Ignorance: What we are up against

[linazelle]

I had lunch today with some people I've met this week during a class. It was a large group of 12 which dwindled down to three well-educated black guys (all have masters degrees) and me. I overheard the youngest talking about Michael Moore and immediately perked up and moved closer. The other two guys were disagreeing with the younger man about F/911, were anti-Moore and bashed the movie as propoganda even though they have not seen it. (One is in his twenties too and the other in his forties. We are all from different cities.)

I asked them whether they had heard one person refute any of Moore's truths. The younger guy added that Moore would definitely be sued for slander if he lied. Even though they could not deny the truth of the movie they still said the movie was pointless.

As we walked back to class the youngest guy urged them to see it. The oldest asked why this was such a big deal and what Kerry would do better than Bush.

I said for one thing our civil rights are being taken away and asked him when we have known a time that people had to be patted down and take loyalty oaths to see the president, who represents all the people, speak. Both said that our civil rights are not being taken away it is just that times have changed since 9/11 and the president has to be cautious. :eyes: I then mentioned the 2000 election and how it was stolen and the younger opposing man said Bush won. (!!!) We had to get back to class but I invited both to meet me after dinner to talk more.

I have traveled a lot this year and I continue to see educated blacks (and whites--like the one who told me there was no such thing as global warming) like these two and I am flabbergasted. I will again share that another of the same ilk from yet another city bragged to me in unison with a like-minded friend that he is a republican and has a picture of Nixon hanging in his office. Another black woman (a lawyer and executive) I talked to about some of the current events, when I finished asked, why this was so important.

Maybe I am just unlucky when it comes to meeting people but I consider these people to be a fairly good representation of the type of political ignorance that permeates our society. As a black woman, I cannot for the life of me understand why other blacks are not up in arms about Bush's destructive and unethical leadership.

Your thoughts? :shrug:

[FloridaPat]

1. It's amazing that the Constitution worked for 200 years and now

under Bush it's out of date.

I have some Black friends in Atlanta that are well educated. They stand behind Kerry. But there is a lot of ignorance in our society and I am amazed. It's so obvious to me. I just don't understand it.

[linazelle]

4. It's like these people all belong to some club that I don't know about

They don't necessarily listen to Rush Limbaugh or anything but they all seem to think alike. During the conversation today, they mentioned the media and also said the media was liberal. Even the youngest Michael Moore fan agreed with them about this. Unreal.

[Barney Rocks]

2. I keep hearing

stories like this more and more. It seems really bizarre to me. All I can say is keep fighting the good fight.

[MissMarple]

3. Being clueless and self absorbed isn't just a black thing.

My sister is the same way. She is "educated", middle class and white. Politically, she is dumb as a post. She hates the war, thinks it is terrible, but likes the tax cuts. No vision, no long view, and has atrophied critical thinking skills.

[RoyGBiv]

5. Why does this matter?

I've been having a similar, extended discussion with two co-workers recently, one of whom is gay, the other a Latino man.

I am new to this place and so don't know all the people with whom I work very well, so I've paid attention to try to gage what topics are acceptable to various individuals. (I want no running arguments in a work environment.) These two in particular struck me as liberal types, and deep down they really are, but, as I learned, they are also exceedingly ignorant of the world around them.

The gay man, for obvious reasons, surprised me the most. A woman came into the place the other day wearing a pink pro-Kerry hat, and I complimented her on it. The gay man asked me what it had said that caused the compliment -- he had only seen the color and has an aversion to pink due to stereotypes -- and when I told him, he made a raspberry sound and said something like, "Ahh, who gives a crap. They're both the same." I was floored.

At another moment, I was with both the gay man and the Latino man, and I heard on the television behind me that one of the hostages had been murdered in Iraq. I said something unflattering about Bush. Both individuals heard me and questioned me, asking me essentially the same thing, "Why do you care so much?" They'd also noted earlier that I occasionally check DU from work during my down time, and I've mentioned a few of the threads, so they have a pretty good gage of my interest level.

And so, since we were slow at the time and had nothing else better to do, I told them.

Neither seemed convinced, but it was the gay man who again surprised me the most by saying he didn't care about the right to get married. He wouldn't get married if someone paid him. He completely failed to see the larger issue, the right to choose to get married or not. He had no choice.

With their permission, I've started sending them e-mail of stories I run across that help explain why I care so much. I send the Latino man pictures from Iraq, pictures I choose deliberately of kids about the same age of his son, whom he adores.

I don't know if any of it will work, but I'm doing what I can. That's all any of us who are aware of the world around us can do. Willful ignorance is a plague for which there may not be a cure that's not worse than the disease itself.

[linazelle]

7. A very good way to approach this

However, I don't know that I would even want to offer to email these guys since they were so closed minded. I'm also new at my work location and looking for new friends in a new city. At the same time, on a daily basis, I find it very hard to simply connect with like-minded people because politics is such a taboo topic and when it is discussed, well, you see what the results have been.

[linazelle]

8. It matters, too, because I need to have been holding out hope

that it's the media that has been distorting the polls and that people really do know what's going on. In other words, that there's hope. If there are too many more people out there like this, I'm not so sure there is hope for overcoming the political siege we are under.

[Aunt Anti-bush]

6. I encounter the same kind of people every day.

It's a shame that so many people are completely ignorant of the issues that concern them. Unfortunately, political ignorance does permeate our society and it ends up making us all weak. Hopefully, the events we've been through for the last 4 years are making people understand that they have got to do their homework, so to speak and learn the issues and investigate the candidates. So many that I've talked to have told me that they just don't have the time, which is so sad, because really our futures are at stake.

[Lydia Leftcoast]

9. People like those you're describing aren't *educated*--

they're merely trained for a high-level job.

I used to run across students like this all the time: training for a specific job, getting good grades in the courses that led directly to that job, blowing off all their other courses, and showing no intellectual curiosity.

Because they have the piece of paper framed on the wall, society calls them "educated," but they're just trained.

Students like that (and almost all my students were white--it's definitely not a black thing) are one reason I was not sorry to leave academia.

[JSJ]

10. were their names 'tom'?

[Disturbed]

11. Purposeful ignorance.

Many people do not want to be educated. They do not want their undeducated opinions questioned or rattled. Thinking is work and they don't want to put work into anything that they don't see direct benefits from right away. Many people have a mind set about a lot of things and they will not listen to others that do not share that mind set or read any other views. Others think they are right about everything and will never question their own views or seriously think about anything contradicting them.

[ursacorwin]

12. i'd go as far to call it

fear of knowledge. this happens at all levels, in all races, and for every class of americans.

i'm a black queer woman in a heavily blue area. but i run across all kinds of people, gay, black, 'educated' and otherwise, who simply fear knowing too much. they don't want to be disturbed in the little bubbles they've created for themselves, where it's comfortable and they only have to think about 10 topics, and in which they can reasonably count of keeping their place. luckily, i don't have to spend too much time with folks like this, but i know they are there.

the greatest triumph of the rethug revolution of the last 20 years is the dissolution of quality public education in this country. some knowledge can seem scary to a mind which has never been exposed to certain ideas in a balanced way; people aren't to be blamed for not wanting to disrupt the lessons of childhood (myth) if there is no comforting replacement for it. learning can be hard, and our culture only encourages intellectual laziness.

it is very frustrating. i've found that often, but not always, money and death issues can break thru willful ignorance. "so you on going to iraq?" (draft) i say to my young queer friends who profess not to care. "but the churches were democratic with MLK" is what i usually say to black folks who think bush is good because he's xtian. i don't have to say that so often around here, only the most fundie blacks i know stay with bush and they are lost as much as any white folks.