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In the medical school and education field, there have been a number of suicides with generally high-achieving individuals. Although I'm speculating for the othe

In the medical school and education field, there have been a number of suicides with generally high-achieving individuals. Although I'm speculating for the others, one student's inability to match to a residency has directly led to his suicide, with a suicide letter detailing the reasons. [1] Several suicides have occurred during the past few years in the Canadian medical school/residency community, but they do not make the news. It makes you wonder if the information in this article could have helped them. [1] https://www.thestar.com/news/canada/2017/06/17/tragic-case-of-robert-chu-shows-plight-of-canadian-medical-school-grads.html?rf https://www.thestar.com/news/canada/2017/06/17/tragic-case-o...

watwut 6y ago
In that case, change in system that makes people study hard for years and then guarantees a number of them wont be able to proceed despite being able to would be necessary. It is not just failed dream, it is also massive sunk cost.
shoo 6y ago
> A second general solution to the problem of cooling the mark out consists of offering him a status which differs from the one he has lost or failed to gain but which provides at least a something or a somebody for him to become. Usually the alternative presented to the mark is a compromise of some kind, providing him with some of the trappings of his lost status as well as some of its spirit. A lover may be asked to become a friend; a student of medicine may be asked to switch to the study of dentistry; a boxer may become a trainer; a dying person may be asked to broaden and empty his worldly loves so as to embrace the All-Father that is about to receive him. Sometimes the mark is allowed to retain his status but is required to fulfill it in a different environment: the honest policeman is transferred to a lonely beat; the too zealous priest is encouraged to enter a monastery; an unsatisfactory plant manager is shipped off to another branch. Sometimes the mark is "kicked upstairs" and given a courtesy status such as "Vice President." In the game for social roles, transfer up, down, or away may all be consolation prizes. > [...] Where roles are ranked and somewhat related, persons who have been rejected from the one above may be difficult to distinguish from persons who have risen from the one below. For example, in America, upper class women who fail to make a marriage in their own circle may follow the recognized route of marrying an upper middle class professional. Successful lower middle class women may arrive at the same station in life, coming from the other direction. Similarly, among those who mingle with one another as colleagues in the profession of dentistry, it is possible to find some who have failed to become physicians and others who have succeeded at not becoming pharmacists or optometrists. No doubt there are few positions in life that do not throw together some persons who are there by virtue of failure and other persons who are there by virtue of success. In this sense, the dead are sorted but not segregated, and continue to walk among the living. On Cooling the Mark Out: Some Aspects of Adaptation to Failure -- Erving Goffman Psychiatry: Journal of Interpersonal Relations 1952 http://infofranpro.wdfiles.com/local--files/19520101-on-cooling/19520101%20On%20cooling.pdf http://infofranpro.wdfiles.com/local--files/19520101-on-cool...

watwut 6y ago

In that case, change in system that makes people study hard for years and then guarantees a number of them wont be able to proceed despite being able to would be necessary. It is not just failed dream, it is also massive sunk cost.

shoo 6y ago

> A second general solution to the problem of cooling the mark out consists of offering him a status which differs from the one he has lost or failed to gain but which provides at least a something or a somebody for him to become. Usually the alternative presented to the mark is a compromise of some kind, providing him with some of the trappings of his lost status as well as some of its spirit. A lover may be asked to become a friend; a student of medicine may be asked to switch to the study of dentistry; a boxer may become a trainer; a dying person may be asked to broaden and empty his worldly loves so as to embrace the All-Father that is about to receive him. Sometimes the mark is allowed to retain his status but is required to fulfill it in a different environment: the honest policeman is transferred to a lonely beat; the too zealous priest is encouraged to enter a monastery; an unsatisfactory plant manager is shipped off to another branch. Sometimes the mark is "kicked upstairs" and given a courtesy status such as "Vice President." In the game for social roles, transfer up, down, or away may all be consolation prizes. > [...] Where roles are ranked and somewhat related, persons who have been rejected from the one above may be difficult to distinguish from persons who have risen from the one below. For example, in America, upper class women who fail to make a marriage in their own circle may follow the recognized route of marrying an upper middle class professional. Successful lower middle class women may arrive at the same station in life, coming from the other direction. Similarly, among those who mingle with one another as colleagues in the profession of dentistry, it is possible to find some who have failed to become physicians and others who have succeeded at not becoming pharmacists or optometrists. No doubt there are few positions in life that do not throw together some persons who are there by virtue of failure and other persons who are there by virtue of success. In this sense, the dead are sorted but not segregated, and continue to walk among the living. On Cooling the Mark Out: Some Aspects of Adaptation to Failure -- Erving Goffman Psychiatry: Journal of Interpersonal Relations 1952 http://infofranpro.wdfiles.com/local--files/19520101-on-cooling/19520101%20On%20cooling.pdf http://infofranpro.wdfiles.com/local--files/19520101-on-cool...