Dullards 63: Law School Participation Trophy

[Ivycoveredtower]

I guess silent prayer is out now you have to write it down and give it to the mother of the child you're praying for. 

 

[SapphireSlytherin]

4 hours ago, Ivycoveredtower said:

I guess silent prayer is out now you have to write it down and give it to the mother of the child you're praying for. 

 

Aww. Actually, back in my church-going days, I'd have LOVED receiving those.

Knowing other people care about your child and take their best interests to heart is SO sweet and helpful.

I'd put this on a par with my atheist self complimenting a mother on how well-behaved her children are (at a restaurant, in a movie, etc.).

[just_ordinary]

@Ivycoveredtower This sounds more like a serious assignment though. I am not sure if I like it or not. Praying for a child over the summer - did they draw lots for? I think sharing it in the end is nice under this circumstances but the whole idea makes me a bit uncomfortable. They probably loved it and I can see it being/becoming very popular in their circles. Better than someone surprisingly showing up giving me the prayers he/she said for MY child. That would scare the hell out of me.

[Lisafer]

5 minutes ago, just_ordinary said:

@Ivycoveredtower This sounds more like a serious assignment though. I am not sure if I like it or not. Praying for a child over the summer - did they draw lots for? I think sharing it in the end is nice under this circumstances but the whole idea makes me a bit uncomfortable. They probably loved it and I can see it being/becoming very popular in their circles. Better than someone surprisingly showing up giving me the prayers he/she said for MY child. That would scare the hell out of me.

A prayer group that a relative belongs to once decided to mail out cards to the people they had been praying for. Which led to me, out of the blue, receiving a handwritten card from someone I didn't know, but who knew my name and address.

I've been stalked a couple times. So I was pretty freaked. I finally got over the anxiety enough to figure out where it might be from, and the relative confirmed it. 

I'm still a little pissed at whoever thought that was a good idea.

[WiseGirl]

My prayer card for the boys would be to have the strength to break free of the cult.

Regarding Derek and law school, when hearing this I always think of the Westboro members that go to law school so they know exactly what they can do to legally be assholes. I see Dwreck fitting in with that mindset.

[2manyKidzzz]

10 hours ago, nst said:

and I can start with my first question 

tell me why I love the color orange and should I go to Europe with my parents.? What does this mean?

Yes, go to Europe whenever you can. Orange....I like those candies, orange slices, as well as candy peanuts, if they are not at all stale.

Plus iced cookies from Wegmans. That’s all....

 

[AlltheJs]

Is it wrong of me that my first thought when I saw DWreck in a suit with a briefcase "Don't tell me he's got a real job that he can use to support his family?"

Alas, DWreck has again proven that he is not cut out to be a responsible house head by commencing training program number 3 through some sort of institution that is happy to take his money in return for a piece of paper that he can say he has credentials with. 

I feel he's gone from grifter to professional student.

[JermajestyDuggar]

Derick’s first day of law school photo needs a piece of paper written in crayon saying “first day of law skool.”

[AlltheJs]

Is it wrong of me that my first thought when I saw DWreck in a suit with a briefcase "Don't tell me he's got a real job that he can use to support his family?"

Alas, DWreck has again proven that he is not cut out to be a responsible house head by commencing training program number 3 through some sort of institution that is happy to take his money in return for a piece of paper that he can say he has credentials with. 

I feel he's gone from grifter to professional student.

[SapphireSlytherin]

9 minutes ago, AlltheJs said:

Is it wrong of me that my first thought when I saw DWreck in a suit with a briefcase "Don't tell me he's got a real job that he can use to support his family?"

He looks like an unmade bed. That suit is wrinkled/crumpled and his shirt collar needs starch.

 

Is that BEC? 

 

Further:  Hearing civilians (including non-former-military) use "stateside" to describe their living situation is odd to me. Anyone else?

[Chickenbutt]

Does Law School require a suit and tie everyday?

[Ais]

[justoneoftwo]

2 minutes ago, Chickenbutt said:

Does Law School require a suit and tie everyday?

No, we had people in pjs many days.  Definitely near finals 

[karen77]

On 8/11/2018 at 9:42 PM, QuiverFullofBooks said:

Actually, only some people can produce asparagus pee AND only some people can smell it. (Source: random person on the internet.)

I checked the UArk Law site, and here’s the info on study abroad programs - https://law.uark.edu/academics/jd/international-programs.php. To clarify my original post, @VaSportsMom had said he might do a semester abroad, and I do think that it would be unusual for an American law student to spend a full fall or spring semester abroad. There are a lot of international programs during summer vacation. The three UArk programs are described as “six weeks,” “in July and August,” and “two credits,” so none of them seem to be a full semester.

I don't know if I can smell or produce asparagus pee... Asparagus tastes HORRID, so I've never found out!

[Chickenbutt]

So will he look pretentious and out of place? Does he have an apple for the professor in that briefcase? So many questions. 

