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I dislike stupidity.  Particularly willful stupidity.

The problem is that you can be having a conversation with some one that you don’t realize is stupid, then they whip out the dumb-hammer and steal some of your IQ points by osmosis.

I hate that.

Since my lobbying efforts to have the willfully stupid get identifying facial tattoos seems to be failing, I’ve developed a system.  My system helps me identify willfully stupid people and allows me to ignore anything they say, or–more likely–walk away as soon as I’ve identified them.

Here’s my system:

If someone expresses a specific opinion on a specific topic, I know they are an inefficient use of air and should be ignored, preferably from a different room.

What topics?  I don’t pick topics that are necessarily controversial.   For example, politics.  I’m a died-in-the-wool Leavemethehellaloneitarian.  Commies who want to take my money to fund stupid programs or stupid people aren’t a part of my IQ test.  They’re just misguided.  I’ll pat them on the head and change the topic, because I’m not interested in being either a history or an economics teacher.

The topics I go for are straightforward.   It’s a matter of “If you believe this, you are beyond help.”

What topics?

• The moon landing was a hoax.   Buzz Alrdin actually got the honor of punching one of these idiots.  I won’t get into the science here because–as I said–I don’t want to be a teacher.  Just 2 points from a human nature perspective: 1) The Russians were watching and good tell where the radio signals were coming from.  If they could have embarrassed us, they would have.  It was a Space Race.   2)  Conspiracy 101.  13 people can keep a secret if 12 of them are dead.
• 9/11 Truthers.  There’s too much stupid rolled up in anybody who think 9/11 was an inside job.  Engineering, human nature, cinematography, and critical thinking are all topics they can never master.  Just walk away.   They probably won’t notice they are talking to a wall for a while, anyway.  If they do get offended, it’s no big deal, because there’s no way they can remember your name longer than it takes to take a couple of breaths.  Seriously, they became Truthers because it’s the only job they could get that didn’t mind retraining them after each coffee break.
• Holocaust Deniers.  I almost skipped this one because it’s hard to describe them without resorting to language I try to avoid here.   Ten million people died as a direct result of evil.  Evil that ran a successful PR campaign on television.  Evil that was witnessed by millions as it was happening, and by tens of thousands more as the concentration camps were liberated and mass graves were uncovered.    If you deny this, you are not only beyond help, you are beneath contempt.

There are some other groups that get this to a lesser degree.  Anti-vaccinators get a pat on the head.   They are benefiting from the herd immunity provided be the people who get their kids vaccinated.  If the rest of us went that route, we’d grow some fabulous epidemics again.

What about you?  Do you have a shortcut system for recognizing people better left ignored?