I recently discussed with a doctor friend the future of his son, who plans to become a surgeon, like him. He doesn’t dare tell him that he would prefer him to choose another profession. The 24-hour guards one weekend out of three, the inextricable bureaucracy to face, the government which risks jeopardizing the public system with its bet on the private sector…
Posted yesterday at 9:00 a.m.
My doctor friend told me that he himself had had a similar discussion, a few days earlier, with a dentist friend who is crossing his fingers that his child will also change his mind and bet on a career other than his own. Because he knows all too well the drawbacks.
The fear of some parents that their child will practice the same profession as them has statistical foundations. According to the analysis of New York Times from a 2017 Cornell University study (The Jobs You’re Most Likely to Inherit From Your Mother and Father), a boy is 2.7 times more likely to practice the same profession as his father than the rest of the American population, and he is twice as likely to choose the same profession as his mother.
The phenomenon is a little less frequent in girls. They are 1.7 and 1.8 times more likely respectively to practice the same job as their father and their mother. The sons and daughters of lawyers, doctors, fishermen and bakers are, according to this study, among the most likely to follow in the footsteps of their parents. Nothing to do, that said, with the XIXand century, while the trades were practiced from father to son (or from mother to daughter) in almost half of the cases.
I have not found any mention of the incidence of this phenomenon among journalists, even though I know several sisters and brothers who are mothers, fathers, daughters or sons of journalists. I say this, because if I am being frank, I also secretly want Sonny to give up his budding journalistic aspirations. Because journalism is a precarious profession, in a fragile industry, for which a large part of the public has little esteem.
A survey by the Edelman firm revealed last week that 56% of Quebecers feared that journalists would try to dupe and mislead them by deliberately spreading false news. According to this same survey, carried out among 1,000 Quebecers in November 2021, Quebecers would trust the media less… than businesses and the government.
In other words, the average Quebecer would give more credibility to the advertising message of a company which claims that its product is revolutionary than to a journalist who has tested different products of the same type and who, with supporting evidence , concludes that this product is actually junk.
And that the average Quebecer would have more confidence in a government that has been claiming for two years that there is no real problem with ventilation in schools than in journalists who have scrutinized the scientific studies on this subject before determining that air purifiers installed in classrooms would effectively help fight COVID-19.
The watchdogs of democracy can get dressed. The Fourth Estate takes it for its cold…
And yet, once again this week, I was able to talk to students (Law University law students), who were wondering what was the best way to find a place in the media job market. I suggested that they put the question to more competent people, namely my boss, who has a law degree from Laval University.
I come back to my doctor friend and his dentist friend. They have in common with me to believe that the lawn is greener on the neighbor. Outside the professional furrow that we ourselves have traced.
We are not the only ones. A survey carried out by HSBC among 5,500 parents in 16 countries revealed that 83% of parents wanted their child not to do the same job as them. Among Canadian parents, the proportion climbs to 87%.
Human nature being what it is, we tend to retain the irritating elements more than the advantages of our profession. And one of the irritating aspects of the profession of journalist – as evidenced by the Edelman firm’s survey – is precisely this mistrust of the public, which is accompanied by more and more insults, in this era of instant communications. .
How do we manage this overflow of reader anger? asked the professor from Laval University, during this talk in which my brilliant colleague from the Homework Aurelie Lanctot.
We manage it as we can. I have very loyal readers who insult me in each of my columns, whether I’m talking about family (every Sunday), cinema or the culture of banishment. They do it out of habit, I imagine. Like a dog always watering the same tree. I hope that relieves them.
Some rude people, whom I haven’t read for years, continue to write to me in vain, even if I have warned them. I see their names, often from another era, appear in the junk items of my e-mail box.
I have brothers and sisters for whom it is much worse. I am thinking of Emilie Nicolas, from Homework, which receives a shower of misogynistic and xenophobic insults every week from reactionary readers. She holds the course, admirable in courage and resilience, braving this endless storm of hatred.
I wouldn’t wish that on my son. Like 78% of Canadian parents surveyed by HSBC, the most important thing for me is that he is happy. He will do whatever he wants… (as long as his apple falls far from my tree!).