"Faster, Faster! Until the thrill of speed overcomes the fear of death!"We all know that guy at the Walgreens inside Lucky. We buy cigarettes from him every single day yet he always ID's us, yeah that guy, and he treats us like he doesn't even know us. That guy. Well anyway, I thought I'd post the regular exchange between him and me. Insert African accent for the clerk.
[Waiting in line..]
Clerk: Next please. (Eyes open wide, looking for the next victim of his asshole-ness)
Me: Hey, how's it going?
[Pause, clerk stares straight into your soul, eats it]
Me: Can I get a pack of Parliament full flavors?
[Clerk stops removing every one of your hopes and dreams]
Clerk: Can I see some, ID?
[This part is important, he says it the exact same way, with emphasis on ID]
Me: Yeah.
[I'll just assume that the annoyance with showing my ID every single day to the same person is obvious]
Clerk: Five twenty.
[I slide a five dollar bill and a quarter towards the man]
Clerk: Out of five twenty-five?
[This is what pisses me off the most, is this a question? Should I answer it? What happens if I say no, it's not out of five twenty-five? Regardless, I either say yes, or nothing.
Clerk: Five cents is your change.
Me: Thanks, have a good one.
[Clerk looks for his next victim whose entire life he will destroy]
Why must corporations desensitize their workers to the point that they must act like they have no idea who their customers are, like they've never seen them before, like we're all the same person?
I've had the same experience when working in a restaurant, at the shittier places that you worked, you could be yourself, whether you're friendly or quiet, whether you're a liberal or a republican, no one gave a fuck, it's either you were that server they hated, or that server who they'd have a drink with, it didn't matter though, because they had to deal with it, they had no choice in the matter. But now as I move into the higher end dining industry, I find myself having to be completely personalityless. Good waiters don't have a personality. We say "Hi, how are you?," and proceed to recite the specials. Good waiters are completely neutral. Now I realize another reason why companies in general blow. If we are trained to be no one at work, how are ever supposed to be anyone in real life?
[I'll just assume that the annoyance with showing my ID every single day to the same person is obvious]
Clerk: Five twenty.
[I slide a five dollar bill and a quarter towards the man]
Clerk: Out of five twenty-five?
[This is what pisses me off the most, is this a question? Should I answer it? What happens if I say no, it's not out of five twenty-five? Regardless, I either say yes, or nothing.
Clerk: Five cents is your change.
Me: Thanks, have a good one.
[Clerk looks for his next victim whose entire life he will destroy]
Why must corporations desensitize their workers to the point that they must act like they have no idea who their customers are, like they've never seen them before, like we're all the same person?
I've had the same experience when working in a restaurant, at the shittier places that you worked, you could be yourself, whether you're friendly or quiet, whether you're a liberal or a republican, no one gave a fuck, it's either you were that server they hated, or that server who they'd have a drink with, it didn't matter though, because they had to deal with it, they had no choice in the matter. But now as I move into the higher end dining industry, I find myself having to be completely personalityless. Good waiters don't have a personality. We say "Hi, how are you?," and proceed to recite the specials. Good waiters are completely neutral. Now I realize another reason why companies in general blow. If we are trained to be no one at work, how are ever supposed to be anyone in real life?
1 comment:
This reminds me of an article we just read for my soc class. " The Managed Heart: Commercialization of Human Feeling" by Arlie Russel Hochschild. It talked about how flight attendants are trained to always be smiling and that made me think that if you are forced to smile at people at work, how are you supposed to differentiate between that and a genuine yearn to smile in real life...
Post a Comment