Stupid Human Tricks
Sometimes it seems like the human race is just getting dumber and dumber.
Making English the official language. STILL???? Aren’t these retarded meaningless non-issues ever going to fade away? Nashville city councilman Eric Crafton is trying to get an English-only initiative on the city ballot. Nashville voters have already rejected an English-only measure. But hey, if you keep doing the same thing over and over, maybe you’ll get a different result someday.
Think of all the serious problems we’re facing, and some douchebag thinks our gravest threat is that swarthy foreigners are walking around talkin’ all funny like.
This five-minute video gives a brief glimpse into the mind-boggling technological and demographic changes that will be happening globally over the next few years. “Future Shock” doesn’t even begin to describe it. And yet some buttwipe is having a tantrum because English isn’t the official — er, I mean “offical” — language.
Sometimes a person is so dense and so small-minded, you just wish you could stand in front of him and wave your hand slowly in front of his face — like you do when someone is daydreaming — and yell “Snap out of it! HELLLOOO!!!”
And more Stupid Human Tricks: Remember that Seinfeld episode where Jerry and Elaine were calling an ambulance? While Jerry was dialing the phone, Elaine says “tell them to hurry.” Jerry looks at her with that look of exasperation and forced patience — like you’re talking to a very slow 3rd grader — and says “it’s an ambulance!”
Well, sometimes those slow 3rd graders grow up to become police officers. Oklahoma state trooper Daniel Martin forced an ambulance driver to pull over after the ambulance driver failed to yield right of way to the officer. “It’s an ambulance! With a patient inside!!”
DUUUHHH!!!
Does the Oklahoma State Police Department have any sort of IQ test for job applicants?
Labels: English offical language, Future Shock, Nashville city councilman Eric Crafton English only, Oklahoma state trooper Daniel Martin ambulance driver, stupid human tricks
posted by Tom Harper @ 4:06 PM
13 Comments:
State trooper and politician: two jobs you don't have to pass an IQ test to get. The problem is we have become an Idiocracy, a country where stupid people breed at a higher rate than intelligent people, leaving nothing but a bunch of morons to fill positions that require a certain amount of reason and intellect.
Lew: Unfortunately, that's a good prognosis.
You forgot the dumbing down of education but that's best left for another post.
I understand the ambulance didn't have his lights and siren on. Nothing like two dummys on the road.
Despite their threats the reason the Xenophobes have never made English a national language is the courts have warned them.
A If it isn't unconstitutional
B.Every citizen that hadn't learned English will have to be trained and that will break the bank
Erik
Re: that English-only idiot. He should be sent to live in New York City for a year. While there, he should be obliged to get around town and over the bridge to Brooklyn. While he's getting around, he should by all means militate to make English the official language. But only after providing the name, address and phone numbers of his next of kin. ;)
Re: the trooper and ambulance. Ambulances often transport non-emergency patients. When doing that, they are not supposed to run emergency lights and use a siren.
In most states, an ambulance running without lights and siren is obliged to obey all traffic rules, just like any other vehicle. With an emergency patient on board, with lights on and the siren in use, an ambulance driver can push traffic rules. For example, slowing down for an intersection against a red light, then pushing through as the driver sees other drivers who have the green light understand the situation and are yielding.
Also, in most states and localities, law officers not on a call on in pursuit, on seeing an ambulance with lights on and using the siren, will customarily get in front of the ambulance and help it get through intersections until it reaches the hospital.
If the Oklahoma ambulance had no lights on and wasn't using the siren, even with a patient on board, the driver should've yielded to the cop, or to any other driver who had the right of way. The trooper was in the right, even though at first glance it seems otherwise.
That official language shit is one of my favorite topics. I like it so much, I even posted about it on my language blog.
The dumbassery is stunning!
So, Tom, when are you getting around to making English the official language of this blog? If you want to use the internets, use our language. Yeah, I'm talking to you, ogres.
I'm originally from TN and familiar with Nashville. Its actually a heavily Democratic, liberal leaning city. Thus it seems almost mind blowing and ridiculous that someone from the city council would even consider this. Nashville has the largest Kurdish population in the US, along with a fairly large Iraqi, Vietnamese, Arabian, and Cambodian population along with a growing Hispanic population. Thus its totally counter intuitive to their growth and future success to strike up such backwards legislation the prohibits people from other places to live as they please and talk in their own languages.
