Saturday, September 13, 2008
They Just Don't Get It
I’m going to reveal something about myself in a way that I don’t usually reveal things about myself. I want to start off by stating that people don’t seem to be much smarter than a herd of cattle, these days. And the reason I feel comfortable in saying that is not because I think I’m some sort of gifted genius and I look down my nose at others as I sit high up on my pedestal of enlightenment, it’s because I’ve been one of those stupid cow people before.
It all started when I was much younger. I gobbled up books off the library shelves at a rate that I cannot compete with today. One of the very few great things my mother did for me was to instill in me that reading is not only extremely important, it’s actually a lot of fun. By the time I was in 4th grade, I had been reading books that were written for adults as well as the silly, typical 4th grade girl literature that was out there. The problem with some of the adult books was that I didn’t fully comprehend everything I was reading. I had vague ideas but my understanding of exactly what was being said, was limited. Like I said, it was instilled that reading was fun but the whole, “let’s discuss what you are reading, especially if you are having difficulty understanding it”, idea was not.
I spent many years reading through entire paragraphs that made no sense to me. I skipped over words that I did not understand let alone know how to pronounce. I always promised myself that I would go look up the word but that meant that I would have to stop reading, go down two flights of stairs in the home and pull out the gigantic and incredibly heavy Dictionary that rested in the parents’ library. I was not allowed to remove it from their library to bring with me to my room to continue reading. I did not wish to read down in the library because I would be interrupted by my irritating siblings and it never occurred to me to purchase a dictionary; saving up my allowance to do so because we already had one. Why would I do that when there were Clash records to be purchased?
In high school we had to read poetry. By now, my imagination had been back in time, all over space, in every fantasy land, every corner of the earth, met all kinds of people, cultures and customs. So when I was told to interpret the poetry, I did not see it the way the other classmates saw the poem. My imagination was filled with all sorts of things that the “long, black ribbon” could represent. It did not have to be a road. It could be a river. It could be a tear in space. It could be a trench in the ground. It was endless what it could be. I did not do well in poetry. And after that class, I decided I really hated poetry and I’ve never really been in to it since then. But that class was a first lesson in the fact that my reading comprehension was poor.
See, it didn’t matter that I read voraciously. It didn’t matter that I was growing smarter in so many ways because of it. The problem was, I was tackling material that far exceeded my intelligence level and when things didn’t make sense to me, when I didn’t understand them, I was getting to the point that I didn’t even know where to go to learn a thing about what I was reading. So I would become frustrated and I started to develop a slight problem that I still have to this day.
I read fast. I read very fast and when I got to words that made no sense to me, I would skim over them and get to the parts I did understand. This eventually became an issue. I would then start reading words from the sentence below the sentence I was reading and they would end up in the first sentence I was reading.
For example, let’s say I was reading this:
What I would end up reading is this:
The difference today is that I realize quickly what has happened and I go back and re-read the entire thing.
When I went in to the military, I had no thoughts of going to college. It wasn’t until I had a very caring and hands on Lt. who talked me in to at least taking the college entrance exams just in case I ever changed my mind. Because this Lt. was really cool, I started studying. I took the test and I got a 96% on Reading Comprehension. I was in the 96th percentile in the nation when it came to understanding what the hell I had just read.
Problem? I didn’t understand what the hell I had just read. The reason I got that high of a score was because yes, in some cases, I did know the answer but in other cases, it was based on good memory. I would read a question and my memory kicked in, I knew exactly where in the text to look for the answer and I would answer it correctly. That’s not reading comprehension. It’s called I read very fast and have a really good memory that afforded me the time to do this part of the test this way. Nothing more.
It wasn’t until I did actually go to college and one of my elective classes was Drama that I actually was given the tools towards building my reading comprehension. In this particular drama class, we were never asked to act like a tree or a table because, as the instructor pointed out, those things don’t have feelings, it’s pointless to act like them. She made us pick plays and she really taught us how to get in to the character. This wasn’t about reciting lines from memory. There was no method acting in this class, it was all Stanivslasky. (I may have spelled that incorrectly.) You do not record your voice and play it back to find out if you sound convincing enough. You do NOT look in to the mirror to see if your facial expressions are believable, hell no. If she caught you doing that, she would embarrass you in front of the entire class. What you did with the play is that you broke apart every line. You put things in to beats. You learned the reason for every movement, every word, every breath, every pause, every little thing that character did, the reason for the reaction, all of it.
This was an elective class. This was a class that many in this world will laugh at, “Oh my God! You went to college and took drama? Wooo, I’m so very fucking impressed with your waste of money.” And many will think you’re an idiot and that your college experience was a complete joke. “Why didn’t you take under water basket weaving while you were at it?” Maybe at some schools, the drama class is a joke. This class, however, was better than any English class I had taken, up to that point. This class dunked my head under the waves of reading comprehension and held it there until I finally started to understand what the hell I was reading.
Because I enjoyed this class so much, I started to pick apart every thing I read or heard. I started to question every character, every person and every talking head on television.
“What are they really saying here? What is their motivation for saying/doing this? Who is to benefit from what they are saying/doing? Why did they use that word instead of this word?”
