(no subject)

[hathycol]

I had a lot to write about today, but honestly, I am so angry right now I can't do anything other than relate what happened to me in my ME1002 tutorial:

Arsehole: Ramble ramble something about Hellenic culture...

Me: Sorry, Hellenic is Greek, right?

Arsehole: Oh, yes, yes. Oh, sorry, I forgot you might not know what it meant; you're the one that went to a comprehensive Northern school so won't have the same educational opportunities...

I couldn't think of what to say. Option one was to thump him, tell him I went to the second best college in the country and that at least I wasn't relying on Mummy and Daddy to get me through my education, and the second was to burst into tears and feel inadequate. I just went "I didn't do classics so I didn't really know, thank you for clearing it up for me and didn't say anything for the rest of the class.

The tutor did cough and say in a very Scottish accent "I would argue there's nothing classical Greek in that source" and I could have hugged her.

spockette, I'm sorry for not being in RU1012 but I had to sit through a lecture after that I probably would have exploded under the weight of working-class guilt and the urge to kill things.

Am I somehow a bad person because my education was paid for by the tax-payer? No, that's not even it, it was the total contempt in his voice as he said 'working class' and then the pity. Am I somehow a lesser person? Is my education and intelligence worse? God, next time I won't ask.

Combined with a tutorial in which I got the mick taken out of me for using 'Native American' and asking if that was the current term used in academia I just wanted to cry a lot.

It was unfair and I shouldn't get so narked by this but I am.

[eta: it may be worth pointing out that, well, he said in a sort of matter-of-fact tone, as though he wasn't putting me down for it, it was just a statement of fact that my education was limited because of how much money my parents earned and where I came from. It wasn't even nasty, so I can't get as justifiably angry. Bah.]

~Hathy_Col~

Comments

[vampiegirl.livejournal.com]

I would have hit the pompous, pretentious asshole. I can't believe that he actualy said that.

[hathy-col.livejournal.com]

He said it in such a matter of fact way, though, that I honestly don't think he was being pretentious, that's just the way he saw the world and it was just unlucky for me.

... bah.

[elyim.livejournal.com]

:O I can't believe he said that.

*storms over there and beats him up*

What is the correct term if "Native American" isn't?! "Indigenous Peoples of North America"?! Like how Australian Aboriginees are now meant to be called "Aboringinal Peoples"...

[hathy-col.livejournal.com]

The correct term is Native American, but the articles we were reading said 'Indian' so I just asked if that was the term back in usage now because I didn't think it was politically correct.

Ugh.

He was all sympathetic and matter of fact, not even that pretentious - it was just the slightly "Oh, well, comprehensive AND Northern!" twinge to it. For fucks sake.

[flickerswitch.livejournal.com]

You have every right to feel narked, upset, offended and pissed.

Want me to come up there and sort him out for you? :p Can you get me his numberplate? >:o)

[hathy-col.livejournal.com]

He smokes a pipe, uses a briefcase, wears his gown to lecures (not compulsory since 1956!) and generally is a tit.

I know where he lives, though.

I mean, honestly. I'm calmer about it now, because he is just a knob and I am better than that and Winstanley was better than whatever inbred private Southern boarding school he went to.

[flickerswitch.livejournal.com]

If he does it again, get irrate with him and blame it on the pill!

[me-and.livejournal.com]

Wears his gown to lectures!? Wuh? My college has the highest proportion of private school students in Oxford, and we get nothing like that! Slap him repeatedly with a five-year-old well used textbook.

[hathy-col.livejournal.com]

I will thwap him with my used library copy of Psellos Byzantine readings. ("Well, the library ones aren't as good but they'll do," he says, waving his brand new version about. DO THESE PEOPLE HAVE NO CONCEPTION OF HOW THE REST OF US LIVE?)

[loneraven.livejournal.com]

You are in the right, and absolutely justified in getting very very pissed off, and I honestly believe that this must contravene some sort of university regulation. Particulatly "Northern" - a southern comprehensive school would be okay regardless of the education you got there, is what that seems to say. I reckon you should complain, if you can. That's out of order.

[hathy-col.livejournal.com]

No, no, because it wasn't a tutor saying it. *le sigh*

It's the common opinion of the university but I've never heard it said out loud before. Or, what I honestly think, is that he was going "Oh! Yeah! Northern state school bird, she won't know! Silly me!" and trying to explain himself.

