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I have never been accused of being an intellectual, and this has never bothered me. To me there is a negative association with being someone who values rationality at the expense of emotions, a cynical bias probably based on feelings of insecurity.

This week's piece by Piper Mejia.

But today, while sitting at the Tauranga Writer's ArtFair stall, I felt undeservedly slighted by the comment that no-one would accuse me of being an intellectual. Just as Groucho Marx felt when he stated: 'I don't want to belong to any club that would accept me as a member”, I am wary of assumptions that would exclude me from such a club.

Throughout history, politics has often been the catalyst for demonising the attributes of the intellectual while promoting the value of the ‘common' workingman. Stalin was actively suspicious of intellectuals, replacing the early, articulate and educated leaders of the Russian revolution, even assassinating Trotsky, a prolific writer and theorist; Mao praised the peasant farmer over the educated elite; George Bush portrayed himself as an ‘average' guy, downplaying his Ivy League education. But you don't even have to be actively pursing knowledge to be labelled an intellectual. During the era of the Khmer Rouge in Cambodia, people were shot simply for knowing a foreign language or wearing glasses. It's a wonder anyone would choose even to be literate.

As recently as last week, Rush Limbaugh suggested that Gaia/God was punishing Japan for their environmentally responsible innovations by sending a tsunami to decimate their shores. 'If these are the people that invented the Prius, have mastered public transportation, recycling, why did mother earth, Gaia if you will, hit them with this disaster?” Rush's implication that the whole planet is out to get anyone with any intelligence at all may explain why he, at least, is alive and well.

The concept of intellectualism may not seem to have any importance to the average person in their day-to-day life; it certainly didn't to me. But as the world grows smaller, where natural disasters and ‘man' made atrocities blanket our news, we need thinkers, intellectuals, who can lead us to believe our lives can be better, who unite us to be better people. I do not wish to die defending my beliefs, nor be attacked for my beliefs, but I would like to be respected for thinking and admiring others who think. So if nothing else, at least let me serve drinks in the club.