“Your Messenger Bag Looks Dumb” and 6 Other Ways to Bully Your ENC 2135 TA

As anyone who has been to orientation is aware, FSU requires its students to take a special English class, ENC 2135. This class is meant to teach you important writing skills that you should have learned in high school, including how to compose a research paper and, uh, that’s just about it. On the journey to unsuccessfully discover the definition of the word “genre,” students are presented with the most challenging archetype to dissect: their ENC 2135 TA. These TAs are famously power-hungry, despite not being able to conjure up a single ounce of respect from a group of 18-year-old idiots. Even though they’re clinically depressed from grad school, ENC2135 teaching assistants are more than ready to roast. The most effective way to keep them in line is through bullying, and in the year of our Lord 2019, the only bullying allowed is that against your English TA. 

Telling Them “Your Messenger Bag Looks Dumb.”  

Nothing lies closer to an English TA’s heart than their overstuffed messenger bag. Toting it around on their shoulder gives them more satisfaction than giving short notice discussion posts or showing the same three TED talks every week. To a TA, the messenger bag is the symbol of an intellectual who thinks on a level ‘You just don’t get’, so tearing this from them really hits hard at their core. 

“Is That You Trying to Grow a Beard, or Did You Just Forget to Shave?”

Everyone at some point has walked into class and wondered if it was No-Shave November or a Nouveau Shamanic commitment to the caveman lifestyle. In reality, they’re just really tired grad students who want to be in that classroom even less than you do. By reminding them of this, students are revealing to them their sad reality: they lack the basic human gene required to grow facial hair, and that, my friends, hurts most of all. 

Asking, “Can You Define Genre Again?”

Almost everyone has been through the Research, Genre, and Context class, yet no one seems to have a clear answer to this question. With how many times the TA is asked this question per week, it’s surprising they haven’t renamed it to Slowly Driving a Broke 25-Year-Old Hemingway Stan Insane.

Asking About Office Hours to Subtly Remind Them That They Share an Office With Seven People.

English TAs have the office equivalent of a Salley dorm. Technically, it has everything they need, but they’ll never have the degree of privacy that they crave. This serves as the ultimate reminder of how far they have left to go before becoming a real professor. Use this one to put them back in their place at the bottom of the higher ed pecking order.

Ask Them Which Grad Schools They Didn’t Get Into.

Just remind them that it’s alright that they weren’t admitted to the Writers Workshop at Iowa. As evidenced by the sheer number of pretentious thrift sweaters they wear in Florida heat, they definitely couldn’t handle the cold anyway. This will make them reflect on how they once dreamed of getting a master’s at the University of Chicago. Instead, they’re forced to teach a glorified AP Lit class in order to willingly read Faulkner and make $14K a year.

Remind Them That With Their Salary, They Can Barely Even Afford the Textbook They Assigned the Class.

This one is really just sad, so only use it if they really messed up your grade. Humble them by pointing out that they are essentially being compensated for babysitting a bunch of barely legal noobs. Reassure them that one day they can graduate with their master’s in English and become something impressive, like a high school teacher or even a librarian!

Be the First Person to Tell Them Plaid Shorts Don’t Actually Match With Striped Shirts.

As noted by the aforementioned messenger bags, English TAs are notoriously bad at fashion. Shakespeare never taught them how to wear matching outfits, so this is the best they can do. Who needs a classic pair of blue jeans when you have books only respected by white guy scholars from the 1800s, right? This insult is the perfect example of constructive bullying; they should at least venture beyond Target on their next shopping trip thanks to this well-intentioned roast.