I am not subtle. There are bound to be inaccuracies. Yes, I will concede to your point.
Religion helps a lot, eh? :P Not that all religious people are like that, but more often than not, those people you described are religious
No, not really. Yeah, I have more dumb Christian conservatives than dumb non-Christian conservatives, but if anything, I think that is attributable to most people in the area being Christian. Where I study and most people aren't Christian though, there certainly aren't any less dumb people.
I agree, stupid people are everywhere. Everyone lacks something. But a college degree is a college degree. The person may have been 'stupid', but at the very least they passed college. Michael Moore is no less crazy than Limbaugh, but to call him 'stupid' is a bit inaccurate. Mr. Moore could have had good education. He may be intelligent in those subjects. But his world view is skewed as hell, and he is blind because of it. He is not wise. As much as I hate it, there is a difference between wisdom and overall intelligence. Your post confuses both, and that is my main objection.
I think we are having terminology issues here. There is a big difference between intelligence (your biological reasoning capacity), wisdom (your willingness to use it), and knowledge (Information stored in your brain, which by itself is useless). (or at least, that is the way I view it) College certainly increases most peoples knowledge, but it surely does not increase their intelligence, and by enforcing standard ways of thinking, I think often decreases people's wisdom.
And you are forgetting an important thing: There are ways to gain as much and far greater knowledge than college. Seriously, I was home-schooled and never did that well in math (though I made it through calculus) or English, and honestly did not do that well in History either. When I came to college and had to do placement tests, I tested out of having to do English, and tested into very high-level math classes. I have learned literally almost nothing at all from any of my History classes. With self-study I was able to learn more knowledge than most people I know in college, and did not have a professor telling me how to think, so I was free to make my own decisions.
A college degree only means that you have went through some college courses (most of which are an insult to your intelligence), gained some knowledge, and have become educated on the standardized ways of doing things. (and of course I am talking mostly about liberal arts and stuff, not most science and math) The average person could have learned a lot more studying by themselves on their own time and still not have a degree. And when the great college student graduates, they will have an abnormally aged liver and a trivial amount of real world knowledge, but think that they are so much smarter than everyone else.
Look, I share your sentiment, and it is certainly accurate, but the problem is that you cannot simply ignore ever societal convention. Any degree-holding person is on average smarter than a non-degree holder. You have to go through college to get the degree. They had to work their
at least once. Few colleges/universities are easy. Most are not (unless it is a community college). Exceptions lie on both sides, but in general, a degree is a degree. One cannot ignore that. This is what I dislike in conservatives.
I disagree that a degree holding person is smarter than a non-degree holding person. As I said, all a degree means is that you have went through a bunch of BS courses (which most people can go through doing minimal work, learning minimal amounts of knowledge, and then forgetting it in a year), have a bit more knowledge than before you went in, and a pretty big ego. And seriously, I have met a lot of people without degrees who are a lot smarter than most people I have met with them. Yeah, ambitious people (who are usually smarter) are drawn to degrees, so what you say is somewhat true for the younger generation, but it is not the merit of the degree, but the person. They go through the BS that is college so that they can succeed.
Again, you are but reinforcing my negative stereotype of conservatives. You cannot discount something like that. It is almost always impossible to go through college and not become at least a
bit smarter. The system is flawed, but it works. If what you said was true, then we would have done away with education aeons ago.
It works...but not how it is supposed to. Yeah, you are right, they learn a bit, but that does not make them more intelligent. And they could have learned much more if they studied by themselves. Still though, knowledge does not reflect intelligence. Going through college does not make them any smarter. It gives them more data that they won't be able to correctly process. It is better to have less data and be able to process it correctly, and even better to have more and be able to process it correctly.
I absolutely, 100% agree with that. Very few professors are neutral. But so what? Everyone has an opinion. Everyone pushes their point of view. Why do you think a conservative is a conservative? because he/she is quiet for their entire life? Of course not.
Yeah, everyone has an opinion and should be able to express it. When they equate their opinion with the absolute truth and teach kids that if they do not agree with them they are stupid though, that is a crime. That is brainwashing. That is what most professors I know are guilty of. That is why conservatives dislike professors. Yeah, it is a stereotype, so what? It does not make it any less true.
Disagree. All of my professors are highly competent, even though I am dual enrolled in a medium-quality local university for a year, before I graduate from my HS. Some of the profs hold strong opinions that slant their world-view, just as a far-right individual, but that does not make them any less intelligent. Just not wise. And closed-minded to a certain degree. Still, any liberal is by default is more open minded, although not in politics, for sure.
Yeah, professors are usually very knowledgable, but most I have met are not incredibly intelligent. (Some not even a bit :P) As far as a liberal being more open minded, I think individual people are open minded or not, and that it has nothing to do with their political opinions. I think that saying conservatives are more likely to be closed minded is pretty closed minded in fact. :P
Indeed, I do know that. Just as the story with me and generalisations goes. But who here actually thinks through things well? Most simply stick to their point of view. While you have to give me credit for entering the Backroom as a conservative and morphing into first a moderate and then a liberal. At least I am not stuck on the same point.
I don't agree with you, but yeah, I can respect someone who is open minded. But hey, guess what, you were a conservative open minded enough to change his opinion! lol, like I said, it is about the person, not the affiliation.
If the Republicans abandon their religious ties to the South, then I will seriously consider voting for them. So far, they have not. I still like McCain as well, as his unwillingness to stick to a partisan mould was a splendid quality. At the same time, I found Obama looking at both sides in a rational manner more than any other politician.
Audacity of Hope is a quite marvellous book, once you get past the sickly-compromising beginning. At least Obama tries. Other than McCain, I have not seen any conservative do the same.
I know that you really dislike religion, but I do not agree with you. Nor do I agree with McCain. I think he has no idea what he is doing. He really just comes across as having no idea about important issues, which is why he flips and flops so much. Being open minded is fine, but something is right or wrong. You gotta have someone who can fairly look at both sides and decide for himself, not someone who is pulled back and forth between the two.
I admire your willingness to patronise to persuade a person to concede on a point, as I often do that too, but in fact, I disagree. We are not more intelligent. Not at all. Not even a fraction. I can however, say with great conviction that both of us have overinflated egos
.
Hardly a patronization, I was using you as a low standard. 
We have inflated egos? Yeah, I am sure of. I try to be humble, honestly, but always fall into the trap of thinking I know it all. To my credit though, if I find out I am wrong, at least I will change my opinion. And don't be to hard on yourself, everyone has an inflated ego, just some more than others.
And yeah, I have met some people in the liberal arts who are quite intelligent (some, I will admit quite a bit smarter than myself), but most people I know in the liberal arts are quite a bit below average intelligence (or at least are just not willing to think). When I was going in for CIS, a lot of the people I met were extremely intelligent, but after I switched from science to the humanities, my opinion of the average type of person attracted to the humanities went down incredibly. As I said though, I blame the professors. A lot of people do not want to think, or to work, or to do anything more than they have to. It is the professor's job to teach them TO think, and to make sure that they do.
You may superficially respect them, but your post was deeply insulting to their profession, no matter what you say now. I think that religion is a joke, but I found all of my past pastors highly intelligent - just skewed, as most professors. I may detest what the pastors do, but I cannot argue with their credentials and intellect. The ones I met had plenty of both.
No, you are wrong. I certainly do (and quite sincerely) respect them, just not majority of the people in their profession. In fact, I respect them even more for breaking the mold.
Yes, yes. That is your opinion, all I can say. Everyoen pushes positions, because everyone has positions, and everyone believes in those positions if they hold them. The universal truth.Let us not grow hypocritical.
I am not being hypocritical. I am going to be a professor of history in 5 years or so. When I am, I am not going to push my views on other people. Yeah I will have them, but I will have the integrity not to make other people feel stupid if they do not agree with me. There is nothing wrong with having or stating opinions. What is wrong (and in fact, intellectually criminal) is that they push them down people's throats and create a feeling of guilt for whoever does not agree with them.
Lol, they keep it because they are in a hostile environment, and not because they are so fair and balanced
(no pun intended) 
. Do not think I will swallow such an unfounded generalisation. There has never been anything made to support this. I can say "blacks are more often than not uneducated"
(and I did once, only to get infracted for the exact same statement), but I can support my position with statistics, which no sane person disagrees with. It is no secret that in their poverty it is difficult to find good education, especially when they have little of it from their birth.
I was speaking of my own experiences with liberal professors, as well as the experience of my family and some of my friends.
You seriously think an average church-going far-right conservative is more intelligent than an average far-left professor? I could swallow that the church-going conservative is
wiser, but to say that professors are stupider than a you-know-who strikes me as amusingly, partisanly, inaccurate.
No, I did not say that. (and what does church going have to do with anything? Some of my professors got to church everyday) I have met some incredible intelligent people without degrees, and some incredibly intelligent people with 8 year degrees, but by the same token I have met a lot of mud dumb people without degrees, and a lot of mud dumb people with degrees. I am not saying that people with degrees are dumber, just that a degree does not make them smarter.
P.S. Hehe, please use paragraphs - do not make a poor liberal suffer more than the must
.
lol, I enjoy making them there liberals suffer. 
Well, we should not disagree that much, as I generally like or at least tolerate most of what the Tories push. The US Republicans are my problem. But what is wrong with the underlined part? Surely they know better than us. Your sentiment is a strikingly human one
(I know, it is 'duh', but still, read on) as it is only natural to feel antagonistic towards persons of higher rank, especially when they meddle so much. But you think a liberal does not have to deal with that? I know the scientists are exponentially smarter than me, yet I accept their actions.
Re: No more global warming?
Originally Posted by Beskar
)
Re: No more global warming?
.
I don't think that 'global warming' is an issue either. Personally (As someone living in WI), I wouldn't really mind if it was a few degrees warmer. 
Re: No more global warming?
. But I could swear my disagreements with you are only recent, mostly when religion comes in the debate.
Re: No more global warming?
Re: No more global warming?
Bookmarks