The Personal Website of Mark W. Dawson

A Special Kind of Stupid

Dietrich Bonhoeffer (4 February 1906 – 9 April 1945) was a German Lutheran pastor, neo-orthodox theologian, and anti-Nazi dissident who was a key founding member of the Confessing Church. His writings on Christianity's role in the secular world have become widely influential; his 1937 book The Cost of Discipleship is described as a modern classic. Apart from his theological writings, Bonhoeffer was known for his staunch resistance to the Nazi dictatorship, including vocal opposition to Adolf Hitler's euthanasia program and genocidal persecution of Jews. He was arrested in April 1943 by the Gestapo and imprisoned at Tegel Prison for 1½ years. Later, he was transferred to Flossenbürg concentration camp.

Bonhoeffer was accused of being associated with the 20 July plot to assassinate Hitler and was tried along with other accused plotters, including former members of the Abwehr (the German Military Intelligence Office). He was hanged on 9 April 1945 during the collapse of the Nazi regime.

In his pondering about the evils of Nazism and the German people who supported the Nazis, he came to an astounding conclusion. The German people were not evil, but stupidity was allowed to overcome them by adopting a collective viewpoint. Bonhoeffer argued that stupid people were more dangerous than evil ones. This is because while we can protest against or fight evil people, against stupid ones, we are defenseless — as reason falls on deaf ears:

“Stupidity is a more dangerous enemy of the good than malice. One may protest against evil; it can be exposed and, if need be, prevented by use of force. Evil always carries within itself the germ of its own subversion in that it leaves behind in human beings at least a sense of unease. Against stupidity we are defenseless. Neither protests nor the use of force accomplish anything here; reasons fall on deaf ears; facts that contradict one’s prejudgment simply need not be believed – in such moments the stupid person even becomes critical – and when facts are irrefutable they are just pushed aside as inconsequential, as incidental. In all this the stupid person, in contrast to the malicious one, is utterly self satisfied and, being easily irritated, becomes dangerous by going on the attack. For that reason, greater caution is called for when dealing with a stupid person than with a malicious one. Never again will we try to persuade the stupid person with reasons, for it is senseless and dangerous.

If we want to know how to get the better of stupidity, we must seek to understand its nature. This much is certain, that it is in essence not an intellectual defect but a human one. There are human beings who are of remarkably agile intellect yet stupid, and others who are intellectually quite dull yet anything but stupid. We discover this to our surprise in particular situations. The impression one gains is not so much that stupidity is a congenital defect, but that, under certain circumstances, people are made stupid or that they allow this to happen to them. We note further that people who have isolated themselves from others or who live in solitude manifest this defect less frequently than individuals or groups of people inclined or condemned to sociability. And so it would seem that stupidity is perhaps less a psychological than a sociological problem. It is a particular form of the impact of historical circumstances on human beings, a psychological concomitant of certain external conditions. Upon closer observation, it becomes apparent that every strong upsurge of power in the public sphere, be it of a political or of a religious nature, infects a large part of humankind with stupidity. It would even seem that this is virtually a sociological-psychological law. The power of the one needs the stupidity of the other. The process at work here is not that particular human capacities, for instance, the intellect, suddenly atrophy or fail. Instead, it seems that under the overwhelming impact of rising power, humans are deprived of their inner independence, and, more or less consciously, give up establishing an autonomous position toward the emerging circumstances. The fact that the stupid person is often stubborn must not blind us to the fact that he is not independent. In conversation with him, one virtually feels that one is dealing not at all with a person, but with slogans, catchwords and the like that have taken possession of him. He is under a spell, blinded, misused, and abused in his very being. Having thus become a mindless tool, the stupid person will also be capable of any evil and at the same time incapable of seeing that it is evil. This is where the danger of diabolical misuse lurks, for it is this that can once and for all destroy human beings.

Yet at this very point it becomes quite clear that only an act of liberation, not instruction, can overcome stupidity. Here we must come to terms with the fact that in most cases a genuine internal liberation becomes possible only when external liberation has preceded it. Until then we must abandon all attempts to convince the stupid person. This state of affairs explains why in such circumstances our attempts to know what ‘the people’ really think are in vain and why, under these circumstances, this question is so irrelevant for the person who is thinking and acting responsibly. The word of the Bible that the fear of God is the beginning of wisdom declares that the internal liberation of human beings to live the responsible life before God is the only genuine way to overcome stupidity.

But these thoughts about stupidity also offer consolation in that they utterly forbid us to consider the majority of people to be stupid in every circumstance. It really will depend on whether those in power expect more from people’s stupidity than from their inner independence and wisdom.”
 - Dietrich Bonhoeffer from his book “After Ten Years: An Account at the Turn of the Year 1942–1943”.

