Friday, August 28, 2009
Circus, circus
Ringling Brothers, Barnum & Bailey is in town and I've been debating for a long time if I should take my two year old to it. I finally gave in and bought tickets earlier this week, much to the recrimination of more principled friends. So I am trying desperately to justify going to the Circus... I know my munchkin will be amazed beyond belief to see elephants, horses and I think even a tiger, so why isn't that impending joy enough? I looked at their website and they had a page or a comment somewhere about how humanely they treat their animals... But then my conscience goes, it's like Philip Morris saying they donate money to lung cancer foundations, isn't it. Bah! Voice in my head, you're killing the fun of it.
Then I try to argue with the voice in my head, that the zoo is the same thing. They have animals on display and they have to deal with heckling kids all day - that's much more sad than the circus animals participating in shows for a few minutes/hours a day. But this is not the same, yells out my conscience. No one is deliberately demeaning you by trying to make you defy gravity, by having the horse or the dog walk on two legs or by having a majestic elephant do silly
anthropomorphic tricks. Or, even worse, no one uses corporal punishment in order to train you to do these things...
I get it - I understand the mistreatment, but in a way, I think, I'm going through the same thing. With the current job market (yes, it will always come back to this somehow), I feel like a circus animal myself in my job search - eager to please, displaying my profound and proficient talents, juggling if I have to, to make an impression, walking on one leg, or so it seems, most days... ;0) The one good thing is that I don't have a whip-happy trainer trying to get me to imbibe these seemingly fantastical skills. Yay! I'm a circus animal but I'm not mistreated. Sigh! Point is, I understand how they feel, with this weird, inexplicable analogy that I have created - the need to achieve something, the desire for applause, people flocking to you...
I don't ever want to be in this boat again, re-inventing myself, starting off at the bottom of the food chain and in a way, I don't think I ever will be. What I don't understand though is how an industry expects to get a skilled workforce if they are not invested in training that workforce or providing this workforce with opportunities and resources.
I'm sure there are many who say that this is just the market correcting itself to get rid of excesses, and they may be right, but it seems that the industry itself is caught unawares - with big law surreptitiously copying one another, with others waiting in the wings to see how the chips will fall, and with the rest of the bottom feeders now aspiring and getting what they couldn't earlier.
As far as I remember, there have been voices for changing the system - for changing the 6 minute "kaching" counter, for being more realistic with associate salaries, bonuses, etc, for having law schools be more responsive to the needs of the market, instead of burying them with theory and heavy coursebooks.
Why is it, that a system that has devised and designed a doctorate degree in three years of rigorous study, is so uncertain about the product it churns out that people are afraid of those who are below the magic number (what is that - the top third of the class?)? I am surprised by the judgment that your transcript inspires in people - not having seen such a phenomena with my other degrees.
Is it because the practice of law is so scripted and rigid that only the top third of the class can practice well? Or is it that the practice of law is so eclectic that those who did badly on one day, at the end of the semester/year, will be doomed to repent it the rest of their lives (dramatic, I know...)? Or is it just a system that has so badly spiralled out of being, that it is its own entity, where, the study of law in this country is now a law unto itself?
I know - I'm asking for the meaning of life and everything, but I digress... Where was I, yes, about the circus... yep "all the world is" indeed "a stage..."
Then I try to argue with the voice in my head, that the zoo is the same thing. They have animals on display and they have to deal with heckling kids all day - that's much more sad than the circus animals participating in shows for a few minutes/hours a day. But this is not the same, yells out my conscience. No one is deliberately demeaning you by trying to make you defy gravity, by having the horse or the dog walk on two legs or by having a majestic elephant do silly
anthropomorphic tricks. Or, even worse, no one uses corporal punishment in order to train you to do these things...
I get it - I understand the mistreatment, but in a way, I think, I'm going through the same thing. With the current job market (yes, it will always come back to this somehow), I feel like a circus animal myself in my job search - eager to please, displaying my profound and proficient talents, juggling if I have to, to make an impression, walking on one leg, or so it seems, most days... ;0) The one good thing is that I don't have a whip-happy trainer trying to get me to imbibe these seemingly fantastical skills. Yay! I'm a circus animal but I'm not mistreated. Sigh! Point is, I understand how they feel, with this weird, inexplicable analogy that I have created - the need to achieve something, the desire for applause, people flocking to you...
I don't ever want to be in this boat again, re-inventing myself, starting off at the bottom of the food chain and in a way, I don't think I ever will be. What I don't understand though is how an industry expects to get a skilled workforce if they are not invested in training that workforce or providing this workforce with opportunities and resources.
I'm sure there are many who say that this is just the market correcting itself to get rid of excesses, and they may be right, but it seems that the industry itself is caught unawares - with big law surreptitiously copying one another, with others waiting in the wings to see how the chips will fall, and with the rest of the bottom feeders now aspiring and getting what they couldn't earlier.
As far as I remember, there have been voices for changing the system - for changing the 6 minute "kaching" counter, for being more realistic with associate salaries, bonuses, etc, for having law schools be more responsive to the needs of the market, instead of burying them with theory and heavy coursebooks.
Why is it, that a system that has devised and designed a doctorate degree in three years of rigorous study, is so uncertain about the product it churns out that people are afraid of those who are below the magic number (what is that - the top third of the class?)? I am surprised by the judgment that your transcript inspires in people - not having seen such a phenomena with my other degrees.
Is it because the practice of law is so scripted and rigid that only the top third of the class can practice well? Or is it that the practice of law is so eclectic that those who did badly on one day, at the end of the semester/year, will be doomed to repent it the rest of their lives (dramatic, I know...)? Or is it just a system that has so badly spiralled out of being, that it is its own entity, where, the study of law in this country is now a law unto itself?
I know - I'm asking for the meaning of life and everything, but I digress... Where was I, yes, about the circus... yep "all the world is" indeed "a stage..."
