Sunday, October 19, 2008

unprofessional

Someone asked, what's anusol? It's a product similar to preparation-h. "Unprofessional" is a buzz word, used a lot these days, to describe someone who disagrees with your personal taste, vanity or views about reality. Workers often use this term of abuse towards those with less power.

The trouble with going to work is that you’re forced to deal with people you might otherwise avoid. On every staff, there’s at least one obsessive-compulsive, power-hungry personality, obsessed with rules and meetings. Such a person follows the boss into his office for briefings each day, to make sure he pressures staff into doing what she wants. Usually the boss has favorites.
Administration tends to side with the strong, in their battle to oppress those who aren’t power-hungry and who don’t like to quarrel, or to get involved in long, time-consuming disputes.
Such a personality will go after you until she finds something in your behavior to attack. She’ll then invade your personal space, like a dentist drill. The only anesthetic against such a person is to tune him or her out. Avoid such a person. But then the person goes after you. She spies on you and reports the little details of your day to the boss. She sifts through your coming and going until she finds something that goes against the ideal of right and wrong that cages her mind. Finally, you’re forced to make a show of strength, to assert the boundary; otherwise the bully will never stop. You assert your legal right and then the bully backs off, but not too far away. The minute you let your guard down, she’ll be back on the attack.

All this creates stress. There’s a knot in my stomach as I go to work in the morning and dread meeting certain colleagues. I’ve talked to other people and they say this is quite common in the workplace. Every staff contains people who delight in tormenting people. Too bad people can’t respect boundaries. Too bad people have trouble tolerating difference.

To cope, I make art about it. I have no choice but to work, or slide to skid row. In order to keep my cool and not sink into depression or fly into a rage, I need protection. Making art offers a kind of mind protection. I won’t elaborate on that right now. Another time.

I could also go on and on about the different freaks in the workplace, but you probably know all about it. You probably have your own tales of torment and misery, because certain hell-beings thrive on aggression, bitterness and self-pity.

2 comments:

Malina Fürhoff said...

hello john,
love ya
malina

Sylvain Lamoureux said...

What is too bad, is that people say that this is 'normal' and just accept it.