Just who are the dumb ones?

For most of my life the dominant cultural narrative was that, with the exception of William F. Buckley, Jr., conservatives are stupid and liberals are smart.  But then it was also the narrative that conservatives were intolerant and liberals were open-minded, conservatives were judgmental and liberals were accepting, and conservatives were violent and liberals were peaceful. So there you go. 

Nonetheless, I've often wondered about that narrative given the head-up-a-donkey's-butt lunacy you sometimes hear coming from people to the left of center. Take for instance this gem from some time back.  Note how easy it was for reader Nate Winchester to own the stupid criticism that the Bible isn't like books we write today. 

In keeping with that trend, I saw this headline:

Candace Owens mocks Harry Styles for wearing a dress.  Did she forget about Jesus? 

It's from over a year ago, and it's an attack piece on every leftists' favorite black woman to hate, Candace Owens.  Like all things liberal, we hear that it's racist to assume blacks have been duped by liberals and Democrats because that suggests blacks are stupid.  But then the same liberals assume any black conservative or non-liberal black commentator has been duped by white racists because the golden rule of the left continues to be 'how dare you do unto us the way we do unto you.'

But just look at that headline.  It was brought to my attention because of the sheer dumb.  I looked and thought it must be a hook.  You know, a headline meant to appear one way that, once you read the article, doesn't really represent the meat of the content.  

But no.  He's actually arguing that Jesus wore so-called dresses because apparently anything dropping lower than waist level in any culture in history was a dress in the way we understand dresses today.  Wearing a toga or wearing a thawb or wearing a kilt is wearing a dress because all fashion in all of history in all of the world is measured according to today's standards (one of the byproducts of the left's obsession with presentism nowadays).  They were dresses because apparently Liz Plank believes men in Saudi Arabia wear dresses?  Because fashion in 500 BC Greece must mean the same thing it means on a fashion model runway in Manhattan in 2021?  That's good scholarship and top notch journalism. 

In kindergarten, we understood and were taught that people in different ages and cultures did things differently than we do.  In fact, in a bizarre twist, we were taught it was wrong when Europeans insisted indigenous people stop dressing their way and dress the way Europeans dressed. How does that square with this piece? 

This is the side that insists it's the smart one.  And for some reason, conservatives often act as if that's a premise that must be overcome.  Part of why this gets a pass within progressive circles is because not caring about anything is a dominant trait for the modern leftwing era.  Really.  They just don't care.  Appeal to this argument, appeal to that fact, appeal to the other reality, and they just laugh and call you names.  Like Moe from the cartoon strip Calvin and Hobbes.  A grunt and a 'yeah, so what?' will do.  Whatever to win the latest argument or advance the agenda is true for the moment. 

But don't ever think they own the intellectual high ground.  And don't be fooled by the press's tendency to ferret out examples of someone who might be a conservative who says something dumb as proof conservatives are dumb.  If they do, never forget this gem at the always reliable MSNBC.  After all, this is hardly a one time goof on the part of those to the left of center, and those who refuse to take a knee before the juggernaut should remember that.