Post 19: Wherein Snobs Bother Me

Samuel here.

You guys! You guys! Exciting news, you guys! Turns out I'm what's wrong with the world. :(

Once again, I'd like to preface this post with an admission that at times it seems like I'm arguing at great length with an image that really isn't trying to put forward a considered opinion, so allow me to defend my post in advance: I choose the images that I complain about on this blog based partly on how familiar I am with the opinions they present. People share things on Facebook because they agree with them. I think this image presents an opinion that a lot of smart people believe, or at least believe a slight modification of. I'm arguing with behaviors I've seen as much as with the image itself.

So, I definitely can't name all of these people. I don't recognize Freud by sight and I sure don't know what Ayaan Hirsi Ali looks like. Yes, I do recognize Snooki, but not because I have ever watched Jersey Shore. I blame some sort of cultural osmosis. Not that it matters at all whether I've watched Jersey Shore or not.

I guess that there are two things for me to address here. I'm going to make the wording of the image --- and probably its meaning, too --- a little bit more reasonable so that I'm actually arguing against real statements that real people might seriously make. One message of the image is, I think, that anyone who watches Jersey Shore is supporting something damaging to humanity. The second message is that you are damaging humanity if you are unfamiliar with the work of history's greatest minds. Note that this isn't my interpretation of the image, it's just the most reasonable argument along these lines that I can construct while still feeling like I'm at least sort of responding to the image.

Well. I'm a gamer (surprise!). I played with colorful pieces of cardboard in public places for most of my free time in high school. I like math and sometimes I read large books while I walk. I know what it's like to have people make fun of me for my hobbies. I never understood why it mattered to random strangers in the cafeteria how my friends and I spent our time. It didn't affect them in the slightest, and I doubt we ever gave much satisfaction to anyone who harassed us. Not that people bothered us often, but it did happen occasionally, and it always perplexed me. I see the same ridiculous error in this image. When someone watches Jersey Shore, they are part of a group of people who are responsible for, uh, let's say, three things that could ever possibly matter to you:

1) They raise the ratings of Jersey Shore, making it more profitable for advertisers to run commercials during that show, which means that the networks are more likely to pick it up for more seasons. So more of the time that you turn on the television, there will be Jersey Shore on. This would be a reasonable argument if it significantly decreased the likelihood that something you want to see is on at any given time. But it doesn't mean that at all. Firstly, the affect that one program has on how much other programs are aired is minimal. Secondly, if you object this strongly to Jersey Shore then you probably aren't watching MTV anyways. Finally, reality shows don't air reruns. Jersey Shore takes up 11 hours of the year. Horror of horrors.

2) They popularize cultural icons, like Snooki, that you find distasteful. This is a stupid complaint. It is absurdly easy to ignore celebrities who annoy you. The fact that Snooki is popular will never affect how much you enjoy television. I mean, Stephen Harper is my Prime Minister and I'm still majoring in political science (OUCH!).

3) They popularize a cultural icon whose behavior glamorizes something destructive, which you feel young people will emulate. Maybe there's something to this, but in order to do this argument justice I would have to figure out what Snooki actually does, which sounds difficult and boring.

I refuse to even attempt to construct an argument about how Snooki's popularity reveals the stupidity of the masses, and stupid people are fun to complain about. Anyone who tries to mount an argument like that desperately needs to relax.

What about ignorance and science and stuff!?

I don't like ignorance, but I think an image like this ignores the crucial distinction between ignorance that hurts society and ignorance that just makes life a little bit more boring for the ignorant person. Chances are you have seen a video or a television show where a camera crew has taken to the streets and asked random people absurdly simple questions, and most people could not answer them. Chances are you thought it was funny, and decided that people are stupid (or that it's easy to edit videos and only show dumb people). These videos from the Rick Mercer Report are exactly what I'm talking about. Or all the ones from the beginning of the #Occupy movement where journalists from major networks asked Occupy protesters questions like "what is the name of the secretary of transportation?" and then whined about how no one knew. I see absolutely nothing wrong with the ignorance of these people. Why would a random resident of South Carolina know the name of the Canadian Prime Minister? Why would someone protesting the influence of money in politics know the name of the secretary of health and human services? These aren't relevant. They really are cheap shots. It's the fallacy of irrelevant conclusion. You're dismissing people and dismissing peoples' ideas based on criteria they have no reason to succeed in.

Same problem with this image. See, I'm all for promoting scientific literacy. But only because science is cool and because you need to understand some science to vote optimally. Neither of these requires knowing shit about Madam Curie or Tesla. Maybe the image would have a point if the pictures were related to global warming, or alternative fuels, or space exploration. Because most people only need to know enough science to vote intelligently and not fall for obvious scams. I love science, but that's just it: I learn science because I love it. Some people do not. I have absolutely no problem with the average citizen not being able to write the Simple Harmonic Motion lab reports that stopped me from uploading yesterday. In fact, I'm rather pleased that they can't, in much the same way that I imagine painters are glad that I can't paint as well as they can. I'm content if everyone understands what global warming means and why you shouldn't smoke cigarettes at the gas pump. That isn't what this image is about. This image is about insisting that everyone absolutely must share your interests. And insisting that anyone who doesn't share your interests is a cancerous sore on the body politic is a great way to have no friends ever.

P.S. For curiosity's sake, from the top left and going vertically before horizontally:
Stephen Hawking, Marie Curie, Nichola Tesla, Albert Einstein, Sigmund Freud, Ayaan Hirsi Ali, Thomas Paine, Christopher Hitchens, Carl Sagan, Charles Darwin. Snooki.