this post was submitted on 11 Dec 2025
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Showerthoughts

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A "Showerthought" is a simple term used to describe the thoughts that pop into your head while you're doing everyday things like taking a shower, driving, or just daydreaming. The most popular seem to be lighthearted clever little truths, hidden in daily life.

Here are some examples to inspire your own showerthoughts:

Rules

  1. All posts must be showerthoughts
  2. The entire showerthought must be in the title
  3. No politics
    • If your topic is in a grey area, please phrase it to emphasize the fascinating aspects, not the dramatic aspects. You can do this by avoiding overly politicized terms such as "capitalism" and "communism". If you must make comparisons, you can say something is different without saying something is better/worse.
    • A good place for politics is c/politicaldiscussion
  4. Posts must be original/unique
  5. Adhere to Lemmy's Code of Conduct and the TOS

If you made it this far, showerthoughts is accepting new mods. This community is generally tame so its not a lot of work, but having a few more mods would help reports get addressed a little sooner.

Whats it like to be a mod? Reports just show up as messages in your Lemmy inbox, and if a different mod has already addressed the report, the message goes away and you never worry about it.

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[–] ptz@dubvee.org 27 points 2 months ago (2 children)

There's nothing wrong with being ignorant. It just means there's opportunity for learning.

There's everything wrong with being willfully ignorant.

-- Me

[–] billwashere@lemmy.world 2 points 2 months ago

I wish I could upvote this 1000 times. I am ignorant of a lot of things but I’m willing to learn and even change my mind. Willful ignorance when someone chooses not to know something, even though the information is available, relevant to them, and often even presented directly to them but they plug their ears and go “la la la”.

[–] DandomRude@lemmy.world -3 points 2 months ago (2 children)

Then you obviously have a completely different understanding of ignorance than I do. By that I mean someone who doesn't want to know anything about a subject, or even someone who deliberately insists on their opinion against their better judgment.

So my understanding of ignorance is what you mean by willful ignorance. However, this may be because the term is defined differently in my native language (German): what you mention first is called "Unwissen" (not knowing) in German.

[–] ptz@dubvee.org 17 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago) (1 children)

Yes, what you're describing is what's called "willful ignorance" here.

"Ignorance" is used to mean simply "lack of knowledge" in most cases in English. It doesn't carry the negative connotation by itself.

[–] DandomRude@lemmy.world 5 points 2 months ago (1 children)

I'm leaving the post up anyway, because "Unwissen" is also a very significant problem, even though I actually meant deliberate ignorance in the sense of what is currently happening so prominently in the US.

[–] ptz@dubvee.org 2 points 2 months ago

Post title works as-is, at least IMO. You can always edit it if you want.

[–] foodandart@lemmy.zip 3 points 2 months ago

You are correct.

It is actually ignore-ance, with the removal of the e at the end of Ignore to form a new word..

To ignore something is a willful action of deliberate inattention.

[–] reddig33@lemmy.world 10 points 2 months ago

A lot of it is willfull ignorance.

[–] AmidFuror@fedia.io 6 points 2 months ago

I didn't know that.

[–] xpey@piefed.social 5 points 2 months ago

I feel like the people in power who take advantage of ignorance for purely selfish reasons is the root of the problem.

[–] shalafi@lemmy.world 4 points 2 months ago (1 children)

COVID taught me that all the knowledge in the world cannot overcome a certain mindset, and an alarming percentage of people are of that group. You can provide all the evidence and education in the world, and some people just can't be helped.

[–] DandomRude@lemmy.world 1 points 2 months ago

Yes, that's exactly what I mean by ignorance. It only occurred to me later that the term has a much more international meaning in my native language (German): what I meant was not so much a lack of knowledge, but the deliberate ignoring of facts, expert knowledge, or scientific standards out of selfish arrogance. I believe in English this is called willful ignorance - this distinction does not exist in German; for us, ignorance always means that someone deliberately ignores things because they simply do not suit them. And I think that this, or rather the fact that we allow it, is responsible for the precarious situation our world finds itself in today: people could and do know better, but they ignore the facts out of selfishness.

[–] OldGrayDog@lemmynsfw.com 4 points 2 months ago

Don't forget about greed, it's the root of every problem that humans have.

[–] Sanctus@anarchist.nexus 3 points 2 months ago

Well, ignorance loves company and misery is bliss.

[–] 1984@lemmy.today 3 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago) (1 children)

The trust in institutions is gone too since everyone lies constantly. Presidents, space agencies, governments, everyone.

Without any trust that those institutions are correct and honest, people wont want to learn from them.

And then you have the social media perception bubbles, with algorithms serving you more of what you like, reinforcing any beliefs you have.

And of course on top of this, gender wars where you turn genders against eachother, so each human becomes even more stupid, angry and alone.

Havent even had my second cup of coffee and im already dooming stuff. Lol.

[–] Peanutbjelly@sopuli.xyz 1 points 2 months ago

Not just gender wars. Divide and conquer is everywhere. If everyone is ignorant and unwilling to learn or communicate, all you have to do is send some 'representatives' to show how stupid and antagonistic [other progressive tribe] is. I keep thinking of when suddenly being anti-circumcision, including men, meant you obviously think male genital mutilation is worse than female genital mutilation, and you hate women. I'm sure a bunch of feminists were getting harassed by neo-incel advocates at the same time.

Couldn't talk about how weird it was, because if you were x/y tribe, you were default a nazi, and no we won't talk about how suddenly everyone advocating for education and social progress is a nazi fighting other progressives.

Bunch of other details on how this stuff changes the environments for progressive action, and how progressives will vacate and the war takes over the space for philosophy and communication.

But race war, or whatever thing people want to think is important for their niche, all you have to do is start a couple fires and point in the other direction. You'll have victim's of actual violence or harassment encouraging tribal behaviour that acts out violence that hurts stray innocent people from the other group, which legitimizes upset and violence back at the broader first progressive tribe. Yadda.

People were never taught how to communicate or learn on their own. We are way too hackable as a result.

Solidarity is important.

[–] possiblylinux127@lemmy.zip 2 points 2 months ago

That and emotional insecurity

[–] murmelade@lemmy.ml 2 points 2 months ago

We must teach everyone everything!