Last year a new bouldering gym opened in the city centre. It took a little while for my youngest daughter and I to finally brave the city and its parking and pay it a visit. Quite a few of the more advanced and younger climbers had already transitioned there from our regular gym and were talking it up.
From the moment we got to the front desk I started to feel distinctly uncomfortable there. It admittedly started with them telling me they don't take cash when I got my wallet out (I'm more comfortable using cash than card and have never used my phone to pay for something). My daughter saw the look on my face and said she'd pay, before I walked back out. She was meeting up with work colleagues there, but still wanted me present because she hadn't been working with them long. I got pretty much left alone for most of our time there while she climbed with her colleagues, but that doesn't bother me as I'm content to climb alone. Usually I'll end up chatting with other climbers anyway, even if we've never met before. This time I talked to hardly anyone and even when there were climbers I knew they were in little cliques where I didn't feel welcome. Don't get me wrong everyone was nice enough, even if they didn't feel as approachable as I'm used to, but I was so feeling like a fish out of water.
I can only describe the place as giving me Uni vibes. I thought maybe it was just me, but it turned out that my daughter felt the same and even the work colleagues have never really gone back there. My eldest daughter, on the other hand, who is actually a Uni student and started going there, also agreed it had Uni vibes and that was why she preferred it to the gyms my youngest and I usually visit. She asked us why it made us feel uncomfortable and at the time I couldn't satisfactorily explain why.
It was just this part week that I was finally able to put my finger on it when I came across someone using the fact that they have degrees to try and shut down an argument with someone else. I realised that it's those "uni educated" people who like pull superiority of intelligence when they're struggling to win an argument. Or the ones who condescendingly call you "sweetie" because you don't know some fact that you'd need to be in their exclusive circles to know. Even those who pity you for your inferior intelligence and education while claiming to be championing the underprivileged.
Disclaimer: I know that not all university educated people are like this, in fact the majority probably aren't. I have family and friends who are university educated and even they will admit that these types exist and some have experienced that judgement themselves while attending university.
This city gym very much caters to the university and city based customers, which completely makes sense because that's it's location. However, I feel that it's ironic that this university ideal of inclusivity is actually better espoused at our regular gyms than this one. As an example, this city gym has a 'no board' policy because it believes that the training based climbing boards don't encourage community enough. Yet everyone's experience with them is quite the opposite and many of the climbers who moved to that gym have started coming back to the original ones occasionally just to use these boards and inevitably end up on the walls too.
This week I also saw a reaction video short where a guy was saying that women have come into the workforce and are just doing the same things they do in the home. This was followed by a female surgeon asking how she would perform surgery at home. Then lots of women chimed in with comments asking how they were supposed to do their profession at home, which were all what would have been traditionally male oriented jobs at one point. As a cleaner I guess I'm just letting all women down and proving this guy right, excuse me while I go and sit shamefully in the corner. Perhaps I can still claw back some dignity and get some virtue signalling points because I work for clients with disabilities?
So my epiphany for the week is that I am actually bottom feeding scum. Which reminds me how much I appreciate all those I've encountered in my life who treat me with respect regardless. To me they are the superior ones and I hope I don't taint them with my inferiority. 😉
So how has your week been?