SuppliedHey you back there with the massive ego, would you mind piping it down? Stop me if this sounds familiar. You’re attending an interesting and exciting guest lecture event featuring some famous guy who presumably knows their stuff, has an excellent command of tone and rhetoric, has years of experience and has possibly studied the talk’s subject for years. All is well until its time for the Q and A session where you encounter that one person, the one person who appears at every guest lecture, the one who is convinced that they have something that must be said regardless of how relevant it is to the topic at hand, the one who saps away time from other people who also have stuff to add to the discussion. The one who thinks that they must be heard at all costs!
Over my three years attending the U of A, I can seldom recall a guest lecture event in which I did not encounter this familiar and obnoxious individual. Most recently, a lady during Stephen Lewis’ speech took several minutes to pitch the documentary Cowspiracy and attempted to embark on a tirade on speciesism, much to the ire of all the other people in the room who were trying to ask Mr. Lewis their question.
Now let me be clear, there is absolutely nothing wrong with speaking your mind. By all means, tell me about how you think western politicians are a bunch of hypocrites, or how speciesism is one of the most neglected issues of this generation, or how our policy regarding the middle east is totally broken, or how big money runs everything, etcetera etcetera. However, there is a time and a place for you to voice your opinion in a less obnoxious fashion including your own Facebook wall, your Twitter page, or even a letter to the editor if you’re feeling retro. The wrong place to do so is during the Q and A event following a guest speaker’s speech. In case you haven’t notice or as beautiful as the sound of your own voice may be, we didn’t come to listen to it. We came to listen to the guy on the advertisement.
