I was contemplating taking down the post from earlier today

Because, let's face it.  It was kind of hostile.  But then the more I thought about it, the more I thought, "fuck it.  the hostility was deserved."

Here's what happened.  Last Friday, and Wednesday, we had a clinical skills class.  Before each class, the instructor decided that they needed to plug their laptop into the loudspeakers in the classroom, and blare shitty pop music at us.  Then today during molecular and cellular biology, one of our groups of classmates decided to do their powerpoint presentation on heartworm with the title of each song a pun based off a pop song.  Which was kind of cute.  Until they decided to aurally assault the whole class with a 10 second clip of "Quit Playing Games With my Heart."  There is nothing cute about forcing a captive audience to listen to boy bands, no matter how brief.  I'm pretty sure had they played that music at Guantanamo instead of waterboarding people, there would have been a public outcry, and actual war crime sanctions against the US.  Even though I got a gawdawful earworm before I was fully awake today, I did misdirect some hostility at my classmates, who were in all fairness, trying to be cute, and trying to make a boring presentation more entertaining.  (FYI, stick with veterinary medicine - I'm sure you'll be a great doctor, but comedy is not your strong point.)

The hostility comes from a place of helplessness and frustration.  I pay to go to school, and learn veterinary medicine.  I pay a lot for that privilege.  The classes I attend have required attendance, (unless you're a certain person who I have ranted about recently.)  If I'm subjected to something that is most definitely NOT veterinary medicine related, and I stand up and walk out of the class, I risk getting in trouble for it.  However, somehow it's perfectly ok for somebody else to ear fuck and entire room of people with their "music," and that's ok.  And I interpret forcing your personal musical taste on people as an act of hostility.

For instance, take my next door neighbors (the douchnozzle ones, not the amazing D.O. students).  One of them likes to work on cars in their driveway.  Which is literally 2 feet from my bedroom window.  They like to blare mariachi from their car speakers at what has to be at least 100 decibels.  It shakes my entire house.  Listening to the bass lines makes me ashamed to be a bass player (because I might get lumped in with these people who think that a bassline consists of C, G, C, G, repeated on tempo for 5 minutes straight.)  And I can only come up with two explanations for my neighbors playing the musical abortions they play at the volume they play it at.  Theory #1 - they're so self-absorbed, that it never occurred to them that sound travels, they're not the center of the universe, and they're absolutely clueless that anybody might find their actions objectionable.  Basically, they're so narcissistic that nobody exists within hearing range except them.  Theory #2 - It's an act of outright hostility.  Much like a dog pissing on somebody's leg, the neighbors are saying "I own this airspace, and I will fill it with the most foul sounding shit I can, because fuck you."  So basically the options are either clinical narcissism or sociopathy.

That's also how I felt during class last week.  I'm trapped in my seat, and I just want to learn about thoracic radiology and get on with my life.  But no.  Instead, I'm subjected to loud, inescapable music and bullshit self-help pop psychology quackery that has no basis is peer-reviewed science.  Once again, I'm left to my theories.  Theory #1 - this person thinks that everything they love must be so wonderful, and must be shared, and everybody will love it because they do.  Basically, they have no concept that other people have different taste, and that their ideas and music aren't the only things out there.  And they're having so much "fun," so the "fun" must be shared with EVERYBODY! i.e. Narcissism.  Theory #2 - They secretly hate us, and like a dog pissing to mark it's territory, they decide to fill the air of the classroom with their piss to mark their place in the pecking order.  i.e. Hostility.  I can't come up with a flattering theory.

So yes, I'm hostile about music.  I listen to all sorts of music that doesn't suck.  Classical.  Metal.  Jazz.  Bluegrass.  Classic rock.  BUT, I also learned from a very young age that not everybody has the same taste as me, and I've always made it a point to not force my choices on other people, because that would be rude.  Apparently, not everybody got that memo, or doesn't have the empathy to figure it out for themselves.  But I've always made it a point to turn down the volume in my car if my windows are open, or to pop in earphones if I'm listening to something and somebody else is in the room.  It strikes me that it takes either extreme hubris or indifference to others to do otherwise. But maybe that's because I make it a point to not do rude things to other people.  Unless you count passive-aggressively calling them rude online, but guess what?  They can choose whether or not to read this.  I could not choose whether or not to sit through class.