Does Academia Make You An A-Hole ???

Here's the story of a Ph.D. who left academia after 16 years to work as a waitress:

I’ve learned a lot about the world and myself since I started working there. But the most important thing I’ve learned is that I’d been an asshole for thinking I was a failure because I was going to be a waitress. I’d been an asshole when I’d believed I was too good, too intelligent and too educated to wait tables, even though I ended up enjoying it more than teaching at any fancy institution. I’d been an asshole because my co-workers are intelligent and interesting, but I had been looking down on what they do, declaring it my biggest fear and failure. I’d been an asshole because I thought that having a Ph.D. made me special or better or smarter than everyone else, when in fact, all it made me was, well. . . an asshole.

I looked back at those parties where I took pride in thinking I wasn’t tainted by academia’s snobbery, when really, I was just as much of an elitist as any of them. Hello, hypocrisy. Confronting my own elitism has been embarrassing. The realization that every time I was asked what I did for a living and got pleasure from saying I taught at Yale or Harvard makes me cringe. And yet I try not to be too hard on myself.  After all, academia cultivates and nurtures elitism and entitlement. Clearly, being critical of it didn’t make me immune to it; elitism can creep up on you.

Now, I’m proud to say I’m a waitress. We pool tips at my bar. This makes for a community where we all have each other’s backs, and if someone doesn’t, they’re called out.  Unlike the competitive environment of academia, working at my bar is actually about being in a place where people want you to do well because that means we all do well.

You can read the rest @
http://www.salon.com/2015/12/20/sixteen_years_in_academia_made_me_an_a_hole/

College prepares you for nothing, except more college. If you can survive at it, great. If not, it is mainly a waste of your life.

Note well - academics advise our government. Maybe that's why it's so f-cked up.