SGT Generic Part 1
One experience I’ve found to be nearly universal to all military personnel, ed and also anyone who has ever had a job, is the stupid boss.
There are plenty of people who are not exceptionally bright. In fact by definition, one half of the population is of lower than normal intelligence. Most of the time, this doesn’t make any difference in their everyday life, any more than being able to lift a little less, or running a little bit slower.
But true stupidity goes beyond simply being under average intelligence. To be truly stupid you need to have the magic combination of poor reasoning skills, a deficit of useful information, and an absolutely iron-clad conviction that you are a frigging genius.
We’ve all dealt with it at some point or another. What made this particular case so special is the circumstances.
PSYOP is one of those rare military units that encourages creativity, careful thought, and empathy. Our job was to interact with foreign nationals and try to get them to behave in a way consistent with U.S. policy. Naturally this means we needed to understand the various cultures from around the world that we needed to interact with.
This brings us to SGT Generic. I am calling her that for two reasons. The first is that, as much as I want to tell my funny stories, I don’t see any need to antagonize someone for a mistake they made five or six years ago. The second reason is that I can’t remember what her name was. I worked for SGT Generic for one month, while I was assigned to EOC detail. For anyone familiar with EOC, you know what that particular hell is like. For anyone who never had the pleasure, it’s basically being a combination receptionist, gofer, and lawn care specialist all at the same time and without the prestige.
Me, SGT Generic, and a few other lower enlisted were all tasked to EOC at the same time. Which meant that she was in charge. Which basically meant that she sat on her butt and watched CNN and yelled at us for not doing enough to help her.
Examples of things we did wrong:
“The floor is a mess over here! I shouldn’t have to tell you to vacuum this up! What’s wrong with you?” – Referring to the popcorn she had just spilled.
“If you’re not doing something else, you should be helping me look up the answers to this.” – Referring to the correspondence course she wanted my help cheating on.
“You stink! What the hell is wrong with you?” Talking to a soldier who is drenched in sweat having just mowed the lawn at one in the afternoon, in North Carolina, in the summer.
So basically she’s your typical useless low-level leader.
One of the few perks you get while working on EOC is that you are allowed to watch the news during the day. During a slow period was a story that vaguely touched upon India and some issues involving the Hindu faith. SGT Generic became loudly confused after viewing this.
At first myself, and the other soldiers present just figured that her knowledge of this particular culture was incomplete. No problem, we gave her a brief rundown on the highlights of that particular belief system, purely layman level stuff.
“There’s no way people in India believe that!”
We assure her, that yes, that is what most of the people in India believe.
I just want to take a moment to remind you that the participants in this conversation are part of a military unit specializing in cross-cultural understanding. And that SGT Generic was in charge of several of us.
“Why would they believe in reincarnation? It isn’t in the Bible, anywhere!”
“They don’t follow the Bible. Hindu’s have their own holy books.”
And then she adopted the tone. The one you use when you are trying to explain a very simple concept to a small, and possibly slow child.
“But everyone follows the Bible. Even Jews use the Bible, they just don’t use the whole thing.”
And as one, the various soldiers who worked for this very special lady, allowed our heads to smack onto our desks, and contemplated the fact that she was the one in charge.
Follow
July 31st, 2007 at 7:33 am
Oh, man, this describes so many people I know. I didn’t know this phenomenon was world wide!
Reply
July 31st, 2007 at 11:00 am
You should send this story off to Scott Adams – bet you any money you car eto wager that it’d make the ‘True Tales of Induhvidials’ in his next DNRC Newsletter… :)
Reply
August 1st, 2007 at 1:04 am
You know, I’ve gotten some pretty good reactions from people with the following line: “You KNOW how stupid the average person is. Just think – half the people out there are dumber than that!” One person went pale.
As to believing that everyone follows the bible in one form or another? Not as unusual as you might think. There are some churches where people are taught that, along with the fact that scientists don’t REALLY believe in Evolution, they just say that so they can keep their funding!
