Good times at lunch with honkies

I had some lunchtime fun yesterday that I'd like to share. I work in the computer industry, and right now I am contracted out with several engineers on a major project. I went to lunch with a few of them on Monday, and we started talking about the closure of the Mall of Memphis.

For a long time, the Mall of Memphis was the biggest mall we had, a large, well-Gapped mecca of typically shitty consumer goods. It started to decline for several reasons discussed in the link above, but basically, the number of crimes committed at the mall began to rise, including violent ones, and the local "news" "media" shit their pants in a mad dash to label it the "Mall of Murder." If that wasn't enough to keep Banana Republic-lovers away, the final coffin nail was driven in by its location in an increasingly African-American, semi-poor area of the city that was suffering from the exodus of many higher-income residents to the suburbs. Yeah, that's right, motherfucking white flight smoked that mall like a turkey.

Anyway, I said as much, at a table of four other white guys, one Hispanic guy, and one black guy. And, let me tell you, I couldn't have brought the conversation to a halt faster if I had pissed in the gumbo. One of the white guys, about my age and more or less in line with my thinking, assented with a nod in a pretty chilled-out way, as did the black guy, who understands a thing or two about white flight, I'm sure, from living in the national capital of scared honkies -- grand ole Memphis, Tennessee. I think the Hispanic guy probably couldn't give a fuck, except to laugh at the awkwardness, but one dude was like "oh wow...I can't believe you said that," and another sat silently in what I suspect was a stew of invigorated racism. The guy who commented is a nice guy, and I think he'd more or less agree with my politics as well, but what seemed to freak him out was just my having the balls to bring up something nobody wants to talk about, especially in Memphis. I mean, public works has near road-widening parties here so white people can faster escape their crippling, irrational fears of, like, jheri curl death squads, or some other figment of their Fox News-addled imaginations. All this while whole sections of the city have potholes you could drown a toddler in, not to mention crumbling buildings, schools, and other decaying remnants of an infrastructure serving people nobody gives a shit about. Fuck it, I'm not keeping the scary talk to myself while that's going on.

Still, good times, even outside of my sociopolitical-whatever soapbox. Go to lunch with a group of assorted white people, maybe some cheese-sandwich-eating goober from middle management, or, say, the weird lady in accounts payable with the toxic waste perm and find a way to bring up white flight in the conversation. Watch them scatter like ants unless they have the slightest clue of what's up in America today. Wheee!!!

I've got your "collection of prejudices acquired by age 18" right here

I remember being told that I didn't have much "common sense" when I was younger. Now, sure, I was smart and all, but I didn't have "common sense." I didn't really understand what that meant, but I heard it plenty of times from my family, and I had no idea what an empty, damaging insult it was until I was older. Looking back, I understand my confusion about what exactly "common sense" is, because the truth is, nobody knows what the fuck it is.

"Common sense" is bullshit. Total stinking bullshit. Ask ten people to define "common sense" and they will give you ten different answers. Seriously, do it, since that's a pretty interesting way to see my point. What happens is that the group starts out giving different answers, and then maybe they start to groupthink it, and they all feel good about agreeing, because who wants to be some dumbass without the "common sense" to know what "common sense" is? It's something people proudly claim, but would never admit they lacked. It's earned a Bill-Gates-style fortune in lip service, and exists only to prop up fucking idiots who talk about it at the expense of those whom they consider lacking.

See, we've probably all heard someone described as having no "common sense." But how often is a person described as having it in spades? The "term" is nearly always pejorative. Google "he has no common sense" and you get 2,590 results, Google "he has common sense" and you get 697 results. The point of describing someone's "common sense" is to insult them, and, specifically toward men, to suggest they are pussies. See, real men have "common sense." They don't worry about books, or school, or some such shit, 'cause they are happy just to be married and work hard and drink beer and change their own oil and kill some fuckin' animal once in a while, by God. I ain't no fag, I got "common sense." Fuck that. I have no use for "common sense," I don't say it, I don't think it, and it's way too wrapped up in all the American bullshit myths about being a "man."

Now, admittedly, all that steam I blew off above is about my experience with the Southern usage as applied to me and other men who have fucking brains. Outside of the redneck's meaning, I know people also use it when they really mean "stupid," but God knows I have heard plenty of stupid people swear they had "common sense" so fuck that too. I've heard all the shit about "common sense" consisting of the things a person needs to know to live successfully, and that's the sense of the word I see in the media, on the Internet, in books, etc. Like, my dad, who really isn't a macho kind of guy, would swear he has plenty of "common sense," but he has my mom dial the goddamn phone for him. What the fuck is that? People definitely have different strengths and weaknesses, and science has been trying to measure all kinds of aptitudes for centuries, but no way can some dumbass judge what I can and can't do on the basis of "common sense." Making those judgments is nothing but a way to masturbate off some pathetically low self-esteem, and when I hear it, I know right away that somebody's trying to offload some baggage, so go blow that load somewhere else, thanks. Still, the worst thing is sticking that label on kids, because it either makes them feel stupid or like something crucial is missing. I've seen the "you're a pussy" usage of "common sense" emasculate the hell out of guys from boyhood on, but that kind of bleeds over into a whole other discussion of macho bullshit, so, maybe another time.

In fact, "common sense" isn't the only bullshit word I see and hear constantly, but that's really for another time too. I'm not talking about plain bad English, although that sucks too, and I'm not talking about "political correctness," since that's a pretty stinking bullshit word itself. What I'm talking about are words that mean absolutely nothing. Words that don't convey meaning so much as advance intention. Words that don't communicate, words that confuse. Worst of all, words that are used as an imperceptible way of separating people. And "common sense" definitely does that.

Anyway, check out the quote. He had plenty of sense, but it sure wasn't common.