It’s a sick society that only considers knowledge worthwhile when it’s profitable.
this post was submitted on 08 Jan 2026
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Agree that’s why we’re in the situation that we’re in. People think that their ignorance is as good as other people knowledge
And yet, at least where I live, many people can and do study those less profitable things, even if they're not exceptionally well-off and still go on to find a well-paying job. The student life isn't luxurious, but it's livable, mostly thanks to the public support systems for students.
So I would definitely say that society values unprofitable knowledge.
it might have something to do with the fact that knowledge does not pay your next month's rent.
It's a sick society
nor it gets your foot in the door in a field, and UNIVERsities obfuscates things like lab work, and [your field of study] volunteering.
Universities are meant to preserve and expand human knowledge, not all degrees lead to jobs, and that would be ok, if only there were few people interested in them.
Liberal Arts degrees are fantastically useful in the fields of sales and marketing. Tons of MBAs have liberal arts undergrad degrees. Tons of lawyers have liberal arts degrees. Tons of real estate agents have liberal arts degrees. Tons of professional con artists, police agents, and intelligence officers have liberal arts degrees.
The idea that the degree is useless, that you can't get a job, or that you are only able to work in academia is entirely false.
The problem with these degrees is that they teach you how to be horrifyingly evil and then politely ask you not to, while dangling an enormous bucket of cash in your face to do exactly that.
As a person who enjoyed liberal art college and studied a liberal art major (mathematics), I think some people here might misunderstood the definition of liberal art.
"Liberal art" means "skills of free people", which by its very history, are useful skills that don't immediately lead to professional applications, since they historically target comparativly weathy people who are in higher class of society, who don't need to immediately find work to stay alive. Not to say we should still limit liberal art education to the wealthiest few, but there is still immense value in these subjects, especially in the long term.
Most of the majors in U.S. undergrad educations are liberal art majors, like physics, chemistry, biology, mathematics, computer science (not engineering), economics, sociology, physiology, music, fine art etc. The exceptions are business, law, medical field, and engineering, several of these fields seldom have undergrad programs.
In general, most of the U.S. research universities teaches libral art subjects in their "college of art and science", which is usually the most popular college in universities.
HAHAHAHA LIBERAL ARTS BAD
This is beyond trite. Stop drawing speech bubbles around shitty cliched jokes.
The person drawing the comic is an artist.
I fail to see who gave you the final authority on who's allowed to reflect and joke about their own professional landscape and who isn't.
"Get off my lawn"
Please stop doing something that artists have doing since practically the invention of paper
Tell me, what new medium is ruining the kids today?
Is it low-effort? Sure. But so are boobs and farts and piss. Artists got to get practice in drawing something, doesn't hurt anyone but your fefes if they use a meme.
Heck, for the context of this tired argument, I wouldn't even care if it's AI. (And I broadly do not like AI)
Computer Science has a higher unemployment rate than art history right now
Picture this.
Person 1 went to uni and invented a great new programming language during his doctorate.
Person 2 is slightly on the spectrum, loves puzzles and enjoys creating businesses forms with person's 1 programming language.
Guess who is making money.
Person 3 who exploits persons 1 and 2 for profit
Graduates in Art history: 1
Profession of graduates in Art history: Freelance developer
Employment rate of Art history: 100%
This cartoon is flawed at the base. Education doesn't lead to jobs, it leads to knowledge. A job is a practical application of part of that knowledge, but only if there is someone willing to pay for it.
Yeah, most people are getting the education for the job part though. They have to pay a lot of money for that shit and if they knew at the beginning it wouldn't lead to a job they wouldn't have done it.
If you're going to college to just get a certain job so that you can be safe and secure financially, then I would suggest a trade school. Of course unless you want to be a: doctor, teacher, engineer, or similar. College is designed to open doors and broaden horizons. . . or at least that's what it used to be (some still are) until the corporate overlords realized they could use them to print money.
The construction unions are nepotistic trump worshiping white supremisist cesspits….lol I know I’m back in college after 15 years in the trenches. It’s bad bad like union officers putting nooses and writing kkk on black apprentices stuff, it’s like female apprentices getting sexually assaulted bad lol. It’s bad
Pfft not everyone lives in dystopian US.
Here in sunny Australia, they're run by underworld figures and bikie gangs.
well the thing is, the employers actually cut corners because they dont want to train a fresh graduate in whatever field you are in, they dont want to pay too much, and they are lazy to train you from the ground up(aka apprenticing). hence why you see all these listings as 2+years and skills you never heard of for low-level jobs in your fields. ALso stem employers love H1B visa holders over domestic students. trade schools is not for everyone, mayb if you began after HIGH SCHOOL it might be preferrable, but if your older with some conditions, it might be more difficult.
also some stems have a significant preference/geared towards a specific gender too(as in actual help to get into field).
lib arts, studies, and psych, physics are pretty much jobless degree at the bachelors level, because there is none. they all require at least a masters to even begin looking for a job. furthermore, a undergrads gpa might be trashed before they can even think about GRAD SCHOOL.
Why I've never gotten any further education after high school. Sucks cause there's subjects I'm fascinated with learning about in a structured environment, but why waste so much money when it leads nowhere? I'm already working a physically demanding job in a slaughterhouse and don't like anything trade schools teach.
I am truly happy to live in the era we do though. There's tons of resources for free structured learning that was not available even 20 years ago.
What about being a butcher? Takes a lot of skill to do right.
I don't trust myself with knives which is why they just stuck me in the cooler and gave me a hook to pull the carcusses with. Doesn't help I used to work in a small grocery store and the meat guys there always messed with me on how close they've come to losing fingers.
Fair enough then, knives are key to being a butcher I'd think.
“You’re now employed by the void.”
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Oh, I'm sorry, you misunderstood. Did you think your degree would earn you something? No, what you've gained is the privilege of not being treated like actual garbage and being able to work for some scraps. Count your blessings.
No, the problem is that too many people were pushed to get degrees that don't lead to a career path, and go into debt to do so. It's caused non-specific degrees to be worthless by oversaturation.
You don't need a bachelor's for philosophy or history. Go read books or take online courses if you're interested, but do so alongside learning skills for a career. You can make a lot of money in the trades, and it doesn't prevent you from learning more for your own enjoyment
I guess people are missing my point. People aren't getting those useless degrees for no reason. They're getting them to avoid being discriminated against, and even though, yes they are useless in a practical sense, avoiding that discrimination is pretty valuable.
And who cares? A lot of people in the trades make more than even engineers. Who cares if someone acts like you're uneducated when you're earning 3x as much as them and they have to call you to get stuff fixed.
I makes 0 sense to go 6 figures inti debt to get an arts degree just to later become a barista at Starbucks or an HR rep. And that discrimination won't end until people start bucking the trend