If he says anything regarding where I come from or my education again, I'm going to calmly point out that the course doesn't say anything regarding needing aknowledge of Ancient Greek customs, nor are we expected to research them at this stage. Then I will point out that my college was the second best in the country so actually I recieved rather a good education. I will do all of this while BEATING HIM TO THE BLOODY PULP.

[loneraven.livejournal.com]

Don't forget the very salient point that you were admitted to the university! That by itself should tell him about the education you've had!

[hathy-col.livejournal.com]

Exactly.

There are eleven people competing for every 1 place in history at St Andrews; I rather think the fact I wasn't quite sure what 'Hellenic' meant doesn't mean that I am TEH DEPRIVED IMBECILE.

[calapine.livejournal.com]

What an utter imbecelic twat. Dude.

[hathy-col.livejournal.com]

I know. I know.

*hits him*

[aelie-baby.livejournal.com]

Getting riled over a snide comment like that is not unjustifiable. He knew what he was saying, and whatever the tone of voice, it was an inappropriate and snide thing to say. Hell, I went to public schools and if someone said something like that... ooooo... he would burn. Ain't nothin' wrong with public schools. It's all in what you do with it.

Thus I say you're totally justified in making comments about his dependency on parental units and his manners, or lack thereof. :P

[hathy-col.livejournal.com]

Oh, I will, next time.

Grrr.

Oh well. His parents tax money paid for me to go to school! And are paying for me in university!

[tau_sigma]

Yes it did. *g* I realised this fact sometime last term, when discussing the fact that, y'know, some people pay to get a good education. We get one for free, and they pay for us to have it. *G*

[dragonlady7.livejournal.com]

There's nobs like that all through higher learning. I mean, everywhere you go. When I got to the school I attended in Britain they automatically assumed I wouldn't know shit because I hadn't gone to their school, regardless of the fact that I actually had my high school degree already from one of the most prestigious high schools in the United States. Once I was at my university there was one who was a philosophy major and thought I couldn't possibly win an argument because I was only an English major (and I actually beat him into an intellectual pulp while Michael Ondaatje was present, which was satisfying), and so on and so forth. Idiots are ever-present. Grit your teeth and plot revenge.

But yes, what he said was actually pretty atrocious, and the more so because he wasn't being atrocious on purpose. That is the worst sort, the mild-mannered absent-minded atrociousness.
The only cure for it is, I believe, beatings.

(Speaking from experience, the worst thing is, of course, to realize two minutes too late that you have just perpetuated something horribly offensive like that. I once said, when someone asked me about a curious custom they'd heard of from one of the other two American girls at the British school, "Oh, it must be a Southern thing," and one of the other Americans snarled back "I'm not Southern" and never spoke to me again. I really have no idea where she was from or why it offended her, but I just know I said something awful. We'll never know. However. In your case, yes, he can't really be excused because that was an awful thing to say from any perspective.)



For the record, "Hellenic" refers to a specific period and place in Greek history, when used properly. I believe there were three major Bronze-Age cultures of the Greek area which fall under the mantle of Hellenic (Mycenean, Cretan, and Cycladic)-- but then, I could be wrong. Nowadays it simply means "Greek" because the Greek word for Greece, naturally, is Hellas (pronounced with a silent H). I mean, of course, right? *rolls eyes* It being thus because the Greeks are understandably more proud of their ancient past than their more recent (somewhat ignominious) past, and so have adopted that name to hearken back to its glory... but anyway, it certainly opens up a nice ambiguity in which to be a total nob.

[hathy-col.livejournal.com]

Normally I can deal with twats like that because I get the "Northern/state school" thing a LOT. It was the sort of mater of fact opinion in front of other people that was the bite and grrr.

I know where your British school is. Because when I come back from lectures, they're always playing hockey because I walk along the Lade Braes route from lectures because it's pretty. And also my university used to own it but we got skint and sold it, although the main quad I do all my lectures in is the United College of St Salvators and St Leonards.

The internet is a small and random place with three people in it.

And I will now use Hellenic in EVERY SINGLE LECTURE. Correctly. And then I will kill him with my brain.

[dragonlady7.livejournal.com]

Yes. St Leonard's. Although the year after I left it went co-ed and changed structure.

It's a God-awful place. Do they still wear teal uniforms?


Have you been to Janetta's for ice creams? It's by the school's front gate. Good shit, yo.


I actually was informed by someone that the world only actually has nine hundred people in it, and if you try hard enough, you will eventually meet them all.
It's a credible theory.


