Why are people so dumb...

No1newts

No1newts

No1newts

Soldato
Joined
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... and instantly believe anything written online as if it is gospel?

I pop on FB every week to keep in touch with old friends and the amount of stuff people "share" and say repost this to stop it happening blah blah when its out right lies/wrong is baffling. Some clown posting something about Danes murdering whales for fun as a coming if age ceremony, hundreds of replies stating how evil the Danish are its a disgrace ban this, ban that. Two seconds of research proved it false but I pointed this out only to be told "we'll it says so in the article so it must be true" :eek:

I see this in the office where people read guff in the Fail or the red tops and off they go ranting. Or watch garbage like Benefits street and declare this is how the world works :rolleyes:

Bit of a rant there but I suppose my point is, is anyone concerned by how gullible and stupid people are these days? I'm sure I could go on the net now and fabricate a story about Ed Miliband being a satanist who sacrifices children and it would be all over the net as the truth in an hour.

Worries me how much people are willing to believe anything they read and have no brain power to find out the facts they are just spoon fed what the media gives them.

/rant off.
 
Human nature and I'll grantee you will do it as well. We can't screen all information we gather. People have interests in different areas, so they'll likely check those areas, but you won't do it for everything. Other areas you heat it enough with nothing to counter it, you'll almost certainly will parrot it out. This happens all the tome and not just from media, how many work stories have little if any bases in reality. And yet we all parrot it out.
Then as soon as you are challenged you realise how dumb the thing you said was.
 
'Down with this sort of thing!'

These days I've come to a decision that I won't judge or form opinions on anything unless I've had first (or reliable second) hand experience of it, or I watch/read what Charlie Brooker says and just agree with him :D
 
From Snopes

Origins: We don't yet know the specific origins of the photographs displayed above, but they're consistent with other documentation of the hunting of pilot whales by residents of the Faroe Islands (an autonomous province of Denmark), a subject which has long been a subject of controversy. Although the International Whaling Commission (IWC) enacted a ban on commercial whaling since 1986, pilot whales are technically a member of the dolphin family, and the Faroe Islands is one of the parts of the world where the IWC's rules still allowed for subsistence hunting of such small cetaceans.

Supporters of the hunt maintain that the practice of killing pilot whales is "an age-old communal, noncommercial hunt aimed at meeting the community's need for whale meat and blubber," that the animals are dealt with so quickly that their pain is brief, and that whale meat accounts for a quarter of the Faroe islanders' annual meat consumption. Conservationists charge that the hunts, which may take hundreds of whales at a time, are barbaric and pointless, that "the practice is outdated, cruel and unnecessary for a place with one of the highest standards of living in Europe," and that most of the whales go to waste (either being left on the beach to rot or thrown back to sea after they are killed.

In late 2008, chief medical officers of the Faroe Islands advised that they no longer considered pilot whales to be fit for human consumption because the animals' meat and blubber had been found to contain too much mercury, PCBs and DDT derivatives.
Read more at http://www.snopes.com/photos/hunting/dolphinhunt.asp#wKDxdl0P0CYOzd5C.99
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Intresting Article on it here
http://earthfirstjournal.org/newswi...e-and-dolphin-slaughter-in-the-faroe-islands/
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Seems this story isn't too far off the mark, maybe describing it as a "coming of age ceremony" rather than a community hunt is a bit dubious - as it's done for meat in the first instance.
However a lot of hunting involves "coming of age" nonsense, so maybe the original author spoke to the people involved and didn't interpret the actions correctly...



but



I am not saying people aren't dumb.
 
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glen8 said:
speak for yourself mate

Perhaps it's my level of maturity, but I question anything and everything.

have to agree with the OP, however.....there are a lot of idiots around these days.
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+1

If I'm going to take a standpoint I'll at least learn the basics, I may make mistakes but I try to be at least moderately informed before spouting off.
 
Half of the population is of below average intelligence and even people of average intelligence are fairly stupid.

The stupider ones are more likely to frequent Facebook and internet forums more as they can't get jobs, so it stands to reason that the average online person with whom you interact will be vastly stupider than average.
 
I'm concerned about how gullible and stupid people are, I understand why and I understand there's nothing you can do about it, it's the same depressing reason I'll probably hang myself before I reach old age.
 
Also I know it gets thrown around a lot in these discussions, but this explains why stupid people tend to be a lot more vocal and convinced they are correct.
 
glen8 said:
speak for yourself mate

Perhaps it's my level of maturity, but I question anything and everything.

have to agree with the OP, however.....there are a lot of idiots around these days.
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Of course you don't, do you realise just how much information you pick up every day from hundreds of sources. Its impossible to question all off it, even if you did remember to when you could. A lot of it will be absorbed subconsciously.

You would have to spend several days checking information you picked up from just one day. There simply is not enough time to do what you say.

No1newts said:
+1

If I'm going to take a standpoint I'll at least learn the basics, I may make mistakes but I try to be at least moderately informed before spouting off.
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Most stuff people say is not taking a stand, its a quick nonsense conversation.
 
Frightful Boar said:
Half of the population is of below average intelligence and even people of average intelligence are fairly stupid.

The stupider ones are more likely to frequent Facebook and internet forums more as they can't get jobs, so it stands to reason that the average online person with whom you interact will be vastly stupider than average.
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Dont go to hard on yourself mate :D
 
Frightful Boar said:
Half of the population is of below average intelligence and even people of average intelligence are fairly stupid.

The stupider ones are more likely to frequent Facebook and internet forums more as they can't get jobs, so it stands to reason that the average online person with whom you interact will be vastly stupider than average.
Click to expand...

This really, think how stupid the average person is and then half of people are dumber than that. I tend not to go on Facebook too much, it just makes me hate the people I know in real life.
 
Frightful Boar said:
Half of the population is of below average intelligence and even people of average intelligence are fairly stupid.

The stupider ones are more likely to frequent Facebook and internet forums more as they can't get jobs, so it stands to reason that the average online person with whom you interact will be vastly stupider than average.
Click to expand...

I'd hazard a guess more people on here are employed/in education than unemployed. Nothing to back that up though.
 
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