Reply
August 1st, 2007 at 6:22 pm
Sounds like a Staff Sergeant I worked for back in 91-92. This idiot believed that we could successfully implement Japan’s business model of Total Quality Management in the Marine Corps! When I explained to him that TQM has a provision allowing for peer and supervisor review, he was the proverbial deer in the headlights… The realization that military chain of command is always top-down completely eluded him.
Reply
August 1st, 2007 at 9:11 pm
you can lead a horse to water
but ya can’t make it think..I mean, drink…. heh
Reply
August 1st, 2007 at 10:39 pm
One of my Air Force friends once told me, completely seriously:
“Catholics aren’t all that bad. They’re almost like Christians.”
So, sadly, I know people out there are like that….
Reply
August 2nd, 2007 at 4:50 pm
Well, it could have been worse…she could have thought that Mexico was part of the U.S. (since New Mexico’s a state). My future mother-in-law’s boss had to have it explained to her as she adamantly stated upon hearing the news about stricter immigration laws, “I just don’t see what the problem is. Why are they calling people from Mexico illegal aliens? They’re U.S. citizens, too!”
I wish people would use the internet to their advantage and look things up before speaking about them with total ignorance and a certain air of self-righteous closed-mindedness.
Reply
August 3rd, 2007 at 6:38 am
The problem with people who are ignorant is that they don;t know they are so horribly wrong about things, and so never bother to verify with a source that they are incorrect.
Not that it matters. Since there’s web sites out there that present “proof” that the moon landings were all staged, it’s likely any position that they might take, no matter how ludicrous, is supported by “fact” on some web site.
Reply
August 3rd, 2007 at 12:06 pm
Agreed, Dean. Particularly since the ‘factual’ website will most likely be run by someone who believes the same screwed up things.
Reply
August 3rd, 2007 at 4:08 pm
I knew a girl in college who basically believed the same thing – that other religions used the Christian Bible. She also thought Washington D.C. was in Washington state, didn’t know which oceans were on which sides of the country, couldn’t use a card catalog, and one time while walking to class after a heavy snowstorm had blanketed the campus asked the rest of us why the college’s physical plant had gone around and only shoveled snow off of the manhole covers in the middle of the streets… these manhole covers were the kind with small holes in them to let steam out, which was exactly what was happening at the moment – large billowing clouds of steam were issuing from them, melting perfect circles in the snow… completely undisturbed, freshly-fallen snow, with no footprints of physical plant workers because… they can hover when they carry their magic snow shovels, I guess…
Her major – elementary education.
Reply
August 3rd, 2007 at 10:52 pm
Stupidity at its finest. And they call them America’s Finest…
Reply
August 7th, 2007 at 10:54 am
I’m currently stationed at Camp Hansen in Okinawa and I have a Corporal thats a pretty close approximation to this woman. These people can’t succeed or function as normal human beings so they find their to the armed forces. There they just have to jump through the right hoops. Never mind that they may be grossly incompetent.
Reply
August 9th, 2007 at 8:23 pm
I am a high school physics teacher. This reminds me of a story related to me by one of my science education professors. A little background is necessary, so please indulge me [I apologize to Skippy for abusing the privilege.]
I was in the process of converting an electrical engineering degree into a high school science teacher’s certification. One of my Science Education professors (who has a PhD in chemistry, and an Education Doctorate in classroom teaching technigues) related the following story of his observation of a tenured literary professor teaching a class in comparative writing in science fiction. The professor was explaining to the class how the science fiction author of the particular story they were covering was interweaving “hard” science into the story as a plot device. The story was of explorers on the moon and the dilemas they had there. The Lit prof used as an example of the science that its was the explorers heavy boots that held them onto the moon because the moon has no gravity. My Ed. Prof was stunned. He said to me and my fellow science teaching candidates that he argued with this professor, but was unable to convince him that the moon does indeed have gravity, the Apollo Moon Missions were sufficient evidence of that, to which the Lit Professor replied, “It was the rockets that got the astronauts to the moon and their heavy boots that held them to the moon’s surface, not gravity. Everyone knows there is no gravity in space, only on the earth.”
