/lit/ - Literature

Who has actually said that ? He isn't even a writer; he's a comedian and an actor, you twonk.

>>3789841
sorry

>>3789835
Not his fault that people need an ass to kiss. He seems like a nice enough guy to me with a nice sense of humour. The Oscar Wilde comparison comes more from him being a gentlemanly homosexual public figure that is relatively well read and well spoken.

The term pseudo-intellectual is best reserved for posers and try-hards. Fry isn't one of those.

I wouldn't say he's a pseudo-intellectual

He's obviously a very clever guy, but certainly doesn't even approach being one of the world's foremost thinkers in any sphere of activity

If he wasn't on television he'd just be an investment banker or run-of-the-mill college professor or something

I should add that his book The Ode Less Travelled is a pretty good intro to writing poetry

>>3789851
I'm inclined to agree, although sometimes his behaviour on social media fdsfdsafasfdsddd
that could be attributed to his bipolar or generational shit though.

please let me be angry at something /lit/

>>3789835
I don't think you understand what the term means and how it is used. You could make a case for elitist, I don't think he is, but you could make a case for it. But Pseudo-Intellectual has different components to it.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_vafxnkWndI

what the other dudes said, he isnt a tryhard, thus not pseudo-intellectual. besides he is an intelligent fella. and an hillarious one too.

>>3789866
I have probably 404'd some amazingly thoughtful and intelligent discussion with my artificial loathing, my attempt to spark some sort of angry circle-jerk has fallen flat on it's face and now I lie twitching in a sticky pool of pre-cum borne out of melancholic frustration. I am more the pseudo-intellectual than Fry ever was. ;~;

captcha: onofAPa dered

Not a pseudo-intellectual, but not super smart either. Honestly the most annoying thing to me about him (and I know this is irrational) is how mentally healthy he seems. He has that confidence that a locally famous pastor might have, where he knows he is looked up to by a small sect but at the same time he has God on his side, so he has the validation of doing "the right thing" with his life. I don't know. I tend to get a bit envious when I see smart people who aren't also incredibly damaged or horrible in some way.

>>3789880
He does have bipolar disorder but you're right, he always seems so cheerful and bright in public in a way that can be kind of irritating in an almost envious kind of way.

>>3789880
Maybe he feels euphoric.

>>3789880
>>3789881
Oh Don't worry, you're not obligated to like him in any way. But pseudo-intellectual is more about authenticity and sincerity.
Say if somebody was a Calculus professor, but he was a jerk, you wouldn't use Pseudo-intellectual against him, because he really is as knowledgeable about Mathematics as he seems to be. But that's a judgement on his personality for or against him, Fry seems to genuinely be an intellectual. But that judgement doesn't extend to his personality either for or against him.

>>3789857
If you want insufferable cunts from British soil you always have Dawkins and Hitchens.

>>3789835
What about a bit of good old-fashioned class resentment in this thread?

I actually haven't lived in England for twelve years now, so I think I probably only caught the very early stages of his resistible rise to ubiquity.

But from what I know of him he appears to be living proof that the English haven't really moved on at all from the days when the lord of the manor used to take a stroll around the town after Sunday service and receive all the little hommages of flowers and prize turnips from people who, long after universal suffrage, still behaved pretty much like his serfs.

The persona that Fry markets very successfully seems to involve the personal trademarking of all the stock characteristics and qualities that the English have fetishized and assigned to the resented but secretly admired "toff" for hundreds of years.

He's passably literate when set up next to some lager-swilling chav from Lewisham Broadway, so this automatically makes him "the unthinking man's Thinking Man", the one all the Great Unwashed look to when it"s a matter of forming an opinion on when and when not to use "whom" or whether the Harry Potter books are any good or not.

Perhaps most importantly of all for his role in sustaining and renewing the grand old English forelock-tugging tradition is that his public persona also comprises just a tincture of the other, "Hellfire Club" element - that is, the real "old school" murder and rapine element - of the discreet charm of the British aristocracy. You only have to look through a few Internet chatboards to see what major props he gets for having spent time in prison.

