If you went to school in Western Society, you remember the brainy kids who the cool kids disliked and bullied. Were they really outcast for their intelligence? No, they weren't. Read on and find out what was really going on back on the lunch court, continuing in adult life as well.
It's impossible to be biased against something you can't perceive. Can you imagine some tyrannical dictator oppressing everyone who dreams in black and white? It can't happen, because it's impossible to look at someone and tell whether they dream in black and white or whether they dream in color. It's the same with intelligence. Intelligence is not some radiating aura that you can perceive. It's impossible for the cool kids to create cliques and specifically exclude the smart kids-- it's impossible for the cool kids to tell who is a "smart kid"!
All that said, you can't deny that the brainiacs had a tendency to be socially outcast. So what the hell is going on??!
In fact, what really distinguished the jocks and the dorks, were a host of traits that had nothing whatsoever to do with intelligence. Traits like: hygiene, social skill, vocabulary, arrogance, hobbies, and so on.
Let me guess where intelligence enters the picture. There's a strong correlation between so-called "smart kids" (kids who were regarded as being "smart", which may or may not have been based on any actual objective measure of brain power), and kids with bad hygiene or social skills etc. Before that gets misread: I'm NOT saying smart people all smell bad, or anything like that. In fact, it's close to the opposite. I'm saying that the "smart kids" everyone disliked, tended to have other negative traits. If a person is in the position of being socially awkward, or fashion challenged, or whatever, it takes the courage of a superhero to acknowledge these shortcomings. Most people don't have such courage, so they use "smartness" as an excuse. "Oh, the cool kids don't like me, it must be because I'm so SMART" (nevermind that the "smart kid" has been wearing that same shirt two weeks in a row, or has an awkward high-pitched voice, or whatever).
I've worked with some college athletes who'd be classified as extreme jocks. Each and every one of them was ridiculously smart. Like, smart enough to make me jealous. But they were as far from the "smart kid" stereotype as you can get. These athletes would never call themselves smart or boast about being smart. Neither explicitly, nor with implicit signals like inappropriate vocabulary. They're almost like undercover smart people. I'd say they're spies in the jock world, except there'd be more spies than non-spies so it'd be a bit silly.
Let's take a look at one trait that a lot of the "smart kids" from school enjoyed/suffered.
VOCABULARY
It's been said, quite truly, that the stronger your vocabulary, the more successful you'll be. This only counts vocabulary you truly understand, though. Understanding a certain vocabulary word means a lot more than just knowing its definition. Understanding words also means knowing when and how to use them.
One trait some dorky people suffer, is they use words that are too big. The excuse mentality of these kids, says: "People hate my vocabulary because it's so superior". This is false. If a man goes around spouting words that are inappropriately long for the occasion, he's actually demonstrating that he doesn't understand those words. If he understood the words, he'd save them for when they were appropriate! The old saying goes, "better to be quiet and be thought a fool, than to speak and remove all doubt". As far as vocabulary goes, the wordy "smart kids" are outcast because of a lack of understanding, rather than because of their "smarts".
Exercise: "Learning English". Pretend English is your second language. You learned it from an evil psychotic teacher who forced you to memorize whole dictionaries, so you have this awesome vocabulary but aren't sure when to use what. Playing this game, listen to the native English speakers around you and observe how they use words. HINT: You can identify a "native speaker", for the purposes of this game, as someone with lots of success and sexy partners and social popularity.
The meaning of a word has nothing to do with what some English professor decides, and everything to do with the reaction it gets. The meaning of a word IS the reaction it gets. Language is not about understanding what dictionaries say, it's about understanding how the spoken word conveys ideas and feelings. If Mr. Encyclodictionary uses words that make him seem awkward, he's misusing language and is demonstrating a lower understanding, a lower intelligence!
ACHIEVING TRUE SMARTNESS
It can be painful and difficult to acknowledge one's own weaknesses. If a person is very intelligent, but at the same time suffers some trait which makes them socially unattractive, it's extremely tempting to fall into the excuse trap and say, "they dislike me for my brains". Noone dislikes a person for their brains. That's ludicrous. It'd be like being biased against strong people, or against people with five fingers per hand. It takes tremendous courage, though, to open one's eyes to the truth, to acknowledge one's own weaknesses.
Saying, "they dislike me cuz I'm smart", is just another example of giving away power by adopting a victim mentality. One can't "correct" smartness short of voluntary frontal lobotomy, and even if one went that far, a frontal lobotomy (surprise!) wouldn't do anything to help the "smart kids" socially. Instead, the smarty-pants's should focus on things they CAN change: Fashion. Clothes. Voice. Mannerisms. Posture.
