With every major there comes different, and usually negative, stereotypes. Some majors are deemed useless, others think that those who have that major must be dumb, sometimes it’s determined that the only reason to choose a certain major is to make money. It seems as though there is no way for you to have a major and not be criticized, and I for the life of me cannot figure out why that is. Do we not realize that different does not mean bad?
When people argue that certain majors are useless it literally makes my skin crawl. If the major was useless, do you think it would exist? Or better yet, do you think that anyone would major in it? No. Clearly people in that major have chosen it because they are good at it, or are passionate about it, or at the very least like it. Clearly that major is not useless to them. And while you might not see the use yourself, that doesn’t mean they want you to question their choice. And they definitely don’t want to be criticized or mocked for it. Don’t we realize that at the end of the day, although we may be headed different places, we are still all working towards the same goal of making this world a better place? There are many different ways to do that, that's why there are different fields for people to go into. So there is a use for it; maybe it’s just different than yours.
It doesn’t make sense to me that people would ever judge someone based on what they are interested in. If you are passionate about something, why wouldn’t you major it? Isn’t the goal in life to be happy? If that’s what makes you happy, then go for it. Too often people judge a major because they don’t think it will make a good income. But my question now is this: why would you ever bring that up to someone majoring in it? Chances are they probably have seen the statistics but still want to be doing that. Why would you criticize someone’s choice because of how much money they will one day make? I think we hear the phrase “there is more to life than money” so often that it doesn’t register for some. But if you are talented at something or enjoy it, shouldn’t making money be second to that?
On the other hand, just because a major does usually result in a job with a high income, that doesn’t mean that is the only reason why someone picked it. Each major has many sides to it that you won’t get to see unless you actually major in it. Too often we judge a major knowing not much more about it than what it is called or what job you might get with it. And while people do major in things they want to have a career in, they don’t always pick that career based on having the highest salary possible. There are many sides to that decision too. Why can we believe so easily that someone can be passionate about a major with a potentially low income, but not about one with a potentially high income? While yes, that may be the case for some, that is not the case for all and we shouldn’t assume it is.
We also shouldn’t deem some majors easier than others and dismiss the people with those majors. Just because something may seem easy to you doesn’t mean it will be. Some classes are deemed easy A’s but every year there will be people who get B’s in them. While the focus of that major will be different, that doesn’t mean that you should dismiss majors that aren’t like yours. You don’t know all the work a major requires until you are in that major and have your diploma. You won’t know what it takes until you’ve gone through it all, so why would you call someone’s major easy if you aren’t even in it? It’s really hard to compare apples to oranges, which is why we shouldn’t.
Instead of ripping on each other's majors in an attempt to make ourselves feel more secure about where we are headed in life, we could be building each other up. Don’t you want a well-rounded, well-functioning society? Shouldn’t we want a wide variety of people majoring in a wide variety of things so that we can have a diversified country? Society can’t function with only one career. We need all of the different majors to be able to work as a country. We need the engineers, the teachers, the artists, the writers, the accountants, the psychologists, the doctors, and--I could literally continue on with this list for another 1000 words. But I won’t, because the idea should be clear at this point.
Tearing down someone based on their major will not ensure your success. Telling someone their major is easy will not make yours harder. Telling someone the only reason they picked their major is for the money will not make your potential job pay more. Our society needs all these majors for all their different purposes, so we should go forth encouraging those in their major so that they can be the best they can possibly be at it. At the end of the day, we want the best work force possible, and that’s not going to happen if we keep making people feel as though they are unneeded. Instead stereotyping someone negatively, we should cheer each other on. At the end of the day, we’re all still in college working to better ourselves. Let’s celebrate the fact that we’ve made it this far, and have a great future ahead of us, regardless of what direction it’s in.
