I'll get the hang of this blogging thing eventually...
Now is the time that everyone is going off to university, except some people who will be going in a couple of years.
I worry, you know, I worry a lot about this. Up to now schooling has been more or less compulsory. We've been effectively forced to go. This means we can hate it and console ourselves by saying "one day, I'll get out of this, and things will be better" and really believe it.
When we move on to post eighteen, we are making--very definitely--our own choices. This can be good, but it can also be bad. If someone takes business computing and doesn't like it, they don't rationalise it by saying "one day, I'll not have to do business computing any-more" they say "this is what life is like", or "the money's worth it", or "I don't know what else to do", or "Eh... it'll get better".
This means that people, especially more passive people, are effectively choosing the path for the rest of their lives. People who choose business computing now will probably be spending a considerable amount of their lives filling in spreadsheets or writing macros for Microsoft Office. And the scary thing is, the universities are in on it too. You pick up a few prospecti and you'll see people touting links with business and placement schemes. The World Of Work starts wrapping its tendrils around you from probably the second year.
To me, right now, nearly all the people I know are all beautiful. These are people who have not 'specialised', who still get big chunks of holidays in which they have their own time, who still have hours after school in which to pursue their own interests, people--above all--who are not owned.
The thought of these people becoming drones terrifies, angers, and physically sickens me.
Sure, they'll get married, go out a couple nights a week for drinks, go play golf with workmates, but is this really the life for an individual? Or is it a cage?
And I see it happening already. I'm losing people. Spontaneity is draining out of people, and they're getting 'rewarded' for it, for 'growing up'. I have a friend, a good few years into work, who recently spent probably around a month in solid overtime mode, working on weekends, etc. He won bread, sure enough, but he neglected his boyfriend in more ways than one, in my opinion, and... most of all... put his work before people. He's one of the biggest reasons I want to succeed in my plans, just to prove him wrong in what it is clear he believes: that I'm being naive. I can't wait for it. There's a bit of spite there, I'll admit.
So, the race is on to try to nudge people in ways I think will put them on less closed paths. Ones that, as mine, have the career prospects of a limp tangerine. Liberal arts courses are the obvious ones, though anything is better than something with 'business' or a synonym in the title.
At the same time... I don't want to unduely influence someone. I try to be transparant and explain my thinking to people rather than telling them to do things (though telling people never gets anywhere anyway), recommend them books and things, deconstruct things like the joys of working life, etc, but I still feel guilty about it sometimes... what if I'm wrong? What if I lead people into poverty or such? I'm trying to live by example, but this is all new to me too.
But when it comes down to it, I know it's more than I'm worth to stand by and watch people lose themselves and become Standardised. I know before long, five or ten years, most of my generation will be locked up in offices. There will be people who will never realise what they could be.
And that, more than anything else, is what kills me.
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