This blog isn’t about politics, but it could be.

I have had this Winston Churchill quote rolling around in my head for the past week: “The best argument against democracy is a five-minute conversation with the average voter.”

Basically what Churchill was saying is the average voter is stupid. The less inflammatory word would be “uninformed.”

This “stupid” situation goes well past voters and stupid cannot be blamed on the person; ignorance can.

The problem as I see it is that people who choose to remain ignorant of the facts and treat their opinion as holy scripture, don’t think they are average. Yet, when we examine the average American IQ, it falls between 90 and 100. Most of us are average but that doesn’t mean we have to remain automatically uninformed.

It’s my experience that when you think of yourself on a higher intellectual rung than you actually are, you are apt to conflate your opinions and prejudices with facts, a deadly and dumb combination.

If you’ve ever conducted or listened to a radio talk show, you will get a daily dose of callers with passionate, uninformed opinions on every known topic. The average caller to a radio talk show is uninformed but they think they know what they’re talking about. They mirror society as a whole. They refused to get informed past their opinion and prejudices and believe they’re smart enough to run whatever they’re offering up the flagpole without evidence. That’s stupid!

Jesus didn’t say it but he could have: “The stupid will always be with us.” But that doesn’t mean they have to remain uninformed.

This writing is just an effort to encourage those who are putting forth arguments to have something besides an opinion and prejudice to back them up, otherwise you’ll keep Churchill turning in his grave.

All the best,

John