how can I use my legal training to help people?

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it's come to the point where the prospect of a future helping big businesses make more money while also helping myself accrue lots of money is a very depressing prospect - I want to know how I can use my legal training to help people. in case you don't know I'm in the UK (scotland); I have a degree and the post-graduate diploma in legal practice and am set to begin a traineeship with a big corporate firm in the fourth quarter of next year... more and more I think it's irresponsible of me to keep this training and intelligence for myself and that idle thought and the cultivation of some wiseass persona of mystery is almost immoral i.e. not right, wrong. I want to know - very simply - how I can use what little training and expertise I have to help people rather than to help business and also which areas of law should I aim for when my traineeship comes to also help people and not businesses? very vague, very dippy I know - perhaps tastes a little insincere, perhaps a little silly OK - gimmie what you got and we can hash out the judgements on me later

― cozen (Cozen), Tuesday, 29 November 2005 13:54 (twenty years ago)

Do you have FLAC in Scotland? Free Legal Advice Centers. Their like drop in clinics for people who can't afford lawyers. Do some time there and get the guilt out of your system or meet people who have felt the same as you and done something about it.

― Kv_nol (Kv_nol), Tuesday, 29 November 2005 13:58 (twenty years ago)

you'll get over it

― Theorry Henry (Enrique), Tuesday, 29 November 2005 13:59 (twenty years ago)

this is not about guilt

x-post

god you're all so jaded

― cozen (Cozen), Tuesday, 29 November 2005 14:00 (twenty years ago)

I don't know about Britain, but at least in here one obvious choice would be to work with immigrants and refugees facing deportation.

― Tuomas (Tuomas), Tuesday, 29 November 2005 14:00 (twenty years ago)

Hey, check the second part of my lst sentence. There should be people there who can advise on what to do next. Here FLAC can take place after office hours so it won't affect your daily routine too much.

Tuomas is OTM if the FLAC isn't in Scotland though I can't see how something similar wouldn't be.

― Kv_nol (Kv_nol), Tuesday, 29 November 2005 14:04 (twenty years ago)

my dad is a solicitor, a few friends are london lawyers. i dunno if my dad has helped people overmuch, but he isn't like my london lawyer friends -- he jumped out of london lawyering himself, wasn't his bag. my LLFs work mad hours and get mad money. (it wasn't quite as insane when my dad left, circa 1980.)

i dunno, i think The Man killed off stuff like CAB, which my dad used to do.

― Theorry Henry (Enrique), Tuesday, 29 November 2005 14:04 (twenty years ago)

http://www.scottishlaw.org.uk/lawscotland/abscotslaw.html Yay google. There're links to Advice Centers.

― Kv_nol (Kv_nol), Tuesday, 29 November 2005 14:06 (twenty years ago)

cozen I could actually put you in touch with a lawyer who's ver socially committed and will probably be able to point you in the direction of several satisfying, non-soulsucking options; say the word if you want me to point him in your direction, this email address I'm using works

― Banana Nutrament (ghostface), Tuesday, 29 November 2005 14:07 (twenty years ago)

Yeah, Cozen, if you're feeling like you would like to do further study, maybe you could start doing some Human Rights Law courses, or you could do some International Development or something.
In the short-term, you could almost certainly help out refugees.
Consider also becoming Scotland's own Erin Brockovich - help the little guy to fight big business. I don't know how one goes about this.

― accentmonkey (accentmonkey), Tuesday, 29 November 2005 14:07 (twenty years ago)

"ver socially committed" = is concerned with the social standing of worms obv

― Banana Nutrament (ghostface), Tuesday, 29 November 2005 14:07 (twenty years ago)

Go into politics

― Oh No, It's Dadaismus (and His Endless Stupid Jokes) (Dada), Tuesday, 29 November 2005 14:08 (twenty years ago)

Can you do lawying in the way doctors have a certain %age of private patients and a certain %age of NHS ones?

― Markelby (Mark C), Tuesday, 29 November 2005 14:09 (twenty years ago)

Go into politics
-- Oh No, It's Dadaismus (and His Endless Stupid Jokes) (dadaismus@hotmail.co.uk), November 29th, 2005.

hahahaha!

― Theorry Henry (Enrique), Tuesday, 29 November 2005 14:09 (twenty years ago)

Accentmonkey: A push up bra and a strong case to start off with...

Not being as flippant as I may seem about the bra. Erin said much the same herself.

― Kv_nol (Kv_nol), Tuesday, 29 November 2005 14:11 (twenty years ago)

Hmm. Perhaps not Erin Brockovich then.

Why not politics though? You might be great!

― accentmonkey (accentmonkey), Tuesday, 29 November 2005 14:13 (twenty years ago)

Ha ha, yeah, see i was kind of half-serious when I said go into politics

― Oh No, It's Dadaismus (and His Endless Stupid Jokes) (Dada), Tuesday, 29 November 2005 14:15 (twenty years ago)

oh.

― Theorry Henry (Enrique), Tuesday, 29 November 2005 14:18 (twenty years ago)

http://images.encarta.msn.com/xrefmedia/sharemed/targets/images/pho/t038/T038343A.jsm

― Theorry Henry (Enrique), Tuesday, 29 November 2005 14:18 (twenty years ago)

Tuomas and I have the same idea. I used to work with an absolutely lovely lawyer who did drop-in sessions for asylum seekers. If you wanted to talk to him and get advice, I could find out if he's still working there.

― Mädchen (Madchen), Tuesday, 29 November 2005 14:19 (twenty years ago)

"Bleedin' foreigners takin' our free lawyers.' ;)

― Kv_nol (Kv_nol), Tuesday, 29 November 2005 14:23 (twenty years ago)

Like the world of politics needs more lawyers!

― Oh No, It's Dadaismus (and His Endless Stupid Jokes) (Dada), Tuesday, 29 November 2005 14:25 (twenty years ago)

Stupid westerner! Your unislamic legal training will count for nothing in the eyes of Allah! When we attack your western devil law firm for the Prophet Muhammed, it will mean nothing! Allah Ackbar!

― Mohammed Zaki, Tuesday, 29 November 2005 14:25 (twenty years ago)

Worst post ever?

― Oh No, It's Dadaismus (and His Endless Stupid Jokes) (Dada), Tuesday, 29 November 2005 14:26 (twenty years ago)

Not mine, the one before it

― Oh No, It's Dadaismus (and His Endless Stupid Jokes) (Dada), Tuesday, 29 November 2005 14:26 (twenty years ago)

for something helpful and veeery streetlevel compared to top flight helping-people stuff like (int'l?) human rights law, go into housing law. i've no idea what the climate around this stuff is in the UK, but a friend of mine does it, and he's in court nearly daily defending ppl in the most dire straits against their landlords.

or you could always take your bigtime traineeship and then flip later into consumer protection

or go into intellectual property stuff and then work cheap for artists you think are good.

― geoff (gcannon), Tuesday, 29 November 2005 15:40 (twenty years ago)

You could become a law librarian and help students and or lawyers find legal info.

― Mary (Mary), Wednesday, 30 November 2005 06:08 (twenty years ago)

geoff otm, although everyone and his dog wants to do IP law now.

― like a circle in a spiral, like a wheel within a wheel (Jody Beth Rosen), Wednesday, 30 November 2005 07:07 (twenty years ago)

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