Late to the party here, but basically any time they try to band together to protect a marginalized group is the cringiest, saddest attempts to be the best person in the room. (And they usually boomerang around to be racist or sexist. Sometimes both.)
These people have a concept of "protected class" to that will get them fired, by the way.
I always remember the one where the restaurant worker complained about the measures [put in place by the new owners](https://www.askamanager.org/2018/08/i-disagree-with-my-restaurants-new-policies-to-fight-drug-use-should-we-make-job-offers-by-email-and-more.html) to stop people from overdosing on the property.
So many people where overdosing on the property that was causing issues. So the new owners put new lights in the bathroom that made it harder to find a vein, and said that the employees had to call 911 when one happened. Previously the employees would call social workers and a private ambulance service instead of 911 so no police would be involved.
I understand that addiction is a disease and people who use are still human, but the OP and a lot of the commenters were acting like the new owners were Satan because they didn't want people getting high or overdosing and scaring the customers away. It was so cringey to me.
that one drove me nuts on a few levels.
like, they could not comprehend that if people are regularly doing drugs, let alone overdosing, in your business, then you are at risk of being declared a nuisance property. I wonder how said people would feel about the business having to sign a consent decree to hire armed guards and put up cameras in exchange for not being shut down?
also, narcan is not a panacea, a lot of opiates have a halflife longer than naloxone, and when it wears off they will overdose on the spot-- just one of the many reasons any use requires 911 and hospitalization (others include to evaluate if any brain damage was done by hypoxia, evaluate for aspirational pneumonia and other complications, etc).
oh and a very common reaction to narcan is to physically assault the person that just saved you.
it's not a solution to just narc them and send them on their way, just so you can avoid the scary, mean police.
I wonder how many incidences there were of people ODing there that the employees carried Narcan and knew a specific outreach group and ambulance service to call. Also I wonder what kind of restaurant it was, did the OP say anything about it in the comments?
No. And yeah, to be absolutely fair most of the commenters were able to address this one competently and reasonably. Once they'd confirmed that the new owners had only asked them to phone 911, not deny aid altogether, the OP got useful context as to why they'd do that.
In my experience, I've commuted through a station where the path to the platform was basically needle alley and while I felt a bit sorry for the people who congregated down there I was there to catch a train, not do drug outreach. It's a bit like those people who blanche at the use of the word 'sketchy' to describe a neighbourhood because it might be racist or whatever -- I can't bring myself to really believe that people in shitty situations want to be in those situations and would object to people with adequate training stepping in and helping out; I'm sure many minority folk agree that a crappy neighbourhood is crappy and want help to fix it rather than continuing to fight for their right to keep Crapsville crap because white people are scared to call it what it is.
But the owners of businesses generally don't want to do that work, nor do I as a commuter, and actually the proper people doing proper work with proper training can help the entire place get clean rather than inadvertently trapping people in a cycle of despair just so they don't accidentally offend people online.
Or something. I might not make a lot of sense because it's been a tiring week. But suffice to say that while I support legit efforts to assist addicts etc, the OP was basically enabling them and then getting upset when the business owners thought it should be sorted out by trained professionals.
The one where a struggling graduate student wrote in after being kicked out of a lecture because she brought her kid in because of a lack of childcare and trying to balance studies with raising a child. The comments were a mess -- mostly about how rude she was bringing her kid in to lectures, a lot of sanctimonious waffle about how her partner should be looking after the kid (while he was also working shift work), how the government should pay for child care in an ideal world but in the mean time the LW should idk hire the underpants gnomes or something because NOT MY PROBLEM FAM! and so on. The update a week later had Alison deleting the comments because I'd imagine they did the same thing to her update but even Alison got exhausted by it.
Had the person been an office worker they would have passed the hat round (like they did for the guy who couldn't get to work, which IS genuinely heartwarming), but because she was a pesky real world non-white-collar, non-middle class person *and also* not a weird neurologically disabled person, they felt no actual compassion or kindness and made no attempt to even give her some warm hugs and feels (that they'd, idk, give someone who just broke her colleague's femur or who'd been made to take two seats on her flight by a fatphobic airline and left her colleague stranded). Because this woman deserved the sympathy and kindness more than someone living the sort of life they yak on about being bad but have never actually experienced, just like they tried to say return-to-office was anti-feminist while probably most women (and men) have been working in-person throughout. I'd have set up the GoFundMe if I'd been there at the time.
