The Myth of White Intelligence
Part I: Education, Propaganda, and the Erasure of Genius
By Down and Out Press written by: Kyle Davidson supporting arguements by Robert Davis.
In this two-part article, Down and Out Press will cover a variety of topics surrounding race, education, power, and the persistent myth of white intelligence.
Introduction: Who Gets the Credit?
Some things have always dumbfounded me—especially in history, astronomy, or frankly any class these days. One of the biggest? The fact that nearly every ancient civilization across the planet knew the sun was the center of the solar system—often for thousands of years—and yet, somehow, white Europeans get all the credit for “discovering” it.
This erasure is not just frustrating—it’s dishonest.
Here’s a short list of civilizations and cultures with documented or strongly evidenced heliocentric understanding long before Copernicus or Galileo ever picked up a telescope:
Civilizations That Knew the Sun Was the Center (Before Europeans Claimed They Discovered It)
Ancient Egyptians
As early as 3000 BCE, their sun god Ra was seen as central to life and cosmic order. The Hermetic texts (likely drawing from older Egyptian cosmology) describe the sun as the governing body of planetary motion.Maya Civilization
By 2000 BCE – 900 CE, the Maya had developed a precise solar calendar, tracked planetary movements (especially Venus and the sun), and built temples aligned with solar events. They likely held a heliocentric view in practice, even if not written in Western terms.Vedic India (Hindu Cosmology)
Ancient Indian texts like the Rig Veda (c. 1500 BCE) and later Surya Siddhanta (written c. 400 CE, drawing on older sources) suggest the sun as central and describe planetary orbits. Aryabhata, an Indian astronomer in 499 CE, explicitly described Earth’s rotation and the sun as the center of the solar system in a mathematical model.Ancient Greeks (Pythagorean School, Aristarchus of Samos)
While later Greek scholars like Aristotle rejected heliocentrism, Aristarchus of Samos (c. 270 BCE) argued that the Earth revolved around the sun. His work was largely ignored in favor of the geocentric Ptolemaic model.Babylonians
Though primarily geocentric in surviving texts, Babylonian astronomical tables (as early as 1800 BCE) show deep solar tracking. Some scholars believe their planetary calculations implied sun-centered models for practical purposes.Persians (Zoroastrian Cosmology)
Zoroastrianism (originating around 1000 BCE) placed high spiritual and physical importance on the sun as a central divine force in maintaining cosmic order.Dogon People of Mali
This West African tribe, whose oral traditions and astronomical knowledge go back thousands, recognized heliocentric structures and even the orbits of distant stars like Sirius B—long before Europeans officially "discovered" them with telescopes.
These are just a few examples—but the point stands:
Knowledge didn’t start in Europe. It was extracted, renamed, and whitewashed.
Donald Trump a prime example of the myth of white intelegince.
Rewriting the Mind of a Nation
In classical education, students are taught to follow the knowledge of those deemed the “greatest minds”—a list curated almost exclusively by those in power. For decades, this meant little to no attention was given to the knowledge of non-white thinkers. Even less likely was the acknowledgment of intelligent or influential women. And absolutely unthinkable was any invitation for the white patriarchy to examine its own failures—be they genocide, war, slavery, capitalism, climate change, Elon Musk, the police, or Walmart.
Alright Karen, calm down. I’m not attacking white people—but get ready, because this is about to get uncomfortable.
This is The Myth of White Intelligence.
What Is Intelligence, and Who Gets to Own It?
The myth that white men possess an inherent intellectual superiority has been crafted and spread through centuries of colonization, conquest, and curriculum. These narratives are not just accidents—they're strategic. Governments, schools, and media institutions in the U.S. and Europe have flooded generations with paintings, speeches, formulas, and battlefield tales centered on white men. This has created a cultural operating system where whiteness is equated with brilliance—and everything else is an afterthought.
From forced sterilizations to eugenic “science,” intelligence has often been weaponized to oppress non-whites, women, and people with disabilities. Meanwhile, the glaring failures of white men are erased from textbooks and timelines, replaced by a glowing highlight reel of distorted triumphs.
White Intelligence as Propaganda
Let’s be clear: the myth of white intelligence is not just a lie—it’s a tool. It is the keystone of modern propaganda. White supremacy first declared itself divine, then cloaked itself in nature, then cloaked itself again in science. The goal? To create a public bias that views non-whites and women as intellectually inferior.
