Rant on society and intelligence.
My brain is wired to be pretty good at any subject that is not science or maths. And despite my constant self-deprecation, I know that I am decently intelligent. I have a special knack for languages, history, and literature, that’s just how I was built. And I hate more than anything that society doesn’t appreciate that kind of intelligence anymore, if they ever did. It’s like you’re an idiot if you aren’t very good at mathematics or the sciences and that’s not the case. The fact that society as a whole isn’t very appreciative of any other form of intelligence is quite sad, to be honest. I have heard more fucking burqa jokes when I tell people that I am taking Arabic this year in school and absolutely plan to continue all through college… I’m serious, the only people who have actually congratulated me on how well I’m doing with the language are language teachers. Not even my own family takes it seriously.
And oh, I can recite back to you nearly word for word a history lesson that was taught to the class months ago. I can pull people and definitions and dates out of nowhere (the dates not quite as well, I am only a high school kid) and have it be 100% accurate. But is that impressive at all to anyone? No. They all just think “Whatever, History is a useless class anyway.” Which, by the way, makes me rage. I won’t go off into my separate rant about how a local school is trying to cut out history courses entirely. I have a passion for the subject though, and absolutely adored the AP class I took this year, even though U.S. History is my least favorite subject of all the History courses offered at my school. But that’s worthless to most people, isn’t it?
And reading? Oh, don’t even get me started on my love of literature. I could spend my whole life in a library, I often wish I could. My threshold for retaining characters and plots and whole books is pretty impressive, and this is coming from a girl who hates everything about herself. Although, for some weird reason, I loathe assigned reading with a passion. I never quite understood that. But still books, dear God, how I love books.
Oh, and I forgot writing. Although I haven’t written very much for the last year or so, I still have a burning passion for writing. It was my first love and it will always have a special place in my heart, no matter what field I do end up specializing in as the years roll on. I remember when writing was my reason for getting up in the morning, when it felt like the only thing keeping me alive was the ink running through my veins. I was never terribly good at it, but oh, how I loved it, and still do.
Anyways, the point is, it breaks my heart to see other people like myself, with similar talents, branded as astonishingly average by society. That maybe someone who can recite to you entire passages of Shakespeare is put down because they can barely spit out the first three digits of Pi. Or maybe someone who can’t tell the difference between the molecular structure of Carbon Dioxide and Carbon Monoxide is maybe not as valuable, or as deserving of academic praise, even though they can improvise an absolutely astounding essay on Nixon and his foreign policy off the top of their head. And maybe the person who can find the foci of an elliptical cone will get the scholarship over someone who can write a story that will bring tears to your eyes with a single page. And what of the other arts? Oh, painting and building and sculpting and singing and working magic with an instrument. Make-up and hair and fashion geniuses. I don’t know, maybe this is just something in my neck of the woods, maybe it’s global, but what I do know that it’s a terrible shame and I hope that no one feels ashamed or stupid of not being able to quite grasp the concept of electromagnetic radiation or the Law of Cosines. And vice verse, I hope no one who is good at those things feels unintelligent because they don’t quite understand what F. Scott is trying to dictate. We’re all beautiful people with different skills, and I hope that the world as a whole recognizes people’s worth, even if their strengths are an oddity or not quite what society looks for.