Better Mad with the rest of the World than Wise alone. So say politicians. If all are so, one is no worse off than the rest, whereas solitary wisdom passes for folly. So important is it to sail with the stream. The greatest wisdom often consists in ignorance, or the pretence of it. One has to live with others, and others are mostly ignorant.
Baltasar Gracián - The Art of Worldly Wisdom (1647)
A striking aspect of modern life is the spectacle of ambitious people in pursuit of ignorance rather than truth. The greatest wisdom often consists in ignorance, or the pretence of it wrote Gracián over three and a half centuries ago and he was right. Ambitious politicians engage in fashionable ignorance because they must. Fashionable ignorance is important for oiling the wheels of social position and political power.
On the one hand, she had contact with the world of fashionable literature, on the other with that of fashionable ignorance. Mrs Lane’s house was a meeting-point of the two spheres.
George Gissing - New Grub Street (1891)
In a technical world such as ours, the pursuit of truth is a narrow and comparatively unrewarding path to tread for the politically ambitious. Facts can be checked, claims destroyed by uncertainties, dishonesty exposed. Yet fashionable ignorance may be expanded, elaborated and pursued with boundless enthusiasm. As we know.
Politically, technical matters are not important unless gross technical incompetence leads to a level of embarrassment where even the most adroit ignorance is no defence.
Yet a crowning achievement of fashionable ignorance has been gender politics, the fabrication of a ludicrous fantasy version of human reproductive biology. Obviously it has mostly generated fake ignorance, but ignorance does not have to be genuine – merely fashionable and therefore exploitable.
7 comments:
Also a weak leader will not appoint underlings who might be smarter than themselves.
So it is wise to hide your smartness. At least until you float to the top.
On the other hand the selected minion is just as likely to be thick as mince.
I think ignorance was always at the heart of politics; it was always about motivating people based on myth and fantasy. It only becomes "fashionable" when the myths have to be changed and replaced due to being seen through. With near universal literacy, mass media and the internet, stonking amounts of stupidity can't last all that long before people begin to realise that they are being played. The stupidity and ignorance of monarchy and church were long-lasting because nobody was exposed to counter arguments; but once the printing press was invented, the cracks quickly appeared. There is widespread ridicule of the gender politics nonsense already. Even the climate scam will begin to crumble once the news about frozen pensioners hits the interwebs. Then they'll have to look for the next bunch of nonsense to fool the ignorant.
Or, which is more scary, they'll start restricting the communication of information. The signs are there, aren't they?
I like to compare the US Constitution and their Declaration of Independence.
The first is pretty fine - flawed, of course, being a human production, but an impressive effort written in clear English for the layman not the lawyer, just as it should have been.
The D of I, on the other hand, is a sleazy advertising flyer written by the mendacious Mr Jefferson.
The worship - not too strong a term - of that Declaration is an example of fashionable ignorance. (If you want to test my proposition just ask an admirer of the Declaration what he thinks of the religious and ethnic hatred expressed in it. His answer will show that he's not read the ruddy thing or that he's too thick to understand it.
Sam Vega. Just so!
Doonhamer - I think I was pretty good at hiding my smartness - or so I tell myself.
Sam and Tammly - yes, the signs are there and restricting information seems to be the only viable way to avoid being found out in the longer term. Otherwise, the next version of fashionable nonsense may not last long enough to become a basis for building careers and reputations.
dearieme - thanks, I haven't read either for a very long time, but I'll read them again in the light of current political divisions.
I admire anyone who quotes Gracián. You can do no wrong, sir
Graeme - it's a mine of practical wisdom isn't it?
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