Ignorant vs. Stupid

Ignorant vs. Stupid

I think it needs to be said. There is a vast difference between the words “ignorant” and “stupid” and we need to learn that. I don’t claim to be an acclaimed grammar/English professional or any such thing, and I make my fair share of mistakes. But misusing a word only propagates the degradation of the English dictionary, which by my guess probably involves some “chat speak” in it these days. Pretty soon “book” will be redefined to mean the same thing as “cool” due to the dreaded T9 app. But this does not excuse our current war against our established vocabulary that our unwilling-to-learn youth are pushing.

Let me start with stupid. Stupid has been in our word repertoire for many years now, and you may recall being a very young child and “stupid” was the biggest insult you could dish out. It grew into “retard” (although now politically incorrect), “moron”, “idiot”, “dumbass” and now suddenly we have it in our heads that “ignorant” is the next level of synonyms for “stupid” in the evolution line. College students throw the word around, sometimes paired with an old “stupid” replacement word, to make themselves feel smart. Oooh, I just used a big word, “ignorant”.

Except, the only thing ignorant going on is the misuse of this word. Dictionary.com defines “stupid” are a person who is “lacking intelligence or common sense”. Someone who is not educated, or unwilling to assess something and come to smart conclusions is and always will be considered “stupid”.

Ignorant is almost the opposite of stupid, I would say. Just as RENT says, the opposite of war isn’t peace, its creation. Well the same is true for the word stupid. The opposite of stupid isn’t smart, its ignorance. Being ignorant doesn’t mean you’re ill-informed, or just making a poor decision.

Ignorant means that person just doesn’t know.

A child learning how to spell may spell “knife” like without the “k” because they don’t know about the silent “kn” rule. They are ignorant about it. This doesn’t make the child stupid by any means.

Calling someone “ignorant” during an argument however makes you look like the ignorant one. Just because someone disagrees with you doesn’t mean they don’t know your side of the argument, they just disagree with you. In fact, they may be well-informed on your stance.

But when it comes down to it, calling someone names is as good as admitting defeat. To me, it’s the lowest form of debate, and means the person throwing around these words just doesn’t have anything significant to say anymore. They are throwing a tantrum, and by misusing such a common word as “ignorant” it only affirms to me that they can go no further in the argument.   

So save some face, and just lay off the word “ignorant” (and any other name calling tactics). Regardless of how “eloquent” your insult is, it is still an “ad hominem” in the end, which in general is a logical fallacy.