[justoneoftwo]

3 minutes ago, Chickenbutt said:

So will he look pretentious and out of place? Does he have an apple for the professor in that briefcase? So many questions. 

Maybe a tinny bit.  This is the first day of orientation, and people probably dress nicer for that (our school did, no full suits, but ties sure).  If he keeps it up he will be odd.

[singsingsing]

6 minutes ago, Ais said:

Derick Dillard is a tool, that's for sure.

[AtlanticTug]

On 8/11/2018 at 10:01 PM, bananabread said:

Not to interrupt the thread drift, but I'm a bit behind on my FJ reading and I have thoughts about Dwreck's latest endeavors.

If he is forreal going to law school, god help Jill. Law school is INCREDIBLY tough and time consuming. In fact, going to a mid-ranked regional school (like U of Ark) is a lot harder than going to a Top 13. At the top schools, virtually everyone gets the jobs they want (Big Law in places like NYC or DC), so grades don't matter as much. But if you're at a mid-ranked school, grades matter a LOT. Depending on the law school and the markets they feed into, you often have to be in the top 25%-50% to have decent job prospects. And everyone there knows it, so the students are all putting in crazy effort to do well. Plus, people actually fail out of mid-ranked schools, something that is unheard of in the T13 (the curves are set so far above the minimum GPA required that it's not really possible to fail).

Sure, Dwreck probably doesn't want to work for a law firm or for the government. He wants to be a politician or work for a "Christian" (read: hate-filled) organization. But he still needs to get through 3 years of constant hard work and working legal jobs each summer. He still needs to be socially tolerable enough to get a job offer somewhere. And he still needs to be respectable enough to be the representative of an organization or district. And with all the weird, hateful, obsessive, controversy-riddled shenanigans he's been up to recently, I have a hard time picturing any of that.

Let's be clear, Josh isn't a great dude; but before the scandals it was pretty evident that Josh was charismatic, well-spoken, handsome(ish), and decently intelligent, as far as fundies go. Josh was also great at acting like a hardworking family man, when he was really riding the curtails of his family's fame. Dwreck is socially awkward, unattractive, and already widely perceived as lazy and combative. And if Dwreck thinks he's going to effortlessly slip into the role of Duggar-affiliated political figure, I think he's dead wrong.

My point is this: law school is going to suck, especially for someone who doesn't like having a 9am-5pm. (Law school, done right, is more like an 8am-6pm. And you don't get paid for it.) Jill is going to be on her own a lot, which we all know she doesn't like. And this whole endeavor is probably not going to amount to anything good.

Truthfully I didn't find law school to be that difficult, but I do agree that unless you're in the 0.1% of brilliant people who don't need to attend class or read anything and still do well, to be done really well you need to treat it like a 9-5 job. That's what I did - I would go in at 8:30 and stay in the building (exceptions being when I went to work out at the gym) until 5 every day of the week, maybe 4 pm on Fridays. And still needed some weekend work here and there, but I always had all my evenings free. I did go to a T14 school (as to not out myself totally, it is one ranked in the 6-9 rung currently), graduated #2 in my class and I did get biglaw in NYC, arguably at one of the top 3 firms in the country. The hard work began then, with 90 or even 100 hours a week not being unthinkable. I left about 4 years later to go in house as I wanted to have kids and that lifestyle wasn't manageable anymore. Plus I didn't want to stay in NYC anymore either.

Basically I think that Derrick will do fine in law school if he puts a bit of effort into it. I'm not particularly concerned about those 3 years. He'll also find enough like minded people, especially in a law school in Arkansas. We had a Christian group at our law school which really attracted very few people but enough for a small community of 20 or so who had prayer groups and did potluck dinners with scripture or what have you. Arkansas is a VERY different place than where I spent 3 years so I am guessing he'll come across many more right wing/fundamentalist types. In that sense he'll probably enjoy the community of law school plus he doesn't appear to have much fun with the kids and this provides the perfect excuse to be out of the house "studying". Derrick's problem will emerge when he graduates. Limited employment opportunities unless he ends up in the top 10-25% of the class, and even then you're looking at more regional employment where salaries are depressed compared to coastal elite firms. And even if he gets one of those jobs, then he'll have to work probably 60ish hours on average, which I absolutely don't think he has the stomach for. Plus he'll be at the mercy of asshole partners and generally a nobody at the firm. This is the best case scenario for him if things work out. If they do not and he does poorly in law school he will end up at a very small firm or chasing his own files, hustling 24/7 for clients who will be unsophisticated and in many instances unable to pay so that collections will be an issue. Just a nightmare basically.

As a sidenote, I really hope he didn't go in on the first day wearing a suit and carrying a briefcase. There are ALWAYS 2-3 of those douchebags in law school, most people hated them for good reason. 

[Georgiana]

I think it's nice that Derick will be dressed like a goober for his first day of Law School.  WE all know he's an asshat, but it's really nice of him to signal that to his fellow students as well.  If he dressed like a normal student, some of them might be taken in and think that he's a normal guy worth being friends with.  At least this way, they'll all know what they're getting into.

