Intelligence Report: Mensa crowd looks smart at annual Vegas convention

Thursday, July 8, 2004 | 8:10 a.m.

"Anyone want to come up and flog me, or be flogged?" a lecturer named Corwin asked a group of 100 during a bondage/sadomasochism lecture.

"Anybody want to have an experience of extreme static electricity around them? Come on up."

With zero hesitation, two women sprung from their chairs and scurried to the front of the convention hall at Paris Las Vegas for a flogging.

Across the way a Scrabble tournament was in full swing, ladies making crafts discussed their cats and introverts pieced together puzzles.

At a blood drive the previous day a man dressed as Dracula joked about getting the "smart blood" into the community, while two Mensans discussed the relevance of high-IQ groups superior to Mensa by 1 to 1 1/2 percent.

"Do you really need to sort yourself out above the 2 percent group?" Ryan Martin from Hillsborough, N.J., asked rhetorically to fellow Mensan Paul Levine. "I don't think so."

Like the 2,000 personalities roaming the hotel's conference area, Martin and Levine are Mensans. They are members of the intelligence-based social club that draws a mixture of introverts, over-compensating extroverts and seemingly average humans who scored better than 98 percent of society on an intelligence test.

Last Thursday the group convened in Las Vegas for a four-day gathering that each year launches members - too bright for their peers - into a weekend of normalcy. "Here you don't feel like you're such a freak," said Tammy Langley, a departmental administrator from Dallas, who attends the gatherings each year. "People get your humor. I'm a smart-ass. I can throw in verbal dynamite. It's a lot of fun.

"Plus," Langley added, "I have five cats, so I can't do puzzles at home. Here, I can go into the game room and put together a 1,000-piece puzzle at 3 in the morning."

Yes, there is a game room open around the clock with a craft area, a hospitality room with snacks and chocolate (also open 24 hours) and a series of lectures that range from "How to Make Love like an Olympic God" to "Tourism Safety" to "Evolution Through the Dimensions of Time and Space, Part 1."

There are bridge tournaments and stickers on everyone's name badges that alert potential huggers whether they'd like to be hugged. Red means "no". Green means "go". Blue means "I'm single," and there are lots of singles here looking to hook up.

There are 12-step support groups, scavenger hunts, karaoke and dance. And if anyone wants to learn about bondage and sadism and masochism, this is the place.

The gatherings are much like summer camps where the intellectually curious make friends, sing songs and discuss world issues. Only at this camp there really is no theme, and conversations on IQ status are anomalies.

"High IQ! That's the only thing the group has in common," said a fortyish self-described extreme introvert who didn't want to disclose his name for fear of identity theft.

"But since everyone has that in common, it's not interesting. You get a conversation on any topic. It's a good way to kill a weekend."

The fact that there is no commonality among Mensans - other than the test score - opens the gatherings to diverse lecture topics: "Uranium and Plutonium: Their Roles in Today's World," "The Sociology of Gambling" and "Broadway Sing-Along."

A workshop called "The Sexy Fishbowl" gave audience members a chance to anonymously ask questions about sex. A lecture on insurance fraud explained how intelligence is a hazard to the fraud perpetrator.

In the lecture "Who Killed My Daughter?" a group of 80 took turns asking novelist Lois Duncan ("I Know What You Did Last Summer") if she ever felt remorse killing off a character.

In "Tourist Safety," audience members watched a security video of a female thief Metro Police nabbed after she stole from a gambler's purse. During the video Metro Police Sgt. Tim Shalhoob fielded questions from the audience: "Is she out on bail?" ... "Will the judicial system give her what she deserves?" ... "If I took a wallet, would I take what I want and go or would I make my way around the casino?"

Discussions on the Middle East, UFOs and healing dances were also available, but sex was a major draw to the lecture rooms.

"Most Mensans claim there's a positive correlation between the brain and the libido," said Levine, who would later turn up in the bondage/sadomasochism class. "It's similar to the connection between intelligence and creativity."

The lecture "How to Make Love Like an Olympic God" was led by a former sex worker with a specialty in tantra and sexuality coaching who told them, "You're all very head oriented. I'd like to get you out of your head and into your body."

As 150 men trickled into the bondage and sadomasochism lecture, Bob Abrahams of Los Angeles, said, "This will draw a lot of Mensa members. A lot of Mensa members think a lot about sex."

Tapping his head with his forefinger, he added, "This is the biggest sex organ we have."

Regarding the bondage and sadomasochism class -- where audience members learned such helpful terms as "top," "bottom," "dom" (short for "dominant"), "submissive," "master" and "slave" -- Langley, who didn't attend the lecture, said that oftentimes classes merely provide a safe and open forum on a topic Mensa members would otherwise not explore.

"They may not want to get involved," Langley said. "This de-mystifies it for them. Here, you can ask people these questions. You don't have to worry about losing your job."

Mensa member Mary, a 35-year-old from Arlington, Ill., who had been flogged during the lecture, added, "I would not go to a dungeon in New York City."

"Most people in Mensa are intellectually curious," Martin interjected. "Even introverts can let their hair down around here.

"Par-tay," Mary added.

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There are about 100,000 Mensans worldwide living in about 100 countries. According to Mensa International, there are more than 49,000 members in the United States, 29,000 in the United Kingdom, 300 in Slovakia and a mere 100 in Japan. American Mensa states that 5 million Americans are eligible to join.

To become a member of Mensa you need score at or above the 98th percentile on a standard IQ test, and pay an annual membership fee of $49.

Those who are hyper-ambitious can continue on, perhaps even getting a spot in the International Society for Philosophical Enquiry.

"With Mensans, you're nominally smarter than 98 out of every 100 people," Levine said. "With Intertel you are in the 99th percentile. With ISPE you're in the 99.9th percentile.

"And I've heard that test is impossible."

Mensa was founded in England in 1946 by a scientist and a lawyer as a way to bring together intelligent people from varying socio-economic backgrounds for discussion and mind stimulation.

Mensa members include lawyers, doctors, truck drivers, scientists and waitresses.

"You find all socioeconomic classes," "If you are a prison inmate or a garbageman who lives in a trailer park or Isaac Asimov. You get rocket scientists or people too lazy or too confused to get a job."

Looking around, he added, "A lot of times really smart people have a hard time fitting into normal society. Growing up was a struggle to fit in."

"I read that if you have a conversation with someone who has 25 points of an IQ higher or lower, you will have difficulty carrying on conversations with that person. There are limits there. With people less intelligent you have to think about words you are going to use with them. You lose the common ground."

However, he said, 'You still come here and you wind up, to some degree, dealing with idiots. Or we all end up talking to someone and they're worlds ahead of us."

A place of our own

Langley sees the gatherings as self-affirming getaways. She's attended eight of them. Until a few years ago, she said she was unable to connect with her peers or feel that she was part of the team at work. "I wasn't interested in what happened on 'Friends.' We didn't see any of the same movies," Langley said. "You end up pulling back on yourself."

Sixteen-year-old Tripp McKay from Smyrma, Tenn., tested to qualify for Mensa after his grandmother took him to an annual gathering in Scottsdale, Ariz.

"You meet people who are smarter than you," McKay said during a game of Scrabble with someone decades older than himself. "It gets annoying when you hang out with some people. It gets frustrating."

Lyn Stinnett of Gilbert, Ariz., has been in Mensa since 1971.

"I didn't know I was smart until I was taking a test to join the Navy. They said, 'You're really bright.' I said, 'I am? Well that's what's wrong with me,' " Gilbert said.

"I was a loner, that's for sure. But we don't have to hide anymore. We can go to our own convention."

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