Why is "being a bit thick" seen as somehow "cool"?

[hunkermunker]

Why isn't knowing stuff cool when you're young? Does it get more "cool" as you get older?

(I'm aware that cool is slightly cringy, btw - but can't be arsed to think of a better way to put it...)

It depends on the age of the children, I think batters. My eldest dd (bright and proud of it all through primary school)has just started in secondary and it was only the third day when the issue of 'looking like a swot' came up.

Nothing, it seems, could be worse.

FIL asks nephew what he wants to be when grown up. Professional sportsman. "That's great. I'm sure you'll do it." Asks my dd same question. Barrister. "You have to realise lots of girls just don't have it in them to work hard for things like that. What about your husband?" (She's 12). You can see why I keep of the wine at family events - brings out the sarcastic in me.

HumphreyCushion, the kids you describe seem to be suffering from a particular kind of mollycoddling rather than a lack of common sense. It sounds rough on them, though I doubt they realise that yet.

I always used to get hassled for having no common sense (of, course, this went hand-in-hand with being a 'swot') despite the fact that (at 15) I had an evening job as a waitress/chambermaid, and did about half the housework in our house, plus all my own laundry and ironing, plus was alone in charge of my younger brother whilst my dad worked nightshift.

PS those two bits of my post not related.

swedishmum, your fil sounds like a twat. sorry.

Isn't it funny that it's acceptable (from a childs point of view) to be good at sports and thick but NOT acceptable to be crap at sports and clever?

IME, it's pretty cool to be very clever if you're a middle class boy who wears the right clothes and listens to the right music. It's also cool to be of reasonable intelligence, as long as you wear the right clothes and listen to the right music. What's NOT cool is to pretend to be cleverer than you are. Or to wear the wrong clothes and listen to the wrong music, however clever you are.

This only holds true for middle class boys living in middle class areas.

It's harder for working class children I think.

And girls have an extraordinarily complex set of social rules, and can seemingly go from Queen Bee too outcast in a couple of days.

yes, it's shallow (aren't all kids???!) but it's true. Remember a boy from my high school. Awful name (Hamish) but really good looking and cool clothes and was into obscure bands. Clever too, but that was 'forgiven'!!!!

it ain't never cool to be clever if you're working class.
ime.
the "clever people have no common sense/emotional intelligence" line makes me wild with rage btw. I have seen no evidence of this whatsoever. Empathy and common sense are equally spread across the intelligence spectrum ime.
People who are gifted musically, however, are uniformly sociopathic

So true HC.

(Actually writing out my last (ish) post has helped me understand why I find housework so loathsome and uninteresting.)

it's annoying isn't it?
I am the "clever" one in my family (i.e. like reading books and passed a few exams along the way), so therefore (clearly) laughably incapable of anything practical.
although I seem, oddly, to have managed to hold down some pretty grown up jobs, set up a couple of companies, and look after two children by myself all day everyday without dropping them down a drain or leaving them on a bus or anything.
sheer luck, presuably.

well I was just speaking from my own personal experience. don't think that is a generalisation, more an observation really.
and anyway, noone with a utility room can in all seriousness call themselves working class, surely

My grandmother thinks I am free of common sense because I wring a cloth out the wrong way. I am not kidding.

If you're up against that mindset, there's not a lot to be done, really.

actually my mum always says that
"HC is so uncoordinated, it's a wonder she can drive"
normally when I have just driven her back from the shops

oh and she always says : remember when you cut yourself peeling that carrot! you're such a dolt! this was in 1982

Sorry Fio. I taught in a very polarised school, with half the kids coming from a very run down estate and the other half coming from a well-heeled suburb that was traditionally quite liberal. There were few shades of grey. I did find there was a significant difference in the way bright children were viewed by others, and more crucially, viewed themselves.

My mum is so stuck in the 'Orlando and her dh are lazy, useless perpetual students' that she still rings us up at 10 in the morning and says 'Oh, are you up? I thought you might still be asleep.'

We have 3 children and haven't slept in beyond 7am for the past 11 years

(I think that might be slightly off the point but I felt compelled to write it for my own mental wellbeing. Thank you for listening.)

That's ok orlando.

Anyway, to go back to the point, I still think we should blame Sophie Anderton.

It doesn't matter why. You know you want to.

My mil always says " well of course... meowmix is..[lowers voice, raises bosom] university educated..." as if it were a particularly nasty social condition. I tend to flamboyantly read The Economist and FT in her presence when she's staying (and normally I can't get past the first section of The Economist in the usual way of things)

I agree Pruni. He once started on some poor bloke in a pub who swore - there were ladies present! Don't fit in with inlaws too well. Can't think why....