We Should Never Be Surprised At The Persistence Of Fools
"We'll call it a draw"
The person who writes for fools is always sure of a large audience.
Arthur Schopenhauer, Religion: A Dialogue and Other Essays
The whole problem with the world is that fools and fanatics are always so certain of themselves, and wiser people so full of doubts.
Bertrand Russell
One of my favorite academic theorems is the Dunning-Kruger Effect. Without going into great detail, it’s the idea that some people are too stupid to recognize that they are, in fact, stupid. Because they lack the self-knowledge, honesty, and self-awareness to be cognizant of their considerable intellectual shortcomings, they believe themselves to actually be quite intelligent when in fact the truth is quite the opposite.
The Dunning-Kruger Effect may be a universally human condition, but it truly defines the American experience today.
America is a country in which shameless stupidity is in many cases considered a virtue. Why? Because stupid people are easily manipulated- by marketers, by politicians, by cable news channels, and anyone else with an agenda or a product to sell. The Dunning-Kruger Effect can account for many of humanity’s darker chapters, like Nazi Germany, for instance. Certainly, no thoughtful, self-aware populace would fall for what Hitler was selling…yet he held millions under his spell for more than a decade. The Dunning-Kruger Effect is something that crosses cultural barriers and can result in titanic historic mistakes and, in the case of WWII, millions of deaths.
It can be difficult to discuss the Dunning-Kruger Effect without sounding arrogant or self-important, but the reality is that most of humanity isn’t equipped to think critically. Most of humanity IS equipped to react, which is what populists and demagogues play to. They trigger hot-button issues, things that create anger among large groups…and then they rely on the mob mentality to take over.
Donald Trump didn’t ascend to power because he appealed to the better angels of White, middle-class Americans. No, he told them who they should blame, who they should be afraid of, and who’s responsible for their perceived diminished lot in life. He played off their anger and promised to create an America in which White, Conservative, heterosexual Christians would once again resume their rightful place at the top of the socioeconomic food chain.
Trump wasn’t appealing to people with college and/or advanced degrees, though large numbers of those folks did come to follow and vote for him. His appeal was tailored to those who’d finished high school but hadn’t gone on with their education. He spoke to largely White, rural, less-educated Conservative Christians who were already concerned that their way of life and their belief system was being threatened by Liberals, homosexuals, atheists, and immigrants.
Most of these folks had never really taken the time to calmly, rationally consider the “facts” behind their beliefs and if those “facts” actually held up under scrutiny. In many cases, they took what they heard on Fox News Channel or other Right-wing propaganda outlets and internalized it as their truth.
Liberals, homosexuals, atheists, and immigrants were in no way presenting any sort of threat to their way of life or their belief system. That said, Fox News had convinced them that quite the opposite was true. Atheists had succeeded in removing God from the public square. Gays and lesbians were recruiting in our public schools. Liberals were working to ensure that Conservative beliefs were “exposed” as heretical. Worst of all, immigrants were pouring over our southern border and coming for our jobs.
None of this was remotely true, but people had come to believe it over the years because the Right-wing media- from Rush Limbaugh to Sean Hannity to Tucker Carlson and on and on- had pounded that message into their pliable brains. And too few Americans had stopped to question what they were hearing.
When Donald Trump came along, it was like putting a match to gasoline. FINALLY, there was someone willing to put America first and who wasn’t afraid to look out for the interests of good, God-fearing, patriotic Conservative White heterosexuals.
I suppose someone reading this might be wonder what sort of arrogant know-it-all would write something like this, essentially referring to millions of his fellow countrymen as too stupid to know that they’re stupid? I’d answer that by pointing out that the Trump years speak for themselves. Anyone who’s ever been to a #MAGA rally or seen one on TV knows what I’m talking about. To put it mildly, the people who attended your average, run-of-the-mill #MAGA rally weren’t the cream of the intellectual crop, if you know what I mean.
These folks weren’t going to learn new things. They were going to have their hatred, ignored, and prejudice reinforced and validated…something Donald Trump was only too happy to do.
These folks fervently believe the patently untrue, including conspiracy theories that defy rational understanding (QAnon, anyone?). They believe what they believe…and no amount of contrary facts and/or evidence will convince them of their error of those beliefs.
There’s no doubt that America is a country with a large number of highly intelligent and capable people. America is the proud owner of the world’s largest and most powerful military and economy, and much of that was done with American-born brainpower. The sad reality is that much of it was also done with the intellectual contributions of people from all over the world, in part because, on aggregate, Americans don’t want to do the hard work of becoming engineers or computer scientists. And so we import brainpower from places like India.
The problem today is that- to borrow Bertrand Russell’s phraseology- America is a place “where fools and fanatics are always so certain of themselves.” You see it on Capitol Hill, where Republicans can’t tell you what they’re for…but they can certainly tell you what they oppose- everything President Joe Biden wants to do.
Intellect looks to innovate, to update, to upgrade, to make things better. It tries to approach change from the viewpoint of the greater good- what would do the greatest good for the largest number? It depends on facts, data, and truth to move forward. It rejects rumor, innuendo, and propaganda as pointless and counterproductive. It needs truth- verifiable, provable truth- in order to function.
Americans today- at least the ones who still support Donald Trump and are convinced that the election was stolen from him- fear the truth. They know, even if they can’t admit it to themselves, that the truth will not reflect positively on them. They’re left to construct a fantasy world in which they cherry-pick “facts” which support their beliefs and thus buttress their iron-clad sense of their own correctness.
This is what I mean when I say that millions of Americans are firmly in the grip of the Dunning-Kruger Effect…and if that makes me an arrogant, self-important know-it-all, so be it.
I defy anyone to prove me wrong.