I don’t consider myself an insulated person. Unless I deliberately avoid the details for reasons of preserving mental health, I usually know exactly what is going on in the world. I know how a lot of different people live and am in general curious about the circumstances of people who are not myself. I do not shy away from controversial issues or dangerous neighborhoods. But at the same time, there are entire segments of experience I am completely and happily ignorant of. Windows PCs for example: I haven’t touched one since 1993. I have absolutely no idea of how they work, except they look complicated and unintuitive and ugly, and everyone I know who has one is forever having problems with it. Between my home and work, there are eleven Macs and two iPhones. This is an ecosystem I have no desire to spoil.

Another thing I have very little direct experience with is overt homophobia. I’d like to believe I have more to do with this than I probably do. My family, for example, is fairly conservative—my father, especially, is a Rush Limbo-loving papist—and yet I have refused to accept any sort of substandard treatment of me or my husband. And indeed, no one has tried to impose it against my will, or at least, no one has tried more than once. Likewise among the other people in my life: sexuality is not an issue, or if it is, no one has told me. To some extent, I am in control of this in that I can control who surrounds me, and I am smart and resourceful enough to bully my way through potentially problematic situations until I get what I want. But I’m also lucky to have been born where and when I was, as opposed to a time or a geographic area or a social strata in which it would be more difficult to establish my preferences.

As may be inferred from above, I have slightly more experience with Republicans, however I don’t know any beyond those I am forced to through genetic ties. I don’t understand their philosophy or why anyone would choose to entertain it for a moment in the face of evidence of its devastating failure when applied outside of action movies.

So I suppose there is a certain willful ignorance on my part in some areas. I am surrounded by Windows PCs and homophobia and Republicans, but they have so little bearing on my life that I could easily pretend they didn’t exist were I not engaged in active campaigns to stamp them out.

But there are also things I used to be immersed in that completely perplex me today. Pop music, for the most part, has become unbearable, and video games have become so complicated as to be unplayable. Likewise, television is becoming a mystery to me. I pick two or three shows to follow but long ago gave up on keeping track of what else exists. I do not understand references to the latest dating program or dancing program or fat-man-thin-wife program, and I don’t understand why anyone would make references to such cultural horrors.

It occurs to me that I am not insulated as much as an intellectual snob, but given the things I eschew are demonstrably bad and the things I like are demonstrably good, I say bring on the intellectual lorgnette and let's get this party started.