- Top Features:
- War Room
- Glenn Greenwald
- Broadsheet
- Joan Walsh
- Camille Paglia
- Since You Asked
- Follow Salon:
Read other letters about this article
I think it was me who first mentioned trust funds in this thread. OK, maybe I mis-spoke, but what I was really meaning was that the attitude of many of the confused graduate students who write in to Cary suggests a lack of familiarity with the working world, that in turn suggests that probably they have a financially supportive family.
Oh, I know EXAAAAAACTLY what you mean. I will elaborate further. These are people who:
- grew up in a pleasant suburb of a major city
- went directly from high school to college to grad school
- have never held a real job ("internships" at megacorps don't count)
- don't, and have never, meaningfully interacted with people outside of their own middle-, upper middle-, or upper class social group (they may have collected coats for the homeless or poor, but have never talked to anyone who is or was)
- have never personally known adversity
- if push came to shove, even if they aren't trust funded, they could turn to their families for support
My partner, who just finished his grad degree, went to school with a number of such people, some of whom were indeed creating similar romantic intrigues for themselves (boredom? to avoid having to come up with a dissertation topic? some combination of the above? who knows!). The older ones who'd worked and/or been kicked around a little, were often interesting people with whom I genuinely enjoyed spending time.