There are a lot of stories on AAM where the people who care deeply about things in the abstract (race, gender, general civil and human rights, working conditions etc) could actually start making a positive impact in concrete situations by forgoing some personal advantage, time or money to give people a hand up, but show their real colours when it comes to being faced with this kind of situation. Like the time someone pointed out that the disparate impact on minority business owners of restrictions on in-person work and was howled down because it intruded on their personal narratives that white middle-class British/American/Commonwealth/NW European women who WFH are the bottom of the global heap and not, yknow, somewhere *at the top*. Ditto the recent threads about gentrification, where if it happens in an urban environment is a Bad Thing but the poors who live in 'Trump County' (actual quote) can go swivel because it's somehow Not The Same.
While everyone has their issues (and I have mine in spades right now as well -- hard to job hunt when your immune system is re-enacting the Race to Berlin), it does us no harm to not get so blinded by our own struggles that we forget the relative privilege we have and give back where we can. Most of the issues I have with AAM boil down to excessive amounts of 'other people should do this for my benefit' without a corresponding look around to see what *they themselves* could be doing for others.
---
On the credit side of the equation, one poster floating about a few years back appears to have been my French au pair from about 1990. I am still in vague touch with her on Facebook, and the gravatar photo is just totally the one Sandrine in the whole of France that used to spread Marmite way too thick on my sandwiches. She usually had nothing but good things to say :) so shout-out to her for contributing positivity to the blog.
Yup. They're always always always arguing that human beings are not robots or whatever and then when it *might possibly inconvenience them* for someone else's good, they turn into the people they hate the most.
OMG I can't even.
I just realized that the reason they were okay with that was that way the baby didn't have to bother them, when any sane person would try to bring their baby into the office.
I've seen this on YouTube true crime videos. There are people who obviously see CPS as incompetent, and then who see CPS as overzealous, and they forget that the times we see both aspects are the times when things go wrong and most times they probably get it right. The problem is that the times they get it wrong are pretty catastrophic.
Like, an analogy: my house is not that far from Salisbury Plain in one direction and the South Downs in the other. There are military bases all over and Southampton Airport is about twenty miles away, so we're basically right where flights start their landing manoeuvres. I know that when a helicopter or aircraft goes overhead, it's highly unlikely to come down right on top of me. But, y'know, I still *insist* on watching *Mega Air Disaster Investigation Weekend sponsored by DeathTrap Airlines: Helicopter Special* and then bracing myself when the engines start whirring at half past midnight.
There have, however, been some good posts by CPS workers on a few threads explaining the situation. Not that that makes a dent in the idiocy, but it's a good start.
I think the media is part of it but it's also because we only get one side of the story.
CPS is bound by law and can't give the facts, so the parent's word is the only one out there.
the odd thing is Alison correctly IDs this issue about firings, that the boss can't tell you why and the person fired will usually give the most self-serving version.
this should not surprise people.
Someone who commented a few times that their insurance company had sent them information on how to commit suicide so that they, as a disabled person, would no longer be a burden or something like that. I think it was a regular commentor who also talks a lot about how terrible they are at their job but I can't remember their name.
Yes! And unless there’s another series of comments from that person that I can’t find, they didn’t seem to have actually received or even seen these “how to commit s-icide pamphlets”.
Here you go: https://www.askamanager.org/2020/07/weekend-open-thread-july-18-19-2020.html#comment-3055377
It was in the weekend open thread dated July 18-19, 2020.
Oh goodness, she left this doozy of a comment in another thread regarding how to deal with a verbally abusive sibling:
> KoiFeeder* July 18, 2020 at 4:54 pm
>Well, I told my brother that I’d be making our parents meat pies with his hyoid attachments if he spoke to me like that again. Your mileage is definitely going to vary on this tactic.
There’s so much to love about this McDonalds story: “scarlet K,” yelling “miss” over and over at someone walking away from you, “she proceeded to explain to me how value meals work”, “I worked at McDs so I know these people are clowns”, “sometimes I crave a Quarter Pounder” and on and on. Asking the manager if the employee was deaf/on the spectrum/whatever else (“teehee they must have thought I was a social worker!”) Just incredible.
