Pearls Before Swine by Stephan Pastis for November 25, 2024

Bingo

I remember once seeing coffee mugs, T-shirts, etc, that read, “If idiots could fly, this place would be an airport.”

They also had the phrase with an A-word instead of “idiots.”

Before social media and cable news, people had opinions, but you didn’t hear them.

Problem is not that peoples has opinions. Problem is peoples trying to forcing one’s own opinions on another as if it is facts.

Dunning Kruger syndrome.

I believe this. Too many times people with no brains get elected because people who have no brains vote for the same kind of people. This is a problem on the left and the right, although moderates also have this problem.

Thank you, Rat.

During the Nixon administration someone said (forget who), “Opinions are like a*sholes – everybody’s got one”. “And they are probably on Yelp!” – my opinion. :)

Why are Americans on Reddit different from Americans on Youtube and Twitter?

Most Americans on Reddit are pro-illegal immigration, pro-feminist and pro-Islam.

however many Americans on Youtube and Twitter are anti-illegal immigration, anti-feminist and anti-Islam

My latest hypothesis is that all people are absolutely stupid. The problem is that some of them think they are relatively less stupid. Especially bad when they think so because they have extra money from winning some business lottery (or scam).

Can’t I have both opinions and a brain? There are facts which you cannot have an opinion about but you can simply know or deny them, while you can have e.g. an opinion how to deal with those facts appropriately.

Opinions are like butt holes. Everyone has one, and they all stink.

Back in the Cronkite Era the Big Three networks’ news shows were losing money, but they were a showcase for how good the networks were. The 1968 Bill Buckley/Gore Vidal debates came about because thrid place ABC couldn’t afford the coverage that the other guys were giving the political conventions.

Also, at that time every town had an independent newspaper and no one entity could own more than one TV station and two radio stations in a city.

Ronald Reagan made the Fairness Doctrine one of his first targets.

“Yeah? Well, you know, that’s just like your opinion, man.”

People have always had opinions, and most of them were always stupid. The internet makes it easier for the dumb ones to drown out the smart ones.

Too bad we can’t graph the rise in social media along side the scale change in the cartoon.

It’s when opinions are not grounded in fact but instead are grounded in partisan BS that it becomes a problem.

It’s an internet thing

I need new glasses it seems, I read “People with Onions”!! >.<

Good thing we’re all on the ”brains” side of the scale

Maybe the scales should read “people that have been taught HOW to think” and “people that have been taught WHAT to think”, or more simply “educated” and “indoctrinated”.

A few years ago “we can agree that we disagree” was a grudgingly accepted solution. We’ve kind of blown past that one. Our ancestors settled such things with wars. We seem to have settled on trying to find the most hurtful insult (and running before we get hurt).

So that’s your opinion, eh Rat?

He’s done his own research.

Only dummies have opinions?

The Rise of Social Media.

Opinions without facts. E.g. , if you think vaccines cause autism, your opinion on the subject is worthless.

Some people just don’t find facts as entertaining as unfounded opinions. But that’s just my opinion. ;-)

1974-two years earlier Nixon won reelection, carried 49 states, 60% of vote.

That’s my opinion, feel free to make it yours

The person who can’t explain why he holds a given opinion (usually saying “it’s an opinion; I don’t have to explain it”) is in fact stating either a prejudice or someone else’s opinion rather than his own. Examine your own “opinions” on that basis.

So much for freedom of speech.

If I remember 1974 right, people weren’t any smarter. They were politer and didn’t have the ability to broadcast their ignorance like they do today.

I disagree with the premise. The problem isn’t that people don’t have brains. The problem is that people don’t seek out accurate information before forming an opinion.

“Great minds discuss ideas; average minds discuss events; small minds have opinions.” – Eleanor Roosevelt [kinda, sorta].

This one, sadly is too close to the reality to be finny.

MY opinion is: this is a good comic.

So, one has to be stupid to have an opinion??? Just the opposite, Pastis.

With respect to the people with opinions, I think the problem is less that they have an opinion, and more that they don’t engage the brain before they form the opinion.

It’s not the ratio that’s unbalanced, it’s the ratio of how loud those people with opinions are compared to the people with brains.

