What the title says. My perspective essay is about being gay and learning to understand homophobes in a conservative country where it was illegal -> trying to look at the root cause behind ideological violence while growing up around it -> why it's valuable to me as a future lawyer.
As a teen I did indeed witness a bombing up close, run from a shooting, get SWATted, and live in a neighborhood where national violent pro-blasphemy law riots took place. I absolutely don't linger on these events - I just mention them to show how they impacted my thinking, becuase I don't want it to be a trauma dump essay. I talk about how during an LLB, my classmates said apostates should be given the death penalty and how that forced me to try and understand how they even got to that point of dehumanization in order to counter them.
My concern is like... that it might sound a little obnoxious to be like "I think I'd be good at int. law / comparative legal studies / refugee law because I've had to confront ideology a lot, and know what living under harmful laws or the absence of protective laws are like." And that it might also sound like I'm humanizing violent rhetoric, rather than saying that having to confront the people who held them and the circusmtances they produce gave me perspective.
Could i get some advice :')
4 comments
I am in the same boat of essay writing so take this with a grain of salt. I think you can 100% use that angle but maybe you shouldn't directly say this will make me a good lawyer. You should absolutely share those pivotal moments and show that they aren't abstract instances, but times you were put in a position where you gained knowledge of what it costs when laws meant to protect people fail or don't even exist. Using those impactful moments to show how you are uniquely positioned to understand/learn how the law can work to make sure people do not experience what you have.
The point you are making of trying to understand how people reach this point of dehumanization is very powerful and shows curiosity vs pure reaction. the angle helps to not go down the path of, i'm qualified because of this trauma. You are focusing on yourself and how it motivates you and not just a claim about the people who hold the extremist views. The topic is strong to me and if you do it tastefully you go from I confronted this ideology to I have seen what the absence of protection looks like and I want to build/defend it.
@niaxain Thank you for your in-depth and thoughtful answer! I appreciate it.
Tbh, I did not mean to imply that I was going to make a statement as direct as "This happened to me, so that's why I'd make a good lawyer" especially since I'm going off the Michigan prompt, which is more about "how would this enrich our class and the profession." More like "this happened to me, it impacted my thinking this way, and i think thats something I find valuable to how i approach law in my current position and in the future hopefully."
The thing I was concerned about most was that aspect of "does this sound like I am excusing violent rhetoric by trying to understand the causes behind it" and I am very encouraged by your response. Again, thank you for taking the time to write it out. I feel more confident about it now :)
@zunair I see I misunderstood that part, my bad! Either way you have a very powerful story and it sounds like you will be a great lawyer! You definitely aren't excusing it, we need more people looking into extremism. my senior thesis was about white nationalist communities online linguistics and their cultural impact!
@niaxain 👀 That is an extremley interesting thesis and I almost want to ask if I can read it (but I understand why you might not want to share) I completely agree we need more ppl working in the field with these ideas in mind, regardless of the area because it does tend to impact a lot more than we think. Thank you again for your response and good luck in your admissions process as well!