I think THAT is the most unmistakable of all the signs here of the fundamentally spineless and willingly subservient nature of the "common folk" of England. They watch their own sons and daughters branded for life and destroyed by the penal system and then tilt their heads coyly with a condoning little smirk at this convicted thief whose criminal record, because

>>3789933
he went to the right preparatory school, was swiftly swept under the carpet.

His criminality, however, is only an open secret and a major element in the "love" felt for him by the "common folk". The British like their "toffs" to be slightly criminal. It feeds their disgusting but ineradicable nostalgia for the days when the 'toffs" used to come around regularly and rape their daughters and burn their homes.

>>3789880
If there is one person who's not confident or mentally healthy, it's Fry. He just does everything he can to try and hide his fears and pain from the public eye, because he's the sweetest person ever and doesn't want to impose what he views as his own petty problems unto the public. Unless he does it for a reason, like raising awareness for bipolarity.

Yes, people worship him as some God, but he is the first to keep everyone's feet on the ground. He just reads a lot, has a good memory and loves to express himself through beautiful and interesting language. He's always been very frank about that. Fry is the example of how we can all be knowledgeable and cultured if we want to. To me, that is his best feature: he tries to inspire others.

>>3789939
And you're an example of how utterly, childishly duped the English remain by the aristocracy and plutocracy's measures to pretty up and obscure a little the obvious savagery and brutality of their continued social dominance.

Fry is "the proof that we can all be knowledgeable and cultured if we want to be".

Bullshit. What he's the proof of is that, if you are born into the class that has a monopoly over the signs and symbols of culture, it will be almost impossible for you NOT to take your well-rewarded place in the "culture industry" no matter how intellectually mediocre or morally corrupt you turn out to be.

>>3789948
>muh marxism

fuck off. put some effort in and you might land a decent job hippie.

>>3789948
I don't know, Fry is a throwback, but not that far, and isn't the biggest problem the miss-identification of the real sources of modern day corruption and oppression. We take a swing at the gentry and the aristocracy of the past and wipe our brows feeling as if a job's well done, meanwhile the plutocrats are fucking us in the ass.
I don't mind Fry and the sort of romanticization of the cambridge elite manor-born schtick, I'm concerned abut the multinational corporations and government corruption, and having a go at the gentry just seems like a decoy from that.

>>3789910
Hitchens, yes, Dawkins, I'm not sure. Hitchens' polemics almost always dissolved into Hitchens basically calling the opposition retarded. They usually were, of course, but that's not the point.

Why don't you like Dawkins?

all I know ft or sure is he is a rapist

>>3789981
>Why don't you like Dawkins?

He's an idiot when it comes to anything that isn't related to science.

>>3789996
He's right about Islam, though. I consider myself very liberal, except in regard to gender politics and religion. Were you referring to the Islam debate?

>>3789881
this is somewhat ignorant. I literally just watched a documentary he did about bipolar and despite his jovial exterior, he suffers from pretty chronic depression. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rGDl6-lyfMY
and having said that, Fry and Laurie is hilarious

>>3789955
This is a measure of the extent to which, in our glorious new millenium, the ruling class have succeeded in making the working classes their willing and enthusiastic bitches.

In a thread about a guy who went to one of the most exclusive preparatory schools in England, then went to PRISON, but was still only tut-tutted at when he got out and was allowed to follow the fixed and predetermined path of his class to one of England's most exclusive universities.....this fucking idiot starts singing the praises of EFFORT.

Bend over a little lower, idiot. There may be a few orifices your masters haven't watched you fuck yourself in yet.

>>3789981
I don't like the sort of barely controlled petty aggression of the meek that he portrays. He's a very frustrated little man with a very nasty and hostile demeanour. Mean cunt of a marine bird. Also any objection of him against religion that I've witnessed is tiresome and often of very little philosophical value. He's like an angry Donny constantly out of his element.

>>3790006
To be honest, you don't really need to provide much evidence to posit why Islam is bad, not that I'm saying it's much worse than any other religion; they're all terrible. The notion of religion is terrible .

>>3789933
>>3789936
This is pretty funny if you read it in his voice.

