- Lawyers are disproportionately prone to depression, alcoholism, marital problems, and stress-related health problems (heart attacks, ulcers, high blood pressure). Law school exposes students to the otherwise oblivious risks of life, human misfortunes, and the glorification of skepticism and dispute. “The staunchest optimist has difficulty going through law school without a more negative view of the world.”
- The Monkey’s Burden: the one (lawyer) responsible for another’s (client’s) pain, suffers greater stress. Lawyers’ Avoidance Syndrome: debilitating procrastination from avoiding a case that he does not like and where there is no hard deadline.
- Optimal behavior in law can be diametrically opposed to optimal behavior in normal life. Lawyers routinely do differently than what good people teach kids: don’t fight, don’t be mean, share, etc. Honesty in law is revealing as little as required, not full sharing and disclosure.
- Legal ethics differs from personal ethics. A lawyer’s duty is, above and beyond all, to advocate for the client, despite his own personal doubts—“moral neutering”. He is even obligated, if needed, to hurt his opponents in order to advance the cause and defend his client.
- The better a lawyer gets at his job, the more likely he will achieve injustice.
- Correct results are valued above correct analysis. Technically correct is more important that fundamentally correct.
- “Modern litigation is like trench warfare: most of the time is spent digging the trenches.” Law school does not teach law so much as it teaches how to research the law. Lawyers spend 99% of their time in discovery, research, and motions—not actually trying cases.
- Good lawyers tend to be psychologically messed up. Law students brought up in healthy homes tend to have a tougher time. They have not been instinctively taught to lie, keep secrets, and manipulate people. In fact, they are trained against it.
- Lawyers are hated because they remind clients of their most unpleasant times. They personify an undesirable society run amuck by rights consciousness.
- Lawyers have to work hard because they are paid by the billable hour. Total hours worked is even more than that which is billable. Marketing skills is more successful than pure intellect.
- Law clients are more likely to be contentious, unpleasant people than the general population—higher “asshole factor”. Reasonable, conciliatory people don’t as often need lawyers.
- Because asshole client demand aggressive representatives of themselves, asshole lawyers are more likely to succeed.
Finished: 22-Nov-2010