While the original thought, not to mention chutzpa, that went into it are remarkable, the scheme is just more than a rational mind can take.  Via ATL, it appears that a second year law student in Manhattan posted an advertisement on Craigslist seeking an intern. No really, she did.

So I am a full time second year law student at a very good law school in Manhattan. I am also the chairperson of many groups on campus, have a part time job, and a lot of administrative stuff that I always need to do.

Lately I have been extremely busy and I have not had time to get all my school work done on top of all the other administrative things I need to do. I am looking to hire an undergraduate intern who is interested in going to law school or is pre-law to help me get some of this stuff done.

Identified as a student at New York Law School, the Harvard of Worth Street, her very busy law student life demanded an assistant.  Not to do the routine, like fetch the dry cleaning or make a Starbucks run, but to cover her law school studies that she can’t get to while performing the important face jobs that “rising law students” need to handle for themselves.

Although I cannot pay you I promise I won’t bore you to death, I won’t give you a ton of bitch work, and working with me will be a great experience in learning the ins and outs of doing well in law school. I wouldn’t ask you to do my school work either. I would need you to read and review certain cases and certain articles and summarize them for a few papers I will be writing throughout the year. I might also need you to send a few e-mails.

Back in my day, reading cases and articles was still considered “school work.”  Not any more, apparently, though it leaves me to wonder what exactly constitutes school work these days.  And what’s in it for the intern?

In return you would get GREAT experience in the legal field as well as a GREAT networking connection to someone who will be an attorney in a year and half (as well as entrance into my web of legal connections). Surely the most important thing you learn in law school is that is not what you know its who you know.

That’s right, the intern would get to “network” with the law student, who (she hopes) will be an attorney in a year and a half, (woo hoo!!!) and entre into her “web of legal connections.”  It looks like somebody’s been paying attention to the Social Media gurus.

It would be overkill to note the narcissism and entitlement inherent in this scheme, where some nobody law student believes that being close to her, a self-proclaimed inchoate center of power, is worthy compensation to someone even lower on the totem pole than she is.   But it really isn’t that much of a stretch, given what happens regularly online. 

The elevation of networking and connections above not only competency but, for any college kid who might be foolish enough to buy into this insanity, payment reflects the Slackoisie ideal of compensation.  This is what’s being sold constantly in the blogosphere and on twitter, that superficial connections to others has its own intrinsic value, enough so that it’s worthy of trade.  This is nuts.

Ellie Mystal questions this 2L for her mistaken self-perception, that she’s important enough to command an intern, that being close to her is worthy enough for someone to do her bidding.  Despite Ellie’s snarky emphasis on her law school and appearance, would her advertisement be more realistic if she was a buttoned-down law review editor from Columbia?  Ellie seems to think that then, at least, her “web of connections” might prove a bit more valuable.

Consider what happens daily on twitter before you laugh.  Experienced lawyers are busy twitting up children for personal validation and approval, not to mention a few more followers.  Law students are lecturing lawyers, while failed and disbarred lawyers are framing the language of conversations.  Why shouldn’t this 2L have an intern to bask in her web of legal connections, as she’s just as likely to be a part of the Happysphere as any of the other law students and baby lawyers who think they’ve got all the answers, and who are absolutely certain that their engaging with lawyers will bring them all the respect and success they’ve earned by amassing a coterie of important followers.

Of course, when this 2L appears before a judge some day, if she is capable of passing the bar exam despite her not having the time to read the cases, I can’t help but wonder whether her response to a question by the court as to the basis for her motion will be, “but judge, I have 10,000 followers on twitter. I must know what I’m talking about.”

In updates, Ellie notes that the law student took down the Craigslist ad. She says that it was all just a big joke and can’t believe that anybody took her seriously.  She gets a “C” for persuasiveness, and I wouldn’t be surprised if some enterprising college student takes her up on her offer nonetheless.  After all, what wouldn’t some college kid do for access to her “web of legal connections?”  It’s not what you know, but who you know.