By the time I was thirty-seven I felt so embarrassed about the practices in my profession that I felt I must do something about it. So, I decided to return my Ph.D. diploma to my alma mater and send a letter to the president with it.
Returning my Ph.D. diploma was a symbolic act, of course. You can't really return a personal achievement. It's like returning a Marathon finisher T-shirt. You did the run, the T-shirt means nothing.
More importantly, I made a mistake.
Professor Piper now has a fountain named after her, which is embarrassing. But at the time she was a formidable foe. I once witnessed her turn a room full of discontented graduate students into a group of rah-rah-rah idiots, and I should have known better. There is one rule in war: Never lose the high ground. I lost the high ground with the last sentence, and it gave Piper an opportunity to ignore me.
I had been foolish, and when I realized that I had been foolish, it was too late.