I want to have a real conversation with academics who feel their research is pretty pointless now.

We invest a lot of ourselves in what we study and some of us are struggling to find good reason to continue.

We need to talk about this.

I’ll start: I study extensive sheep farming in New Zealand. It’s one of the world’s most efficient farming systems but I spend about half my time defending it in the face of total opposition to animal farming. This opposition has increased with the spread of coronavirus.

It makes me an unpopular academic in all sorts of circles but I consider it my responsibility to protect these farmers and their way of life. I genuinely believe that extensive grazing will offer humanity a way through all this shit. But that doesn’t mean I think it’s perfect.

This research stands in direct conflict with teaching anthro in a design school. Every day I struggle with this but the intensity of this struggle is currently suffocating. How can I be so actively involved with something I don’t trust? How am I supposed to live with myself?

For the life of me I can’t seem to think of one good thing this teaching has brought into the world. I can’t reconcile my research and my teaching. I can barely live with the knowledge that I’m still getting paid to do this. I feel guilty all the time.

I cringe when I see designers here talk about fixing things. I want to scream for them to sit down and for once, just once, show some bloody humility. But I can’t be that person either. I just want to go work on a sheep farm and not hate myself for what I do.