The news media fills the opinion bowl. I don’t think they know the difference between facts and opinion.

A failure of our educational system to teach how to evaluate sources of information.

The opinions now have social media sites to dump their trash in… The numbers haven’t changed.

The brains have left the building and gone off the mainstream grid.

Pretty well sums thing up.

We all have opinions but informed opinions would be nice.

Hmm, a lot of opinions floating about here…

The ratio hasn’t changed. Social media has highlighted and exaggerated all the opinions.

true dat

It’s quite taxing on those of us with the brains.

I love it when you nail it, Stephan!

Elitist vs Magats

With the internet, too many people have the same opinion.

In my humble opinion, Pastis is spot on here.

It’s really a rise in people being told what to think. Who wants to think when somebody else can do it for you?

‘’I know that I know nothing.’’ Socrates

try to avoid it as I may, I still (darn it)have opinions

All people have always had brains and opinions, but Gent is about right, except it’s not so much “forcing” as people working together to create a worldview based on “opinions” in various forms — assumptions, beliefs that are disguised as “facts” because they are “based on” scientifically-gathered data, etc. And then accuse anybody who sees through it of being a conspiracy theorist, which is effective because there are plenty of kooky conspiracy theories out there, too.

George Romero had it right; the zombies have eaten the brains.

I believe I once heard the phrase somewhere, “opinions are like butts, everyone’s got one(1), but you don’t want to see yours displayed in public,” but, nowadays, the REAL problem is that EVERYONE is SO DESPERATE for “celebrity” on the internet that they would be happy to show their butts, if it meant they could “get” a sponsorship for a YouTube video or something like that!!!!! Dan aka…ps ugh to overpopulation…..

What does the Venn Diagram of the groups look like?

Opinions are like a———s: everyone has one & they all stink.

“I reject your reality and substitute it with my own,” Look up the logic-fallacy “post hoc ergo propter hoc,” and match it against political half-truths, for example.

Everyone has a right to their opinion, the problem is not all opinions carry the same weight when it comes to reality. (I think I’m paraphrasing Carl Sagan)

Yeah. . . .

The problem with the world is that the intelligent people are full of doubts while the stupid ones are full of confidence.

- Charles Bukowski

The problem is the lack of critical thinking. We tell kids WHAT to think, not HOW to think.

Opinions are a right guaranteed by our constitution. Right, wrong or meaningless.

And the elephant in the room is that the a-holes with opinions just elected an ass-clown by voting against their own interests.Simply because they form their opinions from certain “news” broadcasts and podcasts.

I’m pretty sure his first scale is backwards. People had opinions long before “facts” were available.Old saying: “Opinions are like belly buttons. Everybody has one”. (Multiple sources found).

Well, when Cronkite and Huntley-Brinkley were alive we got facts from MSM, now we just get propaganda. What do you expect?

people with brains have better opinions

Alternative facts are the problem. When someone makes up their own facts, because you are unable to accept real facts, that’s when it gets bad. It’s a form of mental illness.

I remember 1974 like it was only 50 years ago…

What’s your, you know, opinion about the shape of Earth? The moon? Other planets?

Climate change?

Ever increasing wealth inequality?

Gravity?

Vaccines?

The irony of this tune is there’s 227 comments so far, (people with opinions), and 550 likes. Big number for this toon today. A good tune.

The main difference between then and now is the internet. The crap-talking yahoo in a bar in 1974 with just a handful of listeners is now the crap-talking yahoo on social media with a million followers.

You can have brains and still have opinions. It’s just that some people who know nothing aren’t content to either educate themselves or shut up!

The sage wisdom is, Opinions are A$$ holes, everyone has one!

I’m thinking the scales balanced the same in 1974. I was an adult at the time and read the newspaper. Karl Friedrich Gauss, Mr. Normal Distribution, was a very smart guy. He was the Einstein or Newton of the 19th century.

I completely blame the Internet for creating this mess. True it was actually this way since we climbed (or were pushed) out of the trees. But the idiots were confined to their villages. Open communication has been taken over by the least common denominator. As could have been anticipated just watching TV and listening to radio.

Used to be that mostly experts could get their thoughts in front of the public (publishing, interviews, etc.). But thanks to the internet, anyone can get their views in front of the public.