If you’re a fan of my Twitter, then odds are you’ll see something about me commenting on the stupidity of others on a semi-weekly basis. My friends and I always end up talking about someone we know, a situation someone we know is in, or just in the world in general and it always leads back to how stupid the person, or situation is. It is a little elitist, and I am by no means immune from it, but sit there and think about it.
How many of you have said, “That’s stupid.”?
Seriously, think about it, and if you said you haven’t then you’re lying.
Now think about the situation or person where you said, “That’s stupid.”. I’m serious, think about it.
Now look around you, odds are the person you’re next to did something insanely stupid that they regret it. It may have affected others, or just themselves.
I know I’m not immune from it, and I’ve recently gotten over a situation where my stupidity not only affected me, but no less than five individuals. And I know for some, they are still dealing with it because it either indirectly or directly led to them being in a insanely stupid situation where it would’ve affected no less than eight individuals in some form.
Every single one of us learn a new lesson every single day we live and breathe on this planet Earth. We learn this because we all do something stupid, and grow because we learn from it. We have to continually learn from not only our own mistakes, but from others, it is the only way we’ll be able to survive and evolve as a species. But, I’m scared. I see people around me doing the same stupid things day in and day out. They not only put a negative impact on themselves, but all those around them.
It scares me, it really does. An irresponsible mom gives birth to eight more kids with out the means to support them, financial companies handing out money to those who don’t deserve it, people overspending their means and then instead of dealing with it kill their families and themselves. I can’t go on, and I don’t have too. Go to CNN.com, Foxnews.com, ABCNews.com and you can see it all. Every day on the news you can see someone doing something stupid that not only affects them, but damn near everyone on the planet.
It angers me to see it, it’s a waste of time to get angry by it I know, but I can’t fight it. When my friend told me about the situation (I wont go into detail, but let’s just say it’s one of the stupidest things people can do) they were in and how deep it was and how many people it would involve, well. I got really angry, I could my inside fill up with all this anger, because not less than 2 months ago this same person basically broke me down and made me see my issues and then deal with all my “little” issues. So to see this person be in a situation where they knew better NOT to be in, of course I was raging angry! I wanted to slap the shit out of them.
There is by no means to avoid stupidity, and we can not fight it. But, we can try and prevent it, we can try to work around it. If you see your friend doing something stupid, stop them and call them out on it! I hate to break out the Air Force lingo, but goddamnit, be their wingman! I keep a close knit group of friends because I know they’ll call me out on anything stupid I do and they will not let me forget it. And you know what, I’m glad they do. I’m greatful to my friends and family who call me on my stupidty, because I can try to learn from it before it even happens. If we had more people in the world that could be a wingman to their friends, I swear to God himself that half this shit we see, hear, or apart of, will drop ten-fold! We can’t afford to be complacient anymore, the future of our society can’t handle any more stupidification. I’m gonna try and do my part, how about you? What are you going to do? We can’t wait for the world to change on it’s own, everyone of us needs to do something.
Welcome to my world Ian. If I see something stupid about to happen, I will generally step in to try and prevent it, but if I’m rebuffed, then let them remove themselves from the gene pool. So case in point 2 weeks ago I was up snowshoeing in the mountains and I ran into a family of 5 and in talking to the father saw where they were going, and warned them of the avalanche slide areas. I continued my climb and after a bit went looking down for them and saw that they both a crossed the main area I warned them about and also ended up in a bowl with 3-4 other paths that converged on a point. 2 days later one of the slide areas actually slid and they likely have no clue how close to their deaths they came.
While I will at times do things which are stupid, I make sure that I harm no others than myself or get into a position where anyone who has to rescue me doesn’t put themselves in danger, its simple courtesy.