For more of Bonhoeffer's thoughts on collective stupidity, I would direct you to the YouTube videos “Are You A Part Of Them? - Theory Of Stupidity” and “Bonhoeffer‘s Theory of Stupidity”.

Carlo M. Cipolla (15 August 1922 – 5 September 2000) was an Italian economic historian. He was a member of both the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and the American Philosophical Society. Cipolla wrote an essay in 1976, "The Basic Laws of Human Stupidity”, which explores the controversial subject of stupidity. In this essay, Cipolla's postulated five fundamental laws of stupidity:

1. Always and inevitably, everyone underestimates the number of stupid individuals in circulation.
2. The probability that a certain person (will) be stupid is independent of any other characteristic of that person.
3. A stupid person is a person who causes losses to another person or to a group of persons while himself deriving no gain and even possibly incurring losses.
4. Non-stupid people always underestimate the damaging power of stupid individuals. In particular, non-stupid people constantly forget that at all times and places, and under any circumstances, to deal and/or associate with stupid people always turns out to be a costly mistake.
5. A stupid person is the most dangerous type of person.

Thus, he postulated a corollary, “a stupid person is more dangerous than a pillager”. Cipolla also identified two factors to consider when exploring human behavior:

• Benefits and losses that individuals cause to themselves.
• Benefits and losses that individuals cause to others.

For more of Cipolla's thoughts, I would direct you to the YouTube videos “The Roots of The Stupidity Pandemic” and “Why Smart People Believe Stupid Things”.

In pondering Bonhoeffer's thoughts on the stupidity of the German people and Cipolla's thoughts on stupidity in general, I am reminded of Progressives/Leftists and Democrat Party Leaders attitudes regarding President Trump and his MAGA supporters, as well as their general attitude about Conservatives and Republican Party Leaders. Their rhetoric about Conservatives and Republican Party Leaders, as I have examined in my Chirp on "09/22/24 Democrat Extreme Rhetoric", betray their Bonhoeffer collective attitude of stupidity. In thinking about Cipolla's five fundamental laws of stupidity, I realized the dangers of their special kind of stupidity.

In the Clinton, Obama, and Biden presidencies and administrations, and especially in the time between their administrations, we saw the rise in Bonhoeffer's stupidity and the truths of Cipolla's five fundamental laws of stupidity captivating and increasing in numbers within the Progressives/Leftists and Democrat Party Leaders. In their Trump Derangement Syndrome (TDS) and their collective refusal to entertain that they may be wrong by rejecting any rational and reasonable argument to the contrary, they show a Bonhoeffer stupidity. In this collective attitude, they have demonstrated that they are a special kind of stupid—a stupidity that is dangerous to American Ideals and Ideas and to Americans who disagree with them.

Barak Obama saying that when “they get bitter, they cling to guns or religion”, Hillary Clinton saying that “you could put half of Trump's supporters into what I call the basket of deplorables” and that “Now, some of those folks – they are irredeemable”, and Joe Biden saying that “The only garbage I see floating out there is his supporters”, is but an attempt to marginalize their opponents and instill Bonhoeffer stupidity in their supporters. Labels and pejoratives, such as racists, sexists, misogynists, bigots, homophobes, transphobes, xenophobes, Islamophobes, Fascists, and Nazis, and other pejoratives as I have written in my Article Divisiveness in America, are applied to all that oppose them and are also demonstrative of the Bonhoeffer stupidity in their supporters. As in all of Bonhoeffer's stupidity, facts and truths are no longer acceptable to them, and only events that support their narrative are acceptable. Nobody likes being called stupid, but as Forest Gump’s mother said, “Stupid is as stupid does.” Thus, they have exhibited their Bonhoeffer stupidity by what they have said and done.

Let us hope that the recent election of President Trump is the beginning of the end of Bonhoeffer's stupidity amongst Progressives/Leftists and Democrat Party Leaders, along with their understanding that they are engaging in Cipolla's five fundamental laws of stupidity. Alas, given their reflections and recriminations about the election results, it looks like they are engaged in even more Bonhoeffer and Cipolla stupidity to explain their defeat and to map a future course for themselves. Consequently, as Bonhoeffer has cautioned, “Never again will we try to persuade the stupid person with reasons, for it is senseless and dangerous”, and in remembering Cipolla’s fifth law of “A stupid person is the most dangerous type of person”, rationality and reasoning are an ineffective means to counter their stupidity and that they are dangerous. Consequently, we must do all we can to defeat them and remove them from power. Otherwise, we run the risk of traveling down the path that the German people took to Nazism, and/or we would allow them to thoroughly pillage America.