#and you shouldnt let a bunch of dipshits tell you what knowledge is “more valuable”

[specioussussurations]

this take sucks. ive been thinking about it a lot and this take does suck

not because its wrong but because it doesn't address the economic anxieties that STEM propaganda feeds on; how the fuck does an English degree pay your bills?

because, on the surface, these exact responses are what you're taught. That you spend 4 years reading incomprehensible books and multisyllabic words then get spit out to starve in the "real" world (i.e. where STEM skills are "more useful")

But like. Y'all. People. Writing several essays a year for several years is actually super effective training for most corporate work. Fuck, most small businesses would KILL to have employees with that kind of training.

Because to write an essay in college you gotta:

read some shit. it'll be dense. it'll be long. it'll be boring

figure out what the fuck you just read

figure out how to explain that same shit

then figure out who you gotta explain it to

often in less than a day while juggling a hundred other social & financial obligations

you'll never guess what skills "talk to the client about procedure then report back to me" type shit uses. you'll never fucking guess.

humanities degrees do have serious artistic & philosophical value. im gonna be a starving poet. its my shitty, awful destiny. im too belligerent and disabled to live my life any other way.

but they have truly enormous economic value, too. you cannot work 90% of jobs IN ANY FIELD IN ANY POSITION without basic communication skills, and literally every raise, promotion, or job opportunity is 1000% more achievable if you know what & how to say the thing your boss (your AUDIENCE) needs to hear

every single humanities degree teaches deadline, drafting, composition, and critical analysis skills that make you an insanely valuable employee. fuck, man, a degree in 16th century russian maritime history would too. going to a "place of learning" for a "FOUR YEAR degree" happens to learn you a thing or two about a thing about a thing or two. go fucking figure

addendum:

i dont think being in STEM makes you stupid. i think being in STEM because "the humanities are useless" makes you stupid. i like math. im a math head. ive given math oral sex and id do it again.