Stupidity
a lá
Bonhoeffer
Dietrich Bonhoeffer was a keen
observer of human beings and their history. His profound and acute observations
about his German contemporaries who fell prey to Hitler and the Nazi phenomenon
are striking in their own right. They appear downright prescient as America
faces what can only be judged a cognate phenomenon with the election of Donald
Trump in 2016.
Bonhoeffer describes what he calls “Stupidity”
in an essay “On Stupidity” in his Letters and Papers from Prison. The
essay describes this kind of person, probes the nature of their “stupidity,”
and observes appropriate responses to them (Bonhoeffer, Dietrich. Letters and
Papers from Prison: DBW 8 (Kindle Location 1475-1504). Augsburg Fortress.
Kindle Edition).
Description of “Stupid” People
These people are
not malicious or evil. They cannot be made or convinced to forswear their
stupidity. Their prejudgments are immovable overruling or dismissing contrary
evidence. Stupid people are self-satisfied, easily irritated, and dangerous
when provoked.
Nature of Stupidity
Theirs is not an
intellectual but a human defect. In fact, these people can be quite smart.
Under certain circumstances, however, people can made stupid or allow themselves
to become this way.
This stupidity
arises in groups, a sociological more than psychological phenomenon, usually
correlated to a “strong upsurge” of either political or religious power. Though
appearing stubborn these folks are not independent or even acting of their own
accord. Bonhoeffer declares “one virtually feels that one is dealing not at all
with him as a person, but with slogans, catchwords, and the like that have
taken possession of him” and “Having thus become a mindless tool, the stupid
person will also be capable of any evil and at the same time incapable of
seeing that it is evil.”
Responding to “Stupid” People
An inner liberation,
an act of God, is necessary to free them. Their wills have been captured and
they are thus unwilling to obey. No amount of information or facts will make
any difference in speaking with them. Only living a “responsible” life before
God and others can make any difference.
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A responsible life,
according to Bonhoeffer, entails vicarious representative action, accordance with reality,
taking on guilt, and freedom. By these he means sacrificial serving
others in accord with the reality of a world claimed, redeemed, and ruled by
Christ. In accord with that reality we stand with “stupid” people confessing
our own complicity in the circumstances giving rise to their plight, and acting
in freedom to the command of the living Christ in the moment. This means we
(the non-“Stupid” in this situation) can therefore exercise no moral
superiority or distance from them and can treat them only as those also
claimed, redeemed, and ruled by Christ, standing with them and owning our responsibility
in their “stupidity” and loving them in whatever ways the Lord directs us.
Such stupidity knows no partisan boundaries and
can be found among “progressive” people as well as more conservative folk. In
fact, a case can be made that today in America we have both progressive and
conservative “stupidities” facing off with few attempting to live responsibly
in Bonhoefferian terms. Bonhoeffer himself found little support for responsible
living among his contemporaries in Nazi Germany though there was not there the
progressive “Stupid” counterforce we have here.
It does not take
a rocket scientist to see that is analysis maps onto our situation with
substantial overlap. Enough overlap to justify a claim that even without
attempting to identify Trump with Adolf Hitler our situations are comparable
through the presence of the “Stupidity” Bonhoeffer has described. If so, his
thoughts on responding to this “Stupidity” are of utmost importance for us to take
seriously and reflect on deeply.
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