Just another English class

I wonder if there is some sort of mathematical equation that could tell you the chance that a question or statement will completely derail a conversation. I mean, if you could find out the likelihood that some jackass is going to say something that throws the entire conversation onto a crazy tangent (like the amount of fluoride in the water in Orange County), then maybe you could do something about it. For Christ's sake! Maplractice, meat packing, home insurance for flooding; none of these topics have the even a little bit to do with either 1984 or Parable of the Sower. Tort reform? Seriously? Why is it the lady that got burned by hot coffee at McDonalds the story that is always brought up to show how crazy our judicial system is? No, don't use a serious example as in the massive disparity between sentencing for drug abuses. No, use a stupid case involving a huge group of boneheads.

Sometimes I am left speechless by the unadulterated, undiluted idiocy of some of the people that I share a classroom with. I could have spoken up, could have returned us to the topic at hand, but I wanted to correct these people. But I cannot. It is as if they choose to be like this. Aargh!