Femi Lazarus argues that African societies reward frivolous content over intellectual work, shaping what children aspire to become. When TikTok dancers get famous and reality TV fuels rivalry, kids learn that foolishness pays. Intelligence means solving problems and thinking critically, not holding degrees.
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We're sort of anti-intellectual as a society. Ah, is that so? Yeah, we don't reward intellectual property. Yeah, one, we don't reward intellect, we don't reward intelligence. And I'll give you a series of examples. A case in point, um, there's this show, I don't want to mention their name, where they put adults in a house and at the end of the day the winner goes—
they have it across Africa.
Yeah, across Africa. Now interestingly, it didn't start with Africa, I guess. Um, yeah, they have other versions, but the energy at which it's had in Nigeria or in Africa is more intense than— no, you can mention Nigeria. The energy is more intense. People even develop rivalry.
Yes, that doesn't end, doesn't make sense because of fascination for an housemate.
And guess what? Because intelligence is not about degree. Ah, because we must first, before we unpack that, we need to actually look at what intelligence is. Intelligence is not, um, you having a PhD. Intelligence is not you, um, speaking eloquently. Anybody can speak good English or speak big grammar. It's not about that. Intelligence is how you're able to learn quickly from your previous mistake. Intelligence is about how you are able to solve problems, how you are able to think critically. Yes.
Yeah.
You will see how that it is tough for us as a society to engage in this construct that I've described. That is one. And it's also difficult for us to reward these things. The best graduates in— ah, you know, Tashari University, for instance, in Nigeria— what do we reward them with? But I can go on TikTok right now and do something funny, and I'm the celebrity. Now, we don't know the implication There's something called modeling. That's part of where social cognitive theory came from, how that we learn from our environment. That's the concept of modeling. Yeah. So if I want to bring it back home, a child that grows up never to see an airplane will never dream of becoming a pilot. Ah, your dreams, your aspirations, your— yeah, whatever it is, is as a result of the things you're exposed to. You're not permitted to imagine what you've not seen before. Yeah. I'm concerned in that we are already modeling a wrong pattern for the next generation because they can't do beyond what they see. They cannot. And there's the principle of reinforcement. What you reward, you reinforce.
Yes.
So if you reward foolishness, people are going to be foolish.
And one of the ways to reward foolishness is by paying attention to it.
Yeah, so you give it your attention. In fact, that's part of the elements of modeling. I can't take you as a model if I don't give you some sort of attention. So it's
