~np/rpg/DnD/. If you don't see the joke, you're stupid. If you find that you are stupid, step away from the computer screen and go to your local bookstore. Start by reading your local paper and the New York Times. In a few months, you should be ready to graduate to Charles Dickens. Once you've read and understood four Charles Dickens novels, you're ready to move on to the pinnacle of English literature, which is, of course, this site. After reading all the material on this site, you are officially intelligent, and can spread your wisdom throughout the world.

Jonathan Penton is the overworked editor and publisher of Unlikely Stories. Check out his literary works at this site.