5 Jobs You Wanted as a Kid (And Why They Suck)
Every Saturday we have some of our favorite writers from around the web fill in for us. They get the opportunity to be insulted in the comment section and we get to push the neighborhood kids into leaf piles. Today's post comes from Zach Oberman, the man behind Underpants on the Outside which is about superheroes, not fashion.
For some reason, we expect our children to be able to answer the question: "What do you want to be when you grow up?" Some responses are downright idiotic (I wanna be a dinosaur) but for the most part, kids tend to choose the last person they saw in a uniform.
Unfortunately, no one is explaining to our children that there are reasons most people don't stick with the careers that sound so awesome in kindergarten.
#5.
Fireman
Why Kids Think It's Cool:
From a kid's perspective, being a fireman is awesome. You spend all your downtime hanging out in a clubhouse with your friends and a Dalmatian. To go to the first floor everyone slides down a pole. And if that's how they go downstairs, imagine what else firemen get to do! They probably take baths on a water slide! When you factor in the occasional siren, a fire station is only a ball pit away from being a Chuck E. Cheese.
Also, you get to play with the most powerful squirt gun on the planet, which never needs to be refilled. Once the fire's out, all that's left is for you to take pictures with your shirt off, like the ones on Mommy's calendar that make her breathe funny. (Because no childhood fantasy would be complete without some uncomfortable Oedipal implications.)
Why the Job Actually Sucks:
To adults, the idea of wrapping yourself in asbestos and running into a fire with an axe is freakin' INSANE. But there's no point in explaining that to a child. Kids think danger is awesome - it's what makes childhood pastimes like "Hot Potato: M-80 Edition" so popular.
One thing kids absolutely hate though is being bored. Sixty or seventy years ago, when houses were built out of dry leaves and matchsticks, fireman had plenty to do. But now everything's made of flame-retardant materials. These days, being a fireman means a whole lot of sitting around waiting for something to happen. When there is a fire alarm, it's usually some stoner burning toast.
And while firemen may be surrounded by the coolest toys around, what good are they? Sure, you can drive a big red truck, but if you drive it fast, people yell at you. If you use it to play Bumper Cars, people yell at you. And if you use the gigantic water gun to spray your friends, people yell at you (that goes quadruple if some of your friends happen to be African-American). Basically, you sit around, bored, surrounded by toys you can't play with or else you'll get yelled at. Being a fireman is like being in Time Out for a living.
Oh yeah - you also can't play with fireworks ever again. In fact, if you see people playing with fireworks, you have to put them out. Happy Fourth of July, kids!
#4.
Princess
Why Kids Think It's Cool:
According to our six-year-old niece: "You get to wear pretty dresses and you get to ride ponies and everyone calls you "Your Highness" and you get to eat cake all the time and you get to live in a castle where no one ever tells you to make your bed and you get to marry a handsome prince and did we mention the ponies?" (This is where we became too engrossed in pouring a scotch and soda to continue listening.)
The pony is also a princess.
Why the Job Actually Sucks:
As we explained to our niece, she's correct about almost everything, right up until that part about the handsome prince. It's much more likely that she'll have to marry her cousin - the one you guys see at the lake every summer who picks his nose. If she doesn't like it, too bad, them's the rules, and no amount of preventative cootie measures are going to make the process any easier. In fact, cooties might be the least of her worries, because cooties won't be the reason her children end up like Charles II of Spain, who was so retarded he couldn't chew his own food. That sort of thing comes from "homozygosity." (You'll probably want to spell that for her.)
But hey - you take the bad with the good, right? PONIES!!!
#3.
Policeman
Why Kids Think It's Cool:
If you have to ask, there is something wrong with you. Let us put it this way: OHMYGODYOUGETTOCARRYAGUN. Kids think that guns are the coolest thing ever. When you have a gun it means that you don't have to clean your room until you're goddamn good and ready, and anyone will trade you their Hostess cupcake for your carrots.
As for the job itself, that seems pretty cool too, when you keep in mind that a five-year-old doesn't have such a solid grasp of the American judicial system. As far as they can tell, cops arrest people who piss them off, which is appealing, because kids tend to have a lot of grudges. Maybe a couple years of solitary confinement will make Sally Johnson rethink not inviting you to her birthday party.
