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     ## ##  ###    I S S U E   # 0 8 8        0 6 - 3 0 - 0 0   ###  ####   
    ###  # ###                                                   #######    
    ####  ###                  "Jason on IPS"                      ###       
     #######                      by Jason                                  
      ####                                                                  

        You know what bugs me, or more accurately, do you know what bugs me
 today?  It's the Ideological Pretentiousness Syndrome (IPS) that infests
 some peoples' intellects.  This peculiar disease is characterized by this
 person's uncanny ability to easily others with the constant haughty
 expounding their pet cause.  Most often people of college age are stricken
 with IPS, since they have just enough education to be dangerous, kind of
 like a drunken chimp with a loaded shotgun.  Fortunately, they usually grow
 out of it once they get real jobs and realize that they don't know shit.
 Sometimes, though, they don't.  That's when they're REALLY irritating.

        "Wait a minute," shouts the hippie chick wearing a "I'm a love child
 of Karl Marx" T-shirt, "you're the most ideologically pretentious person we
 know, always telling us what to think!"

        I kindly tell her to sit down and toke up, which she does.  You just
 have to know how to deal with these people.

        Anyway, the difference between me and someone with IPS is that I'll
 never hold a position that I cannot prove either through direct evidence or
 through impeccable logic.  I'm also willing to hear new evidence, and when
 faced with contradictory facts, I'll readily switch sides or officially move
 to "neutral".  People with IPS don't do that, since they've defined
 themselves by the adherence to their cause of choice.

        Also, I don't make a point of identifying my politics or beliefs to
 just anybody, nor do I get a superiority charge from them.  That's right,
 people with IPS typically look down smugly at those heathen masses who
 haven't jumped on their boat, and as such, are either not interested in
 converts at all or desire only drones as mindless as they.  After all, if
 everyone agreed with them, who would they have to look down on?

        An excellent example is some guy I had this displeasure of
 communicating with over the Internet recently.  This knucklehead said in his
 profile that he has "no great love for the American monoculture" and has
 since moved to Japan.  The ol' "everything that's American sucks and
 everything that's not is cool" mentality is nothing more than a cheap way to
 feel superior to everybody else.  American monoculture indeed!  We're a lot
 more polycultural than, say JAPAN.  What does an Arizona cattle rancher have
 in common with a Maine lobster fisher?  What does an inner-city Miami Cuban
 refugee have in common with a Virginian old-money debutante?  That idiot has
 obviously never stepped outside his hometown.

        For my own part, I find the tendency for some people to cling to
 irrational and sometimes insane beliefs rather then use their friggin'
 BRAINS annoying.  They certainly don't have to agree with me, but they
 should be able to back it up with common sense and evidence!  After all,
 there are certainly a lot of gray areas where there is not for-sure correct
 answers, and a lot of things are value calls.  That's all cool, but they
 have to actually make use of that mushy gray thing in your head.  It's not
 just there for ballast, you know.

        Of course, if you're a fan of Marx, then you're automatically an
 imbecile.  Just so you know.

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 # (c)2000 aNAda e'zine                              aNAda088 .*.  by Jason #
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