Erling:	We've been hearing quite a bit lately about the "dumbing down" 
	of America.  Has a willful societal idiocy seized Canada as well?  
	Is the True North, like The Land of The Free, now happy to be stupid ?

	Where better to address this issue than the Cafe des Poseurs, 
	favoured haunt for all manner of arty wannabees and might-have-beens.

	Joining me is Dr. Reginald Stanbury.

REG:	How do you do?

ERLING:	He is Henry Stodge and Beatrice Gertrude Fortley-MacMillan Memorial 
	Chair in Post-Industrial Behavior at The University of Newfoundland at St. John's.

LEO:	That must be some chair.

REG:	Why yes ... thank you ... tis.

ERLING:	Also with us is former intellectual, and now television executive, Leo Pelley.

LEO:	Duh !

ERLING:	Very funny.  Leo, you abandoned a promising academic career to produce 
	two of Canada's lowest brow television programs, the situation comedy 
	"Up The Splats", and the monster hit "Canada's Stupid and Super Stupid."

LEO:	And you want on the show, right?

ERLING:	No.  I was going to say that ...

REG:	Hummph.

ERLING:	Sorry Dr. Stanbury?

REG:	Humm?  Oh nothing, sorry, sorry, continue.

ERLING:	Yes, Leo, I was about to say that you are considered by many to be a 
	symbol of this "dumbing down" dynamic.

LEO:	Am I supposed to apologize?  I spent years as a slave to scholarship, 
	and for what?  So that at the peak of my career I'd have to take on two 
	more first year classes of 200 students each, while my salary is frozen ?

ERLING:	Not to mention summer's off and those back-breaking sabbaticals ...

LEO:	Heh, thinking all the time is hard work, and it's totally undervalued.  
	Now, I have my weekends, I sleep nights, I rarely have to think about 
	anything, and I make a fortune.

ERLING:	But what of the larger consequences? Dr. Stanbury?

REG:	Hmmm?  Oh yes, well you see, you see ... if we look at ... I have 
	my notes ... where did they ... 

SFX:	DISAPPEARS UNDER TABLE.  HEAD SMACK ON TABLE.

LEO/ERLING:	Oooooo/ ouch

LEO:	Anyway, I would argue that people, though stupid, are no dumber than 
	they've ever been.  Think of your youth in Gander.

ERLING:	You've got a point there.  Dr. Stanbury, 

REG:	Harrumph.

ERLING:	You are among those responsible for the Newfoundland Studies curriculum 
	where children are taught that Western civilization was founded by 
	Newfoundlanders...

REG:	Well, something like that...

ERLING:	And the controversial Newfphonics language programme, being introduced 
	into schools here.

REG:	Yes, yes..

ERLING:	Do you think it's wise to be teaching kids to speak a sub-group of 
	English that no one else can understand ?

REG:	Unintelligible harrumphs.

LEO:	See, people are always pointing the finger at t.v., but let's face it, 
	the worst dumber-downers are academic cretins like Reg here with their 
	radical populist theories.

REG:	I say, that's not cricket, dirty snooker, below the belt.

WAITER:	Excuse me.  Your coffees.

ERLING/LEO:	Thanks.

WAITER:	Who had the tea ?

REG:	Over here.

SFX:	TEA SPILLED IN REG'S LAP.

REG:	Ooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo

WAITER:	Oooops, sorry.

REG:	Not half as sorry as I am, dear boy.

ERLING:	Are you going to be all right?

LEO:	What it all comes down to is defining your own acceptable comfort level.

ERLING:	How so?

LEO:	If you're dumb, aware that you're dumb and comfortable with that, what's 
	wrong with my taking advantage of the situation for entertainment and profit ?

ERLING:	Adjacency.

LEO:	I don't follow.

ERLING:	Despite trying to remain as disengaged from society as possible, I still 
	have to suffer low-fat ice cream, new age spiritualism and voodoo science... 
	not to mention the kind of po-mo pseudo-think spouted by defenders of "Up the Splats".

REG:	Hoorah!

ERLING:	And because I prefer to read William Gaddis and Edith Bartlett to Sidney 
	Sheldon and John Grisham, I'm accused of being elitist.

LEO:	You usually do the weather, don't you ?

ERLING:	Well, Leo Pelley, independent television producer, and Dr. Reginald 
	Stanbury, independent thinker thank you.