Actually, given the ad hoc nature of discussion on the web, the notion of
'agency' has not really been defined thus far during this string, and of
course, neither has 'stupid'. I do believe that the onus of defining
'stupid' should be left to others who introduced it and accepted its use
(I
envy you not).
I didn't introduce anything, but perhaps the sense of 'stupidity' Foucault
uses in his brilliant review of Deleuze's logic of sense and difference &
Repetition (theatricum philosophicum)?
part of relevant section:
"Intelligence does not respond to stupidity, since it is stupidity already
vanquished, the categorical art of avoiding error. The scholar is
intelligent. It is thought, though, that confronts stupidity, and it is the
philosopher who observes it. Their private conversation is a lengthy one, as
the philosopher's sight plunges into this candleless skull. It is his death
mask, his temptation, perhaps his desire, his catatonic theater. At the
limit, thought would be the intense contemplation from close up-to the point
of losing oneself in it - of stupidity; and its other side is formed by
lassitude, immobility, excessive fatigue, obstinate muteness, and inertia -
or, rather, they form its accompaniment, the daily and thankless exercise
which prepares it and which it suddenly dissipates. The philosopher must
have sufficiently ill will to play the game of truth and error badly: this
perversity, which operates in paradoxes, allows him to escape the grasp of
categories. But aside from this, he must be sufficiently "ill humored" to
persist in the confrontation with stupidity, to remain motionless to the
point of stupefaction in order to approach it successfully and mime it, to
let it slowly grow within himself (this is probably what we politely refer
to as being absorbed in one's thoughts), and to await, in the
always-unpredictable conclusion to this elaborate preparation, the shock of
difference. Once paradoxes have upset the table of representation, catatonia
operates within the theater of thought." (190)
'Stupidity' here is the operative outside of philosophical thought and is
therefore a kind of indirect philosophical resource. This would be opposed
to 'error' which is the domain of the reactionary 'scholar' (ie having a
'correct' understanding or 'representation' in the 'theatre of thought'). So
playing the game of truth and error badly with a certain kind of stupidity
has a pedagogical function, ie getting 'foucault' wrong and reading his work
against the grain can be productive.
Arguably this is what has happened with his Iran writings, and the only
person who seems to have understood anything sensible from them has been the
master contrarian Zizek. Zizek's stupidity should be applauded!