29 Professions That Attract The Worst Kinds Of People, As Shared Online
Interview With AuthorEvery workplace has gone through a questionable set of employees. Perhaps it's a case of "they are who they are," and they portray the same personality outside of their professional life, or maybe assets like power and money are to blame – who knows?
This netizen, however, took to Reddit and posed this question: "Which profession attracts the worst kinds of people?" The thread has garnered over 34K upvotes and almost 30K comments establishing what careers do, in fact, attract a greater number of jerks.
More info: Reddit
This post may include affiliate links.
Unpopular opinion but nurses. There is a lot, A LOT, of toxic abusive high-school girl drama type behavior among nurses.
It's such an important job and about half the people doing it shouldn't be responsible for a yogurt, let alone a human being's life.
I've seen some s**t, man.
As someone who worked HR for a medical clinic, I can vouch for this. I never wanted to yell "Grow the F-up!" more than when I had 30+ nurses to deal with. It's insane.
Bored Panda was lucky to get through to the author of the thread, and we posed them a couple of questions.
First, we asked what inspired them to make the post: "I keep in touch with my college friends. Inevitably, some of our peers are brought up in conversation, and not all of them in a good way. Some of the latter were political science majors who seemed more concerned with basking in their proximity to power than anything else."
We then invited the author to answer their own question: "I don't have an objective answer to this. I can only speak to what tends to get into my head the most, personally. And the response above answers this question in not so many words. (I also disdain certain movie and TV directors who appeal to an audience's most shallow, nihilistic impulses for easy views, attention, and money.)"
Last but certainly not least, the OP added: "I'm an extremely flawed person. I'm judgmental, self-centered, and a touch petty. It's possible that had I the skill and drive, I would have done something in politics myself, because a part of me is attracted to power. The bottom line is that while I have opinions and a right to express them, I claim no absolute moral high ground. And I think that should be the same for everyone."
Law enforcement seems to have some problems
On the whole less than 1% of Law Enforcement Officers will ever have a problem of doing something bad or crossing the line. However that tiny group tends to commit a lot of problems (like the guy with Floyd's death, he had 17 excessive force and abuse complaints on his record before then), but DA's and Police Unions protect the bad ones, which allows them to flourish)
I'm probably gonna get some hate for this... the military (The US Army to be precise). Probably 99% of the Soldiers are good, honest people. The nature of the job just simply attracts some sickos. The Army does what it can, but It takes a long time to kick someone out of the Army. Source: 6 years Active Duty
I was in the marines and most higher ups are sociopaths, got promoted by kissing the a$$ of the sociopaths, have questionable mental stability, negligible intelligence, and power trip like it’s heroin. I couldn’t believe my life was in the hands of these people.
Academia.
Intelligent people in very niche areas, with no consideration for the real world and social interaction, whilst simultaneously being told they are the best in the world at certain specific subject areas (which is true, but just not as many people care as academics think they do). You end up with an unnecessarily toxic environment of people trying to intellectually one up each other and throw anyone off the ladder on their way up.
It's a cruel, nasty, petty, and poisonous environment.
Yep. The absolute worst, those people will see you and talk to you like you're nothing because they believe they know so much and are touched by God. Ugh! I have a graduate degree. Had to deal with this bs from these fools who wouldn't make it outside academia
My mum worked in a prison. She said that a lot of the men in there for sex offences against children had/were looking for jobs like driving ice cream vans, dressing as Santa at shopping centres etc as they liked kids sitting on their laps etc. Apparently it's way more common than people would think
Human resources
Youth Pastor
Mine was fired for trying to turn our youth group into a cult. Perhaps it's a power trip thing.
Hollywood producer it seems.
Over and over and over.
Investment banking. Not all of them are terrible but to be successful its benefical to be a complete c**t
They basically make their money by siphoning wealth away from those who do actual work. They're pretty much economic parasites, like landlords
Stockbrokers. I have some friends who are stockbrokers. I love them, but man, they are some b******t artists. And not like, "Oh, they're a good salesman, and could sell you anything," No, it's like they make s**t up as they go along and try to sound confident in what they say.
