Who’s dumber than a dumb girl who doesn’t know she’s dumb?

(Justin Bieber)

A smart girl who doesn’t know that what she’s going to college for is dumb.

Allow me to share a short anecdote from my very own train wreck of a past to illuminate this point.

Six years ago, I wanted to get a bachelor’s degree. Word on the street said it was the only way to make myself worth anything to the world; also, how the hell else was I supposed to get easy access to alcohol between the ages of 18 and 21?

So, I went to college. And I made the nauseatingly common dumb girl mistake of choosing a completely worthless degree path.

English, with a concentration on writing, rhetoric and communication.

What?

Exactly.

I entered into the program assuming I’d march directly from commencement into the footsteps of one of these ladies:

(From top to bottom: Tina Fey, Lara Logan and Carrie Bradshaw. All images courtesy of Wikipedia because I’m lazy, and yes I’m aware Carrie Bradshaw isn’t a real person.)

After college, I didn’t launch directly from an undergraduate degree program and into journalistic or authorial fame–real or imaginary.

I went from being a dumb girl in college, to this:

Which is essentially a lateral move.

Girls don’t know how to do college. We don’t.

English major? Good luck making 40k a year, forever, as someone’s assistant. And no one cares that you’re writing a book, so stop talking about it. Because it’s never getting published.

And Stephenie Meyer ruined the world for writers anyway.

What about Psychology students? Those are my favorite. I mean, I get that you took an elective in tenth grade and you’re totally in tune with the way people think and anyways all your friends go to you for advice, but do you know what a bachelor’s degree in psychology allows you to do with your life?

Get a master’s degree in psychology. And after that, a doctorate in psychology.

Then maybe you can be useful at it, but you’ll probably either give up and take a job as an Ebay customer support agent before then, or have moved back in with your parents because it turns out that what you initially judged as an affinity toward unraveling the intricacies of the human psyche was actually just a total chemical imbalance in your own.

Of course, we also have the business majors. Those are just rich.

18-year-old girls bounce off the high school debate team and into a degree in business management, imagining themselves five years down the road in a sexy pencil skirt, clipboard in hand, giving a very important presentation to a group of very important people who are very impressed by how very business-y they are.

But instead they end up managing a McDonald’s, where pencil skirts aren’t dress code.

Of course, there’s something snarky to be said about almost every degree program. Except, like, neuroscience. And painting.

In the end, it’s really the way that girls talk about their major– as if it’s both interesting and relevant– that’s the kicker.

“I’m an a-COUNT-ing major.”

“I majored in philAHHsophy.”

“I have a degree in business communication!” 

Super! Here’s something else no one cares about: