fidelishaereticus

[fidelishaereticus]

I spent the first half of my life in a special nook of academia that truly ruined ruined me for the rest of the world. Now academia has its flaws (that's why I left) - but it did manage to instill in me a deep *belief* that expertise doesn't usually look like certainty. Intelligence doesn't just look like a quick quip. Leadership doesn't look like an order barked. All of those qualities look something more like this: 'ahhh interesting ha hm hah well that's not really my field but let's sit down and have a thinkie [lugs out five dusty tomes from under desk and pulls up a search bar in an academic journal]'. Essentially, I learned that an expert is someone who gets *excited* rather than afraid at the prospect of having the bounds of their expertise challenged - someone who will gleefully take the bait to have a deeper, more complex discussion over the low-hanging fruit of the sound-bite answer. I learned that that knowledge is as much about knowing what you don't know as it is about knowing what you know, and that confidence looks like having the self-assurance to admit that without getting ruffled.

In academic circles, i learned to read as confident, assertive, and intelligent because i mimicked the above behavior, which i admired. Often i did feel stupid about not knowing something, but i trained myself to state my ignorance with a smile - because that's what confidence looked like. That's what expertise looked like. Even when I wanted to, I never covered up the gaps in my knowledge or showed fear at the prospect of being wrong. I asked questions back at questions and reached for the more complex truth. This was the environment in which I learned how to command respect. Outside of the ivory tower, it has been a perpetual shock to learn that admitting uncertainty - or simply just stopping to think - reads as weakness, ignorance, lack of confidence, or even submission. People take it as a signal that they can disrespect you. I was taught it all absolutely backwards. To this day there's nothing that infuriates me more than being taken for a pushover because i wear confidence like an academic, not a businessman. But the conditioning is bone-deep, and I'm not about to try and change it.

Ok now do NYT columnists

[fidelishaereticus]

[fidelishaereticus]

society sets unattainable standards for 'smart' the same way it does for 'pretty' and if you choose to pin your entire self-worth on being smart it will fuck you up in the same way.

education is real. skills are real. but smart? that's nebulous. smart can be dangled like a carrot on a stick to get you to buy something, to keep you in line, make you feel like you have to behave a certain way in order to prove your worth.

this is not an anti-intellectual post it is an anti-smart post. you can't stop telling yourself you're stupid if you don't stop caring about being smart. Care about learning instead.

I grew up in a culture that equated neurodivergence with stupidity into a culture where it is suddenly trending to have ADHD and autism but only if you pretend that it somehow actually makes you smarter than others and you know. The more things change the more I wish we would stop superficially moving the bar of mental "acceptability" around and pretending we've made moral progress.

[fidelishaereticus]

I grew up in a culture that equated neurodivergence with stupidity into a culture where it is suddenly trending to have ADHD and autism but only if you pretend that it somehow actually makes you smarter than others and you know. The more things change the more I wish we would stop superficially moving the bar of mental "acceptability" around and pretending we've made moral progress.

[fidelishaereticus]

alright here we go

this one's for "stupid" mentally disabled people. people who can't do basic math. people who are gullible to no fault of their own. people who can't understand nuance in some situations. people with cognitive issues. intellectually disabled people.

hey, you're doin' just fine. doing a great job, even! don't put yourself down or feel like your worth as a person rests on how smart you are. we'll be ok

#this

[fidelishaereticus]

day 1527

#me

[fidelishaereticus]

fear puts a hand down your throat fear squeezes your heart billows your lungs drips down your spine fear has followed you every day since you were born and sang you into being every night before when you were a parasite fear made you twist with fighting terror fear was your first scream fear was your first love fear was your first thought and every feeling since fear has never asked for your thanks fear does not make a shrine to itself it carries everything in syncopation with you in every caravan and crossing fear doesn't wait to be loved it knows what it is to be hated hope yells its name down halls fear built with your ancestor's hands fear has lived in the dimness of your dreams watching inside and out it made itself a sentry inside you warning you awake the point is only this: fear slips beneath your feet even as you try to walk away because it loves you too well to let go

