Covid Complaints

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Trigger Warning: If you're tired of hearing people moan and complain, don't read this. My purpose in this post is to vent and complain. If you choose to read this anyway and find yourself getting upset with my complaints or illustrations, please remember that your frustration is a natural consequence of your own decision. 

The classroom is a crossroad for social trends. And right now, stupid is trending.

Let me say now that I've done, do, and will, without any doubt, do stupid and think stupid both now and in the future. I'm not immune to stupid.  But I like to think this exercise of writing about stupid demonstrates a desire to see, name and repent from stupid to the degree to which I am able.

The thing about stupid, though, is that it can look so different from day to day. One day its, "We don't know what's in the vaccine." The next day it's, "Maybe this hydroxychloroquine  will help!"  The next day, "Oh sh!t, I've been sick for four days and the horse dewormer isn't helping. I better go to the doctor." 

Or this one, "All the kids deserve trophies. Look at them working so hard!" And then, "Our soccer games will all be silent. It might hurt a player's feelings if they hear someone cheering on the other kids more." 

Or this one, "If you're going to teach evolution in science class, you have to teach creationism in science, too!" Followed by, "You can't mandate kids wear masks! Who are you to decide what kids have to do?!" Followed by, "You have to teach kids that the first slaves in America were white! And! And! And! The first slave owner was black!"

Or this one, "In order to ensure all students are achieving, we will give them standardized tests." Then, "And schools will be labeled "failing" if they don't raise their scores every year." Followed by, "And then let's cut funding to those schools that don't show continuous improvement." 

Or this one, "This pandemic is so bad everyone needs to stay home. But let's go to a fancy restaurant because I can."

And so on. And so on.

(Pause.) 

Being a teacher is stupid.

(Deep breath.)

Some might accuse me of taking shots at the "Right" or the "Left" but let's try a thought experiment: What if we didn't call it Right or Left, just stupid. Can something just be stupid? No? "No" is a stupid answer.

How many examples of stupidity on the "Right" or on the "Left" would it take to convince the other "side" I'm an equal opportunity critic of stupid?

Stupid.

(Breath.)

Let's flip the script a little. What's NOT stupid?

Here's a list of things that aren't stupid:    

  1. Listening to your doctor.
  2. Listening to medical experts.
  3. Weighing expert medical opinion more heavily than non-expert medical opinion. 
  4. Weighing the consensus of expert medical opinion over the minority of expert medical opinion.
  5. Assuming since we don't know with absolute certainty what will happen next for every person who takes a shot or doesn't, all choices are ethically equal.
  6. Assuming "experts" get everything right, every time in their field of expertise.
The above list is obviously in the context of Covid. (Remember, I'm ranting. This is an emotional exercise.) But the list is an analogy for a lot of stupid these days.  

As I see it from my frustration clouded vision is that the current flavor of stupid can be summarized as a narcissistic arrogance that centers individual, anarchical freedom in fabrication of fact, community narrative and in relation to community responsibility. 

In other words, there is no way of knowing what action to take or thought to think or feeling to feel until I have empirically experienced and subjectively analyzed all the pertinent information for myself. Only then will I make decisions for my own well being and the well being of the community. And I do not need to value the logical, spiritual or ethical integrity of my own worldview or the actions born from it. In the name of individualism and freedom, of course.

Let me look at some of the many stupid ideas in there: 

  • "no way of knowing" ~ there are many ways of knowing. As a mater of fact, there is a whole discipline of philosophy that studies the ways of knowing. Granted, "knowing" is not always 100% accurate, but it's what we've got. The idea that since I don't know something, no body does, is by definition stupid.
  • "empirically experienced" ~ so while I value experience as an important way of making sense of the world, I also recognize the limitations of my own ability to empirically experience the world. I am, after all, only one stupid human. Maybe if more stupid humans experienced the world, then brought together their stupid experiences and drew some stupid conclusions. Then stupid people might make some stupid conclusions like, say, quantum mechanics or why horse dewormers are a powerful tool in our fight against Covid.
  • "subjectively analyzed" ~ this is redundancy. All analysis is subjective on one level. The burden of meta cognition is to recognize this as objectively as possible and submit oneself and her analysis to the discipline of a critical community, peer review, if you will.
  • "all pertinent information" ~ we live in the f*<king information age, people!
  • "Only then" ~ we like to put prerequisites on reality and our engagement in it. How lovely that we will grace reality with our stupidity.
  • "I do not need to value the logical, spiritual, or ethical integrity" ~ I'm pretty sure this a quote from the literal anti-Christ.
(Red face. Move on.)

The analysis of the current flavor of stupid above is a straw man argument. It's a rhetorical fallacy. It's not meant to be a logically sound argument. This post is a rant. I'm not trying to convince anyone here of anything. I'm trying to rant. I'm trying to share my experiences and frustrations in community as a way of reaching out to my community, maybe even building community. If I have to make the reader believe the emotional sincerity of my words, I've lost already. 

Another brand of stupid is to take things out of context. And I already admitted I do, say and think stupid. Not trusting the science of the vaccine is stupid. Straw man argument is stupid. Declaring that teachers are leftist communists is stupid. Politicizing a pandemic is stupid. Propagating false information is stupid. 

These statements are not an argument. I'm not arguing. 

That'd be stupid.

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