The amount of people losing their shit over a mathematician saying "there are instances where 2+2=5" is why you will never be able to convince transphobes to stop oppressing trans people
-
Show this thread
-
I really do think public education is important but the extent to which it has caused people to smugly embrace simplifications of reality like "2+2=4, there are only two sexes, Columbus discovered America" really, really makes me resent it
13 replies 15 retweets 160 likesShow this thread -
Replying to @Nymphomachy
The private education they'd have goten if it didn't exist would be far worse
1 reply 0 retweets 17 likes -
Replying to @arthur_affect
yeah, that's what I have to tell myself, but I feel like there just has to be another way better than just lying to students
1 reply 0 retweets 10 likes -
Replying to @Nymphomachy
I seriously do feel like writing this up at some point -- I think this is a neurodiversity thing I've seen so much stuff lecturing educators -- and adults in general, parents especially -- never to "talk over the heads" of kids, to adjust their language to an appropriate level
1 reply 3 retweets 21 likes -
Replying to @arthur_affect @Nymphomachy
And maybe it's because I was "gifted" and "accelerated" from a young age anyway but I could always tell when this was being done to me and I hated it What I liked best was people who had the understanding and patience to actually, genuinely explain things
3 replies 3 retweets 39 likes -
Replying to @arthur_affect @Nymphomachy
But failing that, I *like* being talked over the head of It's a challenge, it's a game TH White wrote very vividly about this in The Sword and the Stone, young Wart learning more from Merlyn muttering to himself in his lab than from his actual lessons
3 replies 4 retweets 36 likes -
Replying to @arthur_affect @Nymphomachy
"The feeling of strange thoughts and ideas he couldn't understand flowing past him in a torrent, plucking out errant words and phrases he knew like fish from a stream, saving the most fascinating mysteries in his memory for later, like a map to buried treasure"
1 reply 4 retweets 20 likes -
Replying to @arthur_affect @Nymphomachy
It is a game and it's a fun game, it's something I did constantly as a kid Letting the adults talk and then running to the encyclopedia or, later, the Internet to try to catch up Trying to figure out exactly how much I needed to learn to be able to fake-it-till-you-make-it
3 replies 2 retweets 24 likes -
Replying to @arthur_affect @Nymphomachy
This is critical to the success of nerd media from LotR to Star Wars. Dropping you into a world that seems lived in, and not explaining it, so you have to actively pursue the lore and get invested. (Works best if you did plan ahead at least a bit, unlike Star Wars.)
1 reply 0 retweets 1 like
This is also why they tend to start to get stale over time as the lore piles up
-
-
Replying to @arthur_affect @Nymphomachy
This relates again to the human tendency to try and make things a clean closed system when the real world is vast and messy. Prophesied heroes and X number of magical items that must be reunited to gain ULTIMATE POWER!!! that warp the whole setting around them.
1 reply 0 retweets 1 like -
It's particularly bad with timelines. Having things change dramatically, but over a timescale which they would realistically do so requires grounding in so many areas of study. (And then you've got to come up with a good story as well)
1 reply 0 retweets 1 like - Show replies
New conversation -
Loading seems to be taking a while.
Twitter may be over capacity or experiencing a momentary hiccup. Try again or visit Twitter Status for more information.