Why the Job Actually Sucks:
It's the first rule of the playground: No one likes a tattletale. While an adult might be able to understand a policeman's function as a pillar of society, kids need to know that to be a cop is to be the world's hall monitor. Which means no one will want to hang out with you, Captain Buzzkill. When you come around, everyone will stop playing their games (such as, "Hide and Seek in the back seat of my car in exchange for fifty dollars") and then put away their coolest toys, like that six-foot pipe that Daddy smokes for his asthma.
"Stop having fun, right now!"
Worst of all, everyone will call you "Narc," which is the way adults say "Teacher's Pet."
"Kids think that guns are the coolest thing ever"
ReplyNot in the sane parts of the world they don't... You men need to know that in most of the developed world, police officers (policeman is a term that hasn't been used outside the USA since the 1960s) don't carry guns.
Using the word "retarded" to refer to a disabled person is pathetic. I refused to read any more after that! Eurgh! Not cool man!
Reply Hide All See All 3 RepliesGasp! Somebody actually used the term in a literal sense, rather than as a crude isult! That is so not cool!
No guys bricklites right, he should have used the correct term 'Monkeybrained'
Bricklite, you're absolutely correct, good on you! Vicky
Nah, I'd still be cool being a cop; cops get to...
Replyok, actually I'm not even going to get into it, cause I could go on for days about our system or why the idea of giving power over others to random people and telling everyone "these guys are the bosses, do what they say." is a f*****g ridiculous idea that I'm pretty sure one of those severely retarded princes came up with.
So maybe I'd like to be a cop; I don't like bossing people around that much, or being a general piece of s**t, but not all cops are worthless f*****g piles of dog shit. Just a good number of them do, and they're usually such unbelievable cocksuckers that they more than make up for the others who aren't. Of course most times someone who acted like cops do would get their faces beaten in (ya know, at times like when they spray a bunch of bound people in the face with pepper spray [and only get in trouble cause people had cameras]) but since they're cops and are better than us we have to be scared of em, which is why they become cops in the first place. They're fucks who want to bully other people around, and have no other way to exercise their pitiful egos than to have someone else hand them power they never earned and don't deserve. Yeah, they're supposed to follow rules and guidelines, but everybody knows full well that if a cop feels like doing something, they'll do it, and as long as they're even a little careful and avoid any cameras, cops' worst enemies, they'll get away with it too. Hey, if I had a kid that became a police officer I could make anything short of murder just kind of disappear too, so I wouldn't discourage em.
So then the example would be a little more like if you were a hall monitor who got to do basically whatever you wanted and as long as you didn't leave behind any blatant evidence, got to tell all the other kids what to do/they'd all be scared of you (and if they really made you angry you could pinch them or hit them and just tell the teacher "They started it!" and she'd automatically believe you and you'd get away with it, or if she didn't believe you right away your other monitor friends could just lie for you), you'd get candy and other payment from the teacher that often times came from the other kids when they had candy, and if you were feeling really daring could tell kids who were doing something wrong "I won't tell the teacher if you give me half of your gummy treats". Plus you'd get to do this as long as you wanted, just so long as you didn't do anything so bad that enough kids could get together and tell the teacher "We're going to go to our parents and tell them what you're letting the hall monitors get away with unless you do something about them.", since in that case the teacher would be able to get in trouble and would have to stop ignoring all the bad things you do. But other than that, you could feel free to do whatever you wanted!
That would be more like it. And I feel like that would be pretty ok for most kids, especially for lowlife worthless psychopathic bullies looking for a means to get away with the bad stuff they do AND exert power kids who would normally just kick their ass. A little like cops in real life.
Totally couldn't be bothered to read the whole thing, but you sound baked as hell based on the first paragraph :).
'ok, actually I'm not even going to get into it'
Well you failed there
When was the last time a person of royalty had to marry their cousin. Recently the prince married some random chick(I don't know much about the royal family) but I know they have free reign now to marry whoever they please. And it's not their cousin anymore. So technically being a princess probably is still awesome to want to be.
ReplyThe "being chased around by the paparattzi until you effing drive into a wall" bit kinda sucks though.
This is why I became a financial manager. If you've got enough money, there are adult fantasy camps that let you do all the fun stuff you wanted to do as a kid. They say money can't buy happiness. I call BS.
ReplyI'll admit there are some BS jobs I did that I even said were BS, but "financial manager" is another word for "I can't balance my own books"....no thank you, I did well in my gen-ed in college not to pay one of you fuckers.
The steps at the end are pure gold.
