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Randy

A new CEO at my employer because the company isn't making enough profits and the stockholders aren't happy. Oh, waaaaa waaaaaa waaaaa.

Okay, nothing new there.

My "boss" told me today that HIS boss was no longer with the company. Well, naturally the first thing a new CEO does is "clean house," especially at the level that this man would've been, you know, not quite "executive anything" but well above a manager. Not know what his title was, it would be something along the lines of "regional whatever blah blah blah". (Men and their silly titles will be the death of us all.)

Now you see, I should be really happy that the man is gone because after the first time I met him, it was clear he and I were never, ever going to be able to exchange a pleasant word. But then again, over the last year I've seen him exactly twice. Thank the good Lord for small favors.

However, I ain't the least bit happy about it and even though none of this affects me, personally, it IS one more example of why my posts seem so thoroughly bitter, cynical, and anti-everything having to do with big business and just about anything else that's American.

Care to guess how long that man had been with this employer?

Forty years!

I was told that after much "begging" on his part (because he desparately needed the continued health insurance for his wife--gee, she's only dying of cancer, but of course, that's of no concern to "corporate," now is it?), they did find him "something" else to do. He does, of course, have to move halfway across the country.

And people see the news of a "disgruntled" employee / ex-employee going in and shooting up the place and they scratch their empty little heads and say, "I wonder what happened?"

Rolling Eyes

Pauloz · Posted: Thu Apr 03, 2008 9:35 pm Post subject:

Randy

Yeah, there's a hideous disconnect between corporate and reality.

I used to work with someone who'd been in the same Department, more or less the same work, all his life.

Perfectly nice guy, but nuts.

It's something in the workplace environment which does the damage, makes people dependent on the corporate environment.

So the defence mechanism seems to be "protect own food supply", and that just blots out everything else.

I notice they seem to turn into human beings again, when removed, usually involuntarily, from that environment, too.

Randy · Posted: Fri Apr 04, 2008 4:25 am Post subject:

quote="Pauloz"

I notice they seem to turn into human beings again, when removed, usually involuntarily, from that environment, too.

Ain't that the truth! And what really worries me is that it's rare I read comments like that from Americans. It's men and women from just about everywhere else who "get it". This stuff is beat into our heads over here almost literally from day one. All the emphasis of education and everything else is focused on career and money, career and money....

This is one very mixed up country.....

Pauloz · Posted: Sat Apr 05, 2008 2:09 am Post subject:

Randy

Actually, I've been wondering about that. It's like there's some sort of Divine Right of Corporates.

That's a very different culture.

Our version of it, fortunately, is the hayseed variety, and not too popular to the extent that it's an actual social risk.

We had a big, ridiculous blowup here a while back with three executive types in local government who were dubbed Huey, Dewey, and Louie, because they were literally finishing each others' sentences, etc, to the point of being utterly absurd.

Someone got fired by them, and the whole pitiful saga came out. Social asset, not really.

Pity all that money doesn't seem to wind up as down payments on brains, isn't it?

The ones that get on my nerves are the kind where you can almost smell the decay in the office, sick relationships, no substance, all based on some damn network thing.

All usually butt ugly, too, I notice. "No life? Try becoming a corporate zombie".

Randy · Posted: Sat Apr 05, 2008 3:18 am Post subject:

quote="Pauloz"

Actually, I've been wondering about that. It's like there's some sort of Divine Right of Corporates.

I don't know how it works in other countries, but here in the outermost ring of hell, it started when J. Paul Getty, the railroad-dude from "way back then," had his lawyers argue before the Supreme Court that "person," as used in (I think) the 14th Amendment to the Constitution (talk about a worthless document!) applied not only to real-life flesh-and-blood types but to corporations as well. And so the Supreme Court agreed and hence began the notion that a legal fiction, a "corporate person" had all the rights to engage in commerce and interprise.

And it pretty much all culminated in 1919 with a Michigan state supreme court ruling call "Ford v the Dodge Bros". Henry Ford was told that the number one purpose and duty of a corporation is to increase profits for the shareholders, no matter the results to employees or anything or anyone else.

And now, here we are. Well, it plays out like this: Only in America can a politican say something like "NAFTA will be great for American business" and what people hear is "NAFTA will be great for the American people." And so now everyone around here is bitching about the results we're seeing and saying the politicians lied, which they didn't do. Oh well.....

Pity all that money doesn't seem to wind up as down payments on brains, isn't it?

THAT is so brilliant! Oh, I'll be using that quite often, if you don't mind.

a corporate zombie".

That's the exact phrase I used in my book to describe one of my former employers. BUT he's "successful" enough and wealthy enough so that our very own little psychopathic vp of the US "just happened to be in the neighborhood" and "just happened" to stop by this guy's house (about a twenty minute drive from my house). Oh, the "house" has SIXTEEN bedrooms, 5 floors, full-time maids and butlers and all the rest and unless this chap has hooked up with a new lady, he lives there ALL BY HIMSELF.

God, what a bunch of useless flesh.......

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