In other words, I started to read between the lines. I started to see an entirely new world. I started to realize that people are fantastic liars. I started to see that people will patronize the shit out of you if they think they can get away with it. I started to see that people really, really fucking hate it when you understand that they are feeding you a line of bullshit and you call them out on it. I’ve seen that a lot. I see that a lot in almost every job I’ve ever had. I’ve started to realize that people will like you if they think you are stupid but they really dislike you if they see you are smart. Sometimes you’re smarter than they are. Hell, often you are. And they are very threatened by that. And people turn really ugly when they get threatened. But that’s another post.
That one drama class did more for me than almost any other subject I’ve ever taken in my life. Most importantly, I stepped outside of the herd and started to think for myself. This is something that people do not like to do. Either it’s too hard or it requires too much effort. With the countless number of tourists who come in to the establishment I work at, I can assure you, it’s a global thing. We have a gigantic sign that states that all information is inside. These people will pass right by that sign and ask employees they see outside all about the cost and what we do. They go inside, they get the information, they buy their tickets and they are told what they can do while they wait.
Sure enough, they will come outside, tickets in hand and ask employees outside what they are supposed to do. These people cannot make it 20 fucking steps without someone leading them by the hand because it is too difficult for them, it’s too terrifying for them to think on their own. They want someone to lead them around by the nose. They want someone to hold their hand and tell them what to do, where to go, how long to be in each little spot because it frightens them to do that thinking for themselves. And no, it is not a language barrier issue. It’s a herd mentality issue.
Here’s a really good example: We have a rope. A simple, little rope that we put up right at the dock to slow down those who have not purchased tickets from entering the park. There is no sign that says you cannot enter. It is one of the easiest things in the world to remove. You simply take one end of the rope, pull the shiny metal question mark looking thing out of the loop and wa-lah! You are free to walk around. Many people have figured it out, many have not.
For those who like to sneak in to the park, this rope poses no problem at all. They pull it aside with great ease and waltz right on in to the park. Valid guests have used it with no problem. Then we have guests who will do one of two things:
1: Stop at the rope. Stare. Look around. Give up and go back the way they came.
2: Step over the rope leaving chance wide open to trip and fall.
The people who do one of these two things are the majority. Group 1 has massive herd mentality to the point that every line, every rope, every doorway confuses them. They simply do not know what to do unless someone is standing right there to tell them what to do. Group 2 realizes that the rope does not pertain to them but they have overblown their circuits coming to that realization and do not comprehend the ease with which to move the rope aside to avoid bodily injury. It’s as if they feel brave enough to defy the rope but not brave enough to touch the rope.
We are entertained, quite a bit, at work. Some days we shake our heads in disbelief when the stupidity has been especially high that day. Other days we laugh at the way people act.
People want to be told how to think. They want to be told what to do. They come across as independent, “I’m an individual! I am unique!” (Just like everyone else, right pal?) But if you confront them on it, you’ll find that they don’t know what to do without someone else there to guide them. And the people they pick to guide them will be one of two:
1: Whomever happens to be around.
2: The safest looking person there.
Since I’m a girl amidst some rough looking guys, I usually get asked the questions. I can see them coming from a mile away. They look around in confusion, see me and my co-workers, look dead in my eyes trying to lock on an eye contact, make a bee line directly towards me whether I’m the closest person or not and bam! There they are. Now, I may be the one with my mouthful of lunch and the others are not eating at the time but that doesn’t matter to them. I look the safest, nicest, whateverist so they will trust my word over the others.
And this happens in everything all over the place. This election is being run by talking heads that people think are the smartest or safest or nicest looking and take what they say as the truth. They don’t want to do the research. They want the nice, smart, safe looking talking head to tell them what they are supposed to think. It’s easier that way. They don’t have to think, they don’t have to spend the energy and they can continue to have their internal conversations about shopping or eating or movies that they wish to attend. They can continue to stare, vacantly, at the butterfly that’s flitting around them. As long as they don’t have to think about anything serious, as long as someone else does that for them, all is good.
But don’t debate them. They are unpracticed in thinking critically and comprehending so when you do debate a topic, they throw their opinion in to the swill and get really, really upset when you tell them that their opinion is not fact. Oh man do they hate that.
Anyway, yes, I used to be one of those. Thank God I’m not that way anymore. Unfortunately, many people are still like that and these are people who vote. The problem is, we can’t even educate them because those who do not wish well for this country have inundated our schools; reading comprehension is not a top priority. Buying in to an opinion, is.
Think what I think. Feel what I feel. Just don’t go worrying your pretty little head about it. I’ll tell you what to do and how to do it. You just sit down, relax and think about puppies and sugar. Mmmmkay? Great, robot zombie, good job.
I often get accused of analyzing too much. “Why are you analyzing every little thing that person says or does?” Because it’s telling, that’s why. Because it’s not so easy to fool someone who does analyze things. Because you can save yourself a lot of heartache and headache and you can make good choices based on your analysis. Because I’d rather be known for analyzing too much than being too stupid or lazy to really hear what I’m being told.
Because I think for myself now.