I think you're going to see a lot of things like this as time goes on because the New South is the fastest growing region- both in terms of population and economic growth- in the US, and that means a dramatic shift in demographics and politics. North Carolina's shift in voting characteristics is proof in of itself.
Might as well get used to it. Change is a GOOD thing.
Demeur: No doubt our pitiful "education" system is behind a lot of shit like this.
Erik: I think "English only" serves the purpose of being a hot button issue that they can keep trotting out again and again. Just like a flag burning amendment, banning abortion -- if these laws were actually passed, rightwing demagogues wouldn't have a burning issue to keep whipping up the masses.
SW: Good idea for those English-only advocates.
Technically, that cop was within the law to pull over the ambulance driver since the ambulance didn't have its siren and flashing lights on. But as soon as he was told there was an emergency patient inside the ambulance, he was dead wrong -- morally if not legally -- to keep detaining the driver and arguing with the paramedic. The paramedic's reasoning was that the patient was having heart problems and would be further stressed by the sound of the siren. Also, the cop claimed he was responding to an emergency call, and yet he suddenly had twenty minutes to stand by the side of the road and hassle an ambulance driver and paramedic. I think he needs to find another line of work.
Carlos: Yup, dumbassery at its finest. I'll check out your language blog.
Randal: Jamais, en un million d'années.
Bob: I didn't know that about Nashville. I've been through Tennessee a few times but never to Nashville. I had no idea it was so diverse. Another stereotype goes up in smoke :)
I think this whole Far Right cult and all of their wacky "causes" will be sunk by changing demographics. Older white males are becoming a smaller percentage of the population. Other ethnic groups are increasing in population; and younger people, regardless of their political views, are less likely to have that narrow xenophobic mentality.
The South is interesting. After having lived in Both the Northeast and now California, the perception is that the whole region is conservative.
The reality is that the breakdown in liberal and conservative areas are similar to the way it is in Cali: Rural areas tend to be more conservative. Metro areas more liberal. If you go to any city in TN, the cities tend to be pretty much liberal leaning. The difference between Southern states and others with larger more established metros is that most people in places like TN live in the sticks and the minority lives in the cities versus most living in cities as they do in states like CA.
But I've been observing a change. I recently visited Raleigh Durham, NC. I'd say its progressed from being a sleepy Southern town to a larger metro area. The fact that every other person I met was from somewhere other than NC tells you how much its political leaning has changed. The same is true when I visit my folks.
I supposed I'm biased since I'm from there, but by national standards the Southeast offers a fairly high standard of living via affordability, newer infrastructure, and growth in economics. I'd say that in a few years my Wife and I are going to get out of CA and relocate to one of its cities for these very reasons. While I'm not basing these decisions on political preferences, I'd say that by the time we wind up there, the political atmosphere will have changed drastically.
And Nashville- its actually a pretty small city. But well worth the visit. We had a blast last time.
This is a stab in the dark to find some new bogeyman that they can win on, and down in Dixie it's sure to work.
The Rushpublican Party is finished as a national force. It may be that even they understand it now.
Bob: I think that's true, that big cities are liberal no matter what region of the country they're in. Right after the 2004 election, I read that in every American city with 500,000 or more people, the voters voted for Kerry.
I know that ethnic diversity is spreading all over the country. The town of Forks, WA (made famous by the Twilight books and movies) is miles from anywhere, and they only have about 4,000 people; and yet they have a fairly large Guatemalan population.
I've driven past Nashville on Rt. 40 -- our vacation time was running out and we had to blitz back to California. I'll have to check out Nashville the next time I'm back in that area.
JR: I certainly hope that the Rushpublicans are finished, and that all these phony hot-button issues are just the party's death throes.
Bob, interesting input on how cosmopolitan Nashville has become. I had no idea. Thanks for the insight.
Tom, you're right about the trooper being wrong to take time out from a call the way he did and to keep the ambulance tied up for a lengthy period. If anything, he should've helped the ambulance get to the hospital. Then, once the patient was in the ER, he could've continued his hassling of the driver, if he felt he just had to do that. Clearly, that trooper exhibited lousy judgment.
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