The name of the category together with the restricting paragraph, they both suck. They really do suck. Instead of creating such a counter-intuitive paragraph, why on Earth don't you create a subcategory named "American practicing lawyers"? Shaquille O'Neal is also a lawyer, for heaven's sake. If you remove Shaquille O'Neal, why don't you remove James Cramer? He's not a practicing lawyer either, but you don't know it, because the combination of category name and "explanatory" paragraph is counter-intuitive and relatively unpredictable and sucks. The paragraph sucks.

It's the name of the category that should tell editors what to include in the category, and not a paragraph. I hate it when a paragraph tells me how to interpret the name of the category. The name of the category should be intuitive and simple. If you call the category "American lawyers", it should also be for non-practicing lawyers.

My proposal: as stated above, create a category called "American practicing lawyers" and remove that counter-intuitive paragraph. I hate having to read a paragraph to know what the category "is for", as it says there. That's why we have subcategories, so we can exclude other articles that belong to the main category. The paragraph sucks.

"[M]ost obvious". What the hell is that all about? It's not obvious at all. It says that the connotation "American practicing lawyers" is the "most obvious connotation of the word". That's garbage. It's not obvious. To me, a lawyer is a lawyer, whether practicing or not. "Obvious"? Where's the obviousness in that? The name of the category should not be about connotations. It should be intuitive. It's the name of the category that should be "obvious", and not a connotation that's supposed to be obvious but, in reality, is not.

"This category is for" and "this category is reserved for"? I hate it when a paragraph tells me what to exclude, and that the category is "reserved". Jesus.

"[F]or proper application"? Now you're gonna tell what's proper? If I say that Shaquille O'Neal is an American lawyer, isn't that proper? There's no "proper" subcategory under American lawyers where to include O'Neal, even if he is an "American lawyer", as the category is named. He is not a judge, nor a law professor, nor a legal writer, but he is still an "American lawyer". So, with the restricting paragraph, the whole category sucks. I hate it when a paragraph tells me that my application is not "proper". It puts me in a catch-22. If someone's not a "practicing lawyer", but still a "lawyer", I'm not allowed to categorize him as a lawyer. That's garbage. Absolute and complete and total and utter garbage. 2004-12-29T22:45Z 07:24, July 30, 2005 (UTC)

• Nope. Shaquille O'Neal is not a lawyer. He has a bachelor's degree in law, but he has never taken a bar examination and has never been a lawyer. Go read Lawyer - it says, "lawyering is traditionally considered to be a learned honorable profession requiring, in most common law countries, at least three years of education beyond a bachelor's degree. The degree earned by lawyers in the United States and many other countries is a J.D. or juris doctor. " He does not have a J.D. Another note about renaming the category to American practicing lawyers - dead lawyers can't practice anymore, and there are some people in American lawyers right now who are very dead. --Idont Havaname 20:16, 1 August 2005 (UTC)[reply]