Original subtitles

The Theory of Stupidity Dietrich Bonhoeffer was a young German theologian

and pastor who lived during the Nazi period and was considered a leading figure in the

resistance to the Nazis. Bonhoeffer was imprisoned in 1943 and executed in 1945, a few weeks

before the fall of Berlin, on charges of having participated in a plot against Hitler.

During his imprisonment Bonhoeffer wrote a collection of letters in which he reflected

on the fact that his country of poets and thinkers had turned into a collective of cowards

and criminals, and came to the conclusion that the root of the problem was not the wickedness

of people, but their stupidity. As usual, you can find the sources used for

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According to Bonhoeffer stupidity is an enemy of good much more dangerous than wickedness

because while one can protest against evil, can unmask it and can fight it with force

if necessary, because evil always contains the seeds of its own destruction, there is

no defense against stupidity and madness. Neither protests nor force are of any use

against stupidity, since it is never available to reason.

If irrefutable facts contradict a fool's personal prejudices, he will consider them merely accidental

and will ignore and set them aside, regarding them as exceptions.

Thus, the fool, compared with the scoundrel, will inevitably be satisfied and self-satisfied

with himself. The fool, according to Bonhoeffer, can easily become dangerous, for it does not

take much to make him aggressive. The result is that madness and stupidity require a much

more cautious handling than evil does. We should never try to reason with the fool,

because it is useless and dangerous. If we want to know how to get the better of

stupidity we must try to understand its nature. Stupidity is not essentially an intellectual

defect, but a moral one. There are men with great intellect but fundamentally stupid and

others who are intellectually limited but far from being stupid.

The impression we get from this is that stupidity is acquired rather than congenital; it is

acquired under certain circumstances in which men make fools of themselves or allow others

to make fools of themselves. We further observe that stupidity is less common in asocials

or loners than in individuals or groups who are inclined or condemned to sociability.

From this it would seem that stupidity is a sociological rather than a psychological

problem. According to Bonhoeffer, every violent revolution,

whether political or religious, produces an explosion of stupidity in a large segment

of the population. The power of one needs the stupidity of the

other. And it is not that particular human capacities such as intellect suddenly fail,

but it seems that under the crushing impact of growing power man is deprived of that inner

independence and more or less consciously gives up an autonomous position in which to

evaluate for himself, with his own brain, the new state of things.

The fool may often be stubborn, but this should not lead us to think that he is independent.

In conversations with a stupid individual we often feel that it is almost impossible

to talk to the man in front of us, to talk to him personally. Instead we are confronted

with a series of slogans, buzzwords and the like, which have gained power over him. He

is under a curse, he is blinded, his very humanity is being prostituted and exploited.

Once he has surrendered his will and become a mere tool, there is no limit to the evil

the fool will go to, but all will happen while he will be unable to see that he is doing

evil. And herein lies the danger of a diabolical exploitation of human stupidity, which can

do irreparable damage. According to Bonhoeffer only an act of internal redemption can free

a person from his own stupidity. Until this happens any attempt to educate them would

be futile. If you liked the video I suggest you to have

a look at the video "Why Stupid People Think They are Intelligent - The Dunning Kruger

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