Open-minded stupidity
I hear occassional complaints that conservatives are stupid because they are close-minded and resistant to social change. That may be true of some who call themselves conservatives; after all, in its literal sense, a “conservative” is one who desires to conserve the status quo. But in these modern times, the conservative label covers a far broader swath of philosophies than the original literal meaning. I suspect that when leftists complain that conservatives oppose social change, they’re only referring to their brand of progressive change. In reality, they’re equally resistant to our brand of change, which is every bit as radical as what they propose. The only difference is we admit that what we’re pushing for has been tried before and has worked. They act as if their change is something that has never been attempted and never been proven to fail.
There have even been attempts to scientifically prove stereotypes about conservatives. These attempts come from the incredibly reliable, rigorous, and fad-resistant science known as psychology. Here, they managed to prove that conservatives are more fear driven and respond to the “politics of fear”. No mention of global warming was made. In this 2003 study, they proved that conservatives are more rigid in their thinking and resistant to change than the open-minded liberals. It is amazing that they were able to prove such a stereotype with only seven conservatives, all college-aged. Some may say it’s evidence that the researchers were only trying to confirm their own biases, but those critics obviously don’t understand the miracle that is modern psychology. Clearly, the critics need to open their minds and accept everything that’s given to them because it says “science”.
All sarcasm aside, I think stupidity manifests itself in two ways. The first, obviously, is mental rigidity. Think Homer Simpson stubbornly refusing to accept a good friend, John, after he finds out John’s gay. All of the evidence that John is a great guy and not in-your-face about his homosexuality was not enough to make Homer drop any of his long-held negative stereotypes about gays. John literally had to save Homer’s life to get any sort of acceptance.
The second manifestation of stupidity is excessive open-mindedness. Think Homer Simpson changing his diet to nothing but energy bars and constantly chanting their commercial slogans. He uncritically accepted that the energy bars would turn him into some sort of Superman. At the end of the episode, the company spokesman admitted that they’re nothing but apple cores and Chinese newspapers. Such open-mindedness leads to fashionable but worthless or even dangerous fads.
Intelligence requires a balance. It’s an art. It requires considering the benefits and the costs of a given policy or idea. Going too far with open-mindedness by uncritically accepting any idea that merely sounds good on the surface can lead to disaster. That’s not intelligent. Likewise, going too far the other way by refusing to consider an idea risks losing something beneficial. To quote Richard Feynman, “Keep an open mind, but not so open that your brain falls out.”
However, in politics, the issue usually isn’t about being open-minded. Often, when someone asks you to be open-minded about a policy or an idea, he really mean to close your mind to the downsides. He wants you to be open to the pros but not the cons. It’s usually just a lazy ploy to avoid the hard work of critical thinking and cost-benefit analysis.
