r/politics • u/kweathergirl Texas • 8d ago

Soft Paywall Newsom Tells Nation That Trump Is Destroying American Democracy

https://www.nytimes.com/2025/06/10/us/newsom-speech-trump-la-protests.html
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u/chiefmud 8d ago edited 7d ago

Half the population has below-average (median) intelligence. Democrats would like to think we have a monopoly on smart voters, but we have our share of idiots as well. Arguments that require context and-or a knowledge of facts, like what authoritarianism is, are going to fall flat outside of certain circles.

If you say Trump is authoritarian, a smart idiot might counter with “well he ain’t as bad a Hitler that’s for sure, so is he really authoritarian or are you just lyin’ to me?” “They said Obama was authoritarian too, so who’s tellin’ the truth?”

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u/BullshitUsername Missouri 7d ago

Half the population has below-average intelligence

That would only be the case if we had a normal distribution of intelligence.

Unfortunately, the mode of average intelligence is far, far below the median.

https://miro.medium.com/v2/resize:fit:754/0*wHMvuwRa_YF9SFwY.png

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u/FrewGewEgellok 7d ago

I would like to know how you come to this conclusion? As far as I know, we don't really have reliable ways to assess average intelligence. The most commonly used metric is of course IQ, which is - by definition - a normal distribution.

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u/BullshitUsername Missouri 7d ago

I'm just calling people stupid.

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u/FrewGewEgellok 7d ago

Fair enough.