What would you say to someone who thinks everyone else is stupid?

[Naterade]

I have a friend who is very smart bookwise, he's very into university and is studying 3 things at once. This is fine, but because of what he's learned/learning he has a superiority complex with most people who cannot converse on his level about politics/human nature and motives, history or any other intellectual subjects. The average person is sort of withdrawn and simple minded so it's hard to argue with him when he thinks the world is full of stupid people. What would you say to someone like this? Is it possible to help him see how he could benefit from not writing people off?


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[MiamiSound]

All the books in the world won't help him in the midst of more than a couple of the stupid people he condemns. He will be judged by the same measure he uses on others and so in the end his fate will be the same as theirs. Book smarts will only get you so far when society's values have a pole shift of what is essential for survival.

[indigl]

Tell him that he is right, but that's no reason to judge someone.

[illus]

I wouldn't say anything to him but I would ask myself why I am bothered by his altitude

[Joe]

I have a friend who is very smart bookwise, he's very into university and is studying 3 things at once. This is fine, but because of what he's learned/learning he has a superiority complex with most people who cannot converse on his level about politics/human nature and motives, history or any other intellectual subjects. The average person is sort of withdrawn and simple minded so it's hard to argue with him when he thinks the world is full of stupid people. What would you say to someone like this? Is it possible to help him see how he could benefit from not writing people off?

you flip him the bird and quit wasting your time, enough people do that and he might MAYBE rethink his approach

[Naterade]

I wouldn't say anything to him but I would ask myself why I am bothered by his altitude

I'm bothered by it because such a smart person with so much to offer writes people off instead of feeling compassion for their ignorance. but then again i guess they wouldn't listen anyways. i'd like to think that if we tried enough we could find a way to get through to each other though. i just think we should try to work together and view no one as an enemy in order to make progress. if we want peace then we need to be peaceable to all we come into contact with. I'm bothered because he doesn't try. We could at least be trying to help each other instead of looking out for number one all the time. it's the selfishness and lack of motivation to try to improve the situation when everyone says they want peace. how bout that?

[Sephish]

[Naterade]

you flip him the bird and quit wasting your time, enough people do that and he might MAYBE rethink his approach

i doubt that'd really make a difference at all. i think he judges people by their status anyways. kinda an "if you could then you would", which is kind of a true statement. but yeah, i gave up wasting my time on it a long time ago, i was just curious to see if anyone had an enlightening suggestion because this seems to be a common thing around people who are rich or booksmart yet don't see how narrow minded they are because of their so called "knowledge". anyone can pay big money to be privledged enough to remember some facts others don't know, big deal.

[ThetaAbundance]

People who behave this way are insecure deep down, tend to lean toward an upbringing where one or both of the parents were a "DO AS I SAY" and "APPEAR HOW I WANT YOU TO", pushing them to be perfect. Seems to me you are a great friend in wanting to understand, so you can find compassion and maybe be an example in whatever way you can.

I'm not sure how close of friends you are, sounds like he doesn't let people get too intimately close, but just going based on the words you write. I would look up *drum rolls please* Inverted Narcissism. It's very common! It has helped me to understand way more than I ever imagined. Friends, collegues, family, etc.

[Naterade]

ahahaha seph.

[lillies1978]

If he knows so much about politics I'm sure he knows about Hegel's Master-Slave-Dialectics. As long as he is judging them, in a way oppressing them (by disregarding their input), he enslaves himself no matter how book smart he is.

Here is a link to the theory:
Lordship and Bondage

Wikipedia gives a bit interpretation:
Master-slave dialectic - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

[Naterade]

People who behave this way are insecure deep down, tend to lean toward an upbringing where one or both of the parents were a "DO AS I SAY" and "APPEAR HOW I WANT YOU TO", pushing them to be perfect. Seems to me you are a great friend in wanting to understand, so you can find compassion and maybe be an example in whatever way you can.

