Trust me, I'm a professional

[ladyofastolat]

I was filling in a form today that would allow me to be let into prison (in a professional capacity, I hasten to add), and I need to attach three photos, all counter-signed by "someone with a professional qualification."

Yes, I know this is nothing new, but for some reason it really annoys me. I have a professional qualification. Pellinor has a professional qualification. We also regularly invite friends around and spend the weekend blowing their heads off. We spend weekends dancing, drinking, and singing every song known to man while collapsing slowly into the nearest gutter. Pellinor likes to conquer the world, and knows more than anyone ought to know about swords and armour. I like to be incredibly mean to defenceless fictional characters. The fact that we have professional qualifactions says nothing important about who we are. We could murder bunnies in our spare time, or be inveterate liars, or run a drugs ring out of our living room. Just because I'm a chartered librarian doesn't mean I can't be evil incarnate.

It just seems so old-fashioned, harking back to out-dated class issues, when your humble little farm hands and factory workers lived in a totally different world from the lofty local doctor or solicitor, and the middle and upper classes just knew beyond doubt that "their kind of people" were good chaps in every way, whose word could not be doubted. That isn't today. That isn't now. I don't like it, and want it to go away.

*sigh* I'm probably being very silly. Probably no-one else has a problem with this.

Comments

[nilsigma.livejournal.com]

You are right. The whole of our society is still riddled with these class distinctions, although the counter-signing bit has improved for passports at least. Tracking down a magistrate used to be quite hard!

Presumably the prison service has to be extra careful about who gets in, and who gets out! I would have thought they would have been more interested in a criminal record check than a dubious signature.