Anti-Intellectualism: Why We Hate the Smart Kids
While the title of the essay "Anti-Intellectualism: Why we hate the smart kids" may resonate emotionally with many self-identified nerds, its author Grant Penrod ultimately relies too much on arguments-by-anecdotes to be really persuasive. While there is certainly evidence from modern political life about a strong anti-intellectual current within the American culture, most of Penrod's is based in personal experiences or subjective emotions. The essay opens with a complaint about a football team at one high school that received more school praise than the equally successful science bowl team, the speech and debate team, and the academic decathlon team. Penrod seems to be trying to make a persuasive case to his peers about the persecution of nerds but the essay reads more like a self-serving complaint than a true argument in defense of a persecuted segment of high school or greater American society.
This essay is an excellent example of 'an interesting topic,' but poor execution. Penrod never provides evidence that his supposedly archetypical high school is representative of American culture as a whole. While there are many examples of how intellectualism is frowned upon in the media, the author instead selects a random comment by an unidentified user on a message board as proof that all people 'hate nerds.' "ArCaNe recently posted the following quote on an online discussion...
If this poster is so representative, why does ArCaNe hide behind a pseudonym?
The author
claims that ArCanNe is representative of many persons posting online, but only makes a vague, sweeping generalized reference to this 'many.' Besides, people may say many things online that they do not truly mean. The presence of online conspiracy threads and other harsh comments on message boards is no proof that the ideas are really pervasive in society. While there are quite a few websites written by persons of questionable mental stability about the reality of the attacks on the World Trade Towers, the proliferation of such sites does not mean that these opinions are common or a representative of serious
social problem. The fact that people 'bash nerds' online does not mean that these attitudes are representative of a large segment of society.
Although the essay is a rhetorical treatise making an argument, at no point does the author truly define what a 'nerd' is: is it someone who is smart? Someone who is clumsy? Someone who is a social pariah? Although the first examples he uses are of students on academic bowl teams and other cerebral extracurricular activities, it is perfectly feasible that someone could do debate and get straight As and also
play on the football team. Not every single honors student embodies the typical 'geek.' It is unclear when Penrod truly means when he says a 'nerd,' since usually the word means someone who is not particularly socially accepted, not just smart, but the examples used by Penrod tend to simply revolve around doing well in school, like one quote he cites from yet another online message board. "One online venter describes the image well: 'A+ this and… got a 1600 on my SAT and got all AP class[es] next year woohoo. That's all these people care about don't they have lives damn nerds (Dan6erous)'" (Penrod 2003: 2).
Is doing well on one's SATs an automatic qualification for nerddom, and proof that someone is intellectual? Penrod seems to suggest this is the case, although scoring a perfect 1600 or 2400 on the SATs might just as easily be the product of
parents who can pay for expensive prep school courses, and someone who does well on the SATs can still be quite accomplished in other facets of his or her life without being…
