"Are you serious?" - Ignorant things said by ignorant people

[Kodiak]

My wife has been put in charge of organizing the church Christmas party (the activity person is on bed-rest because she's having a hard pregnancy) and she's very excited about doing a "Christmas in Bethlehem" theme party with food from that region, holy-land type decorations, etc. She's trying to get away from the stereotypical "Jesus & Santa" Christmas party where they serve ham and cheesy-potatoes. Her "party planning committee" (think Dunder-Mifflin), was overwhelmingly slow to get going with helping her aside from one lady, so now they're all playing catch-up since the party is in 2 weeks and my wife had to make a lot of decisions without their input. Anyhow, my wife had this conversation this morning.

Mrs. K: Hi there, how's it going?
Church Lady: Well, I'm concerned about this party.
Mrs. K: Why? What's wrong?
Church Lady: Well, I don't think it's very inclusive of all our congregation.
Mrs. K: What do you mean?
Church Lady: Well (she really started almost ever sentence with 'well'), it's them mexicans. (we have about 20 Spanish-speaking congregants)
Mrs. K: Do you think we should have Spanish language translations for the songs?
Church Lady: Well, no. That's not what I meant.
Mrs. K: Invitations in Spanish?
Church Lady: Well, no.
Mrs. K: Then what?
Church Lady: Well, it's the food. I know you're serving all that Ay-rab food (we're doing Mediterranean style fare), and I don't think they'll like it.
Mrs. K: What do you mean?
Church Lady: Well, we want 'em to feel welcome, so I think we should serve 'em beans or something.
Mrs. K: You know, we're in America and we eat all kinds of different food. They don't only eat Mexican food.
Church Lady: Well, I don't know. I've never seen Mexicans serve food that wasn't Mexican. I just don't want to offend.
Mrs. K: I don't think our menu of food from the holy land is going to offend anyone, but I'll make sure that everyone feels welcome.
Church Lady: Well, I just thought I should say something.

At first I thought the lady was joking, but then I realized that she was stone-serious and really thought that the only way to make "them Mexicans" feel welcome at a Christmas party was to serve beans and rice . It shocked me to see someone doing something so blatantly offensive when they had the exact opposite intentions. I asked several of my friends of Mexican heritage what they thought and they laughed their asses off. As one said "Dude, it's 'Christmas in Bethlehem' not 'Christmas in Bethlehem con frijoles"

Anyone else come across stuff like this?

[aerius]

The best one I've heard recently was a couple guys in the library who thought now would be a great time to buy & flip Florida real estate for a profit. They were convinced that they could buy a $200k home right now and flip it for at least $300k within 6 months, my wife & I overheard the whole conversation and we were struggling to keep from laughing our asses off. I guess these guys have never seen the Case-Shiller charts for Florida and how the entire state's property values are going straight downhill with no end in sight. On the bright side they'll get to claim a massive capital loss on their tax returns next year.

Then there's the ricecar fanboy idiot who thinks a stock Subaru WRX STI will beat a Corvette around a racetrack because the videogames say so. That is so laughably stupid that I don't even know where to start.

[Themightytom]

My ol Kung Fu Master singled out an Indian family that had recently joined and while we were holding postured he casually starts talking to them about how glad he is to have them in his class. he jokingly calls them towel heads, and jokingly asks if they rode a magic carpet over and asks if they know aladdin.

I'm thinkin he came in drunk that day but they were amazingly cool about it and still practice, though they obviously like the new Master better.

[Dalton]

The best one I've heard recently was a couple guys in the library who thought now would be a great time to buy & flip Florida real estate for a profit. They were convinced that they could buy a $200k home right now and flip it for at least $300k within 6 months, my wife & I overheard the whole conversation and we were struggling to keep from laughing our asses off. I guess these guys have never seen the Case-Shiller charts for Florida and how the entire state's property values are going straight downhill with no end in sight. On the bright side they'll get to claim a massive capital loss on their tax returns next year.

A friend of mine told me that she knows someone who's currently living in a house in Florida who hasn't paid the mortgage for two years solid, and the bank won't foreclose because there's too much real estate already on the market. That is staggeringly stupid.

[JLTucker]

I had an email debate with a libertarian friend about socialism and other things back in May. Here are some gems from our exchange. I responded to these things and I was the last to send an email. He never got back to me after saying he would. Note that this is verbatim, including spelling mistakes.

Regarding Obama: “Who's constitution did he teach from for a decade? If it was ours then why is he doing so many things that go against the original intention of the constitution? (i.e. separation of powers, freedom of speech, 10th amendment, ect....)”

“We wouldn't not even be allowed to have this debate if we lived in a socialist country.”

“Their is nothing preventing anyone from being in that top 2% bracket.”

“So in essence we have a tax system that deters success and the incentive to achieve and allows for deadbeats to live off of SOCIETY for free.”

