Another Reason I Hate Golf

Here is Michael Berube's sad attempt at self-effacing humor and an explanation of why he plays golf all summer.

For two consecutive days, I did not revise my book manuscript or work on the copy-edited versions of a pair of new essays (they're sitting on my desk under a packet of golf tees). I did not get anywhere with the tenure cases I'm reviewing this summer -- or with the books I'm supposed to be reviewing.
Then again, I did birdie the hardest par four on the back nine, rolling in a 15-footer from the fringe (it was a devilish pin placement). So there's that.

This piece makes academics look pretty bad, ignorantly privileged, whiny, and trite. But class differences abound in academia. Those instructors and assistants who spend their summers teaching extra classes, to make ends meet, working second jobs, often because of 9-month contracts or just plain inadequate salaries, really aren't interested in Michael's golf scores or his complaints. Even tenured professors with large families often have a hard time of it, and despite his shallow attempts to vindicate professors' 60 hour work-weeks during the school year, Berube ignores the economic situations of those on whose backs he and his "Marxist" friends are playing their 18 holes. He can suck it.