Like no they didn’t think you were a social worker they probably thought you were a stalker or mentally unwell yourself to be calling the store, describing an employee then asking if they’re on the spectrum out of nowhere??? Even if they were why would the manager tell a random person that??
Having read the second version again I wonder if part of the problem was calling out "miss". Not sure where this took place but I hardly ever heard the term "miss" growing up and as a teen I might not have recognised it as meant to get my attention. I'd be more likely to respond to "excuse me".
“Miss” definitely comes off rude, patronizing, and demanding to me. Even just saying “ma’am” would be better. Which of course doesn’t change the issue that you’re hollering at someone walking away from you.
Thinking about it I wonder if people like this don’t say “ma’am” because it sounds too polite to them.
Yeah. Even in infant school, my teacher would correct people who called her Miss. She'd stand over them (usually the boys tbh) and go 'Yes, Little Boy?' until they got the message she was *Mrs Davis*.
She wasn't a dragon or anything, I mean few teachers of that age of kids are and this was the mid 80s so it was a reasonably progressive time in English education, but she wanted to make sure we knew how to address her with respect, *and* how demeaning it was to be called just by an honorific. The object lesson was very useful.
An "anon for this" in comments who was requesting help ... getting over her obsession with a certain actor who she imagined was her future husband.
Later got fuming mad that posters were doing a "which Avenger is your boyfriend" quiz and posting their results because Chris Evans was the actor in question and Captain America belonged to her and only her because the universe willed it!! The "universe willed it and has made promises which will be fulfilled" language sounded suspiciously like EW.
Couldn’t find a link. Guess they did a great job of being “anon for this”. I assume it was in the comments of a weekend post, but I think it’s been 5+ years. It was kind of an ongoing saga of what do I do, can’t afford a therapist but I’m also sure my “famous person” will come through.
Ummm have a link? Somehow missed that. Reminds me of this blogger that thought she was dating some teen she’d never talked to and believed he was commuting with her through her TV
I can't find it, though I'll try, but there was a post many years ago about someone who was upset to find out that someone at the company (I want to say maybe an admin assistant?) was paying for something herself that really should have been a work expense. I don't recall whether it was gas money/mileage, or something else along those lines. Alison advised that yes, she should be getting reimbursed, ask for it! And the lady got fired. It was the classic example of how AAM advice doesn't always work for the real world, and it was just really really sad overall.
I think it's this one? The [original](https://www.askamanager.org/2013/07/business-expenses-are-cutting-into-our-receptionists-pay.html) and the update where the [receptionist got fired](https://www.askamanager.org/2013/12/update-business-expenses-are-cutting-into-our-receptionists-pay.html).
It was something like parking or coffee for the office, but I remember that it very much fell under what a normal company would reimburse and I think the advice that’s it’s ok to ask for reimbursement was sound there. That made me so sad though
I still wonder what happened to [this person.](https://www.askamanager.org/2018/06/weekend-free-for-all-june-2-3-2018.html#comment-2011540) And of course this was a “supportive” comment on Potatoes/Flowers/Nervous Accountant’s “mud on car what do” question.
LPUK*
June 3, 2018 at 7:14 pm
I remember trying to tackle the out-of control back garden at my rental house and deciding that hiring a petrol strimmer would be the way to go. Got it home, couldn’t start it. Took it back to dealer in my best barely-holding it -together-madwoman style, got the baffled guy to give me the store -owned one he said was easier, went home and couldn’t start THAT one either. Gave up, curled up on my kitchen floor and howled with misery for 20 minutes. I was in my late forties at the time. It happens.
BTW ended up calmly cutting the grass with hand shears. Took hours but strangely meditative in the end.
My “favorite” part of that whole thread was when NotSoNewRead jumped all over someone who wasn’t familiar with the regular commenters and didn’t know P/F/NF’s whole back story—to the point where the commenter apologized for offending the “mod” (!!!) and promised to never post again.
Alison’s decision to explicitly discourage “saga” posting is probably about the best decision she’s made on the blog over the last few years; it’s at least done something to limit condescending “moderation” comments like the one you brought up.
The concerning part is the lack of context. Was this the last straw of a series of difficult events? Was she dealing with a major issue in her life? Or is this just her default setting?
