Re: schools banning homework

Yup. My former colleagues often asked me whether I saw that "Fifth Estate"
piece. I think some of them did that to see what my reaction would be. I
don't know what they expected from an educated member of Mensa--maybe they
thought I'd be spouting theorems and derivations all the time, thus
confirming what the documentary showed.

On the other hand, one could argue that any large group or
organization which purports to be a "society" of people with a level
of intelligence higher than the "average" intelligence of the general
public, will eventually be subjected to scrutiny of some sort by
"investigative" journalists. Some "smartass" journalists will go
"undercover" to determine whether the organization's claim of higher
intelligence of their members is for real or just a fraud. I suppose
it's human nature to enjoy the guilty pleasure of seeing other people
being "knocked down" off their perches (ie. schadenfreude).

That book about the George Trepal case, "Poison Mind" by Good &
Goreck,

http://www.amazon.com/Poison-Mind-Jeffrey-Good/dp/0312960166

painted a not so flattering picture of Mensa and Trepal's Mensa
activities. (A police detective went undercover by infiltrating a
local Mensa group, and befriending Trepal to get the goods on him for
a murder conviction).

I never wrote the entrance exam for Mensa, and probably won't anytime
soon. The local group and general organization doesn't have much that
interests me at the present time, to want to apply for membership. I
suppose I have many other activities which are relatively solitary and
require very little to no interaction with other people, like playing
musical instruments, reading books, etc ...

.

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