Those who know me know that the MLK Jr. quote above is something I often cite or paraphrase whenever I hear or see something that is being said or done out of sincere ignorance or conscientious stupidity.
This quote isn’t limited to politics.
I can easily apply it to society in general. To paraphrase Albert Einstein, the technology that is meant to bring us closer together as human beings is actually separating us. I’d add to this salient point that our smartphones are making us dumber in addition to our social media making us less social.
And that brings me to the crux of my beef of the moment…
The Internet and technology is bringing out the ugly in a lot of us precisely because it allows sincere ignorance and conscientious stupidity to propagate efficiently to a wide audience that largely chooses not to educate itself.
There is something admirable about having convictions and the courage to defend those convictions. However, when the courage of your convictions becomes a relentless search to satisfy confirmation bias, then we arrive at the destination of conscientious stupidity by traveling down the highway of sincere ignorance.
Russia didn’t have to do much influence the outcome of an American presidential election using social media. Our proclivity towards tribalism and racism didn’t need much in the way of cultivation.
The Reverend Doctor King’s quote is just as relevant today as it ever was.
-The Rational Ram
The Rational Ram 
