Hamad: One thing I’ve never understood…
Is why professors think they’re better than their students?
Imaginary: Yellow spandex.
Hamad: … o_O
R-R-Right… well… when you look it up on Wikipedia… a PhD is defined as:
Doctor of Philosophy, abbreviated Ph.D. or PhD for the Latin philosophiæ doctor, meaning “teacher of philosophy”, (or, more rarely, D.Phil., for the equivalent doctor philosophiæ) is an advanced academic degree awarded by universities. In many, but not all countries in the English-speaking world, it has become the highest degree one can earn (but see also the higher doctorates awarded by universities in the UK, Ireland and some Commonwealth countries) and applies to graduates in a wide array of disciplines in the sciences and humanities. The Ph.D. has become a requirement for a career as a university professor or researcher in most fields.
So we’re in the clear when we describe a PhD holder as someone who possesses a great amount knowledge… You’d think somewhere in the midst of all that knowledge there are some sort of grounds for BASIC MANNERS! Why the hell can’t they respect their students just enough to make them feel like they’re not in the presence of some talking walking grading god?
Imaginary: Poor you, all your professors are out to get you!
Hamad: … Why are you even here?!
Imaginary: What you’re saying is extremely incorrect.
Hamad: Oh yeah? Let me guess, you’ve got a PhD too and I have no idea what I’m on about?
Imaginary: It is fairly insulting of you to assume that I don’t have a PhD, but I’m going to excuse you because yes, you have no idea “what you’re on about.”
Hamad: …! o_O
Imaginary: You see young one, what you’re saying is based on what you see. To assume that all PhD holders are ill mannered is an incorrect generalization. However, it would have been possible had you assumed a smaller scale, such as all PhD holders in Kuwait, or even at your own college.
Hamad: Ok fine! For the sake of being politically correct, some PhD holders in Kuwait are extremely “ill mannered.”
Imaginary: Tight yellow spandex.
Hamad: … o_O
Imaginary: Excuse my fascination with things that are far more interesting than the topic at hand, how is it that they are ill mannered?
Hamad: You’re not real.
Imaginary: Only to the untrained eye, I assure you.
Hamad: …
Its everything they do!
Here’s a list of things that bug me:
1) Tardiness. PhD holders tend to be extremely nosey and ask you questions like “Where were you?” or “Why are you late?”… WHATS IT TO YOU?! Where the hell do you get off asking me why when where or what I was doing? Oh I get it, its so you can tick me off on attendance? fine lets move on to number two…
2) Attendance. A lot of professors grade me on this… and the only way out of it is if I have a valid and signed off document that states that I was SICK that day… So if anything ELSE comes up, like oh I dont know… I had a sick father… I had a flat tire… I had any of a billion other set backs… I automatically get written off as absent for the respective class. At my college, if you’re absent for what adds up to three entire weeks of said class, you fail the course automatically. Ok so fine, I’m entitled to being able to cut a certain amount of classes so I can tend to other urgencies that pop up in my life without failing said course. Isn’t it bad enough that I fail the course automatically after three weeks worth of not attending? Do I have to get my grades shaved off too? So Mr. PhD holder, you give the person who hasn’t cut a single class a full mark, and you give the person who had to cut your class a couple of times a lower grade? Does that even seem remotely fair to you? Where the hell do you get off determining what I deserve for not maintaining a 100% attendance rate? In fact, where the hell do you get off even comparing attendance rates? Attendance isn’t for you to grade me on Mr. Doctor of Philosophy!
3) Office Hours. You’re a well mannered first class son/daughter of two parents that have put blood sweat and tears into bringing you up the way they did. So when you go see your professor at his/her office for whatever reason, you politely knock on the door in a very unintrusive and respectful manner that would make mummy and daddy extremely proud of you. What happens then? Oh I’ll tell you! Doctors of Philosophy happen! You end up waiting for a ridiculous amount of time at their door while they have tea/coffee and one heck of a conversation either on the phone or with the neighboring jackass Doctor of Philosophy. Yet you toughen it out, keep on waiting. Then the bastard has the nerve to step out, lock his/her office and asks you to come back later because Jack-ass has a very important issue that requires Jack-ass attention. Not you, ohhhh not you, the Jack-ass’ issue. As if you weren’t the reason he gets paid. As if you weren’t the purpose of his/her waking up every morning and going to work.
4) Compliments “to” the Chef. Some professors love it when you compliment them on how fuzzy they make you feel inside. Let me make this clear, I despise it. Whether you’re the person giving the compliment or receiving it. I despise you both. Unless your feelings for this person are GENUINE and TRUE then you’re clearly sucking up to said professor and encouraging this type of behavior which you end up getting a higher grade for. This is a high for some professors believe it or not.
5) Hypocrisy. I was once late for class and Mr. Doctor of Philosophy made me stand for 15 minutes at the door while he gave a lecture on how I wasted the students’ and the professor’s time before he eventually let me in. So he dedicated 15 minutes to explaining how I wasted everyone’s time instead of dedicating those 15 minutes to explaining course content [So wait... I wasted everyone's time?]. Guess what happened after I was let in? Jack-ass was supposed to be lecturing us on the Theory of Mechanics… instead, he deemed it more productive and less time-wasting to talk about traffic congestion and political figures of the Arab world. Gosh… if only I knew what my fellow students missed out on due to my being late for class.
6) Can’t Beat em? Join em! I’ve recently heard that in the history of all the students of Kuwait University that have asked for an administrative review of their course work because they know that they deserve a better grade than the one given to them by the respective course instructor, not one of them has ever won this battle. Is KU not 50 years old? So in around 50 years… not one of these students was done injustice? Oh come on! Don’t take your PhD holders off their damned pedestals here! After all, they’re not human! They can’t make mistakes! Theoretically, this kind of thing would cut off all hope of students having the courage to step forward. So congratulations people, you’ve managed to develop the sucking-up student-professor relationship which in turn formed the popular idolization of PhD holders. Theoretically at least.
There is no measure to how long I can keep on listing things… but that’s not the point. PhD holders aren’t GODS. They shouldn’t have power over students.
Imaginary: Maybe someday you can change this.
Hamad: Maybe someday you can tell me who/what you are.
Imaginary: All in good time my paralleled debater, all in good time. Say, what do you think of spandex? Yellow in particular.
Hamad: You have issues. o_O
Imaginary: Yes… very well, I shall be off now.
Hamad: I think they’re annoying.
Imaginary: Have you tried wearing them?
Hamad: … no. o_O
Imaginary: You should.
*Imaginary disappears*
Hamad: I’m officialy going crazy.