I questioned him over the phone about the above. I asked him if he would consider me a deadbeat if I went on Medicaid, which I am trying to do because of a disease I have that would probably disqualify me from any private plan. Of course he is inconsistent with his own views, so he said “no.” I asked him for evidence that everyone who is on government assistance is a deadbeat; he simply said that he sees it everyday.

One time he said that all Mexican girls are ugly and if they aren’t ugly, they aren’t completely Mexican. In our email exchange I had to tell him how that is racist.

[TheFeniX]

I'm going to get my CHL and carry two Desert Eagles. I won't shoot both at the same time, shooting guns akimbo would be stupid. I just don't want to reload during a gunfight.

I'm going to get my two felony convictions expunged off my record, then buy an AR-15, get it converted to full-auto, then get it registered so I can own it legally.

Same guy, two separate conversations. And he actually begins almost all conversation with the phrase "I'm going to get."

I'm voting for Sarah Palin.

As stupid as that is by itself, it was said by a woman whose only real political "stance" is that making abortion illegal again would be a terrible mistake. Other than that, she refuses to comment on politics. It's funny because in the conversations I've had with her, she's pretty much a liberal. Than again, this is Texas.

I'm not racist, but I just don't like the idea of Obama as president. I get images of those big black women yelling 'Preach on!' and these big congregations going on in the White House.

She honestly believed that Obama getting elected would have the White House overrun by the stereotypical black church scene shown 1000 times in movies. You'd think she'd be glad he wasn't a Muslim.

Here's a conversation from a public game of Left4Dead2:

Pub: "I'm grabbing a ninja sword."
Me: "It's called a Katana. You could say Samurai Sword if you wanted to sound slightly less ignorant."
Pub: "No dude, they call it a ninja sword. That's what it is. Ninjas used this kind of sword."

Maybe he was trolling me, but he acted like I shot his dog when I dared question his calling it a "ninja sword." Let's face facts: the average internet gamer is a retard, but I remember this only because of how pissed he was at my comment.

This one was years ago, but it always stuck out in my mind because it was so blatantly ignorant and bigoted. At an elementary school years ago, we met the principal. He was openly homosexual, which I thought was weird because it was in a rural area of Texas. My coworker questioned the receptionist because he's that kind of guy and was informed that the principal was gay. So, we're doing our work and the conversation goes as follows:

Co-worker: "So, what'd you think about the principal."
Me: "Nice enough guy. A little over the top considering where we're at."
Co-worker: "Yea, you don't have a problem with that?"
Me (Buried in cabling, trying to sort years of mismatched equipment with knocking the network offline): "About what?"
Co-worker: "Him being gay."
Me: "What the Hell do I care?"
Co-worker: "Well, he's around all these kids."
Me: (Busy and not realising where he was going with it): "And?"
Co-worker: "Well, it just doesn't seem right."
Me: "He's gay, not a pedophile."
Co-worker: "It's not that. It's just the kids being exposed to it."
Me: (I finally processed everything, stopped, swung my head around the back of the equipment rack): "He's not going to give them the fucking gay, Dave."

I was really insulted. Not for him being an asshole, because this is Texas. But I was insulted that I was assumed to be on the same wavelength as him solely because.... I don't know. I'm white? And that's really where the conversation went to after that. He didn't push the dumb-shit notion that gays molest children. No, he thought that merely by being exposed (my comment was "what fucking exposure? That he's polite and talks with his hands a lot) to a gay man, these god-fearing young Christians would be corrupted and/or turned gay.

[Oscar Wilde]

The average high schooler (at least the ones I know) can't seem to process supporting gay rights and not being gay. Or being straight and liking a band with gay members (Queen in this instance).

[tim31]

Then there's the ricecar fanboy idiot who thinks a stock Subaru WRX STI will beat a Corvette around a racetrack because the videogames say so. That is so laughably stupid that I don't even know where to start.

For one thing, there are a lot of different specs of Corvette. I don't need to tell you that driver skill is the critical factor in an unevenly matched circuit race. A skilled driver in a Miata could wreck an inexperienced Corvette driver around a technical circuit.

[Mayabird]

Ignorant people saying ignorant things, you say? That only describes my ENTIRE GODDAMN CHILDHOOD in rural georgia (may the true second coming - of Sherman, of course - burn it off the map). Everything from one of my math teachers in elementary school not understanding negative numbers to the girl who refused to believe in both tectonics plates and atomic nuclei because they weren't mentioned in the Bible to the racists who couldn't even use the proper epithets towards me, to every conceivable moment where someone says that Jesus said something when Jesus most certainly said nothing about it (one moment that comes to mind, some woman screaming, "Homosexuality is an abomination against God and the wickedest of sins!" You know who said that? Jesus said it!).

