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And here I thought (American) football players were the dumb ones..

http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20060226/od ... eatbeckham

England football captain David Beckham confessed he is befuddled by his six-year-old son Brooklyn's maths homework in an interview.

Beckham, 30, admitted to being baffled when Brooklyn recently asked for help with a school assignment and had to turn to his former Spice Girls pop star wife Victoria to help out.

It's pretty bad when an ex-Spice Girl is the smart one in the family.

It's pretty bad when an ex-Spice Girl is the smart one in the family.


My thoughts exactly.

The worst part is that he actaully admitted that she is the "brains" (and I use that term loosely) in that family.

what's for sure, he didn't marry her for her brains, nor did she marry him for his.

for a couple of nitwits whose combinded brains can be contained in a tablespoon, they sure got a lot of money...

What's it matter? Nothing he does requires him to be smart nor does he try to hide it. If Tony Blair made that admission I'd think it is bad, but his entire job has been to kick soccer balls, not tell us the the radius of the soccer ball divided by the score. I bet the majority of us would get whooped by a team of sixth graders in soccer right now.

Edit: Thought about it some more. Him not knowing math beyond 6th grade isn't even evidence of his intelligence or lack thereof. It is simply evidence that he doesn't know math beyond that. Whether or not he can grasp the concepts beyond that level is unknown. All that we know is that does not know them currently. It kind of irks me that we are assuming he is actually stupid when it is something that he need not know for his field of work. If Byron or Shelley didn't know a lick of math, we wouldn't call them stupid, but instead "specialized" or allow them to be as "artists." Maybe we (and by "we" I mean "you") shouldn't be so quick to just take a jab at someone who is quite honest about something they can't do. He isn't talking shit about how you suck at soccer and as a result are much much much poorer than he is. I mean really, so he hires a tutor who knows math much much much better than you. Have you really gained anything by knowing math instead of soccer here? Not in this case.

In my opinion, it is more interesting that someone who instead focused on sports can probably actually afford to hire private tutor for full time availability for his son. Possibly hire more than one to make sure that child is getting the best tutoring available. In addition to this, he can afford to pay for the best education. This child has tutors, education, caretakers, resources for quality play and healthcare, and probably more time with his parents due to their wealth and lack of need to work. In short, this kid has the kind of life I'd like to be able to provide and the time I'd like to be able to spend. I think we'd all like to be able to simply be able to stop working by choice even if we wouldn't actually stop working and provide anything we want for our family because our resources would be effectively limitless. Yet the three previous posts all refer to the parents as stupid when the people being called stupid have accomplished exactly what we'd like to be able to do.

EDIT:
i would like to thank JamieW in advance for making use of his numbered point making system, a simple way to convey multiple concepts. thanks, Jamie

1. you're taking this much too seriously.

2. he's a Ceelbrity, which makes him fair game for jokes etc.

3. apparently you read the post too quickly, and also didn't bother to chase the link. the kid is not 6th grade, he's 6 years old. we're talking about 6-year-old math not 6th grade math. which makes him even more deserving of the jokes. click the link and you'll see some examples.

4. me being poorer than him has nothing to do with anything. and again, he's a celebrity and i'm a nobody so obviously he isn't talking about how i suck at soccer. irrelevant.

5. i doubt that any tutor he hires to teach his kid knows much much more about math than i do. prehaps know more about teaching maths to 6-year-olds, yes. but not maths in general (OK i'm not discounting the possibility, since he might hire an Oxford Professor with a Chair to do it, but i find that unlikely).

6. i agree with most of what you said in the last paragraph. all of that notwithstanding, i find it hilarious that a person like Beckham can't manage 6-year-old math exercises.

I too shall use numbers to respond to your numbers! Exclamation mark for unnecessary emphasis!

