To think my OH is pretending not to know stuff?

[Zaphodsotherhead]

We were outside looking at the night sky and I said 'look, there's the Plough'. To which he replies 'what?' 'You know, constellations?' 'I don't know that that is...'

Looking at something that happened during the civil war. Him 'what's that then?' 'When Oliver Cromwell abolished the monarchy? Roundheads and Cavaliers?' 'Dunno any of that'. 'Didn't you do it at school?' 'I dunno. Probably'.

I no longer know if he does know and doesn't care, or just doesn't know. He seems to have a tiny, tiny field of interest (cars) and anything else it's just a shrug and 'I dunno'. Do you think he might be putting it on to stop me talking?

[ShtoppenDerFloppen]

My DH grew up in a mining town. He was working in the mines at summer by the time he was 16.

He can tell you about almost any type of rock, but some of the science I learned is foreign to him.

It sounds as if OP's DH has chosen to forget what he sees as minutiae in favour of important things.

Does he know how to find his way home, OP?

[Zaphodsotherhead]

Oh yes, shtoppen, his geography is good (because he needed it to be able to drive around to motoring events). He is practical and can mend things too. But books, films, plays, history, science, modern developments...nope. He's a raging Tory, without even really knowing what they stand for, thinks anyone on benefits is a scrounger, anyone overweight is hideous, anyone who watches soaps is a chav...

I've tried. Really I have. But his not-knowing and his attitudes are so entrenched that he doesn't even reason them through, and trying to get him to ('I'm on benefits (I was when he first met me), does that make me a scrounger?' 'Oh no, well, you're different. You're only on them to top up your earnings'. 'So are most people'. 'No, they're scroungers', etc) is practically impossible. I told him he suffered from cognitive dissonance...knew I was wasting my breath as I said it...