[Discussion/Seriouspost] How much accountability/responsibility should people have for the quality/outcome of their life?

23  2018-05-12 by MasterLawlz

This is something I've been wondering a lot lately, mostly because I see comments online that frequently reiterate the point that succeeding in life is almost entirely based on luck which I think is ridiculous.

I understand that outside factors can definitely affect your chances of success (like if you're a minority, have a disability, come from a really poor family, etc.), but I'm gonna go out on a limb here and say that a lot of the people who are saying "it's all luck" are middle-class white people in their prime working age that also live in one of the wealthiest countries in the world (with a very low unemployment rate).

I think the biggest thing fucking up young people is how the educational system is structured both because it's ludicrously expensive, a lot of the degrees are idiotic, and very little is told to them about alternative career paths (trade schools for example) so a lot of kids end up buried in debt for no reason because they had no idea what else to do. But even then, I really don't feel that sorry for them because

a) you should do research before making such a massive life decision

b) You shouldn't go to big schools unless you have a scholarship because you could save a lot of money going to smaller schools since the big ones are basically resorts. I did a tour of UT and the student living arrangement might as well have been a Sandals vacation spot. I've applied to a lot of companies on Indeed and most just ask if you have a degree, they don't really care where it's from.

A lot of people I went to school with thought I was insane for not going to college straight out of high school, and I'm so fucking glad that I didn't because a lot of them are now in dumb programs with limited career options. I know people that have gotten degrees in (or are about to) philosophy, acting, entrepreneurship (sounds like a good one but is apparently not), English, and one person that went to Arizona State to party and dropped out after a year. I really have no idea why more people don't just take a year off to assess their life and maybe get some work experience in the meantime.

Several people suggested I go to film school and then I looked at the supposed good ones and their tuitions were like 40k a year? That would be $160k for the whole program and for that money I could probably make multiple feature-length indie films. But then again I think programs like that are more for rich kids to fuck around and have fun than actually go into as a career.

39 comments

1  LSU_Coonass 2018-05-12

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vfl4BGbMxoQ

1  MasterLawlz 2018-05-12

It got a bit too political at the end but overall that was a great video

1  ChaddingTater 2018-05-12

When I become nu-hitler you tards won't have to worry about any of this

1  Muh_tism 2018-05-12

People are responsible for their own success.

If some goatfucking paki bricklayer or poo in loo call center monkey can make a decent life for themselves, anuone living in a non shithole has no excuse

1  rudest 2018-05-12

God damn, Lawlz, you sure know how to shitpost

1  rhyme-ocerus 2018-05-12

This is why I come to /r/drama, not to laugh or have fun.

1  Contentio 2018-05-12

If you want to laugh, direct your gaze towards the nearest mirror.

1  CrosbyStillzandSwag 2018-05-12

Only go for a humanities degree if you were a good enough student in high school to basically get a free ride. That's what I did, and I got afternoon only, piss easy (just make sure you regurgitate your professors' political views) classes. Basically 4 more years to be a kid.

1  SAC-Lawn_Gnome 2018-05-12

I understand that outside factors can definitely affect your chances of success

I think it depends on how you define success. If success is getting a nice career to support a good lifestyle, then I'd lean towards hard work. Though if you define success as being you know Bill Gates- esque, then its probably a whole fuck-ton of luck. Just think, if Bill Gates had been born a few years earlier or later, he wouldn't have been the one of the ones to hit the market at the right point to make it big and rich, and likely someone else would have made similar contributions to him in this hypothetical universe.

Additional, when you look at career fields like Acting, Singing, etc. you see a lot of wealthy individuals over-represented, because they have a lot fewer constraints to make a living while going into these fields, which poorer people would not. So, they in up having a much higher chance of success, since they have a much bigger window of opportunity.

1  MasterLawlz 2018-05-12

I know luck is involved but I hear some stories about rich people who sleep like four hours a day so hard work is definitely involved. I think people like that's brains are just wired differently.

