276 points

I remember reading that when national parks tried to make a ‘bear-proof’ trashcan, they found that there was a larger overlap between the smartest bear and the stupidest human to make a viable product.

I feel like it’s a similar situation here. The smartest kid and the stupidest adult are far more similar than we’d like to admit.

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85 points

Tbh I find it much more surprising that there’s an overlap of bears and stupid people than I do smart kids and dumb adults.

I’ve met an unfortunate amount of people that would struggle to dump water out of their boots with the instructions written on the bottom of the sole.

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42 points
*

Bears can be trained to drive cars and communicate through various means, it’s thought they may be as smart as great apes like gorillas. This is why they were a choice circus animal for a long time.

Yes, this should be terrifying information.

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25 points

They also shit in the woods & wipe their asses with bunny rabbits.

DON’T BELIEVE THE CHARMIN PROPAGANDA

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16 points
*

A bear on my road has learned to open cars by using the door handle. Pretty amazing. It got into mine, ate something sugary, and left with no damage other than mud absolutely everywhere.

Now I lock my car doors at night with respect for this boss bear.

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2 points

The right to arm bears…

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1 point

You can’t just get my hopes up and not give us a video of a bear driving a car!!

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12 points

It’s less idiocy and more laziness. Any amount of inconvenience is too much for a lot of humans, unfortunately.

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8 points
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… people that would struggle to dump water out of their boots with the instructions written on the bottom of the sole.

I love that analogy and need to commit it to heart. XD

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4 points

Why does dumping water out of boots have instructions? Isn’t it like dumping water out of any other container?

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10 points

It’s just a common way to call someone an idiot where I’m from 😅

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3 points

That last line is an absolutely brilliant insult. Love it.

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26 points

I think it’s more like: the maturest kids and the most immature adults.

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3 points

Yeah smart kids can be very immature

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19 points

Side note: the National Park Service has an awesome team running their social media accounts. Their posts are always hilarious and informative.

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6 points

Funny, I came here to make the exact same analogy. I totally agree - a mature kid and an immature adult have a lot of overlap.

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259 points

Nice try little Timmy, but I won’t be telling you how to pass as an adult.

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55 points

Because you are a kid and you don’t know but are pretending to be an adult. Nice try!

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That’s what a kid pretending to be an adult would say.

When I was your age, no kids did that, 'cause we had no damn internets back then. We had to actually walk outside to talk with others.

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11 points

Tell me more about this “outside”. Can I get it on Amazon?

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4 points

And now you’re here, arguing with kids, because you’re also a kid… Nice try.

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9 points

Everyone knows you hop on another kid’s shoulders and put on a trenchcoat, fedora, and sunglasses and gave the name Robert Businessman.

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188 points

Very confidently wrong, poor reading comprehension, poor grammar, limited vocabulary, emoji gore, catch phrase/pop culture quotes/talking points repeated with no comprehension of what they’re saying, clearly not aware of how many things in life work, religious regurgitation while being surprised everyone doesn’t agree with them. Very easily impressed with basic factual statements, clearly thinking confidence is the main thing that makes someone correct. Thinks their mom telling they they are handsome is a valid point. Idk, that’s all I got.

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77 points

Depending on what you meant by “very easily impressed with basic factual statements” it could go either way. I’m an adult and I’m happy to admit I don’t know a lot things, sometimes I’ve been stunned that what I believed was totally wrong and all it took was some to give me a basic fact to make me realise.

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12 points

+1

Ever since I was a wee flipflop I always liked to learn from my friends (and yes I was that gullible naive friend) but now even in my 20s it’s still fun to learn outside a classroom. I don’t have to worry about my terrible memory not keeping all the info, if it sticks it sticks

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3 points

Fun fact: Australia is wider than the diameter of the moon.

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5 points

Happy Cake Day!

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5 points

I’m an adult

🧐

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70 points
*

very confidently wrong

Lmao dude that’s just people in general especially on forums

There’s also nothing wrong with people learning new info, no matter how simple it may seem. That’s kind of a pretentious/egotistical way to operate.

Most of this list is actually pretty garbage. Emojis? Using slang/catch phrases? This is basic social stuff.

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7 points

You😆are🤓🤣wrong🤬😡! 💯💯👁️🍑👁️

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4 points

Got one

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0 points
*

What I wrote – Very easily impressed with basic factual statements

What you think it means – there’s something wrong with people who are learning new things.

Does ‘‘basic factual statements’’ mean ‘‘new information that someone is just now learning’’. Can it also apply to information they already know, or believe is true? Can it also be referring to basic knowledge nearly everyone knows?

