Professionalism in academia.

I think that now being outside of academia, I realize how messed up the professionalism is, where people obstruct projects or want projects to go in the way opposite direction, way after the time for that feedback to have been given or in a disconnect from any thoughtful evaluation, and how often that happens, too.

As my one (straight) friend who's into BDSM remarked to me years ago but I never really absorbed, "That just doesn't happen in other jobs!".

Part of it is that in the Humanities and Social Sciences, the projects really don't matter, or all the people who can obstruct the few projects that do matter don't necessarily realize they matter, so there's no pressure on them to do things in a commonsense way.

I think that was part of my frustration with academia, too.  My work does matter, and instead of development, I just got hindrances, time and again, a lot of it in personal reaction to my work and how it intimidated or challenged people or made them uncomfortable, a few people who have read it have told me.

One of my biggest pet peeves is wasted time, too, and at least for me and my work, academia was increasingly proving an obstacle and not a help.

It really is a sad place, since it has so much potential to contribute to society, but so often it simply doesn't.   When you look into it - and only someone who's been in it a while knows the upsides and the downsides and can really lay them out for people - you really have to wonder why society tolerates funding it, in its present state.

It just doesn't make sense, and the bulk of it is just a waste of time and money.