I have always been terribly
afraid of roving gangs of stupid people terrorizing the streets. The stupid
people in huge mobs, pulling on push doors and pushing on pull doors, crossing
in the middle of the street and expecting cars to stop just for them, yelling
idiotic things like, “we’re here, we’re queer, we don’t want any more gays!”,
and so on and so forth. It always seemed like a silly thing to be afraid of.
Until now.
After the Nevada Republican
Caucus yesterday Presidential (I can’t even say it) candidate Donald Trump thanked
and even bragged about how he loves the poorly educated in his victory speech.
I’m very much a pro-education guy so that phrase chills me to my very core. I think everyone does indeed deserve the right
to vote regardless of social status, education or political affiliations.
However, I’ve never heard a candidate for president ever praise people for
being poorly educated. The majority of modern era Presidents have touted some
level of Education reform, successful or not. Education is often a topic of
most State of the Union Addresses and considered a barometer of cultural
success. So to praise the poorly educated and thank them for voting for
possibly the greatest Presidential hoaxer in American history or a man so mad
with power lust he makes Martin Sheen’s candidate’s character from The Dead
Zone look sane, makes me terrified.
It is not snobbish or elitist to
appreciate education. Donald himself has had an excellent education, whether he
applies that education to anything is beyond me, but he’s certainly not one of
the “poorly educated” he thanked in his speech. He had the benefits of a fine
education and often says he’ll surround himself with the best and the brightest
minds available to help him in his (cough) presidency. So clearly he does
appreciate the intellectual crowd. Unless they are too smart to vote for him,
then he might need to rely on the poorly educated to slip into the Republican nomination.
I am also not attempting to tear
down anyone’s actual education simply because it is different from my own
educational background. I’ve found that in every crowd there are always one or
two High I.Q. morons. The type of people
that have read all the classics of literature but don’t believe the Moon
landings occurred. The point I’m trying to make isn’t about book smarts or
framed Degrees on the wall. I’m talking about critical thinking.
Critical thinking means you
question things that you hear and take it upon yourself to find more about. You
do not just blindly follow the rhetoric of some well-groomed huckster. You
think about what they’ve said and really weigh it against what you already know
and what you can find out. It’s one of
the keys that separates the educated from the intelligent. Critical thinking
means asking the tough questions, like “why” and “how” and sometimes even, “really”.
I fear that the “poorly educated”
Trump refers to are the types that have not developed the critical thinking
skills needed to make informed decisions. The “poorly educated” Trump refers to
are the ones, in my opinion, that haven’t spent the time to consider how, why
or if we really should force an independent sovereign nation to build a border
wall for us, or how, why or if we really should keep Gitmo open to “load it up
with bad dudes”, and how, why and if a Billionaire really has their best
interests at heart.
I fear the “poorly educated”,
the ones that were never exposed to any sort of cultural diversity, civil diversity
or religious diversity, will take their inflated stupidity to the streets and
rage against logic and reasonability. It’s terrifying to think how ignorant savagery
can destabilize whole cultures, whole empires. History is replete with examples
of barbarism against intelligence from the several burnings of the Library at
Alexandria to the Dark Ages.
A society that doesn’t question,
that doesn’t critically think about what their leaders are proposing, is a
society about to step backwards in time. A potential leader actively seeking to
remove or revoke freedoms from the citizenry needs to be questioned about why
and how and if it’s really necessary.
(And don’t bring up the “Obama is taking our second amendment rights
away” thing. He hasn’t and he isn’t so put that old chestnut down).
It’s my hope that the “poorly
educated” don’t have to remain that way. I hope there is a genuine
re-investment in education in our society. A society that values an educated populace, a
literate, open-minded culture, an inclusive rather than exclusive collective,
will almost always fare better than a stubborn and dogmatic one. A “poorly educated” voting block should not be
praised, nor should they be shunned. I feel they should be encouraged to think
a little deeper about their beliefs and the beliefs of their potential
presidential candidate.
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