On a scale of pink to 10, how serious are you?
Have you ever found yourself remembering something that was said to you in, what seems like, a previous life? You gazed into the air and wondered: Why didn't I reply? Why didn't I say this, or that? I am sure you know much better now. Unfortunately, these episodes tend to happen when you least expect them. Such as what happened to me.
"Is this pink glittery USB where you saved your thesis? I feel ashamed for you, I don't even want to read it. How good can it be?"
This is what my 'mentor' told me, one winter evening, when I asked him if he could review the new chapter I wrote for my thesis. He was the only professor for my major, and the one sponsoring my internship, which happened to be for his very own National society of aesthetic philosophy.
In case you're wondering, this is all pretty regular stuff when you study some niche subject in a small city. Well, all but the blatant offence to my intelligence based on the colour of my technological devices.
So much for aesthetic philosophy!
I stood there, holding my pink glittery USB and not knowing what to answer. So I just said: It's a present.
And it was a darn useful present! But the more I think about it, the less sense it makes. Even if it wasn't a present, and I legitimately picked that precise USB, what difference would it make? It's an object with a function: storing data in a portable device.
Do anonymous USBs work better? If it's a non-specific colour, would it improve the information contained? So if the exterior is a gender specific colour, in my case pink, would it not store data? Or would it change its content to some gibberish lullaby?
Oh my god!
What if it was blue?
What marvelous engineering space project my thesis could have been! What a missed opportunity to redefine politics and warfare.
Move along Einstein, I carry the blue USB.
Parallel universes aside, the only way that a pink glittery USB would devalue its content is if the same mind that bought it also wrote its content. This is the thought that my professor, who clearly had some deep philosophical reason for hating pink glitter, chose to follow.
In this reality, aesthetics is so intertwined with morality, ethics, and intelligence, that a grown up couldn't separate the concepts. If it's pink it mustn't be good enough. Many things could be said on this topic, this is just the tip of the iceberg, something that could, and I am sure has, happened to everyone in one way or another.
What hurt me more is that I fell straight into this reality. Saying it was a present almost feels as if I was distancing my work from whoever could have chosen the colour of my USB. I want to live in a world where people don't need to wear restrictive clothes to be considered beautiful, and where someone's intelligence is not determined by their favourite colour or by the amount of makeup they wear.
From that day on, I made it a personal matter to not have any standard USB, be it pink, be it shaped like a penguin, or like a key, and not apologising for it.
I will let its content do the talking.
Image: via
"Is this pink glittery USB where you saved your thesis? I feel ashamed for you, I don't even want to read it. How good can it be?"
This is what my 'mentor' told me, one winter evening, when I asked him if he could review the new chapter I wrote for my thesis. He was the only professor for my major, and the one sponsoring my internship, which happened to be for his very own National society of aesthetic philosophy.
In case you're wondering, this is all pretty regular stuff when you study some niche subject in a small city. Well, all but the blatant offence to my intelligence based on the colour of my technological devices.
So much for aesthetic philosophy!
I stood there, holding my pink glittery USB and not knowing what to answer. So I just said: It's a present.
And it was a darn useful present! But the more I think about it, the less sense it makes. Even if it wasn't a present, and I legitimately picked that precise USB, what difference would it make? It's an object with a function: storing data in a portable device.
Do anonymous USBs work better? If it's a non-specific colour, would it improve the information contained? So if the exterior is a gender specific colour, in my case pink, would it not store data? Or would it change its content to some gibberish lullaby?
Oh my god!
What if it was blue?
What marvelous engineering space project my thesis could have been! What a missed opportunity to redefine politics and warfare.
Move along Einstein, I carry the blue USB.
Parallel universes aside, the only way that a pink glittery USB would devalue its content is if the same mind that bought it also wrote its content. This is the thought that my professor, who clearly had some deep philosophical reason for hating pink glitter, chose to follow.
In this reality, aesthetics is so intertwined with morality, ethics, and intelligence, that a grown up couldn't separate the concepts. If it's pink it mustn't be good enough. Many things could be said on this topic, this is just the tip of the iceberg, something that could, and I am sure has, happened to everyone in one way or another.
What hurt me more is that I fell straight into this reality. Saying it was a present almost feels as if I was distancing my work from whoever could have chosen the colour of my USB. I want to live in a world where people don't need to wear restrictive clothes to be considered beautiful, and where someone's intelligence is not determined by their favourite colour or by the amount of makeup they wear.
From that day on, I made it a personal matter to not have any standard USB, be it pink, be it shaped like a penguin, or like a key, and not apologising for it.
I will let its content do the talking.
Image: via
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