Medical I want to participate in a peaceful protest, but I am worried about being implicated for 'professionalism'.

[GoSpursGo]

Hi. I've recently been admitted into medical school and am still WL'd at my top choice. This top choice is in the city I intend to protest at.

The protest is for a reason I am very passionate about and concerns my nationality. It is easy to misconstrue the purpose of this protest and accuse of something that it is not. For this reason, I am concerned about someone potentially having a picture of me and sending it to the medical school administration of my top choice, or worse, to save it to send to my later program director faculty in residency.

These concerns come amidst a wave I have seen on Twitter of medical students and residents getting punished for "professionalism" violations, even though most of these so-called violations are a scam.

I will be frank and say I am scared of the culture I am entering and want to make sure this doesn't come back to bite me.

Are my concerns especially neurotic? Should I take extra measures to mask my identity? Thanks.

I highly doubt that someone will go out of their way to send a picture of you to your top choice med school, but you absolutely have to be careful about what can be posted about you online. Even if a protest is intended as peaceful, sometimes they do not turn out that way either because of a few bad actors or because of clashes with counter-protesters or law enforcement.

But this isn't unique to medicine. The entire concept of protest implies civil disobedience, and choosing to stand up to those in power always carries risk that you're going to make someone important unhappy. So I'm not going to tell you whether you should or should not go to this protest because some causes are worth the sacrifice, but just be aware of what you are doing and who is around you at all times, and be ready to leave a moment's notice if the protest takes a negative turn.

---

Members don't see this ad.

 

[Goro]

So I should avoid posting any pictures of myself there, even if the protest ends up being entirely peaceful?

My take is that you have a right to protest. If you're worried, wear a mask...not a V mask, but one for COVID-19.

 

[GoSpursGo]

You’re asking someone who is extremely risk averse when it comes to social media. Every school has a social media policy, and rather than worry about whether or not I’m conforming I just don’t post.

Some doctors take the exact opposite point of view and make the decision to have an active social media footprint. But the bottom line is if you’re going to post, know the policies of your schools and organizations and follow them to a T.

 

[TheBoneDoctah]

I think this depends on how much risk you want to have. Yes, you have the right to protest peacefully, but that doesn't mean that everyone is going to look at this as that (if some way they find out). Personally, I would stay away from anything that could POTENTIALLY screw up your career. I am not saying this would, but it could if the wrong person sees something...idk.

 

[Mr.Smile12]

Unless someone has it out for you, don't worry about it. You can ask the school for their policy and students on whether this was something that got students in trouble. Professionalism violations are very broad in scope so you can't be sure why someone is punished.