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One of my biggest pet peeves, and one I know I've gone into before here, is the line of reasoning that goes like this:
"I'm a ________, so ________."
Often, the first half of that statement includes the word "professional" before the blank, and typically the part after "so" is a way of saying "you're entirely wrong."
This statement can be modified to its slightly more annoying brother, which goes:
"I have a degree in ________, so ________."
Again, the first half can also include the specific level of degree (from conversations I've had, it's always at least a Bachelors and usually a Masters or higher). The latter half of the statement is, like the other, a way of saying "you're entirely wrong."
These statements bother me because they are basically a way of saying "I'm better than you!" or even worse, "I'm smarter than you!" because of your career or your education. It's often used in a way where the career or degree have little to do with the argument at hand: it's a way of boosting your own ego while backhandedly insulting the person you're using it as an argument against.
I've also had this come up in conversation where the person may be a professional whatever, or have a degree in whatever subject, but there's still new stuff they can learn about that subject…and they're unwilling to learn it because they think that having that career and/or that degree means they already know everything. I once spent about a month of my job explaining InDesign to a professional graphic designer with a four-year degree in the subject, and yet they knew very little (and worse, were unwilling to learn) about any program other than Photoshop. Not all people are like this, but damn, the ones who use these lines of reasoning have turned out to be almost every time it comes up. Just personal experience, though, hopefully someday someone will prove me wrong.
Perhaps it's the narcism of these kind of statements that peeves me, or perhaps it's the insults to my own intelligence. I learn something new everyday, clearly I'm not the smartest person in the world (who is?), but holding your career or your degree over my head and using it to insult my lack of that career or that degree is pretty damn demeaning, especially since I consider myself a reasonably well-rounded individual…though as I stated earlier, I still have a lot to learn.
I'd much rather learn something new than be bashed for not already knowing it, and I think that's what bothers me most about this line of argument.
Often, the first half of that statement includes the word "professional" before the blank, and typically the part after "so" is a way of saying "you're entirely wrong."
This statement can be modified to its slightly more annoying brother, which goes:
Again, the first half can also include the specific level of degree (from conversations I've had, it's always at least a Bachelors and usually a Masters or higher). The latter half of the statement is, like the other, a way of saying "you're entirely wrong."
These statements bother me because they are basically a way of saying "I'm better than you!" or even worse, "I'm smarter than you!" because of your career or your education. It's often used in a way where the career or degree have little to do with the argument at hand: it's a way of boosting your own ego while backhandedly insulting the person you're using it as an argument against.
I've also had this come up in conversation where the person may be a professional whatever, or have a degree in whatever subject, but there's still new stuff they can learn about that subject…and they're unwilling to learn it because they think that having that career and/or that degree means they already know everything. I once spent about a month of my job explaining InDesign to a professional graphic designer with a four-year degree in the subject, and yet they knew very little (and worse, were unwilling to learn) about any program other than Photoshop. Not all people are like this, but damn, the ones who use these lines of reasoning have turned out to be almost every time it comes up. Just personal experience, though, hopefully someday someone will prove me wrong.
Perhaps it's the narcism of these kind of statements that peeves me, or perhaps it's the insults to my own intelligence. I learn something new everyday, clearly I'm not the smartest person in the world (who is?), but holding your career or your degree over my head and using it to insult my lack of that career or that degree is pretty damn demeaning, especially since I consider myself a reasonably well-rounded individual…though as I stated earlier, I still have a lot to learn.
I'd much rather learn something new than be bashed for not already knowing it, and I think that's what bothers me most about this line of argument.