This narrative supports two main objectives:
It justifies white rule
It links wealth and class to intellectual merit
And when the ruling class intellectuals are placed on a golden pedestal, their ideas—no matter how harmful—trickle down into violence from those below. As Albert Einstein (who himself held racist beliefs) once said:
“Three great forces rule the world: stupidity, fear, and greed.”( Keep in mind ours is -A world ruled by rich white men-.)
The Legacy of Eugenics and Media Bias
Let’s not forget: up to 20,000 people in California were forcibly sterilized under the eugenics movement—often because of "low IQ" scores. That is not ancient history. It’s part of the very modern myth that links intelligence to whiteness.
And today, modern conservatives like Tucker Carlson and Ben Shapiro continue to push the idea that minority communities are somehow intrinsically less competent. This is not just false—it’s violent. It is a rhetorical campaign meant to erase the labor, genius, and struggle of Black and Brown communities by implying we are ethically and intellectually incapable.
Reclaiming Genius
It’s time for a new model—one where all genders and all racial identities are treated as intellectual equals. This is not a symbolic request; it’s a necessary redefinition of what intelligence looks like and where it comes from.
If we don’t start shifting that lens, the lists of “smartest people in history” will continue to look like this:
Elon Musk
Albert Einstein
Ronald Reagan
Joe Rogan
Donald Trump Jr. Jr.
Jordan Peterson (x4, apparently)
And yes, Jordan Peterson. Again. And again. And again.
Link
Whose Knowledge Counts?
During this investigation, I took a deep dive into what the internet considers “the smartest people in history.”
Googling “smartest people ever” leads to sites like:
According to these, 97% of the “most intelligent people in history” are white men. The few exceptions? Usually Marie Curie or Confucius, if they make the cut at all.
Here’s a sample list from one of those sites:
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
Leonardo da Vinci
Isaac Newton
Galileo Galilei
Rene Descartes
Albert Einstein
William Shakespeare
Aristotle
Nikola Tesla
Adolf Hitler
Yes, Adolf Hitler. Let that sink in.
Why This Matters
Lists like these are not just trivial rankings—they are the DNA of how we construct history, worth, and power. They shape who gets hired, who gets heard, who gets believed. My own education was dominated by the names of so-called “brilliant white men,” presented as the intellectual elite of humanity. But were they the smartest—or simply the most privileged?
The business owner who assumes their Black employee is less qualified.
The hiring manager who sees an ethnic name and makes assumptions.
The teacher who doesn’t see genius in a student of color.
These are not just biases—they are echoes of a system built on the myth of white brilliance.
Coming Soon: Part II — Forgotten Geniuses and the Future of Intelligence
We’ll be naming the overlooked Black, Indigenous, and Brown scholars, artists, scientists, and visionaries erased from the canon—and what reclaiming their legacy means for the next generation.
In Closing: A Brief Legacy of “White Intelligence”
Here’s a short list of the so-called achievements of white intelligence:
Pooping in and polluting one’s own clean drinking water (Toilets)
Slavery, racism, genocide, and eugenics
Prisons (a.k.a. modern slavery)
Pop/Country music (torture)
Stock markets (slavery, again)
Nuclear weapons
Psychoactive drugs for children who don’t conform to the propaganda machine (Adderall, Ritalin, Lexapro, Seroquel, Concerta)
Television (Propaganda 1.0)
The Internet (Propaganda 2.0)
Social media and AI (Propaganda 2.0, now with more artificial intelligence and self-replicating)
Fast food (leading cause of global obesity and leading cause of death in usa)
Tobacco—converted from sacred plant medicine into a commercial poison (kills anywhere from 3-50x as many people as “illegal narcotics combined).
Let’s not forget: most of these "achievements" either kill people or just suck ass.
Yes, there were a couple of decent inventions for extreme sports skateboard, snowboards, bicycles. We’ll give white folks that.
But perhaps the most enduring “accomplishment” of all?
Stealing the labor, land, and credit from the 90%+ of the world’s population that actually developed civilization thousands of years before Europe caught up than lied, cheated and white washed it all.
The Myth of White Intelligence
By: Kyle Davidson
Down and Out Press
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