The only good thing he's done is probably Blackadder,

>>3790000
Yeah, but the double standards not done up by class anymore (well it is, but what I'm trying to say is that the classes aren't decided by birth/station/schooling,) It's pure capital now. If you have the money than you live under a different set of rules. Fry is more of a representation of when those things established class. Now it's purely wealth, oppression's been completely democratized, the nouveau riche get to fuck the working class just as much as the old guard.

Requesting videos of him fucking up the last lines of Ulysses and the Tristan chord.

>>3789948
>Implying I am English
>Implying I give a single fuck into what class he was born.

Seriously Comrade, it's not the 1890's anymore. I know plenty of upper and middle class people that do nothing with the luxuries and opportunities they have. Well, shame on them. But just as much shame on the working classes and chavs that want to throw away their lives complaining about how they were born at a disadvantage.

I was born in a family with many financial disadvantages, yet now I am the first to attend uni. Fry was one of the people that inspired me to work hard on broadening my intellectual horizon. I know he is a similar inspiration to many other people. Because no matter where he was born, he's a friendly guy that wants to share the knowledge he obtained in just the same ways that I obtain it: by reading, developing yourself culturally, being interested and open minded.

Stop crying about classes and look at what people do with their lives, regardless of what name their have. It will make your world a lot brighter and more interesting.

>>3790029
It's true that financial capital transforms into cultural capital more quickly in England now than it did 200 years ago, and MUCH more quickly than it did 500 years ago, when "blood" still meant something that money couldn't change. Fry himself is definitely nouveau riche. As far as his personal biography is concerned, it is laughable and despicable to talk about his having made an "effort". He couldn't possibly fail, from the time he was sent to a 500-year-old preparatory school at age 8. But his grandparents were Czech Jews.

That said, though, what he stands for and embodies, personally, are the institutions in England which perpetuate and protect undeserved privilege and a system that is essentially profoundly callous and cruel. He should not be a model for anybody, in anything.

>>3790043
Then you're an idiot for hitting on Fry, of all people, to be "inspired" by.

Why?

I can understand how someone hoping to broaden their intellectual horizons might be inspired by either one or another of two sorts of people

(i) someone who, even from a basis of privilege, has succeeded in producing a genuinely impressive body of artistic or scholarly work.

or

(ii) someone who may have only achieved a moderate level of culture, but has done so against tremendous odds, working their way up from nowhere.

But Fry is neither of these. He is someone who was given every possible advantage but never made use of it to become a serious scholar, serious novelist or serious actor. His non-fiction writings are chatty, journalistic fluff, his novels lightweight, paperback-market pablum, and his films are unambitious Channel 4 funded fluff.

>>3790047
There are two kind of privileged people: people like Cameron and Osborne that don't know what it's like to have to fight for something and in no way put in any effort to consider those who were not so lucky.

And then there are people like Fry. People that are perfectly aware of how lucky they were and are the first to insist on them being lucky. These are the kind of people that want to share what they were able to achieve through privilege by making it available to the less lucky people. That's why Fry does what he does, to spread around the passion for arts, culture and knowledge that is inherent to being born in his background and get others into contact with it as well.

>>3790066
So in the end, it's all about YOU CAN'T LIKE WHAT I DON'T LIKE after all, eh?

Did you really have to take such a silly detour? You could have been clear about it from the start. Instead you tried to pass of your petty frustrations as a political and moral question. What did you hope to achieve with that? Don't you know that shallowness always shines through?

>>3790043
>Implying I am English
>Using terms like chav and Uni
Please.

I agree with him on the class struggle. I just think Fry is a poor target. When there are so much better examples out there.
Fry was the recipient of tremendous privilege, but isn't really doing anything to perpetuate that privilege. His intellectualism and character sort of romanticizes the old "Cambridge Elite" but in the end it's probably harmless.

Meanwhile there are those out there who are actively protecting and enhancing class privilege.It's a serious problem

>>3790087
Okay, poor choice of wording on my part in regards to supporting my own point. But not English though

He seems like a nice bloke and he's quite funny. What more do you want from your family entertainers?

>Stephen Fry
>Neil deGrasse Tyson
>Richard Dawkins
>Carl Sagan

>>3789851
This pretty much sums up how I feel about him. He's very well spoken in a way that is comparative to Wilde. I guess the homosexuality could apply as well, though I didn't immediately draw that conclusion. Is he actually gay or is he just really passive and British? Honest question.

