"Stupidity" or "Stupidness" - What should I use? Can I use either of them?

Solution 1:

Stupidity dates back to the 16th century and has always been the more common term. Stupidness appears to be a later variant which actually has always been used rarely.

Stupidity vs stupidness:

• As nouns the difference between stupidness and stupidity is that stupidness is rare but both refer to the quality or state of being stupid.

Ngram: stupidity vs stupidness.

According to the Oxford Dictionary Online stupidness is mainly a West Indian usage:

(Mass noun) chiefly West Indian - Foolish or nonsensical talk or behaviour: girl, what stupidness are you talking?

and the Dictionary of Caribbean English Usage offers a few examples of its usage such as:

• Nonsense; stupid thinking; an absurdity, a. We asked Mr James to attend a Conference, just a feu: months ago that teas. He said he was not able to go. He is the President of the Senate and to talk stupidness like that around this table around...

Stupidity:

• 1540s, "want of intelligence," from Latin stupiditatem (nominative stupiditas) "dullness, stupidity, senselessness," from stupidus "confounded, amazed; dull, foolish" (see stupid). It also at various times meant "lack of feeling or emotion" (1560s); "stupor, numbness" (c. 1600).

-ity (suffix):

• suffix forming abstract nouns from adjectives, meaning "condition or quality of being ______," from Middle English -ite, from Old French -ité and directly from Latin -itatem (nominative -itas), suffix denoting state or condition, composed of connective -i- + -tas.

Solution 2:

Both are in the OED, with the same meaning.

But stupidness is stated now to be 'rare'. It quotes no examples since 1725.

Certainly my own inclination would be for stupidity

Solution 3:

I am from the West Indies, Trinidad to be exact and when we use the term stupidness it refers to an act of stupidity.

Solution 4:

I'm from Trinidad. The whole society uses the term stupidness. Generally you would hear people say "what kind of stupidness is this" or, "he/she is always involved in stupidness". The word stupidness is part of the lexicon in Trinidad.