3 Groups
I group people like so:
Smart
Helpful
Fools
George Carlin said “Think of how stupid the average person is, and realize half of them are stupider than that.”
hahaha
Breaking it down even further:
Smart: People with the good brain
Helpful: Not smart people, but they know they’re not smart (aware)
Fools: Not smart people and they don’t know it (trainwreck)
I consider myself a member of Group 2. I’m a moron but at least I know it. This awareness in itself is a form of intelligence. So I’m able to make positive contributions despite my basic ass brain. I just find a smart person and figure out how to help them. I’ve done that over and over and over in my life and it has worked out well. Pays the rent. Etc.
Smart people (Group 1) move society forward. Make things better. Innovate. Educate. Etc.
Group 3 is the worst. Idiots that don’t know they’re idiots. “A fool is someone who doesn’t know what they don’t know.” What’s worse, they may even think they have something figured out. They haven’t figured out shit. They’re just loud and dumb and foolish. They hold society back.
Members of Group 1 are born in. You either got it (the good brain) or you don’t. You can’t upgrade into Group 1 from Groups 2 or 3. You just can’t.
You can upgrade from a non contributing group 3 fool to a respectable group 2 helper with a little listening, focus, and self awareness.
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A few words on information privilege
(footnote) Sometimes I’m hard on group 3. It’s egoic masturbation to call someone an idiot (subconsciously elevating myself at their expense - pathetic). Especially when I don’t know anything about them, except maybe a view they might hold on a tiny little subject. Someone’s views are not who they are. I’m privileged. My parents raised me with love and books and (enough) money to thrive. It’s complete BS that people like me, born into such privilege look down our noses at others we perceive as idiots - who in all likelihood didn’t have as many opportunities to develop themselves and therefore don’t perceive things as ideally as those who have developed/adjusted. I see this all the time across the current social landscape manifesting into what some refer to as a cultural “diploma divide” with the political left becoming the home of smug college-educated urban professionals and the political right shifted to angry white people without college degrees.
I wrote the poem Those Leaves in reaction to social division I perceived in the wake of Trump (2016 version), COVID (2020), and the Canadian Truckers Freedom Movement (2022).
I’m out here continually trying not to be a smug ass - yet I often find myself reverting back to the 3 groups of people as a means to get along within my social life. It’s my responsibility to keep pushing the ball forward.
