Mad Scientist by Circumstance, Not Choice

This must be obvious from reading my past postings, but I spend a lot of time thinking about employment: how to get it, what makes it fulfilling, whether it should define your life or merely be a part of it, what about it makes it worthwhile or worthless... I'm at a place where I'm cutting a sharp distinction between the work/life divide, although I hope down the line to somehow integrate those two facets of my life a little more. That is, like most people, I ultimately hope to find the proverbial "perfect job" which channels my skills, talents, ethics, and passion into something that changes the world for the better (and one which I enjoy doing), rather just being employed for the sake of earning money. But that lofty goal can wait for a while. Not an immediately pressing concern.

I met a guy my age about a week ago who had just moved to DC, and was telling me how it was so hard for him to land a job here. He was intelligent, witty, personable, and had just graduated from a top liberal arts college with an engineering degree, so it struck me as strange that he wasn't snapped up by some firm or another right away. (Admittedly, DC may not be the absolute best place for engineers, but there should still be some opportunities, I would imagine.) Anyway, when I asked what he ended up finding, he got extremely sheepish and told me he was just hired by a place called (creepily enough) MetalStorm Ltd. He'll be using his young and talented mind to design new forms of missiles and grenade launchers, which he knows will then be sold to the U.S. government and shipped to Iraq, where he admits that they will presumably inflict staggering damages on civilians and children, among others. I guess I can't hold it against him personally if this really is the ONLY job he can find for now, but I'm really struggling with the idea that he could accept such an appalling job even with the admission that it is, well, evil.

More than anything, I find it more than a little disillusioning (and disturbing) to find out that normal, good people can just "fall into" a profession like missile design. I mean, this really should not be one of those things that smart people just resort to because they have no better career opportunities. Yikes.