My Science Ed. professor used that story to emphasize that there will be some folks, not matter how much to use factual evidence to convince them, will never unlearn something they believe with great conviction.
This story bears that out!
Regards,
Andy Welkley
“Your Phrendlee Hevy Phyzx T-chrr”
Reply
August 12th, 2007 at 3:32 am
Hevy Phyzx: I can beat that. A year after I graduated from high school, they brought in a new general science teacher who taught students that thunder causes lightning as well as men have one less rib than women (due to the Biblical account of creation in Genesis). A good friend of mine two grades lower than I was and still in high school argued valiantly against him to no avail as his explanation of thunder causes lightning was convincing enough that everyone in the class believed him and not my friend.
TlalocW
Reply
August 12th, 2007 at 5:29 am
I have a Master Corporal who does not believe the Holocaust happened and that the Jews are just making it up, even one of the Sgt told her that is happened she still spouted off that we were “brainwashed but the Jews”
Reply
September 27th, 2007 at 9:05 pm
On the subject of incompetant teachers: My 10th grade Health teacher told the class that birth control was unnecessary, because the rhythm method was one hundred percent reliable. He explained that women ovulate on the 14th day of their cycle. Obstain from intercourse for three days before and three days after that date, and the woman cannot get pregnant. I remember believing him, because he was a teacher after all, and wondering why grownups couldn’t control their sexual urges for one week out of the month if they didn’t want kids. I mean, I hadn’t gotten any sex for years despite wanting to. I have often wondered how many teen pregnancies resulted from his educational effort.
For those who are curious, this was a public high school, in 1979, or thereabouts, about 25 miles outside New York City.
Reply
October 31st, 2007 at 1:24 am
to jon: I believe what you’re thinking of is the time little Johnny was asked to use the word ‘horticulture’ in a sentence … his response: “You can lead a horticulture, but you can’t make her think.” Not to cast aspersions on the character or morals of Sgt Generic or any of the other rocket scientists mentioned here, of course.
Reply
November 17th, 2007 at 10:37 pm
Stupid Teachers:
The daughter of a friend of mine had a science project assigned to her. I’m sorry to say I don’t remember the details of the project. Anyway she chose to do it on sulphuric acid. The idea was shot down by her science teacher. Reason: “Sulphuric acid is not on the periodic table, and therefore, does not exist”. The girl, then brought in the sulphuric acid page on wikipedia, and showed it to her teacher. The science teacher did not believe her and yelled that she was making things up.
This teacher also told the same girl that she was not allowed to do any project on the periodic table over a certain weight. We can only assume its for one of two reasons.
1. The teacher is lazy.
2. The teacher is too stupid to understand it
This school also does not recognize dyslexia as a learning disability and does not recognize the First Amendment. I give you the Leesville, Louisiana School System.
Reply
December 2nd, 2007 at 7:16 pm
I did my A levels at a small crammer that specialised in getting students into medical school. unfortunately, some of the students were there as a result of their parents desperation to turn them into doctors, despite their obvious inability to get the grades. some of my favourite classroom moments include the time a student managed to ask three incredibly stupid questions in the space of ten minutes – ‘where does sawdust come from?’ ‘do plants have nerves?’ and ‘if we have two kidneys, why don’t we have two bladders?’
another student, when asked what he would do if he was treating a person with a knife wedged in his lung, stated that he would remove the knife (the correct answer would be to leave it in place until you got to hospital, to prevent the lung collapsing). when he was asked what he would do if the knife had been removed from the chest (correct answer – put your hand over the wound to keep the lung inflated -pretty much basic stuff for anyone hoping to become a doctor and studying biology at that level) he said ‘um… i dunno – stick the knife back in?’
needless to say, neither of these two geniuses have made it into medicine.
Reply
December 4th, 2007 at 4:46 am
Holy frickin… someone else who went to Leesville Louisiana public educational system? I wish you had better news for me, that sounds just like the way it justed to be when I attended the elementary school in Leesville.
Reply
December 5th, 2007 at 7:30 pm
*facepalm* I shouldn’t even be surprised, but come on!