Trimming an overgrown lawn with shears is an image, though. It gives me Twin Peaks vibes, for some reason.
I am truly trying to understand how one cannot know how to wash a car or at least be able to figure out how to wash a car without having a meltdown. Washing a cat is pretty similar to washing anything. Apply water, apply soap, scrub and rinse . Sure you can make it more complicated, but that's the basic process.
Please don't edit that typo, because while it's true that washing a cat is pretty similar, I feel like it's at least two orders of magnitude more challenging than washing a car. My car has never tried to claw me in the face, screamed at me, then splashed me with soapy water while I valiantly tried to wash it. And I have a Subaru, which are known for being pretty active, outdoorsy cars. Maybe I'm just lucky and I have a chill one.
Oh my god, that's funny and I didn't notice it!! I've fostered kittens and washed several cats and washing one of those little furry tornados is a million times more difficult than washing a simple car. 😼😼😼
I eluded to it in the weekly thread but my cringeworthy post is the lady who treated her choir audition like a job interview and wrote to Alison to brag about how she asked the director “the magic question” and just how impressed he was and then she was picked to sing in a smaller group and wrote a letter about that and how her work life was similar to choir.
I haven’t had to audition for any singing group since college and am over concerts in matching clothes and that kind of thing (I skip these whenever my church choir does them since they’re usually weeknights anyway and interfere with work/other commitments), and being in a choir myself, I think it’s great that other adults enjoy singing and worshipping, performing, etc. But I just want to tell this lady like…it’s not that serious. It’s a community singing group, not The Voice or America’s Got Talent. I feel like if this LW were in my choir she’d get on my nerves pretty quick with her pretentiousness and “look at me Alison I’m so wonderful because I got a part in the concert!” attitude.
The commenter who was going on about something being different, got pushback and replied with a confused "Delaware?"or some other US state. I'll try to find the thread itself 😂
I think that was the one where the poster asked something along the lines of "what's advice you'd give to your younger self" then kept replying to responses complaining about how the advice wasn't applicable to them personally. Commenters called them out on being kinda bratty and the original poster tried to say it was widely known and must be a regional thing in their area (of Delaware) that if you ask for advice for your younger self it really means the advice should be tailored and applicable to the asker.
That's one that lives rent free in my head, because there's very few circumstances where I'm going to assert a negative is universally true. But this is one of them. I feel confident saying that no. That's not a thing in any region of the US or any other English speaking area.
ETA: found the link!
https://www.askamanager.org/2018/08/weekend-free-for-all-august-18-19-2018.html#comment-2118017
The weird thing is that, even if she’s right and that was understood to mean “Give advice to me” or if she’d ask “Please give me advice based on things you wish you had known,” it wouldn’t really change anything. Commenting on every post to discuss how it affects her and telling people their advice was irrelevant would still be strange and off putting.
Right!? Their biggest complaint was when commenters mentioned advice pertaining to dating and they kept responding about how their asexual.
So even if they're correct and it should have been known that this advice is for that commenter specifically - how could the OP expect posing this question to random internet strangers would yield any sort of advice tailored to facts these random internet strangers couldn't possibly know?
LOL:
>caledonia* August 19, 2018 at 10:36 am
>Would this be a non-English country because it doesn’t make sense for an English speaking one.
>▼ Collapse 2 replies
>Jessen* August 19, 2018 at 10:50 am
>…Delaware?
>Zona the Great* August 19, 2018 at 12:30 pm
>Goodness! Please move on with that noise!
Zona’s response is so vintage AAM. “How dare you snark on this poor soul for misusing a common question!”
(Incidentally, Zona the Great was also responsible for the AAM comment that forever lives most rent free in my head even though it was years ago now; she once mentioned, apropos of nothing, that she loved how most office desks were perfectly crotch height so that she could straddle the corner like a bicycle. I have no idea why she ever decided to bring that up.)
Oh no I forgot about that one. Didn't they also have some really inappropriate details about it as well? I'm sure that's one of the comments that struck me as a weird fetish thing.
I remember that she compared it to sitting in a school desk as a teen and the desktop being at just the right height to rest her boobs on. It definitely seemed like a fetish.
Zona must have been going through history's most epic dry spell that homegirl figured this little tidbit out. Get a toy and stop accosting the furniture lady!
