“He Works On Nuclear Reactors”: Woman Calls Husband Uneducated, Gets Called Out

While a college degree is generally the bare minimum of schooling we imagine when thinking about who is and isn’t educated, it’s important to remember that it’s not the only source of knowledge.

So one wife ended up in hot water when she joked about her husband being “uneducated” despite him working on a nuclear submarine. Her reasoning was that he technically didn't have a college degree nor did he enjoy reading a lot of fiction. She turned to the internet for advice and clarification and discovered that netizens had very little sympathy for her actions.

So first and foremost, working on any submarine, let alone a navy nuclear submarine, is a very, very highly skilled job requiring rigorous training, study, and experience. After all, who would allow some “uneducated” simpleton access to the most advanced military hardware in the world?

She is also working from the misguided opinion that a “regular” university degree is the only way one can be formally considered educated. In fact, many of the certifications that military specialists go through are actually recognized, at least within their field. The only difference might be the lack of electives, as nuclear submariners perhaps have less use from contemporary literature, for example.

However, as many comments point out, it doesn’t matter where he works, openly calling your partner “uneducated” is simply rude. Because education can be seen as “binary,” that is, you either have a degree or don’t, it perhaps sounds more factual. But in this context, it just looks like she is calling him dumb. Even if it were true, insulting your spouse for a bit of clout at a friendly dinner is horrible behavior.

Her educational snobbism is particularly confusing, given that he works a job that the vast majority of the population would never be able to get. Not only is it intensely specialized and selective, it’s stressful and dangerous. This is something she casually overlooks because, you see, he has a relatively conventional favorite book.

To OP’s husband’s credit, perhaps he doesn’t share enough about his job for her to truly understand the complexity. Given that large parts of it are no doubt secretive, maybe he was simply playing on the safe side. After, goading a specialist into spilling state secrets to satisfy their ego is a pretty common cliche in spy stories.

But the real drama here is the lack of understanding from the wife. While perhaps her statements were not the worst possible variant that they could have been, the fact that her partner said he didn’t like it and she didn’t react is quite telling. Indeed, instead of just accepting that he felt bad and apologizing, she was so confused by her actions that she had to poll the internet.

From the husband's perspective, it almost looks like she valued the opinions of random netizens over how her spouse felt. Fortunately for all involved (save, perhaps, OP,) people on the internet united to call out OP. Perhaps this could be a good reality check for her to deal with her snobbism and to understand her husband’s emotions more.

She might also not take some time and consider why she needed to “explain” her husband's answer to a friend, despite the fact that what he said was clear and made sense. If she is, for some reason, operating under the assumption that he isn’t “smart” she should probably reassess both the feeling of superiority (very toxic in a relationship) and the delusion that she is smarter than a person who works on a nuclear submarine.