It's a common error of judgement in our society that knowledge is synonymous with intelligence. This is far from the case.

>>3790155
he's openly gay

>>3790155
He actually is homosexual, and when you play Oscar Wilde in a movie and have several traits in common with him in real life, you're going to get comparisons, it's just inevitable. Imagine if a social recluse played Thomas Pynchon.

>>3790183
>Imagine if a social recluse played Thomas Pynchon.
What would a movie about Pynchon even be about?

>>3790183
Ah, Thanks. I was just checking some of his bio and he's presented as a big Oscar Wilde fan as well. I can see how making the comparison can be justified.

He's not a pseud, he's a good writer. His book on poetry is excellent, really got me into poetry.

>>3790191
The Ode Less Traveled By? Or does he have more poetry books? I was thinking of picking that up.

>>3789998
>He's right about Islam, though

He's absolutely not right about Islam and acts as a mouthpiece for Western Imperialism, Western Imperialism that has killed hundreds of thousands, if not millions, more innocent people than radical Islam ever has. His diatribes are often drenched in racial undertones, and he betrays a severe historical ignorance every time he says that no Muslim country has ever produced anything of cultural or human importance. He's got the same understanding of the Quran as a fifteen year old soccer jock, and he's only one man in a long history of "scientists" who use the framework of their profession to make completely unfounded, racist claims under the guise of objectivity. He's a twat who, to my knowledge, hasn't even contributed that much to the field of knowledge anyway.

>>3790203
>field of scientific knowledge

>>3790202
That's the one. It was very good.

>>3790203
> he betrays a severe historical ignorance every time he says that no Muslim country has ever produced anything of cultural or human importance.

When and where has he said this?

>he's only one man in a long history of "scientists" who use the framework of their profession to make completely unfounded, racist claims under the guise of objectivity.

If by racist you mean dismissing religion as harmful to a society than yeah, he does that.

>>3790203
>to my knowledge, hasn't even contributed that much to the field of knowledge anyway.
Dawkins has contributed to science. It's just that his anti-theological side-pursuits often cloud that. You see a marked difference in his demeanor in print, than when he is speaking, and I think in his zeal against zealots he misrepresents the contributions of Arabic cultures to scientific achievement and history.
But if we use his anti-religious agenda to dismiss his academic work, than we are committing the same sin that he was when he dismissed the contributions of Arabic countries.

>>3790234
>>3790203
Please don't confuse race and religion, it pisses the hell out of secular Arabs. of which there are a large number.

>>3790203
All those who oppose Islam are Western imperialists, even when they have always been strongly opposed to the most obvious acts of Western imperialism in the past twenty years.

>>3790269
Wow, either you are a troll or really misinformed.
For the first part, western and eastern are no longer meaningful labels in terms of culture, politics or philosophy. There's been just too many cross-cultural events and constructs, secondly I don't see how all who oppose Islam could possibly considered to be western imperialists in light of things like the Pakistani-Indian aggression, or Chinese, Korean and Japanese reactions to Islam.
I'd love to have someone explain how a Hindu rejecting the spread of Islam could be considered western imperialism.

Furthermore, I can't tell you from my own experience how grating it is for Islam and Arabic culture to be confused with each other. All I can tell you is that I have a friend who is a secular man of Arabic descent, whose family is also secular (well, mostly secular) and I can tell you, he hates it.

>>3790269
Islam is just as expansionist as we are. Don't be a hypocrite.

>>3790203
>He's a twat who, to my knowledge, hasn't even contributed that much to the field of knowledge anyway.
Your knowledge is severely limited, then. The crucial argument of his book The Selfish Gene revolutionized the way biologists conceptualize genetics. While it's not the end-all be-all of late 20th century scientific ideas, it did change the way almost every textbook on evolution in the world was composed. His work in evolutionary theory and ethology cannot be denied as highly influential, both through confirmation and criticism of his ideas. He and a handful of other biologists are the cornerstone of what's usually called neo-Darwinism.