Does ‘being very easily impressed’ include a situation where someone reacts to information in a typical fashion? Does it exclude adults learning or recognizing factual information and responding with a simple agreement, such as ‘yeah that’s true’? Or is this an indication that an overreacting response is the dead giveaway?

  1. Did the sentance make a claim something is wrong with being a child?

  2. Did the sentence claim that learning new information is likewise something wrong?

Please write one 5 sentance paragraph explaining your opinion on the above two numbered questions. Proofreading will not be necessary.

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8 points

Jfc no thanks bye dude

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37 points

Bonus: can also be applied to boomers.

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23 points

Boomers are just decrepit toddlers at this point anyway

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13 points

“Know why the call them baby boomers? Because all it takes is one little prick to their egos and boom! You’ve gotta baby!”

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6 points

Could be a new gameshow: Boomer or Toddler

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24 points

Huh

Hexbear is an 8/10 on this scale

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21 points

This is like reading a reverse horoscope - you’ve just thrown as many negative traits as you could think of at the wall, knowing at least a few will stick.

Nothing on your list couldn’t also apply to an adult, especially those most privileged and entitled in society.

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20 points

By these standards, most of my adult relatives are actually children.

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2 points

It’s like I tell my kids, an adult is just a child who got old. It’s also why a lot of cultures have a concept of adulthood that has nothing to do with reaching sexual maturity alone.

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14 points

So every boomer on facebook. Got it.

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2 points

Those first two…and a couple others, also apply to a lot of adults I have had political conversations with the past several years…

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126 points
*

Extreme/insane positions on everything. Not just one or two insane positions, not just political extremism; when I say everything I mean EVERYTHING. No nuance allowed. And it has to be fully sincere, otherwise you are dealing with a Jreg.

There are milder versions of this, but I have rarely met a child that didn’t have a strongly held insane belief formed from their limited experiences. My favorite was a kid who told me that eating pasta supports fascism because it comes from Italy, so loving Italian products means you support Mussolini. Pizza is fine, though, because that’s American.

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126 points

I don’t think there is a “dead giveaway”. Plenty of kids can pass as adults online and plenty of adults seem like kids online. And sometimes with stuff like word usage/grammar/etc you can’t tell if it’s a child or someone who doesn’t speak English very well or maybe an English-speaking adult who happens to type like that. There’s a lot of different people in the world.

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37 points

Yeah seriously, every time someone makes a generalization online “that subreddit is all 12 year olds anyway”, “r/teenagers is mainly grown me”, it really bothers me because no, you’re just overconfident in estimating people’s ages from text

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9 points

frfr m8

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25 points
*

I imagine that part of it comes down to motivation. I pretended to be an adult on a special-interest forum when I was twelve years old because I needed an escape from my miserable existence. At that time, I had no control over my life and every morning I woke up meant I had a new chance for traumatic shit to happen. I desperately needed to be someone else, so I took my time, researched shit, and avoided any conversation where I might be outed. I’m sure I didn’t fool everyone, but I got some shocked responses when I went back as an adult and owned up to it.

Kids doing it for the authority boost or just as a childish fancy will be easier to spot. Kids doing it as a coping mechanism for their horrible lives will probably blend in a lot better.

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4 points

I can’t get over ironically using stupid lingo, without being good at presenting it as ironic use…so I often seem like a child. I am certainly bad at forming sentences that are not stream of thought (with weird punctuation like parentheses containing clarification…like this…and overused ellipsis…)

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3 points
*

It’s interesting to meet someone else who also struggles with an overuse of parentheses and ellipses (I didn’t know what they were called, thanks for that!).

This is a complete shot in the dark, but do you also happen to be on the spectrum? (I have nothing to base this on expect my theory that overclarification could be more common among neurodivergent people)

Edit: ellipsis -> ellipses

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4 points
*

Add to your knowledge- they are ellipses. A single … is an ellipsis. Many words that end in “is” are pluralized as “es”

This is pronounced like iss versus eeze.

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4 points

I don’t present as on the spectrum, but I was diagnosed with ADHD when I was a kid. I haven’t suffered from it much as an adult. I have heard that the parenthetical over clarification and typing as your thoughts would flow naturally is a sign of Autism in particular. I can control it when I focus, but if I am ranting it comes out in force.

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1 point
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I have found the gen xers are the WORST at texting and writing in general. At least the ones I know.

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3 points

I would die without autocorrect. I grew up with “mom, how do I spell (word)” and getting “sound it out”, witch werks grate in Inglish…

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1 point

I grew up getting “Look it up!” and I still can’t spell for shit.

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1 point

Ever watch a kid who grew up after smartphones try to type?

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