Law and Lawyer Humor (#3)
I enjoy lawyer jokes, even being a lawyer. I’m not an outsider taking shots. I’m an insider speaking “the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth.” (Tongue in cheek, of course)
Yes, I did become a lawyer, and I hope you won’t hold this against me. I’m just a product of legal brainwashing and conditioning. No one says lawyers are smart — just educated beyond our intellects.
I Wanted to Become a Psychologist
I actually wanted to go to psychology. After my undergraduate work in college in both business and psychology, I wanted to go to psychology graduate school. But I was in Texas, and the only two schools up in the far north that I was accepted at were in places that were really cold.
I’d heard about all the money psychologists make on Monday mornings — from folks who watched football games on the weekend. It was claimed that every time the teams went into a huddle, thousands of people thought they were talking about them.
Then I also heard that psychologists have plenty to do just trying to cure each others’ neurosis and phobias and sociopathic conditions.
So I wound up going to law school instead.
Psychology vs. Psychiatry?
I used to wonder what the difference was between a psychiatrist and a psychologist. Then as a lawyer I discovered this difference:
A psychiatrist drives you crazy.
A psychologist tests you to see how crazy you are.
I Also Thought About Being A Pastor
Also, because I’m a spiritual person, and ‘The Gospel Life Coach,’ I also thought I wanted to be a pastor. I even tried it for a spell, and was the pastor of a Vineyard Christian Fellowship for a couple of years, even while I was working as a lawyer full time.
I discovered it wasn’t for me.
Someone observed that lawyers and the clergy are very much the same:
Lawyers Are Sometimes Compared to Painters
Lawyers have long been accused of being the only people in the world who can turn black and white into grey.
But I’ve been told that painters can do the exact same thing.
I overheard someone saying he didn’t mind lawyers all that much. But he added he just didn’t want any moving into his neighborhood.
He said he didn’t want his kids going to school with a lawyer’s kids.
I began discovering I didn’t have many lawyer friends. In fact, at one time I only had two lawyer friends. — — One was a criminal lawyer and he was in jail. — — One was in the hospital. He’d been backed over by an ambulance.
Then I Got Some Vocational Counseling
I took some vocational guidance tests!
One day something happened to make me realize why I didn’t really enjoy being a lawyer much, after the law got real complicated, and why I didn’t fit the mold of lawyers.
I represented a man who was in a vocational guidance firm, and he offered to give me a set of tests for free. The word ‘free’ always gets a lawyer’s attention. Anyway, he gave me the tests and came back exclaiming, “How in the world did you ever become a lawyer? You don’t have any personality characteristics of a lawyer.”
He explained that this means having a dominant hostile personality. The picture he painted of this is a person was one of… having his eyes closed, . . . his legs crossed, his arms swinging, . . . and his mouth open.
It’s not a very pretty picture, I realize.
Reasoning vs. Logic
Some people become confused with the difference between legal reasoning and logic. The fact is we lawyers are not trained in logic. Think about it! Have you ever met a logical lawyer?
It’s often an insult to lawyers to consider them logical. We lawyers are instead trained in legal reasoning, which has no similarity to logic. For instance, lawyers often think: “Maybe I can get $5,000 in this case, if I sue for $50,000.” That’s legal reasoning.
Also, we are taught that for every 50 words there should be at least one loophole. And of course two escape clauses (all of which we can charge higher fees for).
Here’s An Example of Legal Reasoning . . .
A defense lawyer was defending his client charged with murder. It was a very serious case, and the prosecutor had just finished making his opening statement to the jury, accusing the defendant of murdering his wife, and cutting up her body to dispose of it.
The defense lawyer, after listening to the prosecutor’s statement said: “Ladies and Gentlemen: you just heard the prosecutor’s opening statement. He has painted a picture of my client that is terrible. He has accused him of murdering his wife, and cutting her body up into pieces and putting them into suitcases.
He claims my client was in the process of transporting her remains over the border into Mexico, to dispose of them, when he was apprehended by an alert border guard who happened to see one of the deceased’s fingers sticking out of one of the suitcases.
“The prosecutor claims that my client is a deranged man; that he is unfit to live. He claims that he is on the level of a Charles Manson, and he wants my client executed.
I don’t happen to see him this way. But I will admit he may be a sloppy packer.”
This is an example of reasoning — lawyer style. But it’s a far cry from logic, wouldn’t you agree?
Law school has a way of bending the mind, and enlarging thoughts and capitalizing on events like nothing else I’ve ever seen. It has a way of ‘creating options’ — even in situations where there are no options.