You're right about the entertainment industry. A lot of it is connections or just coming from a wealthy enough family where you can afford to go to auditions all day without worrying about paying bills (like Julia Louis Dreyfus). I would say that depends on what aspect of entertainment you're in though. Directors have a lot of control over the quality of their work so I don't think that requires as much luck whereas you could be as good of an actor as Anthony Hopkins but only get shitty parts in cereal commercials. I think a lot of actors wouldn't have made it if they weren't buddies with popular directors (like Owen Wilson and Wes Anderson).

Sometimes though it just doesn't make any sense who makes it. The One Direction guys aren't even good but they were a group of decently attractive British guys that could be marketed to teen girls and autotuned to hell and back. It's kind of sad how well Simon Cowell knows the general public tbh.

1  SAC-Lawn_Gnome 2018-05-12

You hear those stories because they're feel good stories. The idea that excessively Rich people have worked exponentially harder than everyone else and deserve exponentially more wealth is comforting. The idea that things just randomly happen leading to some people reaping huge benefits is scary, because it makes people feel powerless, and people hate feeling powerless. Success is predicated upon seizing your opportunities, how many opportunities someone has is highly dependent upon factors outside of their control.

1  MasterLawlz 2018-05-12

Hard work in itself achieves nothing. I can work hard all day digging ditches and get nowhere in life. You're right that seizing opportunities is definitely a big part of it but also focusing your efforts on things you know will benefit you is a big part of it too.

Some people do work crazy hard though. Dwayne Johnson became one of the biggest stars in the world very largely through hard work. He gets up at 4 AM to work out and makes several movies and a TV show every year, I honestly don't know how he manages to find time to even go to the bathroom.

1  SAC-Lawn_Gnome 2018-05-12

Do you think they're not a lot of people working hard how have not succeeded though? Like a lot of bodybuilders work out every morning, no days off, for no monetary compensation.

1  MasterLawlz 2018-05-12

Being an actor is different than being just a body builder though

1  Leftist_Degenerate 2018-05-12

Like 50%

1  DistortedLines 2018-05-12

So random XD

1  PurpleIcy 2018-05-12

lol gay.

(since you influence only 50% of it, that means that you're at least 50% gay, lol faggot)

1  Constantdiarrhea 2018-05-12

Meh, i think part of the problem is that people aren’t really that well equiped to completely chart their lives at 17-18 years old.

We need better education and guidence in secondary schools. The format for teaching in these schools is so archaic compared to the world today that kids have to reconcile the huge difference between higher education and secondary before they start seeing the difference between higher ed and the real world. A true liberal arts education, as has been standard for some time, is outdated and doesn’t prepare people for the real world.

Changing things will inevitably lead to more intellectual stratification, but it will create more people who are more valuable, which is a better end than some vague academic cookie cutter that we try to put everyone through imo.

1  Unicorn_Abattoir 2018-05-12

Better question: which humans count as 'people'?

1  PurpleIcy 2018-05-12

The ones that don't think that they can't change anything about their life.

1  jaredschaffer27 2018-05-12

I have no way of knowing, but I think you should act as though you are the only person responsible for your failure and success.

1  Fucking-Christ 2018-05-12

Making sure students talk to their school counselor about this stuff could stop a lot of people from making decisions that don't make sense for them.

1  YHofSuburbia 2018-05-12

Why do people always offer trade school as a viable alternative to college? Trade school is great for some people for sure but trades aren't for everyone. You need to have a certain amount of affinity for hands on work and you need to be ok with not having constant work all year round and having to hustle for gigs. Some people can flourish in that space for sure but it's not for everyone. I feel like this "don't go to college, go to trade school instead!" meme is only parroted around by people who miss the 50s dream of graduating from high school and working at Ford for the rest of your life as if any of that's ever coming back.

1  MasterLawlz 2018-05-12

Because trade schools are talked about very very little in high schools and are a viable alternative to college. I considered being a stenographer (court reporter) because my typing speed is so high, it's a way shorter program, it's cheaper, and is probably the most stable job in the universe.

There are other trades though that you can go into like being a plumber or a car technician. I work in the automotive industry (at a software company) and some technicians can make great money because cars are so complicated to fix nowadays.

1  survivaltactics 2018-05-12

It’s only your responsibility if you’re a mayo. Everyone else can blame mayos if they turn out to be failures. It’s much easier that way.

