Daring FireballKindness as a Signifier of Intelligence
https://daringfireball.net/linked/2023/07/27/pritzker-kindness-intelligence
https://daringfireball.net/linked/2023/07/27/pritzker-kindness-intelligence
prolixious@daringfireball If this were true, people with intellectual disabilities would be cruelest of all, but that’s not the case. Plenty of stupid people are kind and it doesn’t require intelligence or imagination to be kind. Plenty of cruel people are very smart, which allows them to invent some unique and complex cruelties that unintelligent people would never think of. Please reconsider your endorsement of ableist bigotry, as that is its own form of cruelty.
Sean@prolixious @daringfireball it looks like you’re deliberately misinterpreting the article. Some one with a learning disability is not deliberately refusing to learn or grow. That’s the big and important difference.
@Craktok @daringfireball No. conflating cruelty with intellectual ability is ableist. Saying someone is stupid is saying they don’t have/use intellect. Folks who try to defend this wording need to sit and think for a bit because it’s not me inventing a new meaning for the words chosen here.
@prolixious well a massive example of cruelty and lack of intelligence is former president donald trump. He can barely read and let millions of people die in though his stupidity and ignorance.
@Craktok This essay applies to Trump’s intellectual abilities as well as the other ways people attack him based on perceived disability rather than his character flaws. When you treat lack of intelligence as a character flaw rather than a value-neutral part of human variation you hurt people who aren’t awful — and there are a lot of people who are less intelligent but who aren’t antisocial assholes.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/outlook/2020/06/16/mock-trump-hurts-disabled/
@prolixious interesting article, but who cares whether trump is well or not. The important thing about trump is that his incredible idiocy is hurting and killing people. I don’t know why people always deflect to protect trump. He’s a monster.
@Craktok Your ableism does nothing to stop Trump and a lot to hurt regular people around you. Honestly, your bigotry helps Trump because he’s a eugenicist. And your blaming evil on stupidity is also a eugenicist attitude.
@Craktok And also it seems like you only read the headline rather than the article, otherwise you’d have replied with actual depth.
@prolixious so because I didn’t agree with your interpretation of the article I must not have read it 😂😂
@prolixious so your excuse for trump is that he’s some criminal mastermind who’s trying to weed out inferior people?? You’re reading too much into his stupidity. This is the man who looked directly at the sun during a solar eclipse and suggested people drink bleach to fight COVID. He’s a fucking idiot no matter how you try to dress it up.
@Craktok I’m not saying he’s smart, I’m saying his virulent bigotry and belief in his own genetic superiority are independent from his intellectual abilities or lack thereof. And you’re so focused on using intelligence as shorthand for all of his bad qualities that you don’t care who you hurt as long as you think you’re hurting him. That makes you a bigot doing all sorts of collateral damage. You show that political affiliation is also an independent variable from being an asshole.
@prolixious bravo, I’m impressed with your attempt to deflect. But it still doesn’t change the facts. Trump has below average intelligence and that leads him to do and say stupid things that hurt a LOT of people. Hundreds of thousands of people DIED during his presidency because of his stupidity.
@daringfireball Also, the idea that humans are naturally suspicious and violent and intelligent people move past urges towards violence is some eugenicist nonsense. We’ve done well as a species due to our impulses towards sharing and cooperation, both of which are as natural and intrinsic to humanity as suspicion and the capacity for violence.
Alfredo Octavio@daringfireball If you like that, perhaps you'd also like the fact that the root of idiot comes from the Greek "Idiotes" and means a person not engaged in public life that only cares about their own private affairs.
John Gruber@aoctavio Wow, that’s spot-on.
Margaret@daringfireball According to this theory, Putrid and frump must be a couple of the stupidest people on the planet