Vote: So then, which degree is ultimately the biggest ick?

Picture the scene: you’re in a club smoking area, VK bottle and Elf Bar in hand. You’re wearing your finest new Depop purchase, and deep in conversation with what could possibly be the fittest person you’ve ever seen. All of a sudden you realise you don’t know anything about them – “so, what’re you studying then?” They lean in and whisper the answer in your ear. The bile begins to rise in your throat, you shudder and pretend you need to go and find your best mate who’s crying in the toilets. It is, in fact, you who needs to go and cry in the toilets. You can never see this person again.

What degree did you just imagine the person is studying, which made you rethink everything you know? Was it engineering, who will do nothing but wear checked shirts and talk your ear off about bridges? Was it politics, who will “play devil’s advocate” all day long and mansplain Jeremy Corbyn to you? Or god forbid – was it film, who will force you to watch endless repeats of Pulp Fiction with them?

The thing is, there’s a whole LOAD of degrees that are nothing but huge, massive, ginormous icks. I’d even go so far as to say that the only non-icky degree in existence is modern languages, because everyone knows that speaking another language is fit af. But if we’re getting really scientific about this, which degree is the ultimate King Of The Icks? Here you’ll see arguments for why each degree is an ick, but the decision rests with you – vote at the end of this article for which degree is the biggest ick.

Let’s get into it, then:

Engineering

Starting with the obvious, are we? Engineering students like to think they’re the top of the food chain – STEM this, STEM that. And we get it, you’re the future, blah blah blah. You might be good at numbers and bridges and stuff but you’re about as bland in bed as your dress sense. Wearing checked shirts in 2022 is a jailable offence and certainly won’t get you laid. Avoid.

Business

No, I don’t want to hear about your great idea for a media startup that’s going to make you a millionaire by 25. Sorry, Steven Bartlett x

English lit

English lit students are the laughing stock of higher education. You’re paying over £9k and for what? To read a Shakespeare play and have everyone ask you if you want to go into teaching at the end of it?

Creative writing

See above, except this time you’re paying over the odds to just write a few stories. Wait, really? No referencing? No bibliographies? No critical analysis? Maybe I’m the ick for not getting involved sooner. Who do I email to change majors again? I can’t wait to force everyone I know to read my painfully dull collection of flash fiction.

Economics

Too busy thinking about how to fuel capitalism to learn how to pleasure a woman. No the “you’ve got the curves to supply my demand” pick up line doesn’t work on anyone ever.

Philosophy

Okay so you did a gap yah and found yourself in Thailand and now you’re all existential. Sorry but you’re just boring, no one wants to hear you harp on about Sartre all day.

Philosophy students are the kind of people who’ll be wearing a nice top but refuse to tell you where it’s from, or else just mysteriously say it’s “thrifted” – and then the next week you see it in the Urban Outfitters window. You’re just full of lies and gaslighting, behind a facade of veganism.

Politics

“If I could just play devil’s advocate for a second…” Those words alone are enough to make you throw up in your mouth a little bit. Combine that with either a worrying obsession with Marx or a genuine desire to be the next Boris Johnson and you’ve got one of the most obnoxious students on campus. Try not to get cornered at a party by a Politics student, they will spend 45 minutes trying to mansplain why the media sabotaged Jeremy Corbyn.

PPE

People who do PPE are literally just the worst parts of every other degree all rolled into one. The “devil’s advocate” of politics, the fake-wokeness of philosophy, and the overall rugby lad nature of economics. I beg, just say with your chest that you want to be an MP and live off expenses for the rest of your life.

Journalism

If you want to be ghosted, date someone who does journalism. Sorry but the thought of the person you’re dating going out into public with a huge camera and a boom mic. I’ve been sick. Speaking to members of the public? Gross.

