LOST: My dignity/humanity

answers by the name "schmuck" and looks like it's been through hell. Last seen being beaten mercilessly from me at my place of work. Cash reward. Please call or write with any info.

I've been thinking about a couple of adages I was taught to keep a positive attitude about my work.

The first one comes from my dad, and it goes, "It's a poor workman who blames his tools." In thinking about this, I think, so say I'm a lumberjack and the foreman gives me a hammer. Yeah I can still chop down trees but it will take for-fuckin-ever! Or say I'm on car-drying duty at the car wash and the boss is only giving me kleenex. Say I'm an 80 year old porn-star and the director is skimpin' on the Viagra. A fry-cook with a shallow pan and 10 orders of extra-tasty crispy...

My point with this is yeah, I get it. You do the best you can with what you got. I know that. But when the right tools are out there, and they are more conducive to the work, why shouldn't I as a knowledgeable professional practicing my craft get those? Further than that, and to go back to the lumberjack, say I need to scale a tree and the harnesses are inferior to others available. Then this is a safety concern, and it is the employer's responsibility to listen to their employees when those people, the people that do that work, are certain that there is a better way to do things. This is not just respectful, it's a smart business move.

It all started with the Mac vs. PC thing. I work in the creative industry and recently accepted a job where we use Windows machines. I wasn't told this before I accepted and had I been, I probably would not have accepted the offer. It's an awful experience working on a Windows machine and the whole clunky process is just a hindrance to getting things done. There's nothing a Windows machine does better when it come to design. I can't say enough about how awful it is.



I would go so far to say the main recent that IT is as big of an industry as it is, is because Windows is an awful, consistently failing, mystery of an OS with no rhyme or reason to much of it's offerings or performance.

uck

The next adage is this gem: "Ours is not to question why, ours is but to do or die.”

-which is a popular misquote of The Charge of the Light Brigade by
Alfred, Lord Tennyson. And in that, I find myself asking (though I know I shan't) who are these schlumps and why don't they have any respect for themselves. We should always ask why. Our superiors would certainly love to believe that they hold all the knowledge in the universe inside their highly educated, senior staff minds. But the more real ones, the people who I can certainly respect, have no problem being asked why we would do things a certain way as opposed to another. It's how we learn. It's how we come to make good decisions as a team. Kings and emperors get to make self-serving decisions. My boss is not my king, not my emperor, and even if he were, I'd still consider questioning him, if not overthrowing or killing him. I mean, I don't want to be a peasent. I don't want to be a drone. Fuck!

Why are these two attitude inspiring statements so dehumanizing? Fuck that. No way. If that's what the boss believes, I'll fucking walk. I will question and I will want the best tool for the job, and even more... my life, and my opinions matter. My opinions matter when it's my experience that got me the job. You want people to say yes all day and never question you or ask for better equipment? Then hire a bunch of fear-filled, yes-men, pussies. I'm not that person.


And then on a side note - Do this... send like 5 bucks. Just send a little ya know?! I mean if we all send five, that's a lot!

Dear Joseph Wagner,

Thank you very much for your donation of $20.00 to the Ron Paul 2008 Presidential Campaign.

Your donation will allow us to expand and grow our campaign.

We depend on donors like you to help us spread the message of freedom, peace and prosperity through Ron Paul’s candidacy.

Thanks for being a part of the campaign!