Stupidity

While I try not to talk too much crap behind people's back (my students don't count, BTW, since they remain anonymous), I found myself compromising my values when Betsy called me yesterday to ask whether I remember Rita*. Of course, I remember Rita -- Rita is the dumbest person I know. Actually, now that I teach high school, I realize that that's an exaggeration, but Rita is definitely the dumbest person I know with a college education.

The mere mention of Rita kicks me into an unstoppable rant. I feel compelled to convey to whoever will listen the extent to which this person is dumb. It's not necessary, and yet I can't help it. Before I deliver an abbreviated rant, it is important to note that I don't dislike Rita, which might make my criticism even less defendable. In truth, Rita is a nice person... or, well, not a mean person anyway, the social awkwardness kind of prevents me from discerning any kindness. My main beef with Rita is that ey is abundantly dumb, apparently an unforgivable crime in my book.

I first encountered Rita during my first week of college while walking to an event. In this stage of the game, I tried to be social with nearly everyone so I struck up a conversation with Rita. To my wonderment, Rita couldn't be more socially awkward. Ey wouldn't make eye contact and responded to even the simplest questions ("Where are you from?" "What do you do for fun?") with confused, uninformative answers. I never wanted to abandon a conversation so quickly, and worried that I would never make friends if everyone were like Rita.

Over time, I had a couple of classes in common with Rita. I didn't enjoy this since I was embarrassed to learn alongside including Intro to Video Production. Rita made some slap-you-in-the-face horrendous pieces, most notably one in which ey read a poem, then after reading each line, paused to pantomime the words. Afterwards, the class was asked to critique the video, but no one knew where to begin. Finally, a diplomatic student suggested that it might work better if Rita were to do the actions while reading the line rather than doing them separately so it isn't so disjointed. Initially, Rita responds in such a way where it's obvious ey doesn't get the comment, then decides that such a thing would be too difficult. Normally, I wouldn't reckon that speaking and gesturing at the same time would be a hard task, but I wouldn't put it past Rita.

About that time, Jocelyn decided to declare Rita eir nemesis since Rita had similar interests in acting and video production. Even though Jocelyn was just inventing a pretend rivalry, I adamantly objected, citing that it wasn't fair and that ey might as well select a "retarded squirrel" as eir nemesis instead.

Betsy brought up Rita, eir former suitemate, after spotting eir in Boston from across the street. Not being close to Rita, both in terms of proximity and relationship-wise, Betsy chalked it up to a coincidence and figured ey would never see Rita again. The fates had other plans, however. The next day, at Betsy's place of work, who did ey see but Rita, who was there to observe the work environment for a class.

Being friendly, Betsy approached Rita and it apparently took a lot of details before Rita remembered who Betsy was, even though they lived together for a year. Rita illicitly kept a forbidden cat in the dorm which Betsy was allergic to, so Betsy frequently complained for Rita not to let eir cat be in the common space. It took Betsy reminding eir that Rita essentially tried to kill eir with the cat before Rita acknowledged eir.

Rita couldn't be more disinterested. Usually Pitzer grads, even those that don't like each other, are excited to meet one another since we're a small group with a rare connection, but Rita was not interested in swapping stories, nay, wasn't capable of swapping stories. More importantly, Rita was still dumb.

But here's the kicker - Rita, this same person who overwhelms acquaintances with a sense of stupidity, is apparently in a management masters program at Harvard. Nevermind that someone without social skills could never be an effective manager - the very thought is mind boggling - but how does the dumbest person I know get accepted to Harvard?!

Higher education is such a joke. The news sends me into a tizzy and I start rambling even more about what an idiot Rita is. Admittedly, I'm fairly jealous, yet even more perplexed. How in the hell?

After I get off the phone, my friends who were nearby looked shocked at how much I had reamed Rita, who they are not familiar with. "You really don't like [eir], do you?" they asked. Again, it's not really dislike, but shock that someone can be that stupid. I imagine I come across no other way than hateful, right? That's not a rhetorical question, so feel free to answer. I'm still not sure whether to be more ashamed of myself or Harvard.