> kill him with my brain

Good plan!

[hathy-col.livejournal.com]

I don't think they're teal anymore - I did nearly run two of them over the other day and they were in hideous red and blue tartan affairs. Genuinely awful.

Only been to Janetta's for a job application, actually - currently tend to walk back Luvian's and get distracted...
That theory? Makes sense.

[sevenhelz.livejournal.com]

i think i've met about two hundred already. and a thousand repeats.
xx

[elisa0984.livejournal.com]

In regards to the Southern thing, one of the prevalent attitudes towards the South is that we're a region of backwards hicks who fry everything in sight and marry their cousins. It's a huge insult to some people, as if you were demeaning their intelligence.

[dragonlady7.livejournal.com]

I know. My brother-in-law is from Natchez, Mississippi.

[aramley.livejournal.com]

What an arsehole! I would've thumped him.

Just remember that the fact that you got into university was totally on your own merit, and had nothing to do with how much mummy and daddy were willing to splash out, unlike Mr Upper Class Twit of the Year.

[hathy-col.livejournal.com]

Will thump him next time. It's all good.

[starisfading.livejournal.com]

Just ignore him and remember that being northen makes you generally a superior person to him anyway! Or, alternativly, thump him!

[hathy-col.livejournal.com]

Next time, I will thump him with loud shouting in my accent.

[hyrnetanga.livejournal.com]

The twat! If he'd said thet to me, I would have been very tmepted to beat him to a pulp, especially the "northern" bit.

Surely if Winstanley's the 2nd best college in the country, it's pretty likely it's better than wherever he went.

[hathy-col.livejournal.com]

Well, that's what I thought. I'd made a passing comment, earlier on in the semester, about how I was from the North and how I'd been to this really good college that got some extra funding from the government because it did so well. How does that translate to urban deprivation?

Our college was THE BEST. WE KNOWS IT.

[elisa0984.livejournal.com]

Right, I just can't talk about the guy.

Was it a student who asked about the pcness of Native American? The new current term used in academia...if published then yes you're pretty much expected to or else you'll be flamed by colleagues. Just how often do the Native Americans pop up in British academia anyway?

[hathy-col.livejournal.com]

I have been talking about the guy all evening, by going "Bloody educational opportunities indeed" angrily at people. Honestly, some people.

I asked about what the term was. We had an article to read, written in 1997, that used the term 'Indian' consistently and confused me, so I asked what the current term used in academia is, because I know it changes. I am but a first year undergraduate, so I have a lot to learn.

They turn up pretty often. We had a big lecture on it today, about the Seven Years War (um, referred to in the States as the French-Indian War - I mention this because an American actually asked in the lecture and wars are given different names in different places) involved a lot of Native Americans from the Ohio Valley. It was fascinating, actually, so I might see if I can do an essay on it this semester. We'll see.

[elisa0984.livejournal.com]

Sorry, I thought you had asked and someone else responded in a condesending manner. Honestly I'm not even sure now. I don't think I could use it and get away with it but someone else might.

And I learned about the Seven Year's War last semester. *headdesk* I remember one text book we had a little chart with the American and British names for wars. Have the same thing for the American Civil War when it comes to battles.

It is, we spent some time with the torture techniques. Our professor has a fondness for gore.

[susie22.livejournal.com]

bastard! god, they can be such pillocks here sometimes! i think i would have reacted the same as you though, i cant stand confrontation ... its like when i was living with the yah and one of the first things she said to me was "do you have a student loan" i looked uncertain and said yes and she laughed lightly and said "i dont". for gods sake, they dont have a clue about life. one of the nicer yah boys in sallies was very puzzled to discover that i separate my whites when i do laundry ... hadnt a clue about the reasoning behind it. a lot of them are lovely, but its the few twats that give them their bad reputation. as for fewer educational opportunities, well ... come on, winstanley was bloody brilliant, we had tons of opportunities, we went to bloody new york in feb. i honestly dont believe private education is the way forward.

*hugs*

ignore them, theyre wankers when theyre being like that.

let me know when you fancy going out for hot choc. i think i may have developed a higher yah immunity through living in sallies, but all the same sometimes they can just say really awful things and they dont even see it.

[tashmania.livejournal.com]

What the... what a fucking wanker. Next time, beat him about the head with a heavy object. And you're completely justified in being angry... hell, I would be!

[sevenhelz.livejournal.com]

kill them. kill them all. doooooom!