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zana16The lovely Lucy got my package!! *skips and jumps* It didn't explode and I am not a terrorism suspect! *sigh of relief* Okay, so you'd think I'd be more intelligent than to send gunpowder through the mail. But no. This is Janaki we are talking about. In fact, this is the third time I have sent fireworks. Eep!
So I'm in class yesterday and I have to give a presentation on the nihilistic novel. Which was disturbing but interesting. So, being the nerdy daughter of two sociology professors, I launch into a comparison of the French notion of liberty as opposed to the American concept of liberty. I describe how these are influenced and reinforced by cultural factors, how the French aren't so obsessed about individual rights and how this manifests itself in the different child-rearing objectives. Dude, it's a sociology class. Well, more or less. I happened to be pulling bs out of my ass, but it's true bs. So I get into the legacy of Protestantism and Catholicism in the two countries and how this affected the interpretation of the New Age movement of the 60s and 70s cause that's what the book is about, and I bring up the id, ego, and superego. Cause while I didn't know the French words for them (ça, moi, surmoi) I figured, these are all intelligent college-educated girls, right? Surely everyone at least has a sketchy knowledge of what the superego is, if I know. Right?
Wrong. Only succeeded in alienating several members of the class completely.
note to self: You cannot assume that people who are as intelligent as you are as informed as you. You cannot assume they read the newspapers and have any idea what the international debates are about. You cannot assume intelligence, in fact. Dude, I don't want to be more intelligent than most of the people around me. I want someone smarter and better informed than me to be running my government, in charge of my school, etc. But the sad fact is that I'm in a rather high percentile.
further note to self: The sad fact is, in fact, that you cannot assume even rationality. I was raised to believe that everyone would be rational when faced with evidence. Not so, I have discovered. Also, calmly explaining where you're coming from doesn't work, either.
The world is so damn frustrating. Everything they told me as Truth about how the world works now turns out to be a fantasy of Truth, a version of how they would like the world to be.
last note to self: faced with the evidence since forever, why is it that you didn't figure this out earlier? idiot.
So I'm in class yesterday and I have to give a presentation on the nihilistic novel. Which was disturbing but interesting. So, being the nerdy daughter of two sociology professors, I launch into a comparison of the French notion of liberty as opposed to the American concept of liberty. I describe how these are influenced and reinforced by cultural factors, how the French aren't so obsessed about individual rights and how this manifests itself in the different child-rearing objectives. Dude, it's a sociology class. Well, more or less. I happened to be pulling bs out of my ass, but it's true bs. So I get into the legacy of Protestantism and Catholicism in the two countries and how this affected the interpretation of the New Age movement of the 60s and 70s cause that's what the book is about, and I bring up the id, ego, and superego. Cause while I didn't know the French words for them (ça, moi, surmoi) I figured, these are all intelligent college-educated girls, right? Surely everyone at least has a sketchy knowledge of what the superego is, if I know. Right?
Wrong. Only succeeded in alienating several members of the class completely.
note to self: You cannot assume that people who are as intelligent as you are as informed as you. You cannot assume they read the newspapers and have any idea what the international debates are about. You cannot assume intelligence, in fact. Dude, I don't want to be more intelligent than most of the people around me. I want someone smarter and better informed than me to be running my government, in charge of my school, etc. But the sad fact is that I'm in a rather high percentile.
further note to self: The sad fact is, in fact, that you cannot assume even rationality. I was raised to believe that everyone would be rational when faced with evidence. Not so, I have discovered. Also, calmly explaining where you're coming from doesn't work, either.
The world is so damn frustrating. Everything they told me as Truth about how the world works now turns out to be a fantasy of Truth, a version of how they would like the world to be.
last note to self: faced with the evidence since forever, why is it that you didn't figure this out earlier? idiot.