1. Serious? Me? Do I even really need to address that?

2. I didn't see a joke. If there was one, it lacked the funny part of the joke.

3. Whoops, my bad. Although what is his 6 year old son doing in 6th grade. That kid is brilliant.

4. Math is a function of two parts: what we are taught and what we are capable of performing after we are taught. We do not know where his failing is, so it may be a matter of education. However, everyone made the assumption it was one of capability. However, if we make other assumptions, and these more reasonable, that he is super rich and super richer than anyone here and then we state that wealth is a reasonable goal of intelligence, then he is super smart and the assumptions made here are wrong. Your soccer skills are about as relevant to you as his math skills are to him. It is a point of interest to me and as a discusser on a discussion forum I will at times bring up points of interest.

5. I suppose it would be the "teaching it to 6 year olds" part that would be germane, wouldn't it?

6. I find your numbered points a simple way to convey multiple concepts and have now claimed it as my own and would appreciate it if you went back and edited your post thanking me in advance for using my numbered point making system.

(00000) Thanks for the amusing post, Ian.
(00001) One could reasonably expect an adult to understand a child's math.
(00010) If the adult is a grossly over-paid sports star, he's a legitimate target. This is a well-known fact.
(00011) What's up with the attitude?
(00100) Some people might benefit from having a little fun now and then!
(00101) Perhaps a therapist could help.
(00110) If you take these comments 100% seriously, you're no fun!
(00111) What's up with the Santa Hat in the month of March?

N. This space intentionally left blank.

I. I don't see how this addresses either of the previous #1 points.

II. It doesn't mean the attack itself has valid points even though the target is valid. And people are responding by saying they are joking. Then show me the funny part, someone, please. Find the wit.

III. Attitude? You have got to be kidding.

IV. Are you suggesting that Beckham only played math recreationally and thus never really improved to higher academic level with it because it wasn't of great importance? Interesting proposal.

V. I don't see the relevance of this statement. Perhaps you could explain further.

VI. At this point, either you've stopped reading, you troll worse than I, or you're just being combative.

VII. Ian changes them at random. He has apparently not been inspired.

VIII. Thank you, dodeca, for providing me with inappropriate credit. However, I'm insulted that stix has taken the concept, reapplied it and not given me credit for my point numbering system.

You guys are just encouraging him more.

JamieW wrote:I'm insulted that stix has taken the concept, reapplied it and not given me credit for my point numbering system.

i agree that this is quite shocking and disturbing, and something needs to be done about that...

Ian wrote:You guys are just encouraging him more.

1.* Yes, but in another 2 or 3 years we'll all look back at this thread and laugh...

2.* I'm laughing already

*convenient number system copyright JamieW 2006

I agree with so much here and have fresh points to make:

1. I am being encouraged, but I am also self motivating.

1. That something needs to be done about this insult.

2. That dolph did appropriately apply for use of the numbering system.

3. That laughter at some point will happen, be it now or in the future.

5. Is there some way we can make this retroactive and go back and audit the system to give me credit for previous use?

8. Seriously, guys, posts this weekend from Ian should be interesting.

What will be funny is after weeks using various numbering systems I end up just making one up and driving people insane.

JamieW wrote:What will be funny is after weeks using various numbering systems I end up just making one up and driving people insane.

It wasn't a long trip for most of us

JamieW wrote:I agree with so much here and have fresh points to make:


8. Seriously, guys, posts this weekend from Ian should be interesting.

I will be checking this weekend for sure.

Jamie never showed up. He called angry saying something about not being able to park because of a "Save Wayne Newton's Thong" benefit being held at my house. Which is ridiculous because that was last week so someone must have forgotten to take down the signs. This week the benefit was for something completely different.

You really need to guard that laptop when he's around

Sigh.. now I like Wayne Newton? What happened to Boy George?

since Wayne Newton benefit was last week, Boy George must've been this week's.

LOL !

Geeze: I take 2 weeks of vacation and miss all of the fun!

I'd join in, but people keep calling 911 and interupting my websurfing...