I shall now regress to one of my previous rants… the one about stupid people. The main reason I care to go back to this is to relay a quote from a former CSE Student.
I was TAing like a good little grad student and answering a question for these two girls in the back of the room. Part way through the question, a guy in the class walked out the door (this was at the end of class), and girl A comments to girl B “There goes Tarzan” at which they both start half giggling half laughing.
I was slightly curious about this comment and the reaction it inspired and I looked at one of them with something like a “what the fuck is wrong with you” look, which if you know me, could easily be construed for any other unspoken statement since they all pretty much a look of disgust to an inferior life form, but apparently the look was interpreted as “what was that all about.”
Girl A the said something to the effect of: “He’s hot, but working with him is like talking to Tarzan.” Then in a Tarzan voice: “Jane use mouse?” This was quite funny coming from a student, and brings me to my point about stupid people.
This guy was dumb as a friggin rock. Several times over the course of the semester I would be helping him do something and he literally would not move the mouse without direct instruction to do so. At one point he was supposed to use a certain file that we had created in class earlier. I told him to open the file and he asked what it was called. HOW THE HELL AM I SUPPOSED TO KNOW WHAT IT IS CALLED, YOUR THE APE WHO CREATED AND SAVED IT IN THE FIRST PLACE. I swear, chimps can be trained to do more intelligent things than this guy.
This guy embodied my hate of stupid people. It’s not that he was just not computer smart, he just wasn’t smart. I think it was the steroids and pot based on the dead lifeless look that resided on his face. He took the class, and showed up for class but then used instant messenger during class making stupid comments to his friends like “what up g” and I’m pretty sure they were written just like that. Because of his IM use, it’s safe to say that he wasn’t entirely new to computers, he was just too damned stupid to understand anything more than the basic ‘click on name, type to friend’ that one of his bro’s had surely taught him.
I find it hard to put into words how stupid some people are, but I’m pretty sure everyone has been in a situation where they have met this type of person. This isn’t the casual, driving along and someone forgets to use their turn signal “oh they’re stupid” comment. This understanding comes when one sits down and thinks about what they have witnessed, gives the person the benefit of the doubt that it might just have been an off day, discards any possibility of a simple momentary lapse or simple foolish mistake and realizes that that person is just plain stupid and the best lawyers in the world could not convince a jury otherwise. How I wish there was a cost effective and proven way to keep them from breeding. Not to say that stupid is genetic, I really think it’s more in the raising of a child.
