I was having a conversation with someone yesterday; or rather, trying to have a conversation with someone who wasn’t as interested in conversation as they were interested in flexing their high IQ, and unfortunately it didn’t go anywhere. Honestly, I’m not sure what I was expecting. I suppose I always have hope that people can pull their heads out of their ass for just long enough to see that they’re being a pretentious waste of space, knock it off, and have some honest conversation. Unfortunately, he’d sunk too low in his ego to dig himself out of the hole he’d created for himself and resorted to insulting my intelligence.

The conversation that we were having was spurred by this gem of a Facebook post that he’d dropped earlier that day:

“A controversial FACT is that while ecosystems that are being used as industrial toilets are taking heavy damage, there is NO MANMADE CLIMATE CHANGE going on. Ice cores reveal that higher temperatures than these were reached in the Roman time, and on average the global temperature is, for the greater period, actually going down.”

Now, there are a couple of issues that I took with this initial post; first of all, his incorrect use of the word “fact”. By definition, a fact is something that is a thing that is known or proven to be true and I don’t see one shred of evidence or even a hint of any source that would back up his claim. Second of all, why? Why are you posting stuff like this if not to laugh at people’s attempts to talk you down off of your high horse as you get high off the lack of oxygen up there?

I have no issue with discussing controversial topics or even debating opinions of the unknown, in fact I even promote it. However, if your entire point of posting unwarranted and unsubstantiated claims is just so you can prove to everyone how smart you are, that makes you nothing more than an insecure, pretentious prick. Furthermore, if your entire argument is based on your claim that I’ve been “brainwashed by the system into believing in science” and that my “years of research and schooling means nothing” compared to your spiritual search for the truth that you experienced, either you’re a troll or not as smart as you think you are.

One of my biggest pet peeves is when people come into a discussion puffed up like a bird in a mating dance in their Trojan horse of false claims and big words but actually have nothing of substance to offer. Only condescension and claims of their own intellectual prowess. I may be confident in my own intelligence and ability to hold my own in discussions and debates but I would never profess to be the smartest person in the room and by no means would I ever claim to always be correct. People who swing their credentials around before they offer anything of value to a conversation are more akin to men who tell you how satisfied you’re going to be, getting your hopes up just to disappoint you.

The irony of having someone spewing rhetoric that they’ve seen on Youtube videos and conspiracy theory blogs telling you that you don’t think for yourself is far too much and elicits responses like this one.

“What grounds do you have to tell me I don’t think for myself? Lol it sounds to me that just because I stand by facts and disagree with you that I’m suddenly just ‘one of the masses who doesn’t think for herself’. Being pretentious and making claims based on unsubstantiated ‘evidence’ does not make you correct. There’s no point in presenting you with further evidence because you’ve strayed so far from reality and into your ego that you only look for ‘evidence’ that supports what you think lol.”

I’ve got a controversial FACT for you sir, being pretentious doesn’t make you the smartest person in the room, not even close. And it certainly doesn’t make you right.