When asked (and nobody asks) what my secret power is, I claim the power of invisibility. So you will not have noticed that I, too, sit mute through nearly every class. With that said, it seems to me that your list omits one clear benefit of voluntary participation: engaging in an exchange of ideas for their own sake, or because it's interesting (or was formerly) to communicate with our peers and thereby to investigate our own thoughts about society, justice, etc. What an idea! Speaking (and listening to others speak) in order to communicate! The problem seems to be that law school is not a community of scholars, but one of distilled individualistic striving. A competitive environment makes openness and trusting communication difficult. So one question might be: who has created this environment? And one obvious answer might be: who else, if not we ourselves?

How soon did we begin to learn that law school was a cutthroat, hellish trial? (When did you learn the word “gunner”?) Admitted students day? LSAT exam day? While browsing Top-law-schools.com? The study of law is famed for the harsh social, cultural and emotional environment in which it takes place. Anticipating this, we have zealously sought to assimilate as quickly as possible, and in the process I suspect that we ourselves have created the environment that we were told to expect. (Who is the class?)

Somewhere close to the root of the particular tension that characterizes the law classroom is, I suspect, the reason that we are here at all. If the big payoff for our 3 years of toil is position, wealth and prestige – that is, joining the ‘elite’ of the world’s most powerful society – well then, it’s clearly a Me vs. The World proposition (how many elites can there be, after all?).

Bring on the cost-benefit analysis (and another round for the house).

-- LeslieHannay - 01 Feb 2009