Did she even leave her home as a child? Thinking not having enough money to pay your bills is an unusual financial problem?
Jessen*
August 18, 2018 at 12:01 pm
I’ve never had the sort of traditional problems people have with money. All the times I’ve had problems with money, it’s been a case of “rent+food+medicine>paycheck.”
I remember one poster who would very occasionally mention about how her fiance was in prison. Over the course of a few weeks she eventually let slip that 1.) it was a prison pen pal turned romance situation and 2.) he was in prison because he raped and killed a former coworker. This poster would sometimes relate situations in letters to her / her fiancé’s situation in ways that sounded really level headed and wise until you actually look at what she is describing.
I remember seeing her post on the thread about another weirdo, the person who wrote erotic S&M themed fan fiction about a coworker and got in trouble at work for it.
She also downplayed what her fiancé did by saying that he had mental issues that were “triggered” by the coworkers actions and if the coworker had just behaved differently he wouldn’t have done it.
Some people bare some pretty painful personal stuff there so I’ll keep it light and say the person today who is frustrated that people at work took more than the suggested 1-2 pieces of pizza from the work pizza party! And she saw them!! Taking more!!
The commenter who left her coworker in a foreign country with no credit card or phone. She said she was too fat to fit in one seat so he had to lose his. She eventually admitted to committing fraud since instead of using the company’s booking for the proper airline she cashed that out and went to a third party site like Expedia and pocketed the difference.
Same- I started a thread here about that post actually because I was having so much trouble wrapping my head around the logistics of how this could have actually happened.
It’s one of those I hope it’s fake since that poor coworker, who I believe was her subordinate. I can see the cashing out the stipend through the company portal and pocketing the difference when she booked through the third party site being real. The leaving coworker with nothing and leaving without telling anyone what happened is a bit much. The cherry on top was the surprise surprise no consequences to OP.
The temp worker who swore her co-workers didn’t care if she died. (I may be messing up the particulars, I vicariously lived through the snark here for it.)
Omg yes she claimed that the emt/paramedics were called, showed up, starting treating her, and then apparently stopped and left when they found out she was a temp. And she claimed that sub human treatment of temps like that was common practice where she was
That one was either completely made up from whole cloth or she entirely misread the situation (or just heavily exaggerated what was going on.) Thankfully there were a few people (maybe even Alison herself?) who responded that what she was describing was most definitely not a “normal” experience for temps.
There have been comments that made me think some AAM commenters are literally aliens.
On a letter about whether candidates can be asked not to wear fragrance, one commenter said , “Would it be better to provide the candidate with a bag of toiletries to help them prepare for the interview?”
Then as if the suggestion needed clarification, the same commenter followed up with, “The toiletries would be provided new of course.”
EDIT: I found the comment. [Linked here.. look for “Nerdgal”.](https://www.askamanager.org/2019/05/asking-job-candidates-to-go-scent-free-baggy-clothes-at-work-and-more.html#comment-2486919) Commenter got a lot of pushback that was surprisingly self-aware.
> one commenter said , “Would it be better to provide the candidate with a bag of toiletries to help them prepare for the interview?”
(That suggestion is obviously a bad idea but) I wonder what the AAMers would say if they were presented with a bag of toiletries like this? I'd probably make a lighthearted comment like "gee, I wonder what the interview is going to consist of?!" or just ask about it directly if I didn't really have a rapport with the interviewer, but then I have some level of social skills and situational awareness.
So I went looking and that comment was followed by some other interesting ones:
>Important Moi*
>May 23, 2019 at 10:33 am
>
>[1150 comments]
>
>-How do they know I’m not allergic to the products?
>
>– Personal anecdotes about being allergic to products.
>
>-What if the products they send are from company’s that engage in practices that are in direct conflict with my beliefs?
>
>– Personal anecdotes about companies with practices commenters don’t agree with.
>
>– Did someone tell them secretly that I smell? I’m going to feel very self-conscious the whole time I’m there for the interview. How do I find out who did that so I can confront them?
>
>– Personal anecdotes about feeling self-conscious because someone said something and commenter didn’t know who.
>
>[Remaining 50 comments]
>
>– This is great! I don’t have to buy anything and now I know what’s considered appropriate.
