The lighter side of ADHD
When I was in the third grade, I had a teacher tell me it was okay we pushed the natives off the land because we made more efficient use of it, and could therefore carry a greater population.
In the previous grade the teacher passed around a worksheet, and we had to choose which jobs were most suited to what gender.
Oh what a glorious whitebread bublefuck town I grew up in!
my mom didn't want me playing pokemon because it "taught evolution"
Its weird cuz evolution in Pokemon is more akin to metamorposes or even just basic puberty except theres sometimes 1 extra step XD
this was not lost on little ol gradeschool me
How fun would it be to have an entirely breeding focused game of Pokemon that was about evolution, though? You want an ivysaur? Selectively breed these bulbasaurs that kind of look more like an ivysaur!
My second grade teacher taught us the civil war was because of a disagreement over state's rights.
The same teacher marked me and a few other students down for completing a subtraction assignment using negative numbers. She explained we were supposed to be confused and write that we couldn't do it.
I remember in 7th grade social studies (on the edge of the SF bay area in the 90s for crab godssake) we had to do a little assignment where we made up pros and cons of slavery.
the pros i made up were absolute bullshit "uh maybe the technology was better in the states than africa so even with slavery quality of life improved? that doesn't sound right but maybe i don't know" racist fucking ass shit turd bull fuck assignment.
sorry i'm like 10 years behind on my swears i got some catching up to do
I'm sorry, I'm really sorry, but pros to slavery?? jfc.
yeah like can you help me think up some swears i'm really tired comrade
Jizztrap. Fuck-wit, -stick, -stain. Frozen tampon popsicle Barbara Streisand!
we were supposed to be confused and write that we couldn't do it.
Is this a US specific thing? In our schools, they taught us stuff, then took a test to see how much of it got inside our head. I can't imagine a test having a question about a topic which is not taught yet. It feels like straight up bullying by the system. We send kids to school to learn things, not to get bullied for not knowing things they haven't even been taught yet.
I was raised in an exceedingly rural area of an already rural state. My school district was rated amongst the worst in the nation, so my experience was more indicative of the worst 1980s US had to offer. It was bad then, but not usually that bad.
I feel bad that I wore the free D.A.R.E. propaganda shirts in school because my family was too poor to get me decent clothing.
I know a lot of adults that wore them ironically, so maybe you were just ahead of your time.
Naw. Wear that shit with pride, then take a Snoop-level rip from a bong.
Don't.
Don't feel bad for doing it out of necessity.
Nah, they gave you free clothes. 🙂
Just think of it as cop-averting camo.
I stopped saying the Pledge of Allegiance because I was hyperfixated on the Eragon books and it seemed too similar to swearing loyalty to Galbatorix.
it's literal brainwashing. Americans laugh at the NK people having to praise Dear Daddy, but then every morning in school, they cite the pledge of allegiance. Why would you want to be allied with one of the worst countries in modern history? Fuck that.
Honestly? Mission accomplished
Most propaganda is aimed at neurotypical wiring. We are out of tune with it, that gives us a measure of protection.
It's one of the worries I have with AI. While I think we are more protected from propaganda than most (since we constantly want to poke at the crack in a story), we are not immune. It's perfectly possible to shape it to effect us. They just haven't bothered, since we are a small target. AI makes that a lot easier to do, so we will see more of it.
So that’s why my fifth grade teacher hated me. Because I was too smart for her lazy bullshit lessons. 😂
Did anyone else ace the assignments without paying any attention to the lectures?
In 8th grade i would spend a lot of class on my phone by hiding it in my desk. I was still one of the only people to regularly participate in class and was a straight A student until uni.
There was one instance where another srudent ratted me out for using my phone. He had tried to rat me out multiple times before but i usually stuck it in a book or folder. This time he called me out for doing so, so the teacher ended up taking my phone. School policy was that she would have to turn it over to the principal and my parents would have to pick it up. The teacher was a 60+ year old former nun and I had strict parents so i was not looking forward to it. When we went out to lunch the teacher called me over and told me to wait for a second. She handed me my phone back and told me not to get caught again.
She never checked my desk for my phone again and I continued to be one of the only people who raised my hand.
Aw what a nice teacher! I was in school way before smart phones came out. I definitely would have used one during class. 😂
It was a small Catholic school in a big city and the student population was a majority middle-class white kids; that is to say that despite being the weird nerdy queer brown kid I was one of the best behaved, had some of the best grades, consistently output high quality work (even when bullshitting it), and participated in all my classes including religion despite being an outspoken atheist. Most of my teachers loved me and gave me a lot of leniency because even at my worst I was still leagues ahead typically. It also helped that my mom was very involved and made it known if i was causing trouble that they could call her and she'd sort it out quickly, so if i ever was actually out of line they knew it wouldn't last long.
Yeah, they repeated so much to the normies I never did any studying and only barely paid attention in class and aced all the tests. Then I went to college where I might have a class every other days and realized I had no idea how to study. doh.
Yeah. It’s one of the reasons I wasn’t diagnosed until my 30s.
Constantly in highschool. If you count a lazy 85% without really lifting a finger as "acing," that is.
God it's funny when your brain not working right accidentally prevents certain issues. I'm immune to getting addicted to MMOs, my brain can't handle the slow dopamine distribution.
Working harder and grinding more should mean more levels and cool gear faster.
In reality, the harder you work the slower the dopamine, and then I dip.
To be fair , MMOs aren't fun because of gameplay, they are fun because of the social aspects.
my hyperfocus (i'm not adhd, i just love my adhd peeps) did because i paid too much attention and pointed out the gaps to my favorite history teacher in high school (after class, i'm not an asshole. well, not an asshole all the time). first month he gave me the book "lies my teacher told me" with the note "Good! Keep thinking critically about what you are learning! This book too!" or something like that, it's in a box somewhere (i don't have room to unpack my entire library here, i've got 2 bookshelves of books waiting to be unpacked).
I was fortunate my social studies teachers weren't propagandizing, they straight up said the government lied to pursue some wars such as Vietnam
I'm not trying to talk down or condescend, so please accept this at the face value it is intended with: I suggest it's critical thinking that's saved you.
ADHD is the true anarchist spirit.
Same with Autism, I will hyperfixate Rome, the Soviet Union, and Nazi Germany and I will call out the similarities between them and the United States. I also got into a verbal fight with some kid in middle school because I wasn't going to play nice with his creationism BS unlike the teacher who danced around it, the only reason he didn't attack me was because I would probably throw him around like a ragdoll.
Joke's on me; I totally locked in on that shit and even made some pro-propaganda student films!
Few things teach you humility like a friend finally breaking through to you and shattering your glass bubble of misinformation. Especially when your personality and morals are completely at odds with your foundational beliefs that were built up by authority figures. I was that kid who would hang out with unhoused people and try to help them with shit because everybody deserves a friend, but I wouldn't give them money because I was taught that poor people don't know how to manage their money or spend it all on drugs.
My 3rd grader informed us in 1st grade that he opted to not participate in the pledge of allegiance (does so respectfully) because we have discussed how the US doesn't take care of people (his words). He was even more frustrated when a substitute kept going on about how we're the greatest country in the world and have all these freedoms.
See also: aphantasia!
Not visualizing myself with or for a product has likely helped a ton.
Bullshit. There's more propaganda online.
Now. There wasn't always an online. Even once there was, back in my day, sonny, it wasn't always filled with inescapable propaganda. That all started in the 2010s.
Before that you would get some stupid ass chain email from your weird uncle and be like "does he really think I'm reading this bullshit?" lulz
I also tied onions around my belt.