Or do you really think that one of the most powerful countries in the world is “normally” somehow full of ignorants? I’ll answer - not any more than where you are from.
In California, my social circle is mostly PhDs. These are phenomenally smart people. You go to a JPL party and the average IQ has to be 2 or 3 standard deviations above the mean. There are a lot of rooms where I'm by far the dumbest person. But most people I know are either unilingual or bilingual. Even in Southern California, a majority of people have sub-conversational levels of Spanish. I know very few people who are conversationally trilingual. Where I grew up in Canada, E/F bilingualism was somewhat common but very, very, very few people spoke a third language and most people had halting French. I'm in Ireland right now and native-born Irish speak English and a culpa focal of Irish, and that's about it.
What this says to me is that it's pretty unlikely that a country's tendency towards multilingualism is meaningfully correlated with education or economic status. And while I know the idea of measuring "intelligence" is completely fraught, I can at least say it seems unlikely that a random sample of people in one place are as intelligent as JPL people.
All this to say that in all three of the anglosphere countries I've lived in, people seem to have a mental block on the idea that a second language is essential, or that a third or fourth language are even feasible. Someone who fluently speaks four languages is considered a polyglot, a freakshow, some kind of Beautiful Mind. But then you go to Netherlands or Switzerland or Morocco and it's normal. And the reason for this isn't obvious to me: it doesn't seem to relate to income, education, it doesn't seem to obviously correlate with intelligence. It seems to just reflect some kind of cultural premium placed on language acquisition. I'd love to read more about why this is.
I think this becomes more acute when one's profession is specialized and the professional circle doesn't value multilingualism, especially because of how much harder it is to become exposed to the genre/technical writing and jargon of your professional language in another language, as opposed to mundane professions.
And I'm not saying that the US has a higher percentage of ignorants than other countries, but being one of the most powerful countries in the world, they are also one of the most (if not the most) self-centered. So, not a higher percentage of ignorance in general, but maybe a higher percentage of ignorance of other languages, cultures etc.
Is it. I was curious, and the first google hit I came across was:
https://worldpopulationreview.com/country-rankings/most-dive...
1. Chad - 0.8514
2. Cameroon - 0.8426
3. Nigeria - 0.8306
4. Togo - 0.8118
5. Congo (Dem. Republic of) - 0.8111
For example, in terms of language, Nigeria has 525 languages:
“Index value is the probability of two people selected at random from any one country speaking the same language. 1.0 is most diverse, 0.0 is least diverse.”
I leave the reader to judge for themselves whether that is a good measure to judge diversity as being discussed here or not.
The hidden motivation behind this is fear of other people and the fear of evil which for most people has all but conquered their love of reality, truth, and so on.
If one does have other genuine interests and pursuits (for example foreign languages) then the task of appearing normal is harder. So the implication that he isn't smart enough to be normal is in this sense correct.
Which by the by suggests that motivation is the key to learning, not attention control, repetition, particular books, starting young or the other usual suspects and methods. These are downstream from motivation.
I think they presented it honestly without being derisive.
and the best at murder are those who preach against it
and the best at hate are those who preach love
and the best at war finally are those who preach peace
those who preach god, need god those who preach peace do not have peace those who preach peace do not have love
beware the preachers
beware the knowers
beware those who are always reading books
beware those who either detest poverty
or are proud of it
beware those quick to praise
for they need praise in return
beware those who are quick to censor
they are afraid of what they do not know
beware those who seek constant crowds for
they are nothing alone
beware the average man the average woman
beware their love, their love is average
seeks average
but there is genius in their hatred
there is enough genius in their hatred to kill you
to kill anybody
not wanting solitude
not understanding solitude
they will attempt to destroy anything
that differs from their own
not being able to create art
they will not understand art
they will consider their failure as creators
only as a failure of the world
not being able to love fully
they will believe your love incomplete
and then they will hate you
and their hatred will be perfect
like a shining diamond
like a knife
like a mountain
like a tiger
like hemlock
their finest art
Of this lyric “ And I'm no different, I live in conflict and contradiction But it can be so beautiful When I don't reject what lies within It's beautiful the way agony connects us to the living I think of the world when I hurt, and keep on existing in the Now”
Am I on the right path by thinking it talks on the strange symmetry in the hearts of man? (fearing the darkness and scraping away at the edges with fire - Rei Ayanami) waves and troughs, prickles and goo, anxiety is thinking one of them will win (Alan watts). This dastardly act I do only for good reason! (Someone’s ladder?) A seemingly endless cycle of justification?
