Admitting ignorance is bliss
Rob Long
At a recent family dinner, the conversation drifted from upcoming travel to where we’re spending the summer to, finally, the brutal murder of four University of Idaho students that took place in November.
This was before Idaho police and the FBI had identified and arrested a suspect, when it seemed like the murders would go unsolved. Perhaps six members of my family, ranging in ages from 14 to 83, holding only a cursory understanding of the details of the crime and zero experience in homicide investigations, felt they could solve the case, probably, between the main course and dessert.
We weren’t alone in this delusion. Walking through the airport a few days later, a small clump of glum-looking travelers were glued to the Official News Network of America’s Tense, Unhappy Airport Terminals, CNN. They watched people from Idaho and neighboring Washington tell reporters that they were nervous and scared and unhappy with the lack of progress in the investigation. “Those local police departments don’t have enough experience collecting crime scene evidence,” a man next to me said to no one.
Well, I think he was talking to me, though it was hard to tell because he was wearing one of those cushions around his neck that are shaped like a toilet seat, and his face was mostly blocked by an enormous Cinnabon.
“They blew it,” another CNN viewer muttered. “The trail’s cold now. If you don’t catch him in the first 48 hours, it’s all over.” A lot of nods around the group. It was clear that the gathering of Crime Scene Investigation Experts at Gate B23A was in agreement.
To be fair, I have no idea if the guy with the Cinnabon was a professional forensic investigator heading home after the holidays or just a guy who’s watched too many episodes of CSI and now thinks he’s Hercule Poirot, though my money is on the latter. And I’m not claiming the high ground here. By the time we were digging into our ice cream, my family had decided that the other residents of the University of Idaho student house, the two who had remained asleep upstairs, needed to be taken into custody and interrogated.
“Something just doesn’t add up,” my young teenage niece said. “I agree,” said her grandmother. “It all seems too convenient.” And they nodded to each other like two Miss Marples.
And then a few days later, when a suspect was arrested in Pennsylvania after a painstakingly thorough and careful investigation, the reaction from the assorted Inspector Clouseaux and know-nothings who had asserted, days before, in airport lounges and (to my shame) family dinners, total confidence about what investigators “did wrong” and how they “blew it” and who, probably, was responsible for the unspeakable crime wasn’t Gee, I guess I’m not an expert crime solver or Gosh I’m a moron or Learned my lesson! Gonna keep my trap shut next time!
Instead, the reaction was somehow even more idiotically self-assured. “I’m baffled,” one woman posted in a Facebook group with more than 160,000 members that had sprung up to discuss the crime. “Literally everything we know doesn’t make sense.”
Literally everything she knew, it must be said, was close to zero in the first place. Like the guy with the toilet cushion and the Cinnabon, I am not 100% certain she wasn’t an expert involved with the investigation, but I am willing to bet a large sum of money that her grasp of the facts was only a few clicks more detailed than my family’s, who wanted to haul in the roommates and sweat out a confession.
I’m not sure what makes us all insist on acting like know-it-alls — the internet, probably, or maybe an excess of self-esteem — or why we all need to adopt a lower-register, knowing tone of voice when talking about things of which we have nearly total ignorance, but it seems to take a lot of energy. And I can’t imagine that reviewing crime scene details makes a Cinnabon taste better. For my part, the next time I’m tempted to engage in a cultural know-it-all festival, I’m going to try something different. I’m going to shrug and say, “I got no idea.” Just writing those words feels like a liberation.
Rob Long is a television writer and producer and the co-founder of Ricochet.com.