I could pull out quotes from my head if I wanted but this would take all day.

[Neko_Oni]

One of my friends was at a meet-and-greet kind of event for his teaching course.
Now my friend has Indian heritage, but the guy is pretty much a born and bred Aussie.
One of his lecturers came up to him to inform him about the choice of food on offer.

Lecturer: "Just thought I'd let you know that we have some vegetarian food over there."
Friend: "Okay, that's great."
Lecturer: "You know why I'm telling you right? We don't want you to be uncomfortable."
Friend: "Thanks?"
Lecturer walks off with, as my friend said, an "I did good thing today smile" on her face.
Friends look at each other like "what the fuck just happened?"
I guess she thought he was Hindu or something (and therefore vegetarian?) based purely on his appearance.
Apparently she's done it a few times.

[Solauren]

Here's a conversation from a public game of Left4Dead2:

Pub: "I'm grabbing a ninja sword."

Me: "It's called a Katana. You could say Samurai Sword if you wanted to sound slightly less ignorant."

Pub: "No dude, they call it a ninja sword. That's what it is. Ninjas used this kind of sword."

Maybe he was trolling me, but he acted like I shot his dog when I dared question his calling it a "ninja sword."

Let's face facts: the average internet gamer is a retard, but I remember this only because of how pissed he was at my comment.

In his defense, there is is a type of Japanese sword called a Ninja-tu. Depending on the hilt style, it can look like a Katana to the casual observer.

[Big Phil]

One of my friends was at a meet-and-greet kind of event for his teaching course.
Now my friend has Indian heritage, but the guy is pretty much a born and bred Aussie.
One of his lecturers came up to him to inform him about the choice of food on offer.

Lecturer: "Just thought I'd let you know that we have some vegetarian food over there."
Friend: "Okay, that's great."
Lecturer: "You know why I'm telling you right? We don't want you to be uncomfortable."
Friend: "Thanks?"
Lecturer walks off with, as my friend said, an "I did good thing today smile" on her face.
Friends look at each other like "what the fuck just happened?"
I guess she thought he was Hindu or something (and therefore vegetarian?) based purely on his appearance.
Apparently she's done it a few times.

Being Hispanic, I occasionally get similar things directed at me. I'm pretty good at either ignoring it or giving them a "are you a complete dumbass?" look depending on the situation.

My favorite... haven't been asked this in a while... is "where are you from?"
Me: "um... Seattle"
Them: "No, I mean where were you born?"
Me: "Seattle"

Depending on the person, I may answer the question they're really trying to ask, which is "what's your ethnicity?" but usually I just let them feel stupid.

The other good one I get, again haven't gotten this in a long time:
Them: "Where did you learn to speak English?"
Me: "Here"
Them: "Well, you don't have an accent."
Me: "Why would I have an accent? I was born here."

Again, depending on how annoying the person is and who they are, I might remind them that I'm a Seattle native while they're a fucking import whose only been here for five or ten years.

[aerius]

My favorite... haven't been asked this in a while... is "where are you from?"
Me: "um... Seattle"
Them: "No, I mean where were you born?"
Me: "Seattle"

I get that one a lot too, I speak with an accent so people assume that I learned English at a late age and therefore I must've immigrated here from some Asian country. Sometimes they don't believe me and go "really?" and I remember one time when I was particularly annoyed I said something like "no, not really, I was born in fucking Russia".

[CarsonPalmer]

For a memory exercise in my Education class, we had to list all 43 presidents in order, which was no problem for me because I knew them all off the top of my head. On the other hand, we had one FUTURE TEACHER list JEFFERSON DAVIS as the 17th fucking president of the United States. Following Abraham Lincoln. I almost had a heart attack thinking that this idiot will one day have a class of their own.

[Phantasee]

Then there's the ricecar fanboy idiot who thinks a stock Subaru WRX STI will beat a Corvette around a racetrack because the videogames say so. That is so laughably stupid that I don't even know where to start.

For one thing, there are a lot of different specs of Corvette. I don't need to tell you that driver skill is the critical factor in an unevenly matched circuit race. A skilled driver in a Miata could wreck an inexperienced Corvette driver around a technical circuit.

Isn't a WRX STI by definition not stock?

[aerius]

For one thing, there are a lot of different specs of Corvette. I don't need to tell you that driver skill is the critical factor in an unevenly matched circuit race. A skilled driver in a Miata could wreck an inexperienced Corvette driver around a technical circuit.

It doesn't really matter, even a base Corvette has something like 430hp and will go around a track way faster than most drivers can handle. Assuming equally skilled drivers, it'll spank the Subaru so hard that it's not even funny.

Isn't a WRX STI by definition not stock?