>>3790380
I forgot to add that it's incredibly stupid, I mean mind-boggling in its naivete, to just assume Oxford, one of the (if not the most) prestigious centers of higher learning in the world, hands out tenure in its science departments to people who contributed nothing to their respective fields.

>>3790380
http://www.science20.com/gadfly/extended_phenotype_how_richard_dawkins_got_it_wrong_twice-46661

>>3789933

>from Lewisham Broadway

I live in Lewisham. No such place called Broadway here.

He's a clever guy but not the point of being remarkable.

He is a decent writer, filmmaker, comedian and actor. Not great at any but pretty good. He's better read than most and is able to quote well.

But I don't associate him with pseudo-intellectualism. While some people do attribute qualities to him that he doesn't deserve (people treat him as an authority on English), he himself admits his shortcomings. In his biography he goes on about how he is just able to memorise trivia well, not a sign of cognitive ability. Similarly, that in exams he only got a 2.1 and only passed because he realised there was a template examiners liked in all exams.

I don't think he boasts himself up to be more intelligent or profound than he is.

That all said, anyone here actually read one of his novels?

>>3790401
>http://www.science20.com/gadfly/extended_phenotype_how_richard_dawkins_got_it_wrong_twice-46661

> I’ll start with “Darwinian purpose”. There is no such thing. Natural selection has no purpose.

Dropped right there. Not only does he claim that Dawkins dismisses Epigenetics, which he doesn't. The article claims that Dawkins doesn't understand one of the most basic principles of Evolution. ie that evolution is rudderless and not an expression of a path from one organism to another, but is instead an expression of the effects of the environment on a creature's development.

This is inexcusably lazy. The author of this article took two words "Evolutionary Purpose" out of context, deliberately misconstrued them into something they could use to attack Dawkins with. This is the source you would have us consider, to prove to us that Dawkins has no scientific value.
"He doesn't have any scientific value, because I found an article on-line attacking him."

I haven't read the Extended Phenotype, but I've read The Selfish Gene, and this was just a lazy article, this was just shoddy work.
And I'm sorry if I'm being harsh on you for the source you dropped. But it's not enough to find examples of his work being criticized, the criticisms have to make sense.

He's very polemic in public, you can accuse him of arrogance and dismissiveness, you can make a case for him being rude and disrespectful. But you can't just go around saying "Oy, and I bet he's a crap scientist too." without some support. Because that's not how science works. Someone being a jerk doesn't invalidate his academic accomplishments.

>>3790401
Uh-huh.
>His work in evolutionary theory and ethology cannot be denied as highly influential, both through confirmation and criticism of his ideas.
Selection theory has a lot of controversy. Dawkins isn't perfect. Dawkins' work isn't perfect. That website has numerous polemics against him, too. None of them contradict what I said. He's contributed quite a bit to his field of study. His fame as a shit-stirrer is more deserved than as an academic, but that doesn't mean he "hasn't contributed that much." He's a prominent figure in any debate on evolution today.

>>3790203
>Western Imperialism that has killed hundreds of thousands, if not millions, more innocent people than radical Islam ever has.

I want to stay out of these kind of debates, not because they don't interest me, but because people get personal and stray off from a search of any genuine truth.

I just want to say that it doesn't really matter what others, like the West, have done when we look at radical islam.

The crusades were amoral as well, and had little to do with Christianity, and it's pretty much the same with extreme fundamental islamists.

I think the first reason this discussion is empty of any value, is that it's bound to be ruined if someone enters who have a passion for a world with either religion or non-religion.

>>3790472
No, I'm familiar with his work on telly and I was actually in the middle of his poetry book when I had to drop it to read something for research, I'll get back to it soon.
But yeah, Op's wrong. Pseudo-intellectual is a 14 yr old anorak reading Byron, Keats and Browning and saying that his favorite book is Ulysses. When it's a 55 year old Cambridge Alum its not really pseudo-intellectual. You can call it elitist or snobby, but it's sincere elitism or snobbery. Pseudo-Intellectualism always has a component of artifice.

He's the stupid man's stereotype of an educated man. Not sure if that's good or bad

From what I understand and this is coming from something he said in one of those Big Think videos: his only real experience with philosophy is reading Bertrand Russell's A History of Western Philosophy, which is just... urgh...

