Misanthropy and the Superiority Complex

A superiority complex is not a simple problem, nor is it a convenient burden to carry around. While less obviously damaging than an inferiority complex, it certainly has ill latent effects, and because it is just that much harder to discern, possibly ultimately the more harmful of the two.

When I was younger, I did believe that general ability in comprehension was a higher order ability than, say, being able to pitch a ball really far. It was a simple sort of brains better than brawn sort of idea. To cut the history of my life short, everything I knew then about managing the issues of life, I learnt from playing chinese chess. Essentially, they were lessons on predicting what would happen next and preparing for it in advance by moving certain pieces into place, or sacrificing some if necessary. Of course, when I was 11, I could not clearly express these ideas, but they had become a habit of sorts.

Needless to say, I was not very popular at school. It was partly because my family was not from Singapore, nor am I really, and partly because I thought everyone else was strange in not understanding a great many things. Now, there weren't really a great many things, nor was it really strange given the different upbringings between me and my peers, but 11-year-olds lack that sort of perspective.

So since the people around didn't accept me, in the usual childish tit-for-tat, I couldn't care less about them either. After all, stupid is as stupid does. Obviously, intellectual capacity didn't bring along any emotional maturity whatsoever.

Then I made my way to RI as I had declared I would, and it was a completely different world. There were still many cultural differences to overcome in order to fit in a bit better, but at least everyone was intelligent. The curriculum was challenging, and the majority of us were struggling together, creating a sort of bond. On hindsight, I am not certain if that was the best thing for a child who was already not fitting into mainstream society. Obviously, testing into the GEP did not help at all.

So there I was innoculated in a culture of superiority. Look at it this way. You know you're in the best school in the country. Every other day they remind you you're the best, and that you should start acting like it. After 4 years, you don't think you're the best. You know it, like you know your own name. Of course, the emphasis was on scholastic and sporting achievement, which clearly is not everything, but what did I know then.

As I grew beyond those years, when I was in RJC, I came to realise that neither good grades or being a sportsman meant very much in the final analysis. It was nice, but I was not all. There were other gifts and talents in other people, outside of this secluded JC environment that had gone sterile.

And this entire idea of superiority lost the ground it stood upon. Being better at certain things did not make you altogether better, just better at certain things. Its a fine argument to say that certain abilities, like strategic thought, have more general applications and are thus more important, but that does not a general principle make.

And for a long while, it was a struggle to deal with an ingrained superiority complex that hinged on rejecting what this society emphatically states are the more important abilities to have. So not only did I have to wrestle my inner thoughts, I had to wrestle the societal norms bolstering those thoughts.

Only recently though, did I realise that the entire superiority complex, while real enough in itself, was merely a front. It covered something even deeper. Let us be more than crystal clear. Being smarter isn't everything. But it is an easy way to differentiate yourself from the vast majority of society when you don't like them. And honestly, the dislike was not because they were less intelligent.

The truth is that everyone wants to be accepted. And rejection develops resentment. Even after dealing with the resentment itself, the ingrained misanthropy still remains. And it is the misanthropy, more than anything, that is driving the problems with feeling superior.

So the final conclusion is a rather simpler and yet more profound mindset. I think, or feel, that Singaporeans are insular and unfriendly, often rather uncivilised, and dislike them on a general level. This is not to say all Singaporeans are like that, but I may be justified in saying that most are. And it was this unwelcoming, unfriendly side that I was first exposed to, which has far-reaching effects in my life.

Well, at least these things are now out in the open and can be better dealt with.

The writer tests in the 130 - 140 IQ range.
This probably justifies the smarter-than-thou complex on an empirical level.
But it is still wrong. That's all there is to it.