Booboisie

Booboisie is a word that has virtually disappeared from the commonly-used American vocabulary.  It was invented about eighty-odd years ago by H. L. Mencken, who coined the phrase of "booboisie" as an ignorant guy from the heartland of America....who thinks he's smart enough to participate in Democracy (mostly by voting).....attempting to have bourgeoisie values (having status, money, class, or intellectual abilities beyond the lower class.

Mencken kinda had a view of most Americans being unable to comprehend the abusive nature of political figures, and their ability to promise you anything.....to get your vote.

Most people in America today....would be classified as potential members of the booboisie-class.  I think Mencken would find himself a seat in an airport, a city park, a studio audience, or a city-hall meeting.....to observe people trying to manipulate democracy to work for their agenda or goals.  Some might be for the better of mankind, and some might be only introduced to get your kid to add seven and seven.....to eventually get to the potential of equaling fifteen (by a mythical magical formula).

H. L. Mencken once said that "Democracy is the theory that people think they know what they want, and they want it good and hard."  I suspect he'd seen a great deal of democracy at work, and knew it's general results were a mixed bag.

A cynical guy?  Yeah.  Mencken had seen enough of personal relationships that he more or less branded marriage as a dead-end.  Oddly enough, he ended up meeting some Alabama gal, who had a degree in literature, and could write a wicked piece on occasion.....throwing common sense to the wind and marrying this Bama lass.

What made Mencken what he was?  I went back a while ago looking at his youth, and how he'd somehow stumbled upon Huck Finn (by Mark Twain) and fell completely for the book.    After you spend a period reading over Huck Finn.....you tend to admire simple language and the uncomplicated simplicity of life's little adventures.

So, as you might be sitting there tonight....watching ABC Nightly News, Fox's O'Reilly or CNN....with some joker trying hard to get you mentally set to some understanding of a topic or problem facing America.....deserving your time to get frustrated, angry, or hostile....thus voting a certain way, you might want to remember the word booboisie.  You might be smart enough to get their message, but it doesn't mean you really understood or grasped the big picture of what's going on, or how you got manipulated into a bogus view.