Life — November 6, 1931 — page 6: what you’re looking at

What you’re looking at

# Analysis of "Is It More Fun To Be A Moron?" This satirical article argues *against* valuing intelligence, using absurdist humor. The main cartoon shows a tall man in formal dress looking down at a tiny child, captioned "And how are you this morning, Charles?" The joke appears to be about physical stature—the adult towers over the child—but the article's title suggests the irony: society might prefer unintelligence because smart people cause problems (stock market crashes, etc.). The text references the "average mental age" of Americans as 14.06 years and sarcastically proposes solutions like intelligence tests with financial rewards, suggesting such systems are impractical and society functions better with widespread mediocrity. The humor relies on inverting conventional wisdom about intelligence being desirable.