The WRX STI is the high performance version of the WRX. It's stock, as in you can buy one straight from the dealer. It's like how the Z06 and ZR1 are the high performance versions of the Corvette, they're all available staight from the factory, and are safety and emissions legal and all that other stuff. Of course they often don't stay stock for long as owners like to stuff all kinds of aftermarket performance mods into them.

[J]

A friend of mine told me that she knows someone who's currently living in a house in Florida who hasn't paid the mortgage for two years solid, and the bank won't foreclose because there's too much real estate already on the market. That is staggeringly stupid.

Wow, two years? That's crazy! I've heard many stories of people going over a year without making a single mortgage payment without being foreclosed, but two years? Wow. I wonder if people will start moving into the housing disaster states so they can take out a zero down mortgage, intentionally default, and then get a free home to live in for a few years.

[Master of Cards]

Oh god I go to "Rolla", its a college thats basically all Engineers and the like, so we're supposed to be really smart right?

One girl cited Ann Coulter on a paper

One guy claimed that studies that don't ask every person in the country what their religion is means they're wrong.

My Roommate and his friend

You see niggers are the annoying blacks. I make jokes about them, the average black man isn't a nigger, hell I had a black roommate we were cracking the jokes together!

Then theres the small ones of I like John Stewart but hes bad because hes Liberal, to removing funding for Lacrosse helmets to pay for more hockey practice time. (The helmets were falling apart and Hockey got more money then Lacrosse as it was)

[Oni Koneko Damien]

My girlfriend is about a year and a half way from going to grad school (majoring in paleontology with a focus in Precambrian crinoids and brachiopods), and we were having a lighthearted discussion on the idiocy of creationism. The boyfriend of one of our room-mates, who's rather fundamentalist christian and pretty much a scientologist in some of his beliefs as well, interrupted. He claimed that my girlfriend's professor/mentor didn't know what the hell he was talking about in regards to the fossil record. When informed that said professor received a Masters in invertebrate paleontology from Princeton, he claimed that a real paleontologist doesn't teach, they do lecture circuits, field work, and museum work.

This person also happens to be going to college at the time. An arts major, but still.

[ray245]

I've talked with some people who believe that losing the war from the strategic point of view is the same as losing individual engagement.

Additionally, I do remember some of my friends who thinks that a nuclear bomb going off in Burma would result in Singapore being destroyed by the nuclear fallout.

[RazorOutlaw]

I grew up in a much more socially conservative area and if I could remember most of what I was taught/heard I would have a veritable goldmine. But a few things that came to mind the moment I finished reading the OP:

"He better not grow up to be gay because if does I'll slap him it out of him!" - My father regarding my nephew of 1 and-a-half years of age.

"Too bad he'll never know the touch of a woman. It's a shame..." - My father regarding my girlfriend's gay friend.

And because Pennsylvania voted thoroughly for McCain I frequently have to hear whining about socialism and healthcare and/or global warming but I haven't heard the n-word once from any strangers.

[bobalot]

When correcting a work colleague about the scientific method and the difference between a theory and a hypothesis, because he was obviously making up the definitions on the spot. He came up with this whopper.

Gravity isn't a theory, it's a hypothesis.

[His Divine Shadow]

I was told Zlatan Ibrahimovic (famous swedish football player, born in sweden, immigrant parents) isn't a true swede because he chose a foreign name thus clearly indicating his preference for non-swedish culture.

Yeah man I chose my name too when I was born, totally, you're not utterly fucking dumb and insane or anything like that.

[hongi]

One of my friends was at a meet-and-greet kind of event for his teaching course.
Now my friend has Indian heritage, but the guy is pretty much a born and bred Aussie.
One of his lecturers came up to him to inform him about the choice of food on offer.

Lecturer: "Just thought I'd let you know that we have some vegetarian food over there."
Friend: "Okay, that's great."
Lecturer: "You know why I'm telling you right? We don't want you to be uncomfortable."
Friend: "Thanks?"
Lecturer walks off with, as my friend said, an "I did good thing today smile" on her face.
Friends look at each other like "what the fuck just happened?"
I guess she thought he was Hindu or something (and therefore vegetarian?) based purely on his appearance.
Apparently she's done it a few times.

My friend of Chinese heritage.

Person: So where are you from?
Friend: Here.
Person: No, I mean where are you from?
Friend: I was born here.
Person: But where were your parents born?
Friend: China.

The lady goes off, presumably satisfied knowing that my friend is 'Chinese'.

[Neko_Oni]

My friend of Chinese heritage.

Person: So where are you from?
Friend: Here.
Person: No, I mean where are you from?
Friend: I was born here.
Person: But where were your parents born?
Friend: China.

The lady goes off, presumably satisfied knowing that my friend is 'Chinese'.

My dad had a similar thing happen at one of the meetings at his university. One girl is an Australian Born Chinese. One person at the meeting asks her where she's from. She responds in a nasal north Queensland accent "Townsville" (near Cairns).