December 7th, 2007

So I've had to reassess everything. Lots of people have said that people join Mensa because they want to tell the world how much greater than (most) everyone else they are. Of course, that is the charge being made by non-Mensans. And I figured that there are a lot of people who feel intimidated by so-called smart people, too, and that intimidation manifested itself as a free-floating mild overtone of hostility at people who wanted to join the organization.

Is that why I joined Mensa? I mean, they asked me about it at the time I wrote the test and I replied that I didn't know why I was trying to join Mensa. So what is the reason I did? I still believe that, as I said the other day, I wanted to prove to myself that I was as smart as I sometimes thought I was, and beat back the fears that I sometimes had in dark moments that I was really kind of stupid.

Well, almost universally, I've received static from people who've learned that I became a member of Mensa. They don't say it, but they act as though I am wanking about it. I've had people go all weird and pseudo-analytical on me (painful to watch when they do it out of some sense that it's the only way I can understand them; when it's not the real thing it just feels odd and forced) and I've had people tell me--repeatedly, in some cases--that they are smart enough to join Mensa, but they choose not to because they are better than all that.

Fine.

So my first reaction to all this is to say, "Being identified as smart is sure massaging other peoples' sore spots! I guess people really are intimidated by smart people."

Q.E.D.
Q.E.D.

But there's more to it than that. I think I have to consider it from a different point of view.

It kind of reminds me of how, when I was a teenager, I figured out (from friends and a book) how to solve the Rubik's Cube. Many of the people I solved it in front of used to say, "Oh, I solved it once. By accident."

But, in any case, there's maybe more to it than that. No, there is definitely more to it than that. I think that I personally have gotten carried away with the significance of it. The static and quarrelsomeness I've been feeling from others is very telling: You don't get that feeling of friction and internal burn if you aren't at least partially responsible for strangeness yourself. So, with that pretty iron-clad assertion in place, I can see that I need to tidy my own house before I'm going to feel better about this.

I must think further ...

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