Pen-Elayne on the Web

A Brain, A Heart, Da Noive

There's been a lot of chat, on blogs and elsewhere in print, about the contempt many "ordinary people" seem to have for intellectuals, and vice versa. I readily admit to being a part of the latter crew; I find the idea that many well-spoken writers have about "middle America" being a bunch of unrefined, racist/sexist/homophobic/name-your-prejudice couch-potato buffoons who don't know their asses from crop circles to be about as appalling and provincial as people who support terrorists like Eric Rudolph based on their contempt for stereotypes of city-dwellers or Ivory Tower inhabitants. I always wind up shaking my head and wondering why nobody seems to learn the lessons of history insofar as recognizing "divide and conquer" - i.e., that the powers that be subtly, and sometimes not so subtly, encourage this kind of bigotry and stereotyping so that the victims of their bad policies don't notice the real culprits behind their communities' problems and band together in protest against them. Assuming the worst of your fellow Americans is an easy and convenient way to avoid actually communicating with them and =gasp!= finding out how much you might actually have in common.

Maybe that's why downright nastiness between folks of different backgrounds (racial, geographic, educational, etc.) seems so pervasive. We've lost or misplaced the skill or the desire or the time to actually listen to each other, so assumptions about what the other person "really meant by that" and attempts to "score points" over your "opponent" take the place of actual thought-and-response. I remember, at the March 18 What Liberal Media panel, an audience member seriously querying, "Why does the liberal media always seem to express itself with profanity?" His question wasn't any kookier than those of any other attendee, some of whom went on major conspiracy-theory rants completely ignoring that they were supposed to be asking questions - but it alone was met with another audience member's "clever" retort, "Fuck you!" Nor did the panelists address his question. Was it really too much trouble to examine the guy's point and formulate a quick response along the lines of "I see what you're saying, and yes, all of us on every end of the political spectrum are probably guilty to one degree or another of using harsh language to make our points. Sometimes it's done deliberately to get attention or for shock value, or to incite others, or just because we're occasionally sloppy and lapse into crudity. But it's important to remember that you're often dealing with a sliding scale as to what language is found offensive - for instance, you may not like my use of 'damn' and I may not like your use of 'chick' - and that's why it's often a good idea to look beyond individual words to the point that the speaker or writer is trying to make."? The more we dismiss or ignore people when they actually try to communicate, the more estranged we become from our fellow human beings.

What prompted this musing as well was a fascinating article by Peter David (link at sidebar) in a recent CBG regarding responses he had seen to his friend Harlan Ellison's critique of a comic book in a previous issue. Peter read the response letters as anti-intellectual - "if he can't say something simplistically, he shouldn't say anything at all" - and excoriated "the utter disdain, segueing into outright hostility, toward the very act of thinking," as evidenced by bright folks being referred to derogatorily as "geeks" and the like, just to give one example. Now, as the girl who always had crushes on the brainy guys in school, I'm probably the wrong person to ask about anti-smart-kid hostility. As I recall, when I was taunted in high school it wasn't based on my smarts; the other kids had a wealth of differences to pick on, from my religion to my weight to my lack of social skills and grace and athletic ability, without ever coming close to my GPA. Kids are like that, they're cruel and they'll zero in on anything that stands out and I was a total sore thumb. I got over it.

But I remember the meanness. And, having read the critique and the letters, I think what the letter-writers were responding to was the perceived meanness of the critique rather than its erudition. In other words, I believe it was a case of not "if he can't say something simplistically, he shouldn't say anything at all," but "if he can't say something nice, he shouldn't say anything at all" - and not even so much "shouldn't say anything at all" but "why go so far out of one's way to be mean?" Now, I don't know Ellison other than as a friend-of-friends but, despite his reputation, he's always been very polite whenever I've seen him. And I don't think he intended his critique to be nasty at all, but probably clever and insightful. But I can see where others might find it mean, and for a lot of people meanness still sends up a red flag.

Which is actually encouraging to me personally. Whenever we protest against perceived bullying, whether it's against intellectuals or against small-town middle Americans or against powerful governments with radical agendas, it speaks to something valuable within us. It says that we shouldn't only reason with our heads, but also with our hearts as well. That we should consider how our words might be perceived by others, and strive to minimize the "mean factor" (provided we don't actually mean to be mean, if you get my meaning) in the interest of clearer communication and general courtesy. It reminds us that the people on the other side of whatever artificial divide we erect are every bit as interesting and special and three-dimensional as we are, and if we want to be done right by others we need to do right by them.

Now, if only I would practice what I preached more often. :) But they say that recognizing the problem is the first step towards doing something about it...