11/25/2019

Real Life 101

On more than one occasion I have suggested that one course that needs to be taught in our schools and colleges is Real Life 101, aka Life Isn’t Fair 101. It is sad that so many of the kids in our schools have not been taught the harsh realities that entail life. This is something that parents and teachers should have been instilling in the children from day one. But teaching these truths has been sadly neglected to the point where students have come to believe that they should never have to deal with life’s unpleasantries such as receiving poor grades for poor work, having to listen to ideas or beliefs that disagree with theirs, finding out that their way isn’t the only way, and most important, the truth about Rule #51, that being that sometimes they are wrong.

As I have mentioned in other posts recently, I have been perusing the 17-and-a-half years of Weekend Pundit archives and have come across something from 2015 that is even more important today.

Were I a professor at one of these institutions that used to provide higher education rather than coddling these self-made 'victims', this is the what I would say to them on their very first day in my class:

“Welcome to Real Life 101. I am Professor Pundit and I'm going to tell you right now that I don't believe in trigger warnings.”

“You will be hearing and seeing things you should have been exposed to earlier in life, but that your misguided and ignorant parents chose to shield you from, meaning you arrived here unprepared to deal with life as it is.”

“I also expect that a good portion of you were told all through school that you were special and never had to worry about losing because 'everyone gets a trophy for just showing up'. Unfortunately, you were lied to because very few of you, if any, are special. Instead, you're average. No, strike that. You're below average because you have no idea what it's like to fail. When you do, you'll have no idea how to deal with it and you'll fall apart. You aren't prepared for failure and that's one of the biggest failings of your parents and teachers.”

“One of the first things I'm going to teach you is this one solid and perpetual truth: Life isn't fair. It never has been and it never will be. Get used to it. If you can't handle this, then I strongly suggest you drop this course and salve your wounded psyche by taking Basket Weaving 100 or Bunny Hugging 110 and leave real life to the rest of us.”

“I intend to flush out all of the crap that has been force fed to you over the previous 12 years of your scholastic life and teach you how to think, not what to think. I will help you develop the skills you need to survive out there in the real world where there will be no trigger warnings, no safe spaces, no college tribunals to take your side because you were offended by what someone said, wrote, or did that everyone else in the world sees as trivial and not worth mentioning.”

“I am going to shove reality in your face. I'm not going to sugar coat it or make it easy for you to coast through this course. I'm going to show you that not everyone can be reasoned with. I'm going to prove to you that there are people out there who don't give a good goddamn about you or your feelings, nor should they. I'm going to show you that there are evil fucking people out there who wouldn't think twice about raping you and then slicing your head off with a knife because it pleases them to do so to someone they see as sub-human. (Yes, this means you, Miss Sorority Pledge.)”

“I'm going to prove to you that the only person you can count on is you when you're out there in the real world. Your mommy or daddy won't be able to bail you out and none of the teachers from your schools will lend you a helping hand once you leave this place. You'll be on your own. If you fail to learn these lessons and the others I hope to teach you, then you will be truly and totally fucked. The only way you'll survive is to move back in with your mommy and daddy and live in their basement. At worst, you'll be curled up on your bed down there, stuck in a semi-catatonic state because you were set up by your parents and your teachers to fail, being totally incapable of dealing with real life as it is, not as you want it to be.”

“Any questions before we begin? No? Good. Then let's get started....”

I feel the need to add a list of a few topics that would be covered in such a course to bring this up to date: .

Grades are earned, not owed. They are based upon the work you do and are not based on your race, ethnicity, political leanings, gender, sexual orientation, or religious beliefs. This is particularly true out there in the real world. Employers expect you to do the work they hired you to perform and none of those things listed will matter to them, period.

Feeling is not the same as thinking. Too often you equate one with the other. They are nothing alike. Basing all your decisions upon feelz rather than facts and reasoning will lead you to make the wrong decision most of the time.

Opinions abound and everyone has their own. Your opinion is no more valid than that of anyone else. Get used to it. A lot of folks will have opinions that differ from yours, but that doesn’t automatically mean yours is valid and theirs are not. They may know things you don’t and have had experiences you cannot fathom.

Just because someone disagrees with you doesn’t mean they’re racist or any other kind of ‘-ist’. It just means they disagree with you, period. If you try to push the ‘-ist’ narrative, you’ll prove that you are willfully ignorant about the subject at hand and can be ignored because your opinion isn’t based upon anything but ‘feelz’.

Freedom of speech includes speech you may find offensive. The First Amendment also applies to speech you disagree with, even ‘hate speech’, a concept that is so vague that someone saying “hello” could be defined as having used hate speech. Get used to the idea that hate speech is constitutionally protected speech, not just the speech with which you agree.

Respect is earned. It is not owed nor can it be demanded, no matter what you may believe. If you show no respect, don’t expect to get any in return. If you demand respect, don’t be surprised if you receive only ridicule in return.

I could go on, but then I’d need a bigger blog.