This post is intended as an advice piece for aspiring humanities/social sciences students who are not complete morons, actually care about what they're studying and occasionally indulge in daydreams of academia. As most people are in a permanent tl;dr mood, I will sum up my main points with an actual drawing of my car as a third year anthropology student:
What these students don't realise before they go to college, is that social sciences share a basic tenet of existing for no particular reason, other than to accommodate people who hated math in high school. So they arrive, all optimistic and excited about their first classes, adorably unaware of the bleak fate that awaits them. (In case you're thinking I need to get over myself, this description was based on personal experience). Anyway, pretty soon they realise what a huge mistake they've made but by then it's too late to get out. So here is what you need to know before deciding to get a degree in the humanities/social sciences:
Don't expect all that knowledge to pay off
If you choose to slowly kill yourself all the way to a PhD you may, at some point, become a published author and/or professor. Unfortunately, at the graduate level you don't really know enough to do anything other than teach high-school kids, or work as an assistant at a research centre or/and live off food stamps while talking about Foucault to the local bartender. The "good" news is, if you stop being delusional and expecting to get a job in your field with a bachelor's degree, you can instead get a dead-end job in the real world and start saving up for your master's. Or you can abandon your ridiculous dreams of grad school and stay in the real world, because chances are you aren't going to make it in academia anyway. And even if you somehow beat the odds and do make it, the salaries leave a lot to be desired (understatement of the year).
Your college experience will disappoint you
This one is exclusive to people who actually care about what they're studying and didn't choose it for lack of having other options. (If you belong in the second category I hate you so feel free to gtfo) Back to us, remember what we were saying earlier about the kids who hated math in high school? Congratulations because these kids are now the ones you will spend every hour of class with. Get ready for their stupid questions, useless observations and general complete lack of knowledge of what they're studying. That's what your first classes are going to be like. In time you will learn to block it out, having come down with a terminal case of misanthropy in the process. If you're extremely lucky you may meet one or two people who are actually interested in their major, but if you were hoping of finally being among your intellectual peers, boy, are you in for a filled-with-suicidal-thoughts surprise.
The professor didn't fail you on purpose, you just didn't study enough/are stupid
Usually in social science classes professors try to explain the subject by discussing it with the students, so you may think that some kind of relationship is formed. (personally I resent this teaching method because it encourages the category of students mentioned above to further torture me) Maybe one day you disagreed with a professor and they seemed kinda annoyed with you. Then the grades come in and it looks like you failed. Of course you assume that a) your argument was so revolutionary, world-shattering and offensive to "the system" the professor represents that they'll never forget it b) that they hate you for it and that's the reason they failed you. The thing to remember is that college offers a refreshing change from high school because professors may vaguely remember you or even know your name (if you stand out like an oasis in the intellectual desert of uninterested people), but very rarely will you make such an impact that they will pass or fail you on purpose. So no, the professors don't hate you, instead they have hundreds of annoying students that they would prefer to get rid off than having them retake their class. Own your failure and move on.
Learning about the world will make you sad
Society (and Littlefinger) have been telling us for quite some time that knowledge is power. I'm not gonna argue with that because it's obviously true, but they tend to leave out an important part. Sure, it's all "knowledge gives you the power to change the world" before you actually have to sit down and acquire that knowledge. Then it's "how's your crippling depression going?" Somehow the more you learn about the world, the more confused you end up feeling. You find yourself craving social change and hating everyone for being so fucking stupid about so many issues, while at the same time you understand why they are that way and how complex and difficult these issues are. As for the "changing the world" part, your knowledge isn't some force of nature. You can't really change anyone who doesn't want to change. You talk to people and you think "maybe if I explain some basics of race theory, this idiot will stop being racist". But it just doesn't work that way. And that's fucking depressing as shit.
It's not really worth it unless you're committed to it
Despite what losers desperate for self validation aspiring engineers everywhere would have you believe, humanities and social sciences aren't actually easy. They're the exact opposite of easy, as they literally cover every aspect of human life. They're also annoyingly self-indulgent and sometimes frivolous to the point of causing headaches. And it's seriously not worth memorising their enormous piles of unrelated theories if you're not actually interested in them. Also, as I said before, their degrees are not exactly synonymous with "lucrative job opportunities". In conclusion, I hope some of these points have dissuaded you from going down that path of self-destruction, unless you actually really, really want to. Cause every time you choose humanities because they sound easy/you hate math, a nerd like me dies.