Reply
January 8th, 2008 at 4:54 pm
I thought I knew stupid people. I really did. But you “yanks,” as the brits like to call you, have certainly taken it to a new level. I Pity each and every person of average intelligence who has to put up with anything resembling these stories. My girlfriend lives just outside of Chicago, and (I hope) she is an excellent example of the average American…but now I’m kinda scared to visit her for fear of encoutering….something like that. We’re both students, so the mentions of the Education system are especially frightening…
Reply
January 10th, 2008 at 12:24 am
Stupid teacher story:
So when i was about 6,maybe 7 years old (can’t remember if this was 1994 or 1995. give it a rest.) they made us go to the library once a week to learn to use the library for studies. One day,whilst sitting in a circle,legs indian style,i raised my hand and said something like “Teacher,Why can’t we just use the internet?”
The teacher was dumbfounded. The way i see it,either she did not know what the internet was (or did and was amazed i did too…),or was terrified that the sanctity of her work had just been demolished by a 6 year old.
Reply
January 11th, 2008 at 6:33 pm
Disposal By Detonation…need I say anything else?
Reply
January 22nd, 2008 at 9:19 am
I can add two other stories which encountered me in my final years on school. On girl was talking loudly with a friend of hers while standing in the corridor of the school. So unfortnately everybody on the floor was able to overhear following conversation:
“Where are you travelling in your holidays?”
“Last Minute? Where’s that?”
That wasn’t the last time she gave us and our teachers a lot of pain … now she’s going to become a teacher.
And again a teacher saying the following during class:
“The center of an atomic explosion is quite hot nearly 500° Celsius (260° F).”
After laughing their heads off a few friends of mine explained that he could add about 3 to 4 0 to that value.
That is what can happen if you are going to school in Germany so be warned.
Reply
March 17th, 2008 at 2:30 pm
love the stories and wanted to add my own, a friend of mine and I were talking, the conversation consisted of , events at a park one day where some kids were breaking ice with sticks just being goofy, and somehow he brings up his formation of ice theory in which it freezes on the floor of a body of water, then rises to the top. this was kind of understandable since he also things a proctor is short for a proctologist
Reply
April 29th, 2008 at 7:59 am
I have to add one, my health teacher (in 2007) announced to the class that you always need to wear a condom while having oral sex because the girl could get pregnant.
Reply
Wolfsbane reply on June 15th, 2010 1:38 pm:
Well, there’s a good reason for telling students that. If you don’t tell them they can get pregnant doing it, some idiots will do it without a condom and get an incurable STD like AIDS. Sometimes lying is for their own good.
Reply
May 21st, 2008 at 4:49 am
Another one:
When I was in seventh grade, I heard the following conversation between three eighth grade girls as our history teacher watched, dumbfounded.
“The capitol of texas is in Dallas!”
“No it’s not, silly, it’s in Houston!”
*Proceeds like this for a bit and then another girl walks up and hears the arguement*
“Oh my gosh, yall are both wrong! Everybody knows that the capitol is in San Antonio!”
Mind you, this is in Texas, and seventh grade history means Texas history. My history teacher couldn’t believe that she hadn’t been able to teach these girls even so simple a fact as where our state capitol was.
Reply
November 2nd, 2008 at 2:07 pm
That reminds me of a story my 7th grade teacher told about teaching in New York, where half her class thought the capitol of Nebraska was Iowa, D.C. stood for District of Conneticut, and that Cheyanne (correct me if that’s not spelled right) was pronounced Cha-en-ah-ee. I also had a science teacher in second grade who swore that the blood in veins is blue.
Reply
Stickfodder reply on November 2nd, 2008 4:33 pm:
Man I hadn’t thought about that blue blood bull shit in a long long time. And I have cut myself pretty deep in my life so I know that when I bleed It is red. So just for a definite answer as to why teachers tell little kids this stupid lie I did a quick little Google search and came up with this:
http://wiki.answers.com/Q/Is_blood_blue_or_red
Take that elementary school teachers!
Captcha “(something I cant Identify) defective” Yes captcha you are defective.