Give unto Caesar, which bokonon paraphrased as Caesar doesn’t know what’s really going on.
The vine produces fruit and the wild boar has bad breath.
Is it the dangers of being locked in idealised or normative interpretations and advocacy?
I don’t think it’s what it’s trying to talk about but I’ll mention on talk of those best able to murder, those best at warfare, they may preach peace because it is they that do the killing, someone else decides the victim. Your poem maybe is of them trying to keep their monopoly.
And so it is that your poem talks of the other, beware them, do not believe their lies (write it on your Polaroid for when you forget later - memento) but it is really talking of yourself, you aren’t better than them, when you are sure of yourself you have lost, when you are unsure of yourself you have lost. If your aren’t to be fooled by others you need only stop fooling yourself? (Which maybe can’t be done haha)
Not sure how it fits in but I’m also compelled to add from a beautiful mind: you watched a mugging John, that’s weird.
Let me save you said the monkey, putting the fish safely up the tree.
Also, beware them all you like, your still stuck with them.
Gosh, actually I’m lost. I grapple with this a long time, inwards spirals infinitely, outside doesn’t stay still long enough. It’s best not to get involved. Don’t mention that you know Spanish, make friends with strangers at the bus stop.
It looks spammy otherwise.
Perhaps the line means that people who read a lot are judgemental and likely to hate others. If that's the case, I don't really buy it, because people who truly read a lot are probably too busy reading to hate people not in the books.
One thing would be a talk by Temple Grandin, who had her brain scanned in some way (I’m not sure between mri cat ekg eeg etc but I think fmri). Iirc and very loose summary it showed a mid section of her brain to be different, and therefore an explanation of the symptoms of her autism was her brain rewireing around this difference by relying more on other parts. I think she does compare it to others who have suffered brain trauma to see how the brain can do amazing things, as well as there might be some physical thing to autism. So I’d say rather interesting and a reason to bother with those kinds of things. Otoh have you ever been so different that people want to study you? An autist can miss this and think they’ve made a new friend but the crushing realisation is that it’s a bit more like a freak show.
And so, mentioned at the bottom of the article is that he shows signs of autism. If you assume that to be true and read between the lines of his history, throw in a leap here and there, in an attempt to understand why, it can look as though he learnt the languages because he decided to and did, but why is that he wanted to connect with someone, anyone, from childhood being a constant outsider. Like Forrest Gump learning ping pong. Like Forrest Gump only ever being treated like a person from damaged people. It also explains why he didn’t want attention, associating all attention with bad, since early childhood. Iirc, to be specific, he found novelty in how different words sound in his mouth and enjoys seeing people be happy that he can speak to them. Those people being outsiders as well, from a certain perspective. I feel as though these are all quite common autistic experiences. Another one is being paraded around as a novelty by people only long enough until you annoy them and then you are tossed aside again, not knowing why, todays puppy being tomorrows embarrassment/responsibility. Which talks of another autistic trait: be useful.
So please forgive me for portraying that I am mocking the event, you are correct in that I may have been too sensitive, but I feel as though the writer writes off as him just being brown, something quite different: the lengths some autists, and generally, some outsiders, will go to to fit in or to avoid or cope with the anxiety of not fitting in. To have a normal experience in a normal way.
So to stress again, I appreciate the story and everyone involved. I’m aware there’s a lot of contention and hot button issues nearby but I’d like to avoid it. I’ll leave you with a scene from almost famous: https://youtu.be/WzY2pWrXB_0
The article talks of him like he’s a child. Bouncing around at all the attention. Thrilled to make new friends. Bordering on mockery. Hidden behind wonder, the call goes out: look at you, who are not one of us. A carnival ride for the writer, gather ‘round everyone!
Smart enough to do anything he wants, not smart enough to be normal.
“There he goes. One of God's own prototypes. A high-powered mutant of some kind never even considered for mass production. Too weird to live, and too rare to die.“