#poetry #damn yes

[fidelishaereticus]

like everyone i hate ads but also sometimes an add will bring you somewhat to make up for it like an adult man facing the camera and delivering the phrases 'alpha meditative practice' and 'alpha brainwave state' with not a trace of irony and maybe that makes it all worthwhile

[fidelishaereticus]

I think an oscars slap should become a thing like setting that straw goat on fire where it doesn't happen every year but the threat is always there and a large group of people are always rooting for it and there's betting pools on if it'll happen and who the parties involved will be and everyone is a lil disappointed when you get through it without The Thing happening but you know what we'll get em next year. Would spice things up a bit.

[fidelishaereticus]

call me old fashioned but if your movie is over 90 min it should be for a good reason, and if it is over two hours it should be for an even better reason, like watching people freeze to death (Titanic, 1997).

[fidelishaereticus]

life is way better when you can laugh

is this about that 'it's ok to be more serious' post i made that took off because my friend one thing you need to know about me is that often my partner has to text me to shut up because i am laughing too loudly too late at night. whenever i go to see a play a friend of mine is in, they know i am in the audience because my laughter is just that distinctive. my laugh is notorious, and notoriously loud. i am very good at laughing. and also, i am very serious. sometimes i am cackling and sometimes i am delivering the entirety of To Be Or Not To Be with one glance wile eating welches fruit snacks and that's ok too. idk what to tell you its the duality of man.

here's the thing though when i genuinely need to be serious or sad or just straightforward no goofs Sincere life is not made way better by laughing over it. life is made distinctly worse by doing that. those moments when i am feeling Serious are much better for being allowed the full breadth of their gravitas. and if you're the sort of person who experiences Serious at a higher frequency than Goof, that's ok.

life is not Always better when you can laugh. life is better when you can genuinely acknowledge the vibe you're vibing without having to force a vibe that's not.

[fidelishaereticus]

practicing kindness toward your past self is truly the boot camp for kindness generally

Please stop attacking the past versions of you. They were doing their best at the time and they got you here. It’s amazing how much progress you’ve made and how much you’ve grown but please don’t think your past self lacked worth in any way.

[fidelishaereticus]

giving straights the watered down version of your gender because they can’t handle the ingredients

[fidelishaereticus]

Fuck this one hits home.

#i just don't have the proper similie for how 'you have so much potential' just hit me in this thread #its tricky because everyone talks a big game about how so many ultra-successful creative geniuses do have ADHD #to the point where you almost start to think ADHD is supposed to be making you Smarter Faster Quirkier and More Interesting #and: surely if Successful Genius Superstars have ADHD then surely it can't be my ADHD that's keeping me from fulfilling my Potential #...like on the one hand it is good to have famous role-models with your disability #on the other hand #it can real backfire right back into the psychological death-trap of 'you have so much potential' (its your fault you're not fulfilling it)

[fidelishaereticus]

big fan of shakespeare villains who step onto the stage and immediately announce “I am here and I am evil. I am here to do mischief.” and then that’s exactly what they do for the next two hours. no other motive is ever explained. at the end they fail. kings

[fidelishaereticus]

fjskjfkd there is so much going on here

At first I was all “oh Holmes is into art as well as music!!” but then noticed the “of which he had the crudest ideas”

So Watson is just “he wouldn’t shut up about art but he doesn’t know SHIT”

Meanwhile I find it endearing to see an example of Holmes hyperfixating on something without being an expert on it. One of us one of us one of us—

#not to be that guy but book holmes is kind of a masterpiece of a character #nearly every adaptation misses out crucial facets of him that leave him obnoxious and lacking

[fidelishaereticus]

don’t know why people put so much effort into bragging. when i want to impress upon someone that i’m good at a thing i just say Yes I Pretty Good At That and then produce a think piece on a completely different topic that sexifies my claim not at all