fandomhigh | Dealing With Stupid People [Monday, May 14, 2nd period]

Josh was obviously uncomfortable with the whole "being outside" thing as he perched on a picnic bench and smiled at the students as they assembled.

"Okay, one of the most annoying things you will encounter in your life will be other people," he began, rolling his eyes. "Most of us -- in my universe, anyway, some of you might have other experiences -- can't kill them by using our brains, so we have to come up with different coping methods. We'll get to the more advanced techniques -- sarcasm, the strategic use of an eye roll -- later, but today we'll start out with something that gives you a lot of chance to practice before you send out the final product."

He pulled out a sheaf of papers and dropped it onto the table. "Writing back to stupid people!" he said triumphantly. "In this exercise you need to reply to these obviously deranged letters in a polite way without asking if they've thought to seek professional help for their delusions. There are five different letters so pair up with a partner -- it's better to double check your language against someone else, at least at the beginning -- and write back to these completely insane people."

Josh grinned. "Questions? Problems? I don't really care, but ask anyway."

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Mac looked at him a moment. "You're one of those very very nice tolerant people, huh?" she commented.

It would probably be good for her to lose the sarcasm, be more understanding of the stupid, so she shrugged. "Sure, we'll go with tact." She supposed that was probably what they were supposed to be learning anyway.

Not always, not as often as he should be, but he tried. "Is that a bad thing to be?" he asked.

"God, no," Mac said. "Nice is good. Great, even. Just... unusual, that's all. Not many people are nice to people who write spam."

"I'm a priest," he said with a small smile. "Tolerance is a large part of that. And I'm sorry, but spam?"

"Oh, I just get this sort of crazy coming into my email inbox all the time." The idea someone wouldn't know about computers and email, just doesn't really enter into Mac's brain.

"It travels into your email inbox," he repeated, baffled but willing. "The letter is spam?"

"Well, it might not be, I guess," she said. "It just reminds me of some of the stuff I get, that's all."

"I have no idea what an email inbox is," he admitted, wondering exactly long before he gave up admitting he didn't know what things were. "Nor how this," he touched the letter, "would arrive in one."

Mac blinked at him. "Are you from the past or something?" she asked carefully. Because really, that was the only way he couldn't know about these things, to her mind.

"From a different world, so I've recently learned," he explained.

"Oh, yeah." Mac nodded. "That'll do it," she said. "... it's kind of like getting mail, just without the paper and with a computer instead," Mac explained, leaning down to tap the ibook in her bag.

Karal looked at her bag, and at the item she was tapping, and decided he knew enough to get through this class. "All right. So our task is to write a reply to this spam, and to do so with some measure of tact."

"Yep." Mac nodded. "I think we can handle that."

"I think so, too," he said with a smile. "We have a greeting, perhaps we should note the fascinating arrangement of words? Or comment on the lack of punctuation?"

[ooc: must sleep now. Pick up in my AM?]

Mac nodded again. "Yeah, and we could add something about the way they create their own vocabulary by smooshing two or more words together," she suggested. "It's very... inventive of them."

"Smooshing," he repeated, trying out the word and deciding he liked it. "Very inventive. And bold! To be so daring and new, fearless of how it might be received by others."

"Are we actually trying to encourage them to write more of this stuff?" she asked carefully. "Because, if we're too nice to them, that's gonna happen."

"That is a very good point. So we wish to discourage them, but in a gentle way?" he asked. "So, maybe make it clear that we couldn't understand what they were trying to tell us? That the meaning was lost in their unique approach?"

"That'd work perfectly," Mac said with a nod. "We're just encouraging them to... maybe use grammar and actually make sense. It's is nicer than telling them that they might be crazy, at least."

Karal gave her a quick smile. "No matter how deserved it might be," he said. "How about: While we greatly appreciate the time and effort that you have dedicated to creating your message, we sadly are unable to respond, as your particular approach to language has rendered us speechless. With wonder."

"Wondering, at what you actually mean," Mac continued. "Oh, and then we can respectfully request that they re-word it in such a way that someone whose brain is not finely attuned to their own can follow."

"Perfect," he laughed. "How could they possibly be offended at that? And with a touch of luck, they'll decide we're simply not worth the effort and deliver their spam to someone more appreciative."

"Hopefully. I'm learning so much from this workshop already," Mac decided sending a quick grin at Karal. There might be just a little bit of sarcasm in her words. "And, it's surprisingly fun."

"Yes, I can feel my knowledge and intelligence growing even as we speak," he replied, indulging in a little sarcasm of his own. "But it has been fun, even if it's not a particularly valuable class."

[ooc: sleep well!]

Dealing With Stupid People [Monday, May 14, 2nd period]

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Re: Write to Stupid People: Letter #2

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Re: Write to Stupid People: Letter #2

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