Good luck to Jill on her first day as well!  Going to be really hard having BestHubbyEver in a program where she won't be able to tag along all of the time.  

I wish them nothing but failure, because honestly they are the worst, and the world really does not need a hateful twat like Derick getting a JD.  Until they pull their heads out from up their own asses, the less they succeed at, the better.

[fluffernutter]

"Remaining stateside." Like they are jet-setting world travelers. Weren't they fired from the missionary trip like a year or so ago?

 

[AlltheJs]

23 minutes ago, justoneoftwo said:

No, we had people in pjs many days.  Definitely near finals 

I love that pyjamas towards the end of semester wasn't just those of us doing the Ag Business Degree on my campus. We were super laid back because we were all super close, especially at the end of three years when all of us had been through a hideous amount of stuff in our personal lives while studying.

23 minutes ago, justoneoftwo said:

Maybe a tinny bit.  This is the first day of orientation, and people probably dress nicer for that (our school did, no full suits, but ties sure).  If he keeps it up he will be odd.

He is odd. At least the people on campus will get prior warning to how odd he is, unlike Jill in the "courtship" phase.

[AtlanticTug]

I wore Birkenstocks to law school when warm enough and those Lululemon yoga pants were also a staple. Jeans, hoodies, t-shirts, normal stuff you'd wear anywhere.

I remember on the first day, in my small group class, the Criminal Law prof asked us all to introduce ourselves and also asked us where we'd like to be/what we'd like to be doing if we hadn't gone to law school. My small group had a bunch of super serious types along with some great people but literally to the last one the answers were along the lines of "business school, getting my masters in economics, staying in their consulting/accounting firm, etc." I said I'd go train to be a pastry chef. They all looked at me like "great, she'll be the reliable C student pulling down the curve letting us coast". Like I said, I graduated 2nd in my class.

[singsingsing]

33 minutes ago, AtlanticTug said:

Derrick's problem will emerge when he graduates. Limited employment opportunities unless he ends up in the top 10-25% of the class, and even then you're looking at more regional employment where salaries are depressed compared to coastal elite firms. And even if he gets one of those jobs, then he'll have to work probably 60ish hours on average, which I absolutely don't think he has the stomach for.

After my dad went to law school he articled in Ottawa, then moved back down here because he and my mum were starting their family and wanted to be close to my grandparents. He started working for a small (I think? Not sure how large the average law firm is or how it compares to others in my city) but very old and respected law firm. All through my childhood he worked insane hours. He would work 10-14 hour days, come home and keep working. He would work on the weekends. Holidays. Family trips (if he even made it). He was always on call.

He ended up being very successful and is now a senior partner and kind of a big wig in the community, with tons of big name former and current clients, but in terms of his hours? Well, I'd say he's probably got a bit more flexibility now. He certainly makes good money (judging by solidly middle class standards). He can afford to take a vacation or two every year. I think he enjoys the work he's doing more. But a Monday-Friday, 9-5 job it is not. 

I just can't see Derick being able to handle that. Unless law turns out to be that magical thing he's been searching for that's going to totally transform his life and ignite his passion (very doubtful, imo), how on earth is he going to cope with the hours? The accountability? The slog of doing all the drudge work that you have to do as you work your way up the ladder? The criticism (to put it lightly) he'll inevitably encounter from clients and his bosses?

I honestly wonder if he has this fantasy in his head that once he graduates law school and becomes a full fledged ~*~lawyer~*~, everyone will treat him with respect, awe and reverence. If so, he's in for one hell of a rude awakening.

[justoneoftwo]

Most associates I know have taken less than 4 days off in the 5 years after law school.  Thats just not Ofjill's way...

[singsingsing]

1 minute ago, justoneoftwo said:

Most associates I know have taken less than 4 days off in the 5 years after law school.  Thats just not Ofjill's way...

And what about Jill? She couldn't bear to be parted from Derick even for a full day when he was working for Wal-Mart. Has she mellowed that much since they were first married? In the 5 years after law school my parents had two kids around Izzy and Sam's age. My dad's schedule and work habits were really, really hard for my mum to deal with along with raising two little kids, and my mum is very independent and self-sufficient. 

This just seems like the worst idea ever for both of them and for their marriage. All I can think is that Derick (like many others, to be fair) still can't figure out what he wants to do, so he's going to go back to school for another three years and then of course once he's a lawyer he's going to be rich and respected and working in the Trump White House or something. Maybe he's got visions of succeeding in Washington where Josh failed. I really get the sense that there's some bad blood between Derick and the Duggars, and he'd love to shove his success in their faces.

But now I'm really rolling down the speculation track, so enough of that for now. We'll just have to wait and see. But let's just say I would not be surprised if Derick's made another 180 turn and five years from now we're discussing his latest scheme, which has nothing to do with accounting, missions, ministry, or law.