Film

Doing film is just a prerequisite to having a room filled with Pulp Fiction and Fight Club posters. If you ever walk into someone’s uni house and see it’s filled with those: run. Nothing good has ever come out of shagging someone who will force you to watch The Wolf of Wall Street with them, or worse – mansplain it to you in the smoking area.

Geography

If you ever want to get the ick about someone immediately, just imagine them wearing wellies. Now imagine them on a geography field trip, in the pouring rain somewhere in the middle of Wales, wearing said wellies. You will never want to go near them again.

Maths

I have never met a maths student who doesn’t have some sort of weird superiority complex. We get it, you’re clever, but that doesn’t mean you’re a good person – or even mildly nice.

Your mum still buys your clothes, probably from Gap, and you only do your washing once a term, when you go home for the holidays. I guarantee your bed sheets are harbouring several diseases, and I am therefore never going near them. A walking, talking ick.

Psychology

If the world has one too many of something it’s psychology students. You didn’t know what to do when you got to the end of A Levels, thought English lit was too basic, and somehow chose the only other subject that is more basic.

Marine biology

Okay so you saw The Little Mermaid and H2O when you were in primary school and then made that your whole personality. Grow up. Then you came to uni and realised marine biology is less about dolphins and more just learning about algae for three years straight. I promise you, no one cares about seaweed.

Classics

“I study Classics” is just a codeword for “I’m a massive Tory”. Cool so you went to private school, and mummy and daddy have already bought a flat in London for you to live in when you graduate? It’s a good thing you’ll be able to live off pocket money for the rest of your life, because what jobs does Classics even lead to?

Sport science

Sorry but I don’t even need to meet someone who does sports science without already being aware that they will cheat on me. I’m not getting involved.

Medicine

Medical students are the biggest know-it-alls on campus, and nothing is a bigger ick than that. They’re just so smug about being able to finish uni with an actual good job. God forbid you tell them you have a busy day, because “didn’t you know they have 9-5 lectures every day, ACTUALLY?” Plus they’re always trying to do some sort of weird medical test on you, and that simply couldn’t be any less sexy.

History

If you study history you are either one of two distinct groups: a girl who does nothing at uni but a fuck tonne of ket, or a boy who wears fleeces, has no chat and will become the most boring secondary school history teacher ever known to man.

Zoology

Grow up.

Modern languages

Let’s get one thing straight right now: There is nothing icky whatsoever about being fluent in another language. If you think languages students are an ick, I’m sorry to break it to you but you’re the real ick. Languages students are just so sexy and you cannot change my mind. Bonus points if they’re doing a year abroad somewhere cool.

Joint honours

We’re not doing A Levels anymore. There’s no need to cover every single subject under the sun under one degree. I’m assuming your end of year exams look something like a pub quiz – one minute you’re writing about Tudor kings and the next exponential equations. Have a day off, mate.

Oh and please stop telling me how hard your life is because 90 per cent of your time on campus is spent legging it from science labs to English seminars. If your degree title looks like it came from randomly landing on two entirely different pages in a prospectus, you deserve no sympathy.

Computer science

I’m going to try and be kind here but it’s going to be hard. You had dreams about being the next Mark Zuckerberg before going off to uni but now you’re here and your aspirations have been brutally crushed by underestimating how hard your degree was going to be. But it’s okay because you’re going to be the one laughing when you start on a £60k salary unlike the rest of us £20k idiots.

Sociology

Getting a nose piercing and oat milk in your Starbucks iced lattes doesn’t make you edgy, babes. You thought this would be a chill few years doing an “ology” but within a week you’re crying in the library over theory texts from the 1800s and regretting everything. Chill out and remember everything’s a social construct after all x

Law

We get it. You were born in Surrey and your parents are dirt rich. All law students ever talk about is how many boring law books they have to read and how many boring grad schemes they’ve applied for. Boring!

Your parents definitely paid for your accommodation and bills throughout the whole of university but despite this you constantly complain about having the lowest student loan. What a hard life x

So then, which degree is the biggest ick? Vote now: