On the issue of ignorance and feelings in an age of opinion: I grew up working class. Surrounding me were men and women who, though not formally educated, placed huge value on the acquisition of knowledge as a mark of self-respect. Our local library flourished. /1
I can see one such man in my mind's eye now. A pub quiz champion. A self-taught expert on Mahler. A drinker who could recite every line of Shakespeare.. What marked these people wasn't snobbery, but the idea that to be in ignorance was, while not wrong, worth correcting. /2
To know something was liberation - a growth of self that gave a life dignity. One of the worst insults on those streets was to be an 'ignoramus' - someone who gloried in their own lack of knowledge. This wasn't a slight on those who *couldn't* know, but those who chose not to. /3
What certainly wouldn't have stood in those streets was the idea that a view based on elective ignorance was somehow a valid cultural marker - an identity which must be deferred to and respected as a democratic right. /4
These people in my past- the music listeners, the Shakespeare reciters - were, like me today, often in ignorance of particular facts. But their response to this frequent human condition was to attempt to acquire it in the most reliable way possible. Never to lionise ignorance. /5
For them, like for me, to be poor or humble or simple was no disgrace. But to be in ignorance wilfully was never a desirable residence, and not one worthy of special consideration. /end