If a young man can understand advanced calculus, or learn exotic languages, or do C programming... then with his astounding mental powers, it should be a cinch to learn things like fashion, posture, social skills, and so on. These are not hard. It just takes a little initiative and the strength to acknowledge that they need working on. If it weren't for the excuse trap of saying, "my only fault is I'm too SMART"... then I imagine the "cool kids" would be EXACTLY the kids who can do calculus or physics or whatever.
THE REBEL
A common complaint I get when I share the above insight, is what I call "the Rebel's Retort". It goes like this: "GlowingFaceMan, why should I spend lots of money on brand name clothes just because everyone else is doing it?!" (Or replace fancy clothes with whatever other thing the person is resisting)
Let me put it like this. Why would you open a bank account just because everyone else is doing it? Well, because there are certain advantages to having a bank account, as opposed to just stuffing cash under your mattress. Being cheap on clothing- or voice training, or posture training, or anything like that- is like stuffing cash under your mattress because you don't want to "jump on that faddish BANK bandwagon".
Good clothes, for example, have the advantage of making you look good, which earns enormous "interest" in the form of more friendship, better treatment, and better self esteem. And I don't really care whether this is a result of actual, objective "looking better" (whatever that means) or years of commercial marketing. I don't really care. What matters is that it works. If current fashion was to wear something ridiculous like bright clown facepaint, it wouldn't really matter as long as by wearing that bright clown facepaint you could increase your influence and social currency.
THE "SMART" EGO AND THE "SMART" LIFESTYLE
The difference between a smart person and a "smarty person" is that the former is just a person with good thinkin' power, and the latter is someone who IDENTIFIES themself as "smart". In other words, that smartypants kid who everyone despised in high school, "because he was smart", probably saw himself as "smarter", being smarter was a core part of his being. His smartness was the mask he presented to the world- he led the "SMARTY LIFESTYLE". (Which has nothing to do with actual smartness, just like someone can lead a Euro lifestyle without being from Europe, or someone can be gay without living the gay lifestyle).
When we identify with an image, we project everything that goes along with it. When a man identifies himself as "smarter than all these fools", he subconsciously starts projecting the whole smartypants image, including all the negative traits that go with the stereotype.
The best way to dismantle any egoic mask is to just let yourself become aware of it. For the example of the "smartypants" person, the prescription would be to let themselves become aware whenever they were projecting "smarty". For example, Dr. Brainiac might be invited by co-workers to a happy hour. "No," his inner dialog kicks in, "I'd rather not, that's not very SMART. I've never seen a single person wearing a labcoat at a happy hour." At this point, the prescription would tell Mr. Brainiac: consciously observe the fact that you're thinking from a "smarty" ego viewpoint. Don't try to do anything about it or correct it, simply be aware of it. Very quickly, Mr. Brainiac realizes how silly and weird that "smart, serious person" mask is! As Eckhart Tolle says, our ego can't stand scrutiny, it dissolves under scrutiny.
Please don't read this wrong and go the other direction. It would be just as bad, maybe even worse, to adopt a "stupid person" ego. The point is to dismantle ego altogether, not to replace one mask with another. Also, it's perfectly fine and healthy for one to congratulate oneself when one does something smart, or even to actively tell oneself, "I'm pretty smart!" In short, it's fine to be self-confident and have a positive self image. The negative part would be if a person told themselves "I'm pretty smart - smarter than all these fools!" I think that's where trouble arises. True self esteem is inherently generous and it loves company.
MIRROR MODEL
The Mirror Model of Social Interaction is a simple axiom which states: in a social interaction, whatever you feel about the interaction, the other parties will mirror. Part of what's going on in nerd-jock interaction, is that the nerd is actually biased against the jock! If you ask a dorky clueless "smart guy" about his love life, you're bound to hear something like, "Who would want a girl like that (party girl) for a girlfriend anyway! Not me!" Part of being liked, is liking. Years of being a loner can breed lots of resentment toward the socially savvy, and the mirror model says that when the smartypants resents the party boys, the party boys resent the smartypants. One necessary healing step toward becoming socially alive, is to totally open up to people. When this is done sincerely, the Mirror Model says everyone will return the favor.
SMART READER, DO YOUR PART TO DISMANTLE STEREOTYPES
If you happen to be in one of the stereotypically "smart" career fields, like if you're a scientist, a linguist, a doctor, a lawyer, an engineer, etc., or even if you just have a hobby that falls in this category, here's how you can do your part to reverse the ridiculous stereotypes connecting intellect with poor social skills. Go out. Be social. Be the life of the party. Have a hot girl hanging off each arm (or if you're a girl, have hot guys at your beck and call). Be sexy and fun. Be unapologetically (but not obsessively) open about your sophisticated interests, and do it under the assumption that everyone else at the party is also smart- the odds are, they are. Be a total badass. The English Wiktionary defines a badass as: "a person whose extreme attitudes and behavior are admirable". Be that person. Be muthafekin Bruce Willis. Let your Face Glow!
