POINT
Jen Aziz (2L) 
Law school feels a surprising amount like high school. Every day, you see the same people, in the same classrooms, the same library, the same overpriced coffee shop… It’s inevitable that you become close friends with your classmates, which might be one of the best parts of this earning this degree. They’re wonderful, brilliant, hilarious people, and impressive drinking buddies. Your law school friends are always there to encourage you to take a break come Thursday night. Making it through the work week together feels like fighting in the trenches, and Thursday night is our brief respite from reality. Your law school friends would never say that you shouldn’t have that last tequila shot at 1:30 am. In fact, if you’re home and tucked into bed before last call you’re probably missing out on some pretty great times.
The law school friends you’ll hang out with will come from a variety of backgrounds and experiences. You will meet SO many people who hail from all over the GTA from the exotic Oakville to the oasis known as Richmond Hill! However, although we all come from different places there are certain characteristics found in every law student which make them awesome to hang out with.
Law students love puns. Puns are our lifeblood and you don’t want to see what happens when supplies run low. Your sense of humour has probably tweaked already even if you just started school this year. Jokes about gingerbeer, negligence and Lord Denning just don’t land with non-law school friends. As well, all of our peers seem to have amazing hidden talents (not fair) from their lives before law school (remember that time?) and they can introduce you to exciting new opportunities that you didn’t even know you were missing out on with your non-law school friends. It’s also great that everyone’s nerdiness is fully exposed and a source of pride if anything (case in point – trivia competition).
And who else but fellow law students can commiserate with you about the cruel and unusual circumstances of 5 exams and a paper in the span of a few weeks? (Does not apply to current 1Ls, but there are no inter-year friendships anyways so it’s not a problem). Sometimes you just want to vent about how weird the reading room smells or why we’re spending so much time reading dissents, and when you hang out with law students you have your audience.
Chances are, most of your law school friends also rely on that (life)line of credit. That’s another plus of hanging out with them. When you’re already thousands of dollars in debt, that extra $5 (or $8….) pint is a really just a drop in the ocean and all of your friends probably feel the same way. They will never make you feel bad for giving in to your FOMO and trying to live a little before exams and papers start to crush your soul.
The last reason why hanging out with law school friends is awesome is because pretty soon you’ll drop the “law school” and consider them your real, plain old friends. There are a lot of amazing people in this school so don’t miss your chance to sink your claws in and secure some sweet lifelong friendships.
COUNTERPOINT
Alex Wong (2L)
Disclaimer: This position is contingent on still having friends outside of law school.
HH in social life and friendship if you have managed to keep this up! P if more than half of them are furry and have tails.
Hanging out with non-law student friends (“normals” or “normies”) is great. It’s important to keep in touch with them and to take a step out of the bubble of all-things-law once in a while. One of the obvious pros of being with them is that, because you see them way less often, it’s just inherently qualitatively more special. It’s so exciting. All the things to catch up on. You’re not going to take them for granted. Not that I take my law school friends for granted, but you’re going to treat the friends you see less often really nice when you do see them. Not that I treat my law school friends poorly, if that’s what you’ve heard.
Sometimes we just need to be reminded that there is Life Outside of Law (or LOL for short). “Huh? What’s a Seven Sister?”, “Where’s Bay Street?”, “What’s that law that sounds like cake?” These questions are so much more refreshing than, “How many OCIs did you get?”, “Wow, you haven’t started your map yet?” Speaking of, no one really cares about the ‘failures’ of your law school life, of which I have many. Or at least, it’s easier to gloss over the low points when you talk to non-law friends because they just don’t ever have to know about them. In fact, you’re pretty much a success by default for being in law school.
With non-law friends, every trivial thing does not have to become the subject of heated (some might argue “spirited”) debate. Case in point, point/counterpoint is a perma-feature of UV for a reason: law students love arguing / debating / being contrarian for the sake of being contrarian. Jen even admits that a lot of the arguments make her feel like George Costanza far more often than is normal. On the other hand, with non-law friends, you can pretend you’re an expert on the law. I don’t do this, but I’m pretty sure I could get away with it. All you have to say is “well, if it’s what a reasonable [person] would do… [random legalese] … [not-legal-advice disclaimer]” … right? Also, everyone will ask you to be their future lawyer because they don’t know any better.
One more thing, how do I put this gently? Maybe I won’t. Seeing my friends outside of law school reminds me that TO is really multicultural. Visible minorities make up over two-thirds of the suburb where I’m from, nearly half of Toronto’s population, but less than one-third at UofT Law. Part of what I’m saying is, there’s a reason for the lack of good AYCE sushi in downtown Toronto and for the state of the “sushi” at Ned’s, and this is a huge disaster for me.
There is one great thing about law school friends, though, which maybe you can guess from my points. They remind you that your other friends are so amazing to hang out with by virtue of them not being law students. The corollary of this is that law school friends are actually awesome friends, but for their relation to law school. Love you guys.
