If you're one of the people conceding that A. Sullivan is garbage but convincing because of his intellect, I just want you to know that you don't have to concede that shit at all, so don't

First of all, "intelligence" is a construct serving bigotry and nothing else. There is no objective way to measure it, because it's honestly just not a thing, at all

The thing that people refer to as intelligence isn't actually that hard to tease out from observation: it's how closely you hew to a majoritarian communicational standard that shifts over time

People get this idea that because one can communicate "properly," suddenly their terrible and wrong ideas are somehow valid or debatable, which, again, just isn't true at all

It's easy to quickly prove this: AAVE, for example, is looked down upon as "uneducated" and "anti-intellectual," in the sense that it supposedly locks kids and conversations into some sort of non-intellectual space, permanently

One of the ways you know that this isn't true is that there are fundamental grammatical differences in AAVE that don't really have analogs in "intellectual" discourse. Those differences aren't "quirky," they impact understanding

So theoretically (often proven in practice as well) much of these grammatical differences therefore unlock differences in perception that can add to discussions around all kinds of foundational concepts, because the mainstream version ignores what it has ill-defined

Another way to put it: groundbreaking research isn't any less groundbreaking if it's done by scientists who speak a different language than you do. There's a difference between the ideas and the form containing the ideas (grammar, vocabulary, language writ large)

So back to folks who take bigots seriously because of "intellect." The ability to cloak inherently contradictory and baseless claims within the most mainstream of communicational constructs isn't being "smart," it's just demonstrating passing talent as a mimic

Confusing that, the ability to blend in in order to make irrational ideas appear rational, with "intellect," is like thinking that a parrot who has been trained to recite Newton's third law is just as capable as Newton of coming up with his fourth law. That's just silly

There is a massive difference between the ability to formally communicate ideas to a majoritarian standard and the validity of those ideas. Those things, in fact, never necessarily have to cross, and often don't

Yes, I get the fact that sometimes we have to engage people with bad ideas because they hold sway over the conversation. I'm sympathetic to that, and that's not at all what I'm talking about here

This very specific point has everything to do with the fact that you do NOT have to legitimate anyone just because they know which order the words go in so as to best and most appropriately please the masters

People like Sullivan, and JK Rowling, while we're at it, would not be "smart" even if that concept wasn't total bullshit; they're just painfully ordinary bigots who happen to have read a lot of books written by white men, and learned the form

That's not something you ever, EVER have to give anyone credit for, much less people for whom the project is writing marginalized populations out of existence. Don't give them any ground.

If you find my analysis useful, please check my pinned tweet and give whatever you're comfortably able to!