Here are some other articles I've written. One of them won the Nobel Peace Prize two years in a row. Read them all and see if you can guess which one!
How The Mind Learns
The Mirror Model of Social Interaction
Book Review: James Heisig's "Remembering the Kanji"
It's impossible to be biased against something you can't perceive. Can you imagine some tyrannical dictator oppressing everyone who dreams in black and white? It can't happen, because it's impossible to look at someone and tell whether they dream in black and white or whether they dream in color. It's the same with intelligence. Intelligence is not some radiating aura that you can perceive. It's impossible for the cool kids to create cliques and specifically exclude the smart kids-- it's impossible for the cool kids to tell who is a "smart kid"!
All that said, you can't deny that the brainiacs had a tendency to be socially outcast. So what the hell is going on??!
In fact, what really distinguished the jocks and the dorks, were a host of traits that had nothing whatsoever to do with intelligence. Traits like: hygiene, social skill, vocabulary, arrogance, hobbies, and so on.
Let me guess where intelligence enters the picture. There's a strong correlation between so-called "smart kids" (kids who were regarded as being "smart", which may or may not have been based on any actual objective measure of brain power), and kids with bad hygiene or social skills etc. Before that gets misread: I'm NOT saying smart people all smell bad, or anything like that. In fact, it's close to the opposite. I'm saying that the "smart kids" everyone disliked, tended to have other negative traits. If a person is in the position of being socially awkward, or fashion challenged, or whatever, it takes the courage of a superhero to acknowledge these shortcomings. Most people don't have such courage, so they use "smartness" as an excuse. "Oh, the cool kids don't like me, it must be because I'm so SMART" (nevermind that the "smart kid" has been wearing that same shirt two weeks in a row, or has an awkward high-pitched voice, or whatever).
I've worked with some college athletes who'd be classified as extreme jocks. Each and every one of them was ridiculously smart. Like, smart enough to make me jealous. But they were as far from the "smart kid" stereotype as you can get. These athletes would never call themselves smart or boast about being smart. Neither explicitly, nor with implicit signals like inappropriate vocabulary. They're almost like undercover smart people. I'd say they're spies in the jock world, except there'd be more spies than non-spies so it'd be a bit silly.
Let's take a look at one trait that a lot of the "smart kids" from school enjoyed/suffered.
VOCABULARY
It's been said, quite truly, that the stronger your vocabulary, the more successful you'll be. This only counts vocabulary you truly understand, though. Understanding a certain vocabulary word means a lot more than just knowing its definition. Understanding words also means knowing when and how to use them.
One trait some dorky people suffer, is they use words that are too big. The excuse mentality of these kids, says: "People hate my vocabulary because it's so superior". This is false. If a man goes around spouting words that are inappropriately long for the occasion, he's actually demonstrating that he doesn't understand those words. If he understood the words, he'd save them for when they were appropriate! The old saying goes, "better to be quiet and be thought a fool, than to speak and remove all doubt". As far as vocabulary goes, the wordy "smart kids" are outcast because of a lack of understanding, rather than because of their "smarts".
Exercise: "Learning English". Pretend English is your second language. You learned it from an evil psychotic teacher who forced you to memorize whole dictionaries, so you have this awesome vocabulary but aren't sure when to use what. Playing this game, listen to the native English speakers around you and observe how they use words. HINT: You can identify a "native speaker", for the purposes of this game, as someone with lots of success and sexy partners and social popularity.
The meaning of a word has nothing to do with what some English professor decides, and everything to do with the reaction it gets. The meaning of a word IS the reaction it gets. Language is not about understanding what dictionaries say, it's about understanding how the spoken word conveys ideas and feelings. If Mr. Encyclodictionary uses words that make him seem awkward, he's misusing language and is demonstrating a lower understanding, a lower intelligence!
ACHIEVING TRUE SMARTNESS
It can be painful and difficult to acknowledge one's own weaknesses. If a person is very intelligent, but at the same time suffers some trait which makes them socially unattractive, it's extremely tempting to fall into the excuse trap and say, "they dislike me for my brains". Noone dislikes a person for their brains. That's ludicrous. It'd be like being biased against strong people, or against people with five fingers per hand. It takes tremendous courage, though, to open one's eyes to the truth, to acknowledge one's own weaknesses.