He may very well be an incredibly smart man, he certainly comes across that way. But for so many of his fans to cream themselves over his intellect in the way they do is a little presumptuous, to be honest.

>>3790525
I wonder how smart Paxman is.

>>3790525
Yeah, but it's no good busting the image that other people have about him. It's only fun when you burst someone's own inflated ego. If someone is seen by others to be an intellectual, but is acting like a bro. You just don't feel like wasting the effort to criticize him, like you would if everybody was treating him like an intellectual but he was acting like a dick. And with his Bipolar condition he's unlikely to start getting a swelled head now.
He seems to be genuinely well read but not contributing anything important academically.
He's basically what most of /lit will be in forty years.

>>3790010
My point is mostly that Dawkins is a shit representative for any atheist cause because he's such a neurotic spiteful cunt.

>>3790510
Peter Hitchens called him "a stupid person's idea of a clever person". He's right, but it's not Fry's fault.

>>3790766
He's not and I'm not sure why any thinking person would trust Peter Hitchens to provide an accurate character assessment of a gay atheist. Lets look at a summary of his opinion on Stephen Fry:

http://hitchensblog.mailonsunday.co.uk/2012/04/stephen-fry-a-stupid-persons-idea-of-what-an-intelligent-person-is-like.html

The second to last paragraph is the killer - it can basically be summarised as "Stephen Fry and I got in a debate about how terrible atheism is. I will spare you the details but of course all of his arguments were stupid and fallacious and he was proved wrong and he knew it but wouldn't admit it because he is so ignorant and I'm so clever."

Its Alan Partridge level delusion.

>>3790528
Good general knowledge and confident. He's no polymath though.

>>3790234
>>3790208
>>3790241
>>3790380
>>3790490
hows the propaganda treating you?

>>3790944
I don't understand what you mean by this.
Would you care to elaborate or was it meant as a joke?

>>3790901
I can't stand Peter Hitchens, I just meant that he's right. I love Fry but too many idiots are all "Stephen Fry 4 PM" etc. and it's quite cringeworthy.

>>3790901

So, we can conclude that you have sucked Fry's cock. Right?

>>3790901

I don't dislike Fry, and he seems to be an intelligent and pleasant man. What I think is the problem is his legions of rabid fans who blow his intelligence out of proportion and are convinced that everything he says is profound and 100% true. I doubt he himself thinks he's a genius.

>>3789835
>those fucking stonewall banners.

These are all over buses in Brighton. You'd think this would be the one place in the UK where they are entirely redundant.

>>3790992
There's direct correlation between homosexuality and homophobia.

>>3790980
>>I don't dislike Fry, and he seems to be an intelligent and pleasant man

So, Hitchens' dictum stands: Stephen Fry - A Stupid Person's idea of What an Intelligent Person is Like.

>>3790961
Yes, some people are over the top in their praise. That doesn't mean he's not intelligent, as Peter Hitchens suggests.

>>3790962
Obviously. I mean, anyone who finds a Daily Mail columnist objectionable must be some sort of liberal islamic atheist Eurocrat bleeding heart Guardian reading faggot.

>>3791024
As opposed to Hitchens himself, an intelligent person's idea of what a stupid person is like.

>>3791037

So, we can conclude that you'd prefer to be considered smart by the pleb than a pleb by patricians. Right?

>>3791037
>>Protestant conservative hurr durr awful and automatically an idot

Nice fedora, kid.

>>3791055
When the only difference is in how you are received and not how you are then who gives a shit?

>>3791057
>Implying that protestant conservatives don't think Peter Hitchens is stupid.
>hurgh fedoras and neckbeards lol ngh

>>3791055
I wouldn't prefer either. But given that Peter Hitchens is a massive pleb and he thinks Stephen Fry is stupid, that's not really an issue for Mr Fry.

>>3790962
>sasha grey
love that cunt. would drink whisket with and laugh about monetising plebs with

>>3791073

Intellectual quality is not a matter of majorities.

;)

>>3791093
Of course not. A man must be judged by his deeds, and anyone who reads the garbage written by Peter Hitchens and judges it to be the work of an intellectual has either never read the work of an intellectual or has recently suffered a debilitating brain aneurysm and has my sincere condolences.

>>3789880

He's manic-depressive and has attempted suicide via carbon-monoxide poisoning.

i think you're forgetting that he's both an actor and a comedian and these are going to factor into the way he presents himself.

>>3791109

Oh please, share with us Fry's intellectual deeds, i.e. his contributions to the betterment of human intellect.

>>3791160
That's a question better addressed to one of the people saying Stephen Fry is intelligent. I haven't read any of his writings so I'm not in a position to argue either for or against his intelligence.

My contention was the Peter Hitchens is not intelligent. Demanding proof of Stephen Fry's intelligence is not a rebuttal to that argument.

>>3791174

Fair enough. I stand corrected. Please provide proof that Peter Hitchens has not contributed to the betterment of human intellect.

Then we can make a comparison and judge if Hitchens has the credentials to belittle Fry.

>>3791244
It's not possible to prove that he hasn't contributed to the betterment of human intellect. Rather, that he hasn't is the null hypothesis - when someone shows me something of intellectual value that Peter Hitchens has written I will stand corrected.

>>3791160
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LrIHw0fZNOA

>>3791160
See, this is the problem, calling Fry a pseudo-intellectual based on his contributions to academia. When that's not his image. his image is of someone who is well-read and intelligent. It's like if someone was purported to be a connoisseur of fine wine and cheeses, and someone said "Oh yeah? where is his vineyard? Where is his dairy?

>>3791273

Weren't you the anon who implied Hitchens was considered stupid by intelligent people? That assertion requires backing it up with a proof that Hitchens is stupid in comparison to intelligent people.

By no means I will defend Hitchens. Heavens no! Though I consider him way more intellectually consistent and productive than Fry, who is, well, a buffoon worshiped by many as some sort of new genius.

>>3791295

I thought we were talking here about his image as the new Oscar Wilde.

>>3791306
If you seek proof of his stupidity, I would suggest you start with his Mail on Sunday columns.

>>3791349

I've read some and I disagree with plenty of his conclusions. However, when I check his line of thought, I can see that he has a structured process of thought and at least tries to construct his opinions.

On the other hand, all I can hear from Fry are common places --when he speaks about politics.

I will not defend Hitchens, as I said. I will only say that it annoys me that a guy who intellectually tries, like him, is the laughing stock while Fry, who is all about clichés, is worshiped by the masses.

>>3791318
Well that can't even be analyzed until it's more properly defined.
If all it takes is being a gay intellectual poet who was once imprisoned, than he's got it down. But he's neither a playwright nor is he Irish, and he's completely failed at dying at the age of 46, which you'd think would be the easy part.
We know he's a great admirer of Oscar Wilde and he played him in a movie. He's also a comedian, so could be considered to be witty.
So frankly, yes, he's got enough of a connection with Oscar Wilde for people to compare the two. But that doesn't mean he's as intelligent or as good an artist as Oscar Wilde or that he is worthy of inheriting his legacy. But then again, I don't know who was suggesting he was.
He's like Oscar Wilde, but who is it that is suggesting he's the next Oscar Wilde. Cause Wilde died in 1900 the "next Oscar Wilde" has probably come and gone.

>>3791372
>who was once imprisoned, than he's got it down
I think there's some difference between breaking rocks for two years and being a young offender on remand whose mummy brings in crossword puzzles.

>>3791425
There's immense difference, but the point stands. Until we know what OP meant with
>the modern Oscar Wilde everyone else says he is.
How are we supposed to evaluate the claim?
He's got some qualities in common with Oscar Wilde, but that doesn't mean he's as good as Oscar Wilde, and the main thrust of OP's complaint is not what Fry makes of himself, but what other people make him out to be.
And it's hard not to be dismissive of that, and say. "So what?" "So he's not as intelligent as the public thinks he is." "What's your point?"

"The new X" is just a nice line for the media. Stop making so much out of it. Every cunt who's some cunt always gets compared to another cunt.

>>3790269
you are either deluded or a cynical liar; F for Effort