From: "Simon Wistow" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> > Look at this way. Think about the average person. Well, the bell curve > dictates that 50% of people are more stupid than that. That's > depressing. But pandering to the left hand side isn't going to help > things. It's just going to keep shifting the curve left rather than > right. Which is bad.
And perhaps not too surprisingly the intelligence of the average person has been declining. Perhaps in part to the fact that kids are more likely to be taught by the images of Ronald McDonald and the like on TV than having their parents taking the time and effort to provide a basic grasp of the real world. One of the reasons why McDonalds advertise to kids (even though they say they don't, despite the McLibel case) is that they have a large unknowing audience who can be subverted to their way of thinking. We all laugh at the idiocy of people in email stories, but is it really funny that these stories are gaining momentum, or the fact that AOL users are treated with such derision on message boards or Matt Wright Scripts are lapped up by so many novices. We are lucky in that everyone on this list has above average intelligence, and can hopefully make considered appraisal of what is good and bad. There are many others who can't and just accept what's fed to them by the mass media. IMHO pandering to the lowest common denominator is not a good thing. Barbie.
