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From reproductive rights to climate change to Big Tech, The Independent is on the ground when the story is developing. Whether it’s investigating the financials of Elon Musk’s pro-Trump PAC or producing our latest documentary, ‘The A Word’, which shines a light on the American women fighting for reproductive rights, we know how important it is to parse out the facts from the messaging.<\/p>\n
At such a critical moment in US history, we need reporters on the ground. Your donation allows us to keep sending journalists to speak to both sides of the story.<\/p>\n
The Independent is trusted by Americans across the entire political spectrum. And unlike many other quality news outlets, we choose not to lock Americans out of our reporting and analysis with paywalls. We believe quality journalism should be available to everyone, paid for by those who can afford it.<\/p>\n
Your support makes all the difference.<\/strong><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\nRead more<\/span><\/svg><\/span><\/button><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/aside>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\nI<\/span>s there a doctor in the house?\u201d<\/p>\nA hush falls across the restaurant as people stare aghast at the prostrate body lying on the floor, audibly struggling for breath.<\/p>\n
\u201cPlease \u2013 is there a doctor? This woman needs a doctor!\u201d The waiter asks again, more plaintive, more desperate this time. Someone steps forward; tentatively, yes, but with a brisk, confident nod. He\u2019s ushered towards the patient, kneels down beside her and says, in a calm, clear voice: \u201cWould you like me to tell you about my thesis on depictions of mental health in 19th-century poetry?\u201d<\/p>\n
Some variation of this joke \u2013 the PhD-holder who thinks that being a doctor of philosophy is the equivalent of being a doctor of medicine \u2013 has been turned into a million memes across the internet. The setup is intended to bluntly underscore the fact that attaining an advanced degree, however intriguing the subject, really isn\u2019t<\/em> all that practically useful compared to undergoing six years of medical training.<\/p>\nI was musing on this recently after seeing the news that civil servants are instructed not to use the \u201cDr\u201d honorific, either on their name badges or the employee directory, over concerns that the title might exclude other staff. Passes should only contain a worker\u2019s name, with no academic or gender-based (such as \u201cMiss\u201d or \u201cMr\u201d) titles, reports The Telegraph<\/em>.<\/p>\nThe reasoning behind the move was inclusivity. In a 2020 submission to LGBT+ rights charity Stonewall from the government\u2019s Department for Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS) for inclusion in the former\u2019s Workplace Equality Index, the policy was highlighted as being \u201cthe most inclusive approach\u201d.<\/p>\n
Going name-only \u201cavoids needlessly highlighting gender, marital status, or other hierarchical identifiers to other members of staff\u201d. The use of \u201cDr\u201d is an unnecessary \u201chierarchical identifier\u201d, in this case.<\/p>\n
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open image in gallery<\/span><\/button><\/p>\n<\/div>Doctor Who? There’s no need to immediately inform people that you have a PhD (Getty)<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\nI can only applaud the civil service, in all honesty. No one needs <\/em>to know your qualifications \u2013 not unless you\u2019re an academic, and even then, not outside the confines of the university or other academic institution in which you work. And insisting that civilians or co-workers address you as \u201cDoctor\u201d \u2013 unless you happen to be roaming through time and space in a Tardis \u2013 is, let\u2019s face it, the height of obnoxiousness.<\/p>\nThere\u2019s a reason the topic is such a rich source of piss-taking in Friends<\/em>, with Ross\u2019s academic credentials the butt of countless jokes throughout the American sitcom\u2019s 10-season run.<\/p>\n\u201cI\u2019m here to see my father. My name is Rachel Green,\u201d says Jennifer Aniston\u2019s character, in one scene after her dad has suffered a heart attack.<\/p>\n
\u201cAnd I\u2019m Doctor<\/em> Ross Geller,\u201d chips in Ross (David Schwimmer).<\/p>\n\u201cRoss, please, this is a hospital, OK? That actually means something here,\u201d Rachel hisses back.<\/p>\n\n
\nWe all <\/em>know someone who needlessly brings up the fact that they have a PhD at every opportunity<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<\/div>\n<\/figure>\n\u201cI mean, a PhD is just as good as an MD!\u201d Ross proclaims during another exchange.<\/p>\n
To which Rachel gives the perfect rejoinder: \u201cOh sure, Ross, yeah! If I have a heart attack at a restaurant, I want you there with your fossil brush!\u201d<\/p>\n
And finally, the iconic take down from Phoebe (Lisa Kudrow): \u201cIs this like that time you tried to convince us that you were a doctor?\u201d<\/p>\n
The irony of this repeated punchline is that having a PhD does, technically, make you more of a \u201creal\u201d doctor than being an MD. As a friend who used to practise medicine was quick to inform me, in the UK at least, the doctorates awarded to doctors of medicine are honorary.<\/p>\n
