Ok, before I can post like a normal human being I have to get this off my chest. So remember my english professor? The one who is constantly harping on us about how we're all brainwashed, we don't know anything, we're receiving a piss poor education, etc? Yeah well fuck that guy.
I mean, ok, he's pretty nice when you talk to him before class. I was asking him some questions about The Aeneid (you know, a book written over 2,000 years ago that has nothing to do with the current politics of this university and/or country?) today, which we've just finished skimming, and he was really helpful. Then class started, and I thought "Boy, I bet today is actually gonna be pretty productive in here! He seems to be in a good mood, and he's already thinking about the Aeneid since we were just talking about it. Awesome."
So we took our quiz on the chapter we had to read for today, handed in our reading journals, and then he asked if we had any questions. I asked him what Virgil meant when he referred to those that "the Fates owed a second body". First word out of his mouth was "reincarnation". Perfect! That's a term I understand. Then he went a little further into what qualified a soul for reincarnation (apparently 1,000 years in the underworld), which was interesting and still relevent. Then he kind of tied it in with our next book, The Divine Comedy. Ok, that works, since we're starting that over the weekend. Then, and I don't totally understand how this happened, he was suddenly ranting about how you can't say God doesn't exist because you can't prove he doesn't exist, but we're all taught to be good little followers of science so we just blindly believe it and blah blah blah...for almost 30 minutes. Literally.
Now, I don't give two shits what you believe - it's not going to change my opinion of you as a person, it's just another facet of your life. Don't force it on me, I'll do you the same courtesy, and we'll get on just fine. But seroiusly, what the fuck was that? The only part about that garbage that was relevant to the class was that it was about God, and the Divine Comedy was written by Dante, who was Christian. But he took that tiny connection, and suddenly it was (hooray!) another tirade about how everyone is constantly feeding us bullshit, and how they're trying to indoctrinate us. He even started blabbering on about feminism and how stupid it is. That had NOTHING to do with ANYTHING!
So finally he finishes his ridiculous speech. I'm sitting at my desk doodling in my notebook, because I checked out about 5 minutes in. It's not like that stuff mattered, and I've heard all of it from him before. And he was like "Ok sorry, got a little excited there. What was your question? Did I answer it?" and I was like "Yup." And then he asked if there were other questions, and by that point I was resigned to not actually learning anything for the day. So the girl next to me asked another question with a relatively simple answer. It involves explanation of a few people, but that's ok. And then he wandered off again, talking about all the Roman emperors. But you know, at least it was the right era and he wasn't bitching at us.
And then class was over. That was it. I wasted 1 hour and 20 minutes of my life (the other 10 minutes were spent on my quiz and writing out a grocery list). The worst part is, we go through this song and dance with him every day. Honestly, when he stays on topic, he's a really good teacher. He's excited about the material and can put it into terms that we understand (not easy to do with medieval lit). But when he spends less than half the class period actually discussing the material, then it's not really worth it.
I think he says shit like that because he wants to "shock" us or whatever. He's like "None of your other professors are gonna say this stuff to you, because they don't want you to know." as he talks about how our military is wonderful and how Barack Obama is not fit to be president and feminism and multiculturalism are bullshit.
And he's right, none of my other professors will. But do you want to know why? It's because they're too busy TEACHING THEIR FUCKING CLASSES. No, we don't discuss current events and what's wrong with the world today in my goddamn math class. In Econ I'm learning about absolute advantage and PPFs. My speech professor teaches us good public speaking habits and good listening habits. The only other professor I have that even mentions current events is my Anthro professor, and all he says about them is that we should stay informed on them. That's it. Doesn't tell us what he thinks or that we're wrong. He just tells us to read the newspaper.
My english professor also likes to ask us questions that he knows nobody will answer. Then he can be like "You don't know, do you?" or "Nobody's gonna argue with me? I can see you don't look happy, but nobody's gonna say anything?" And honestly, next time he does it I'm going to say "No, I am not going to argue with you. I am not paying $3,500 a semester to come to class and argue with you. I am paying $3,500 to come to class and learn from you. So please teach me."
Either that or I'll just set fire to my desk and walk out.
/Rant.
Woo, I feel a lot better. But now I'm all blogged out, so I will try to keep this short. Apart from being ridiculously frustrated, I've had a pretty great day. I was done with class at 11:10, had an awesome buffalo chicken sandwich for lunch, and I made meatballs and mashed potatoes for dinner, which was AMAZING. I was so sure I was gonna fuck it up, but I did not. Also, I studied math and did practice problems for an hour and a half. I actually feel prepared for our quiz tomorrow. This has been an unprecedented level of productivity.
This weekend my younger brothers are coming down to visit and to bring me my copy of Gears of War 3 (YAYYYYYY!!!), so that will be pretty baller. But that also means I've got to be even more productive tomorrow and get the apartment cleaned and my Econ homework done before they get here. Thankfully, they aren't going to show up til about 11pm. And I think on Saturday Andy is going to come over and play games with us. I can't wait.
Sorry about the grumpy post, but I can't blow up like that in class, and I was getting worried that my head was going to explode. Now I'm much happier. I think it's time to play a little Saints Row before bed.
Sweet dreams, darlings.
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