Originally Posted by KJP
I think a lot of this goes back to average folks on some level not liking smart people.

When we are at the zoo and my two year old points to a gibbon and says "Look Mama, a monkey" I will correct him and tell him it is an ape and go on to explain some differences.

If I get weird looks, so be it.

DD8 was at the zoo with me in the reptile room, and she was clearly anxious about how to tell venomous snakes from the other kind. I had to give her some information as a way of calming that anxiety. So we talked about pit vipers, identified the pits that give them their name, and also noted the distinctive shape many of them have to their heads. We discussed how certain keywords in species names are telling, because "rattlesnake," "viper," and "cobra" always mean venomous, but "boa" and "python" always signify constrictors. We identified the difference between venomous coral snake and its friendly doppleganger, the scarlet king snake.

We didn't draw much attention during our conversations. The weird looks came a couple days later, when DD went back to the zoo with a couple of her friends, and she delivered her version of the same lecture as she led them around the room.