But regardless, the best humour always contains at least a grain of truth. And we all <\/em>know someone who needlessly brings up the fact that they have a PhD at every opportunity, oblivious to the eye-rolls it causes; the person who absolutely revels in being given a form to fill in with a dropdown title menu, practically tripping over themselves to click those two letters that (they believe) confer superiority.<\/p>\n\n
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open image in gallery<\/span><\/button><\/p>\n<\/div>Doctor Ross Geller never failed to shoehorn in his PhD in the US sitcom \u2018Friends\u2019 (Warner Bros)<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\nPlease don\u2019t think I\u2019m anti-academia. Some of my best friends have PhDs! It\u2019s obviously a huge achievement: all those years of painstaking work, dedication and passion, poured into a hundred-thousand-word thesis that is nothing if not the ultimate labour of research love. I am so far from having the focus, stamina or brains to accomplish such a feat that I can only look on in awe. And the topics genuinely can make for fascinating conversation, the more niche the better. Just look at the staggering interest in Dr Ally Louks\u2019s research on smells in literature, after her Cambridge PhD\u2019s thesis on \u201cOlfactory Ethics: The Politics of Smell in Modern and Contemporary Prose\u201d became a surprising viral sensation on social media last year.<\/p>\n
But the Venn diagram of PhDs who would voluntarily introduce themselves as \u201cDr\u201d [insert name here] at a party, or insist on using the honorific on their civil service name badge, and people who turn out to be egotistical bores, is pretty much a circle at this point. It feels the equivalent of adding BA (Hons) after the name on your email signature, or going around bragging about your GCSE results decades after the fact. Well done and everything, but please don\u2019t be offended if absolutely no one cares.<\/p>\n
Take comfort in the fact that having a doctorate is probably one of the least interesting things about you \u2013 and maybe save the big reveal until someone collapses in a restaurant, just waiting for you to revive them with your paper on the emergence of agrarian capitalism in early modern England\u2026<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Your support helps us to tell the story From reproductive rights to climate change to Big Tech, The Independent is on the ground when the story is developing. Whether it’s investigating the financials of Elon Musk’s pro-Trump PAC or producing our latest documentary, ‘The A Word’, which shines a light on the American women fighting for reproductive rights, we know how important it is to parse out the facts from the messaging. At such a critical moment in US history, we need reporters on the ground. Your donation allows us to keep sending journalists to speak to both sides of the story. The Independent is trusted by Americans across the entire political spectrum. And unlike many other quality news outlets, we choose not to lock Americans out of our reporting and analysis with paywalls. We believe quality journalism should be available to everyone, paid for by those who can afford it. Your support makes all the difference. Read more Is there a doctor in the house?\u201d A hush falls across the restaurant as people stare aghast at the prostrate body lying on the floor, audibly struggling for breath. \u201cPlease \u2013 is there a doctor? This woman needs a doctor!\u201d The waiter asks again, more plaintive, more desperate this time. Someone steps forward; tentatively, yes, but with a brisk, confident nod. He\u2019s ushered towards the patient, kneels down beside her and says, in a calm, clear voice: \u201cWould you like me to tell you about my thesis on depictions of mental health in 19th-century poetry?\u201d Some variation of this joke \u2013 the PhD-holder who thinks that being a doctor of philosophy is the equivalent of being a doctor of medicine \u2013 has been turned into a million memes across the internet. The setup is intended to bluntly underscore the fact that attaining an advanced degree, however intriguing the subject, really isn\u2019t all that practically useful compared to undergoing six years of medical training. I was musing on this recently after seeing the news that civil se…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":761,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[2],"tags":[],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.seekyourlove.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/760"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.seekyourlove.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.seekyourlove.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.seekyourlove.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.seekyourlove.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=760"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.seekyourlove.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/760\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.seekyourlove.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/761"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.seekyourlove.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=760"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.seekyourlove.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=760"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.seekyourlove.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=760"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}