I went looking for a stockbroker five years ago. I didn't find one. They're an extinct species, in my country anyway. You can only find "investment brokers" these days.
Psychology. There are lots of great people in that field, but it also attracted the most manipulate and destructive a*****e I've ever known. He's a licensed therapist now, and I feel sorry for anyone who crosses his path.
Police
Absolutely not true. There are black sheep in every profession, but police are not shady figures in general.
Sales, estate agents, recruiters
I had many jobs and the recruiters have been nice and hardworking people.
Substance abuse mental health professionals seem to fall into one of the following categories: a) wonderful, angelic and highly competent souls who truly want to help drug addicts/alcoholics (they're maybe 20% of the counselors, optimistically); b) burnt-out incompetent/lazy/don't-care types (another 60%); or c) absolute personality-disordered, narcissistic/ Machiavellian sadistic types who really get off on the enormous power/control they have over the lives and fates of the people under their care (maybe another 20%). YMMV. The last group can do a LOT of damage.
Actually... Idk I disagree with this one! I'm in recovery and have worked with many, many substance abuse counselors and professionals and I can truly, honestly say I've never had the misfortune of meeting a bad one they have all been super kind and helpful and just amazing. They saved my life I have nothing bad to say about any of the ones I've worked with ❤️ that's a good thing right?! Most or a lot of them are also recovering addicts so it's possible that is the reason for my good experience. Actually I've had a lot of terrible experiences at hospitals like emergency rooms and stuff and once the ambulance people were really mean and scary to me.
I thought I wanted to be an architect… but then I met a bunch of architects. And architecture students. And architecture professors. And they were pretty much all A******s. It was weird. I mean… how could it be so consistent? But there ya have it.
George Costanza wanted to be an architect, so it sounds like he would have fitted in just fine
Sales.
Ironically i am also getting into sales 🙄
Depends on the sales by extension: marketing. There’s some truly amazing people in that industry but also some genuinely scary psychopaths
Ok so not really a profession but… there is a certain subset of musicians who are also wannabe influencers… particular people who are very on twitter. so back-stabby and clout hungry
Tow truck drivers. At least 80% of all the tow truck drivers I've met have been felons, and about 98% have been shady d**kheads.
Maybe I've just been lucky, but every tow truck driver I've interacted with has been extremely kind. One pulled me out a snow bank and refused payment, another drove me several miles looking for an open motel (before smart phones).
Insofar as psychopaths tend to be dangerous kinds of people, heres a [list of the professions that seem to attract a disproportionate number of psychopaths]:
* Civil servant
* Chef
* Clergy
* Police
* Journalist
* Surgeon
* Salesperson
* Media
* Lawyer
* CEO
Personally, I'd go with sales because there's simply a lot more salespeople than CEOs or police, so it's a lot more likely that you're going to encounter a terrible person who's in sales. My anecdotal experience would also tend to confirm this.
Prisons are full of unsuccessful psychopaths, c-suites are full of successful psychopaths.
Private equity
Bouncers. I swear those people are always looking to create trouble so they can exercise their right to kick a*s
Line cook. A lot of them are great people, but every beyond horrible person I've met has always been a cook
I dunno my buddy was a landlord, but he quit because people trashed his houses and many times didn't pay rent, staying through the whole eviction process. He was really good to the tenants too... but they took advantage of him.
Load More Replies...-Jobs that come with power over other people -Jobs that put potential predators in close unsupervised contact with their prey of choice -Jobs with structural incentives for dishonesty
I dunno my buddy was a landlord, but he quit because people trashed his houses and many times didn't pay rent, staying through the whole eviction process. He was really good to the tenants too... but they took advantage of him.
Load More Replies...-Jobs that come with power over other people -Jobs that put potential predators in close unsupervised contact with their prey of choice -Jobs with structural incentives for dishonesty