<p>yes, and i think they do the law a big disservice by not liking it, conforming it to their interests or needs, and clients, interests, in disregard of federal interests, et cetera. i once thought lawyers were good guys who “uphold” the law and justice when i was very little, lol, obviously i now know i was hugely mistaken, they can be vicious people that would like to set forth a new law or rule and put in motion via cause lawyering to establish a greater goal. </p>
<p>i am now pondering medical school depsite have a social science degree because the harmony and ethical standards is almost universally present in the medical profession whereas in the legal world the caprice and whims of your own interests are what determines your career and security.</p>
<p>hmm…just don’t know which route i like most, as i love the harmony and betterment for mankind in the medical profession yet am slightly interested in the devious and knotty realm of the legal world.</p>
<p>that being said, i think the medical profession can enlighten me in ways law school can’t. i really don’t know yet.</p>
<p>What would make you come to this conclusion?</p>
<p>Law is a client service industry. As a lawyer, your professional and ethical obligation is serve the needs of your clients to the best of your ability. The “caprice and whims of your own interests” will have little to nothing to do with your practice.</p>
<p>There are corrupt people in every profession. I was a practising lawyer for a long time, and I have to say that I encountered very few lawyers on any side who I thought were corrupt, though. I thought some of them were jerks, and some of the clients were corrupt, but most lawyers I encountered played by the rules.
But if you are going to be a lawyer who represents clients, you have to believe in the system enough to believe that every client deserves competent representation. This can be tough if you are a criminal defense lawyer, and your client is guilty as sin, or if you are representing a big corporation against a personal injury suit by a sympathetic plaintiff. And on the other side, you have to be willing to stick by the rules even if you have a client that you think is in the right, but who doesn’t have a strong case.</p>
<p>As an attorney who has had opportunity to investigate violations of the anti-fraud and anti-kickback statutes (affecting medical practitioners), I have to disagree. </p>
<p>There are corrupt people in every profession. I can’t imagine where you got the impression that lawyers are “more” corrupt than doctors. Please share if you do have a source.</p>
<p>Yes, i actually was misinformed when i said that as i know there are untold counts of malpractices and doctor violations yearly, so excuse my misnomers of corrupt and distorted. ultimately, the gist of what i’m trying to say is that i think in medicine, there is a natural order, more of a natural ‘harmony’ embedded in the profession that is more enlightening than, say, business or law, where corporate america just wants to weed one another out (if not in the medical community than much more so in med school, my guess is). that being said, though, i think it can be good as it gives you business learning skills, strategizing with others, et cetera, but many times this goes the wrong way for personal gain, manipulative ways, and the like, which can be unethical most of the time. </p>
<p>i like how in medicine you don’t have to constantly butt heads with others, though butting heads with others may in fact give you good business skills and is essential to learn in order to thrive, i still think medicine is less corrupt.</p>
<p>but blue and sally: how is the medical profession corrupt? i’m not accusing or pinpointing you i’m wanting to know as this sounds interesting and i have not heard so much of it. what practices, etc, are unnerving about it? blue, what join degree status are you doing? thanks.</p>
<p>In every profession, there are people who are doing it for good reasons and for bad reasons. There are people who think it’s interesting, or a good fit for their talents, or an opportunity to serve others. There are others who think it will be a good way to make lots of money, or to get prestige. People who are just looking for money or prestige will cut corners.</p>
<p>Malpractice is one example, but kickbacks and other shady arrangement are some others. I have never seen any quantitative analysis on the subject, of course. Lawyers also have shady arrangements sometimes, but from what I’ve seen the influence of money is relatively straightforward in law.</p>
<p>“i like how in medicine you don’t have to constantly butt heads with others”</p>
<p>try getting an insurer to pay for treatment you deem necessary, convincing a patient that they have a virus and that prescribing antibiotics won’t help, encouraging a patient to lose weight or stay on medication, getting a patient listed appropriately on the UNOS transplant list, balancing the opinions of the patient and her family and a variety of specialists when determining a treatment plan, making sure nurses and technicians do what you ask when you ask for it, etc…and then come back to me.</p>
<p>As a future lawyer (if the bar goes well) with a sister in med school, I don’t think that being a doctor requires any fewer confrontations than being a lawyer. The major differences: as a lawyer, there are more formalized systems for some of the confrontations. And fewer of the people I deal with are bleeding, or contagious.</p>
<p>stacy i am a future lawyer as well (assuming i continue liking the legal profession) but i think you know that what you just said is at best nominal in comparison to the legal world…in others words constant manipulation and transforming politics to further one’s own agenda i think is a lot more dense than having doctors to encourage and enforce, i guess you could say, ‘regular’ things. in the court room, you are trying to change things, and roe v. wade was a crushing example of how one decision (per the religious right) was the “evil” of society. that’s what i mean when i say the legal profession can be much more “corrupt.”</p>
<p>roe v. wade simply isn’t representative of what legal practice is like. the big cases get a lot of attention but this simply is not what the overwhelming majority of lawyers do. to keep using that example to paint the legal profession just simply isn’t reasonable. it would be like characterizing the entire medical community based on the example of dr. kevorkian.</p>
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<p>this simply isn’t what most lawyers are doing.</p>
<p>its been said here before and i’ll repeat it – law is a service industry. a lawyer’s work is dictated by the interests of their clients. if you feel uncomfortable with that, the profession is not for you. if you think you are going to be able to crusade for your own political agenda as a lawyer, you should careful reconsider as to what type of legal job you realistically think you will able to get that will allow you to do so.</p>