Stupidity is extremely useful to statist politicians, not just because stupid people are easily manipulated, but more importantly because they believe the world can be remade to fit their incorrect beliefs if enough force is deployed. This is the basis of most left-wing populism.
Stupidity is aggressive, while ignorance is passive. Stupidity refuses to seek out knowledge, rejects information that does not fit its preconceptions, and destroys what it does not understand. The defining characteristic of stupidity is the refusal to admit ignorance or error.
The refusal to admit error is also a key characteristic of statist politics. The State is never wrong. Its programs never end. It acts with absolute confidence that it can do everything from managing trillion dollar economies to rewriting human nature and controlling the weather.
This is the bridge between collectivism and individual foolishness: the promise that with enough power and money, the collective State can force the real world to change, making foolish conclusions valid and incorrect beliefs "true." The more power needed, the better!
Trying the same thing over and over again while expecting different results is the definition of insanity... and the core operating principle of statism. The answer to every failure is invariably: "We didn't try hard enough!"
Look at the delirious persistence of the belief in "free lunches" - the absolute conviction that government can make things "free," and the recent corollary that if something is not "free" then people are being "denied access" to it.
This belief is objectively stupid. Even very small children grasp the idea that no limited resource or product of human labor can be "free." But statist politics weaponizes stupidity to nourish the belief that "free stuff" can be conjured out of thin air by virtuous politicians.
The increasing dominance of our politics and culture by weaponized stupidity is a complete inversion of the idea that laws should conform with nature, thus placing the lightest possible burden upon the greatest number of people.
Instead, weaponizing stupidity allows the statists to create laws that impose the GREATEST possible expense and burden upon the largest number of people, forcing us to accept that obviously foolish notions are "true" and behave accordingly.
There is little power to be harvested by fashioning a government that is consistent with natural law, human nature, common sense, time-tested traditions, and the healthy ambitions of free people. Do the opposite, however, and your power can be unlimited.
Intelligence can lack knowledge - it allows for that possibility and seeks to learn what it does not know. Intelligence can make mistakes, even painful ones - it learns from them. Intelligence is not infallible - on the contrary, it constantly accepts that it could be wrong.
Everything about socialism and the modern ideal of the authoritarian central State rejects these precepts of knowledge in favor of their opposites: truth is defined by power, questions are treason, the State makes no errors and allows no one to suffer (and learn) from theirs.
Our diminished notion of free speech is a great example of weaponized stupidity, and that attitude is seeping into every aspect of our lives. The powerful will tell you what is True, and you are not permitted to disagree with their "consensus." You will be made stupid. /end
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