for 29 April 1998. Updated every WEEKDAY.

Fish On Fish

Subject: Stupid Hate Mail Day

You've had this "Stupid Hate
Mail Day" posted for several
days now. You're leaving it
up, perhaps, so as to impress
us with the effortless
demolition of your detractors
as affected by Polly and Co.?
Better for your rap that you
humiliate a more intelligent
opposition than this lot,
whose very presence on the
Web refutes my utopia-crazed
computer ethics prof.'s
optimism concerning the
social benefits of
wide-spread literacy.

Michael Fox
<foxi@qi3.com>

We should send you a
print out of a sample week's
worth of mail for your
professor. His ideas of
utopia should be immediately
dashed, if not by the idiocy
of the average response, then
by the idiocy of the average
Suck reaction to the average
response.

But then again, the Web Site's
name is a real idiot magnet.

Which is nice, actually, if
only to boost our pathetic
little flaccid egos.

Revisiting That Snobbish
High,
Elitist Pigs

Dumb Mail on Dumbstruck

I meant to write something
about the fact that the apex
of snobbism is to snob the
snobs. Then I read the mail
you received and got even
more convinced that (at least
some of) the snobs you snob
are not that wrong.

With many thanks for granting
me again my daily dose of
Suck.

Guido

Snob the snobs? Do you mean
"snub" the snobs?

Fishing for Fish,
Snubbed Snobs

Perceptive essay! Much better
than a recent George Will
column which rambled
aimlessly and mentioned
professors who don't wear
ties, students who feel
entitled to have greater say
of their education dollars,
and racial quotas in
colleges. (George Will is
becoming more like Archimedes
Plutonium!)

Dumbmongering *is* an empty
pastime. An intellectual or
academic who sneers at the
ignorant often forgets that
while his or her knowledge
might be deep, it is
certainly narrow. Y'know, in
this crazy info-age of ours,
WHAT you know is diddly
compared to whether or not
you can *learn* anything. And
there are some people you
just can't tell anything. As
in Good Will Hunting, the
pivot isn't what esoteric
knowledge (say, graph theory)
one might know, it is whether
or not one's thick skull is
open to learning something
new.

That we, the plain people of
America, are "dumb" merely
implies that we've filled our
heads with information we
find useful in our own lives
as opposed to the axioms that
others would have us parrot
viz Bill Bennett.

If the information we value
is the practical rather than
ponderous, the trivial rather
than the transcendent, one
shouldn't ascribe this to a
lack of knowledge, but
rather, a lack of
imagination.

Oh come now. Imagination is
way overrated. Do we want
more Basquiats or more Alex
Trebeks?

We're not sure. Maybe ditch
both and order more Jerry
Springers and Bob Sagets?

Ponderously Parrotting
Axioms, Sucksters

I loved this! I've had the
idea for a long time that
North America is "dumbing
down"!

Your article simply confirmed
what I'd been thinking ever
since my daughter entered
Kindergarten. You know
there's a problem when our
kids' teachers have
difficulty spelling the word
"pumpkin" but no one seems to
feel it's a problem - after
all, the child is only in
Kindergarten (maybe so, but I
thought the TEACHER had gone
beyond that!).

"Dumbing Down" our educators
while protecting them with
unions and tenure is the
reason illiteracy is becoming
acceptable.

The United States and my home
country of Canada can share
in this embarrassment. We
have no right to complain
about our college grads being
unable to read or spell when
we turn their education over
to teachers who are unable to
do either of these things!

Keep those articles coming!
I've tried getting this issue
through to our local and
provincial powers-that-be,
and was threatened with legal
action if I persisted. It
would appear that you are as
"impressed" as I am with the
lowering of our standards.

I hope I didn't misunderstand
your views. If I did, oops.
If not, good show!

Kelly Sholinder
<kellyb@wkpowerlink.com>

Right on, Kelly! Our college
graduates can't read or spell
because they're taught by
teachers who were once
college graduates who
couldn't read or spell! Or
something! It's time our
college graduates learned the
basics, at least!

P.S. Where exactly is this
"Canada" you speak of?

More Rewarding Hobbies for
You

Subject: George Michael

George Michael is a Cancer?
Damn I'd better get right on
it. This looks like a job for
Celebrity Astrology. Problem
is, I'm still finishing up
Tammy Wynette's astro-profile
and Obituary. Something
happens to these celebrities
every day! I can't keep up.

Donna Marsh
<scrotch@total.net>

Well you know what they say:
If you can't keep up, give
up.

See also: Creating Celebrity
Astro-Profiles: One of the
More Useless Pasttimes Known
to Humankind.

Sucksters, I sent for an XL
Suck T-shirt a year ago but
it never showed. Should I
kill my mailman?

Ciao,
Alan

Yes. And kill your
"Ciao" while you're at it.

More Grandstanding
Foreigners

Hi: I'm 33 years old and be
an international student in
Los Angeles since 1996.
Studding now for my third
semester in Los Angeles City
College in cinema department,
I would like to be a
filmmaker,
(directing/producing.)

Being from Geneva,
Switzerland, I came back
every year in my native town
to work and make some money.
But unfortunately, last
summer 97 was very bad for my
temporary job, limo-driver
(chauffeur,) because a rich
client from the Gulf country
did not choose right to come
as usual in Geneva. So, now
I'm having several problems
to be at school and make some
decent money as a security
officer in Los Angeles.

As I'm expecting to stay at
least 2 or 3 semester to
finish my degree, I would
like to find a support to
help a decent living. I wish
you could do something about
my very bad situation (have
$800 left on my bank account)
or would it be possible you
to give me some advice on how
I could find a grand.

Thank you very much for you
time.

Sincerely,
<Name Withheld
To Protect The Poor>

Indeed, it can be very hard
to find a grand. It sounds
like you're going to need
more than one grand, too,
given your financial
situation. We've been
searching for, oh, about 200
grand, lately, and as you can
imagine, it's been quite a
challenge.

The best we can do is give
you some good old capitalist
advice - that business plan
of yours sounds pretty
flawed. Your entire profit
margin depended on the
existence of one client from
the Gulf country visiting
Geneva? We'd suggest a
wider-range marketing blitz
and some alternative income
strategies. You're in L. A. and
you want to be a
director/producer? Why not
start out as a PA? They can
make one, two grand a month,
sometimes under the table,
all by sucking up to American
assholes, which, based on
your letter, is quite easy
for you to do.

Good luck with your very bad
situation!