Saying, "they dislike me cuz I'm smart", is just another example of giving away power by adopting a victim mentality. One can't "correct" smartness short of voluntary frontal lobotomy, and even if one went that far, a frontal lobotomy (surprise!) wouldn't do anything to help the "smart kids" socially. Instead, the smarty-pants's should focus on things they CAN change: Fashion. Clothes. Voice. Mannerisms. Posture.
If a young man can understand advanced calculus, or learn exotic languages, or do C programming... then with his astounding mental powers, it should be a cinch to learn things like fashion, posture, social skills, and so on. These are not hard. It just takes a little initiative and the strength to acknowledge that they need working on. If it weren't for the excuse trap of saying, "my only fault is I'm too SMART"... then I imagine the "cool kids" would be EXACTLY the kids who can do calculus or physics or whatever.
THE REBEL
A common complaint I get when I share the above insight, is what I call "the Rebel's Retort". It goes like this: "GlowingFaceMan, why should I spend lots of money on brand name clothes just because everyone else is doing it?!" (Or replace fancy clothes with whatever other thing the person is resisting)
Let me put it like this. Why would you open a bank account just because everyone else is doing it? Well, because there are certain advantages to having a bank account, as opposed to just stuffing cash under your mattress. Being cheap on clothing- or voice training, or posture training, or anything like that- is like stuffing cash under your mattress because you don't want to "jump on that faddish BANK bandwagon".
Good clothes, for example, have the advantage of making you look good, which earns enormous "interest" in the form of more friendship, better treatment, and better self esteem. And I don't really care whether this is a result of actual, objective "looking better" (whatever that means) or years of commercial marketing. I don't really care. What matters is that it works. If current fashion was to wear something ridiculous like bright clown facepaint, it wouldn't really matter as long as by wearing that bright clown facepaint you could increase your influence and social currency.
THE "SMART" EGO AND THE "SMART" LIFESTYLE
The difference between a smart person and a "smarty person" is that the former is just a person with good thinkin' power, and the latter is someone who IDENTIFIES themself as "smart". In other words, that smartypants kid who everyone despised in high school, "because he was smart", probably saw himself as "smarter", being smarter was a core part of his being. His smartness was the mask he presented to the world- he led the "SMARTY LIFESTYLE". (Which has nothing to do with actual smartness, just like someone can lead a Euro lifestyle without being from Europe, or someone can be gay without living the gay lifestyle).
When we identify with an image, we project everything that goes along with it. When a man identifies himself as "smarter than all these fools", he subconsciously starts projecting the whole smartypants image, including all the negative traits that go with the stereotype.
The best way to dismantle any egoic mask is to just let yourself become aware of it. For the example of the "smartypants" person, the prescription would be to let themselves become aware whenever they were projecting "smarty". For example, Dr. Brainiac might be invited by co-workers to a happy hour. "No," his inner dialog kicks in, "I'd rather not, that's not very SMART. I've never seen a single person wearing a labcoat at a happy hour." At this point, the prescription would tell Mr. Brainiac: consciously observe the fact that you're thinking from a "smarty" ego viewpoint. Don't try to do anything about it or correct it, simply be aware of it. Very quickly, Mr. Brainiac realizes how silly and weird that "smart, serious person" mask is! As Eckhart Tolle says, our ego can't stand scrutiny, it dissolves under scrutiny.
Please don't read this wrong and go the other direction. It would be just as bad, maybe even worse, to adopt a "stupid person" ego. The point is to dismantle ego altogether, not to replace one mask with another. Also, it's perfectly fine and healthy for one to congratulate oneself when one does something smart, or even to actively tell oneself, "I'm pretty smart!" In short, it's fine to be self-confident and have a positive self image. The negative part would be if a person told themselves "I'm pretty smart - smarter than all these fools!" I think that's where trouble arises. True self esteem is inherently generous and it loves company.
MIRROR MODEL
The Mirror Model of Social Interaction is a simple axiom which states: in a social interaction, whatever you feel about the interaction, the other parties will mirror. Part of what's going on in nerd-jock interaction, is that the nerd is actually biased against the jock! If you ask a dorky clueless "smart guy" about his love life, you're bound to hear something like, "Who would want a girl like that (party girl) for a girlfriend anyway! Not me!" Part of being liked, is liking. Years of being a loner can breed lots of resentment toward the socially savvy, and the mirror model says that when the smartypants resents the party boys, the party boys resent the smartypants. One necessary healing step toward becoming socially alive, is to totally open up to people. When this is done sincerely, the Mirror Model says everyone will return the favor.