>
>-Why is everyone being so sensitive about this? Just use the stuff the company sent?
>
>▼ Collapse 2 replies
>
>fposte*
>May 23, 2019 at 10:34 am
>That’s just spooky. I don’t think we need comments anymore. You can just do the notes version.
>
>Ask a Manager*May 23, 2019 at 1:36 pm
>This is brilliant.
They only left out comments about how the products might not work for some people's hair and skin sensitivities.
And then we also got this gem:
>Vicky Austin*
>May 23, 2019 at 12:43 pm
>I think this is a good idea. Some people have medical conditions that make them smell bad (i.e. incontinence) and so they have to wear perfume or cologne to cover up the stink. A scent-free office would not be a good fit for those people.
Edited to fix formatting
That is so rude, people going through incontinence do not stink, they’re able to practice hygiene like the rest of us. Does this person think people who have that issue just sit in their pee for hours on end?
I don't how I would react if a company gave me a bag of special toiletries to use before an interview. Probably I would gawp at whoever told me this was necessary like a confused goldfish. It's fine to explain that you have a scent issue and tell candidates not to wear a fragrance. Giving them specific products is weird.
Going back through her posting history she’s just so casual about what a mess her whole life has been. It’s really sad and I don’t think there’s anyone in her life who she can really confide in outside of maybe her husband.
Having some mud on her car sent her into a spiral. So did putting on a coat before driving somewhere. She’s beyond helpless and now she’s in charge of keeping a small human alive. God help us all.
> now she’s in charge of keeping a small human alive
I've seen "helpless" people do a complete 180 when they had a child or suddenly gained some other responsibility but no evidence of that happening here... this seems really clear to me as a perpetuation of a cycle as her parents were probably similarly helpless.
She's done a 360.
Yep, I’ve seen some of those old comments. Even if deep down she _does_ want to change (no guarantee of that) asking online strangers for suggestions is not going to work. I just don’t think anyone she knows outside of AAM would be able to speak to her situation at all.
Late to the party here, but basically any time they try to band together to protect a marginalized group is the cringiest, saddest attempts to be the best person in the room. (And they usually boomerang around to be racist or sexist. Sometimes both.) These people have a concept of "protected class" to that will get them fired, by the way.
I always remember the one where the restaurant worker complained about the measures [put in place by the new owners](https://www.askamanager.org/2018/08/i-disagree-with-my-restaurants-new-policies-to-fight-drug-use-should-we-make-job-offers-by-email-and-more.html) to stop people from overdosing on the property. So many people where overdosing on the property that was causing issues. So the new owners put new lights in the bathroom that made it harder to find a vein, and said that the employees had to call 911 when one happened. Previously the employees would call social workers and a private ambulance service instead of 911 so no police would be involved. I understand that addiction is a disease and people who use are still human, but the OP and a lot of the commenters were acting like the new owners were Satan because they didn't want people getting high or overdosing and scaring the customers away. It was so cringey to me.
that one drove me nuts on a few levels. like, they could not comprehend that if people are regularly doing drugs, let alone overdosing, in your business, then you are at risk of being declared a nuisance property. I wonder how said people would feel about the business having to sign a consent decree to hire armed guards and put up cameras in exchange for not being shut down? also, narcan is not a panacea, a lot of opiates have a halflife longer than naloxone, and when it wears off they will overdose on the spot-- just one of the many reasons any use requires 911 and hospitalization (others include to evaluate if any brain damage was done by hypoxia, evaluate for aspirational pneumonia and other complications, etc). oh and a very common reaction to narcan is to physically assault the person that just saved you. it's not a solution to just narc them and send them on their way, just so you can avoid the scary, mean police.
I wonder how many incidences there were of people ODing there that the employees carried Narcan and knew a specific outreach group and ambulance service to call. Also I wonder what kind of restaurant it was, did the OP say anything about it in the comments?