ReplyI wanted to be a Jedi Knight because really loved the lightsabers (still do). Now I'm an optical engineering student... seems like I didn't sway off too far.
ReplyYeah, because, you know, all the engineering that Yoda did. Sounds like you are, in fact, way off.
^At least it's a more honest admission and realization of personal goals than "financial manager".
Yeah...as a kid...*tugs collar*
Replydon't worry, I still want to be a dinosaur too :P
When it comes to good jobs, my grandfather had excellent advice. He said, "Become a dermatologist. You clients never get worse, and they never get better."
ReplyAnd there's the rare occasion when you get to save a baby's life. (My daughter was born with hemangiomatosis, to the extent that it would have been fatal without the treatments provided by her dermatologist. I never knew dermatologists did stuff like that!)
My dad tells be quite frequently he's proud of me for picking a profession I love instead of the one that makes the most money. He's a firefighter and I'm a professional pilot. I also find the author's assertions in regards to both fields are wildly theatrical and completely off-base. If anything they reveal ignorance as to what classically draws people to the fire-fighting and aviation careers. Sure, I sit in the right-seat for a long time. That's certainly not all there is to being a pilot though, and I wouldn't trade that spot for anything in the world. (Except for maybe sitting in the left-seat...)
Reply"...theatrical and off-base..." Hey...welcome to Cracked. I also have a PPL. At this level it's like giving money to the Church of Scientiology to advance in ranks, or in this case, certifications.
Dude, being a firefighter is seriously the coolest thing EVER. You are actually REQUIRED to play with all the toys so that you stay current on your skills, you're SUPPOSED to at least drive sort of fast, people get out of your way, you get paid to work out for 90 minutes per shift, you get to be a superhero, and you get to check out hot girls on the way to and from the grocery store. It's an amazing job, and I wouldn't trade it for anything in the world. The only part of it that sucks is the amount of math you have to take and the amount of stuff you have to memorize from Paramedic school. That gets pretty easy after a while, though.
ReplyIts posts like this that makes me have a brief lapse in judgment in which I think kids would be ultimately better off if they read Cracked comments.
Yeah, kids also think special forces soldiers are the coolest things ever (thanks to BF and MW series). The military absolutely REQUIRES you to play with all that cool weaponry or gear (relative to your job set).
I just wanted to be 'in the know'.
ReplyAnd rich.
Being an astronaut would still be awesome.
Reply Hide All See All 4 RepliesEven if it means having to wear a daiper, or eating nasty food out of a tube like gogurt, and having to work out for hours a day just to keep up with your muscle deterioration?
Shut up cocnut you're ruining the fun
Yes. Even wearing a diaper, eating crap out of a tube, doing grunt work. You can't put a price on being one of the few people alive who have seen the deserts and the glaciers in the same gaze.
Fuck, I'd s**t in my own uniform just to be in an environment that less than 1500 people can say they've been. The view would be worth it alone.
Plus, being a cop means that whenever you actually get to do anything cool, you get accused of brutality.
ReplyBeing a cop is cool; you get to shoot people for any reason, park wherever you want, and get a good pension after 20 years.
ReplyImplying that there aren't strict limitations on shooting people.
I always (and still) wanted to be a dentist because they get paid a s**t load of money (well, minus how much they lose from medical school) and do basically one thing a week.
ReplyI want to be a male stripper when I grow up. Don't worry though; I'm well prepared. My grandfather taught me all kinds of tactics when I was young.
Replyi wanted to be a vet, i'm in university and still do... only until i found out I'd have to move somewhere like Germany or Australia to become one because the entrance rates here are the hardest out of all medical professions in the country.. and doesn't help i can't afford that
Replydamn you dreams
The entrance rates are really that difficult to be a veterinarian? That's kind of sad in its own way.
You know whats REALLY sad SeanYamazaki? The daughter of one of my mother's friends (cousins ex-roommate) wanted to be a vet that specializes in artificial insemination of farm animals... when she was 18-20. Yeah....
I wanted to be a Farmer lol I'm glad I changed my mind, I don't like early starts or cleaning up shit.
ReplyGet a PhD in political science and be a politician or join the CIA then.
I actually really wanted to be an Astronaut when I was a little kid, then the Challenger blew up when I was 5 (showing my age) that pretty much stopped that dream. Then I wanted to be a Cartoonist or an Artist. Now I am an unemployed Graphic Designer, see how that turned out.
Reply