Reply
December 5th, 2009 at 7:01 pm
Oh, the entertainment value of an American primary education, which I, too, had once endured… Can’t really feign surprise over some of its products!
1) Our 6th grade teacher, an ex-Marine, told the class about how he managed to glue himself to some construction materials, quite firmly, and with superheated glue, too, but how this was such a fun learning experience, due to the oblivious bliss of paramedic-administered morphine IV, multiple doses. Good man!
2) Our high school health class mostly consisted of the teacher’s reminiscing on his psychonautic youth. He sounded like he quite missed having no idea who the hell he was making out with while watching interesting colours on the wall. Effin nostalgic hippie…
3) Everyone was so damn paranoid about being PC that, in a conversation about SUPER-HEAVY ACNE, recommending proper facial hygiene to a black kid got you suspended and nearly expelled.
4) The COLLEGE-LEVEL CALCULUS teacher, a withered hag dated circa 80 made you take detailed notes on her stories about being cool with dem kids and surfing with her husband like the youth of the day back in the 60s. Then, she *checked* your surfing notes. Needless to say, despite reaching science major level maths by 10th grade, I later dropped out of an engineering school – due to difficulties with the maths.
5) The science teacher sold his (school property?) boa constrictor to the school’s #1 Bad Girl. And the chick got suspended some 5 minutes later for possession of a deadly weapon on school campus (the aforementioned snake).
6) Another science instructor believed that a millilitre was 1/1,000,000 of a litre, religiously, and preached said heresy with the utmost conviction.
7) Physical education was taught by a blob so gender-ambiguous it responded to both “Ms.” and “Mr.”, was alternatively addressed both ways by all school administration, and freely roamed both locker rooms at will. Oh, and its crazy dog with mismatched eyes tended to make lap days really interesting, by, you know, trying to EAT the students.
8) Stabbing people with pens was a lot more acceptable than Possession of Advil.
9) Kids with highly active intercultural social lives, lacking even a single friend with a command of their native language, stayed in the lowest-level ESL classes for years, figuring that having to learn anything in school was quite superfluous. And then turned around and got into good colleges, despite supposedly knowing all of 10 words of English. The highly professional staff never caught on. Cause, hey, the Japanese, Korean, and Chinese trio of best buddies in their Know-no-English-whatsoever class understand each other perfectly on account of all being Asian!
10) The Ukrainian chick got tired of explaining to teachers where one of the largest countries in Europe was, and elected to become Russian instead. To the history teacher, that just confirmed his old theory that his class was being infiltrated by “freakin’ Commies”, which he voiced loudly, time and again.
11) The New Age gnome teaching mythology put such a spin on everything and anything that nothing even stood out or surprised us anymore. And 60-year old biker cat lady, who also drove a Porsche that she parked in the disabled spot, gave us amazing insight into morality issues in classical literature.
12) The early-middle-aged vice principal, known for never being seen without a piece of cake in hand, anytime, anywhere, preached the most convincing heartfelt sermons on the evils of teenage smoking. Problem is, the bloke soon ate himself to death by clinical obesity (400+ kilos), and got the school parking lot named after him, memorial plaque and all.
13) The most straightforward, meaningful, practical, and absolutely hypocrisy-free lesson came from the construction foreman fixing up school grounds: he casually mentioned that, while book learnin’ was fun and all, after barely finishing high school and a couple years of apprenticeship, he was making nearly a hundred grand and was certainly the highest-paid individual on campus. “See, kids, Advanced Basket Weaving at Liberal Arts College is nice and all, but actual job skills are the key to stably puttin’ food on yer family’s table and never worrying about the Pits of Debt or how to survive tomorrow.” …95% of the graduating class went on the ten-year plan to a Bachelor’s in Psychology anyway. Last I checked up on them, some are in debt, others in prison, and no one has made a hundred grand yet.
Reply
November 6th, 2014 at 3:38 pm
You are aware of for that reason significantly pertaining to the following theme, developed us for me accept is as true from several many aspects. Their just like both males and females don’t seem to be interested unless of course it really is one thing to attain along with Rhianna! Your own personal stuffs superb. Usually handle that!
Reply