1  Death_Trolley 2018-05-12

In your case, Lawlz, it’s pretty safe to say that you are the author of your own misfortune

1  MasterLawlz 2018-05-12

true

1  Phantom_Engineer 2018-05-12

I don't plan on going to college right out of school. I've got a decent job lined up (maybe) and I'll save a little money up before deciding what I want to do with my life. Maybe I'll join the military for that sweet GI bill money, or maybe I'll do something else. Who knows?

1  MasterLawlz 2018-05-12

That's the smart way to go, if I was in better shape I might have considered joining the military too just for some of the benefits it can bring when you get out.

1  Phantom_Engineer 2018-05-12

I'm trying to get in shape. I might be able to just barely make in my current shape if I joined the navy or something. I'm eating right, exercising. Maybe I'll be there if/when Trump invades Iran.

1  BIknkbtKitNwniS 2018-05-12

Unironically, the more successful you are the more likely you are to ascribe it to your own abilities while the less succesful you are the more likely you are to blame your surroundings.

Really makes you 🤔 about the types of people who become communists.

1  MasterLawlz 2018-05-12

I definitely see the logic in some socialist policies to help even the playing field especially since our healthcare system is so bad

But I see what you're saying lol, wasn't the creator of communism a massive loser?

1  uniqueguy263 2018-05-12

I mean that goes the other way too. Rich kids think they earned their scraps of daddy's money success through hard work

1  ComedicSans 2018-05-12

/u/MasterLawlz is already looking for excuses to fail 😂 😂 😂

1  Yiin 2018-05-12

Bootstraps aren't a meme, they're a way of life.

1  sparingchanges 2018-05-12

It should be obvious to anyone with half a brain that a combination of genetics, upbringing, and environment fundamentally shape the outcome of a life.

For each individual, there is a limited scope of what short term/long term/ongoing actions are available. The scope may be widened or constricted by cultural, parental, educational, economic, personal, and natural factors and events. Many of these are out of control of the individual, and many are in their control.

I don't think anything else meaningful can be said. With this in mind, your life is simultaneously all your fault and not your fault. Radical centrism wins again, YOU'RE WELCOME

1  solfuckingrosenberg 2018-05-12

I’m getting this printed on toilet paper so whenever Masterlawlz’s Mom comes over I can hand it to her when she wipes my spunk off her mustache.

1  MasterLawlz 2018-05-12

wow, there's a whole lot to unpack in this comment

1  solfuckingrosenberg 2018-05-12

I can pack your fudge, but I can’t unpack it. Sorry.

1  aqouta 2018-05-12

There is no such thing as free will but once you've accepted that you understand that humans are just unimportant instantiations of the information in DNA repropogating itself to grow natural complexity and the state of human experience is utterly irrelevant so suffering or not suffering because of your malformed information or because of that information's interaction in the greater environment is the exact same thing. This brings you to the enlightenment of radical centrism.

1  BigPriceToupee 2018-05-12

please stop with the "but muh trade skools" bullshit.

most of those jobs are gonna be automated the fuck out of existence as soon as it is convenient. You think you're gonna beat the automation system by learning plumbing? LOL China's already working on making you obsolete.

Your only chance is to embrace Marxism and learn about the way in which you are being fucked because of commodity-based economics.

I really gotta laugh at this idea that everything can just be saved if we all go back to trade schools like grandpa. The thing is, the on ly reasons trades ever m ade decent wages was 1) unions (which are fucking dead now) and 2) the work was dangerous sometimes literally life threatening - and your working life was considerably shorter due to the wear and tear on your body. If your idea of "retirement" is sitting around waiting for the fucking pain killers to kick in to help deal with your fucking bursitis that you got from kneeling 8 hours a day while welding seams (oh don't worry welders are going to be automated right into redundancy soon) then by all means, take that plunge

1  Deity_Of_Death 2018-05-12

You do realize that automation will create more jobs, not less?

1  Jimbo_B_Beterson 2018-05-12

A degree is just a piece of paper that let's you access a high level of jobs.

Just go suck dick for nickles in the alley and you'll get a free one from the police

1  PurpleIcy 2018-05-12

90% minimum.

Unless you're a mayo, in that case mother nature 100% decided your death, fag.