I'm not sure how close of friends you are, sounds like he doesn't let people get too intimately close, but just going based on the words you write. I would look up *drum rolls please* Inverted Narcissism. It's very common! It has helped me to understand way more than I ever imagined. Friends, collegues, family, etc.

thanks for that. Looking that up helped a bit in understanding it, and I can relate. I feel frustrated though that I probably can't do anything about it. Or can I?

[Ian]

The trap of feeling superior is hard to get out of, and not something anyone can help him out of.

Until he feels connected to humanity on a deeper level he's just going to keep seeing evidence to support his perspective.

Best you can do is be an example.

Getting him laid might help. :-)

[lillies1978]

Getting him laid might help. :-)

That poor girl probably has to talk politics between taking breaths. Or call him "Oh Mr President"...lol. Just kidding.

[Naterade]

lol he's fine there and lillies, you're closer to the real picture than you might think haha. ah well, who cares. i accept people for who they are, back to being responsible for just me. I should already know by now it's not my job to teach people nor can I, they gotta do it themselves. I'd just like to be able to help people, to reach out, and I feel frustrated by my inability to have an effect really by conscious choice. any time i do have one it's a natural side effect that i'm probly not aware of unless they come tell me. i wish there was more i could do besides just being the lone soldier. I want to really connect with people on a deep level, but perhaps i'm creating an unrealistic illusion of perfection that can't be attained. i wish there was a way to cut through everyone's wall and just say the one thing was would make them pop and go .

[lillies1978]

You can give him food for thought. What he makes out of it is up to him.

---------- Post added at 03:10 PM ---------- Previous post was at 03:08 PM ----------

How does he like philosophy? Philosophy is one of the few things I found that can change an intelligent mind. Politics after all are based on philosophy.

[Indigo Dog]

I've met a couple of geniuses that were socially retarded. I had no luck in " helping " them to become more like-able. I don't think either one of them even thought it was worth their trouble to try.

About all I was able to do for them was to be friendly and act as kind of a buffer. Eventually I got tiered of smoothing down the ruffled feather of the people they would offend and I gave up and found nicer friends.

It must be an Indigo trait to want and make people live to their best possible selves. Sometimes when you scratch the surface there is nothing underneath.

Probably it is a testimony to me not accepting people as they are and demanding they be better, more, more like what I want.

[illuminati]

Just let him be...

An attempt to subjugate his esteem and or knowledge of self, is a superiority complex in of itself.

This is his process of mental discovery, let him discover humility with in his claimed genuis.

Come now friends, surely in the arrogance and dismissiveness of simple-mindedness, we will find those intelligent enough to accept the pride and ignorance with in their own simplemindedness.

Be the friend and learn the loving language of silence.

Let him speak and say nothing against his thoughts. When he is done, simple remark ... "that is interesting"...
He will then ask you your opinion.... (that is when he is ready and anxious to learn about perspective)

I was once like your friend until I understood "love"..

So dont be too hard on him or so frustrated to the point that he think he or she needs help in seeing the validity in your perspective...
Honor his standards by learning how he or she communicates...that would be a show of your mastery....

Trust me, he will learn how to love stupidity...
and once stupidity is received in love, he will understand stupidity as simply an err of language and comprehension....

and not of intellectual aptitude.
Take care butterfly

BTW print this out and give it to your friend (wink)

[membrane]

well i couldent tell you what to do, but i know what i would do.... i would take him camping.. northern canadain style, way out in the stix, with the cougars and bears, and there i will show him of what he is ignorant of... show him that all his smarts cant save him without the system of society.... show him quite clearly that he would die withouth the proper smarts... from geting food, to starting a fire, making shelter... names of uses of plants and trees... no amount of book reading can prepare you for hands on action... you canot read a book and build a houce... you cant read a book then properly and safely fell a tree... nobody knows everything, and everybody knows somthing

[Naterade]

nvm.