SMART READER, DO YOUR PART TO DISMANTLE STEREOTYPES
If you happen to be in one of the stereotypically "smart" career fields, like if you're a scientist, a linguist, a doctor, a lawyer, an engineer, etc., or even if you just have a hobby that falls in this category, here's how you can do your part to reverse the ridiculous stereotypes connecting intellect with poor social skills. Go out. Be social. Be the life of the party. Have a hot girl hanging off each arm (or if you're a girl, have hot guys at your beck and call). Be sexy and fun. Be unapologetically (but not obsessively) open about your sophisticated interests, and do it under the assumption that everyone else at the party is also smart- the odds are, they are. Be a total badass. The English Wiktionary defines a badass as: "a person whose extreme attitudes and behavior are admirable". Be that person. Be muthafekin Bruce Willis. Let your Face Glow!
Here are some other articles I've written. One of them won the Nobel Peace Prize two years in a row. Read them all and see if you can guess which one!
How The Mind Learns
The Mirror Model of Social Interaction
Book Review: James Heisig's "Remembering the Kanji"
Posts
6 comments:
FROM READING YOUR BLOG I AM NOW STRONGER THAN A TRUCK
THANKS GLOWING FACE MAN
Yeah, I don't like this. Wearing supposedly 'cool' clothes almost always for me means wearing something I don't like. So that pink shirt with a popped collar and the bright orange sneakers, eighties aviator glasses, I don't want to wear that. And cool clothes are always expensive, but expensive clothes are not always cool. You are talking about following fashion, not about wearing good clothing. They are not the same.
Perhaps freeing yourself from the expectations of others is also of some benefit to your life and self image.
Also, your nerd jock duality idea doesn't even exist in most countries, because in other countries athletes do not receive scholarships for university(or they are contingent on passing academic tests). So being good at sports is a kind of useless skill, and learning stuff is not so vilified. If you want a good job, if you want to go to university, you must study, there is no other method.
I think many times smart people are interested in different things than the average joe. Sure there might be a little overlap here and there, but for the most part, average people can relate to average people, and smart people can relate to smart people. Basically, the smarter you are, the less people you have that can relate to you. It's not necessarily a "smarty-pants" mentality, they just can't relate as well to most other people.
The smart thing to do is to live up to your own expectations, not those of others. If you don't want to be the life of the party, don't worry about not being it.
I have to say - I disagree with this on some points.
Have been the self-consciously smart kid, I think you're right about a few things. Certainly, some reasons that I got bullied as a kid were my lack of social skills, a personality that tends to be over-analytical - kids actually thought I was slow because I took a while to think before replying, and a tendency to prefer the company of books to that of other kids.
The central problem was that I just didn't get people. The intuitive understanding of other peoples actions and emotions that comes very naturally to some people was something that I had to paintakingly learn, and it took a while. It would have come a lot sooner if I hadn't been punished and abused for my forays into socialising, though.
That to my mind is the real problem - a social culture in schools that turns kids into bullies. Call me a naive optimist, but I don't think it's an inseparable part of human nature. Certainly, there will always be the occasional cruel person whose mission in life is to torment those who can't defend themselves, but in a controlled environment it's a matter of whether they're tolerated or not which makes the difference. The worst thing about being bullied is that it can turn you into a bully too - I speak from painful and shameful experience. The right environment, one that's accepting of difference and inhospitable to cruelty, can break that cycle.
I think there is a reason for the intellectual social outcast/geek stererotype. Certain kinds of intelligence do sometimes correlate with a lack in other areas - namely emotional and social intelligence. In the right environment though, those things can be taught, and those kids don't have get outcast - and consequently, won't grow up with that alienation/superiority complex thing you're describing.
As far as "geeky" areas of interest go - I'm never going to apologise for my enthusiasm, interests, sense of humor, or personal style, and nor should I have to. I'm me, and to pretend to be anything else would be false on my part.
You need to factor in Asperger's syndrome. As visual spatial intelligence and/or systemizing ability increases, often linguistic and/or empathetic abilities often lag. The brain essentially uses social processing areas for other uses and hence cannot pickup on things like nonverbal cues or the subtleties of sarcasm. Sometimes its extreme form is called "mind blindness". Its when someone is unaware that what other people are thinking and feeling is different than how they would think or feel. So I must somewhat disagree, although you make many great points, sometimes certain types of intelligences are perceived by others, but more likely the lack of social skills that sometime go along with those abilities is what is strongly noticed. God rarely gives with both hands. As a geek, who has studied my mental nuances, I am proud of the way I think, although we need all types, I do believe "The Geek will inherit the earth."
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