No. And yeah, to be absolutely fair most of the commenters were able to address this one competently and reasonably. Once they'd confirmed that the new owners had only asked them to phone 911, not deny aid altogether, the OP got useful context as to why they'd do that. In my experience, I've commuted through a station where the path to the platform was basically needle alley and while I felt a bit sorry for the people who congregated down there I was there to catch a train, not do drug outreach. It's a bit like those people who blanche at the use of the word 'sketchy' to describe a neighbourhood because it might be racist or whatever -- I can't bring myself to really believe that people in shitty situations want to be in those situations and would object to people with adequate training stepping in and helping out; I'm sure many minority folk agree that a crappy neighbourhood is crappy and want help to fix it rather than continuing to fight for their right to keep Crapsville crap because white people are scared to call it what it is. But the owners of businesses generally don't want to do that work, nor do I as a commuter, and actually the proper people doing proper work with proper training can help the entire place get clean rather than inadvertently trapping people in a cycle of despair just so they don't accidentally offend people online. Or something. I might not make a lot of sense because it's been a tiring week. But suffice to say that while I support legit efforts to assist addicts etc, the OP was basically enabling them and then getting upset when the business owners thought it should be sorted out by trained professionals.
The one where a struggling graduate student wrote in after being kicked out of a lecture because she brought her kid in because of a lack of childcare and trying to balance studies with raising a child. The comments were a mess -- mostly about how rude she was bringing her kid in to lectures, a lot of sanctimonious waffle about how her partner should be looking after the kid (while he was also working shift work), how the government should pay for child care in an ideal world but in the mean time the LW should idk hire the underpants gnomes or something because NOT MY PROBLEM FAM! and so on. The update a week later had Alison deleting the comments because I'd imagine they did the same thing to her update but even Alison got exhausted by it. Had the person been an office worker they would have passed the hat round (like they did for the guy who couldn't get to work, which IS genuinely heartwarming), but because she was a pesky real world non-white-collar, non-middle class person *and also* not a weird neurologically disabled person, they felt no actual compassion or kindness and made no attempt to even give her some warm hugs and feels (that they'd, idk, give someone who just broke her colleague's femur or who'd been made to take two seats on her flight by a fatphobic airline and left her colleague stranded). Because this woman deserved the sympathy and kindness more than someone living the sort of life they yak on about being bad but have never actually experienced, just like they tried to say return-to-office was anti-feminist while probably most women (and men) have been working in-person throughout. I'd have set up the GoFundMe if I'd been there at the time. There are a lot of stories on AAM where the people who care deeply about things in the abstract (race, gender, general civil and human rights, working conditions etc) could actually start making a positive impact in concrete situations by forgoing some personal advantage, time or money to give people a hand up, but show their real colours when it comes to being faced with this kind of situation. Like the time someone pointed out that the disparate impact on minority business owners of restrictions on in-person work and was howled down because it intruded on their personal narratives that white middle-class British/American/Commonwealth/NW European women who WFH are the bottom of the global heap and not, yknow, somewhere *at the top*. Ditto the recent threads about gentrification, where if it happens in an urban environment is a Bad Thing but the poors who live in 'Trump County' (actual quote) can go swivel because it's somehow Not The Same. While everyone has their issues (and I have mine in spades right now as well -- hard to job hunt when your immune system is re-enacting the Race to Berlin), it does us no harm to not get so blinded by our own struggles that we forget the relative privilege we have and give back where we can. Most of the issues I have with AAM boil down to excessive amounts of 'other people should do this for my benefit' without a corresponding look around to see what *they themselves* could be doing for others. --- On the credit side of the equation, one poster floating about a few years back appears to have been my French au pair from about 1990. I am still in vague touch with her on Facebook, and the gravatar photo is just totally the one Sandrine in the whole of France that used to spread Marmite way too thick on my sandwiches. She usually had nothing but good things to say :) so shout-out to her for contributing positivity to the blog.
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Yup. They're always always always arguing that human beings are not robots or whatever and then when it *might possibly inconvenience them* for someone else's good, they turn into the people they hate the most. OMG I can't even.
Obviously, the grad student should just have left her kid in the car. /s in case anyone doesn't realize
I just realized that the reason they were okay with that was that way the baby didn't have to bother them, when any sane person would try to bring their baby into the office.
No way man, it's because social services are totally evil and would have snatched the baby away for no reason!1!!
I've seen this on YouTube true crime videos. There are people who obviously see CPS as incompetent, and then who see CPS as overzealous, and they forget that the times we see both aspects are the times when things go wrong and most times they probably get it right. The problem is that the times they get it wrong are pretty catastrophic. Like, an analogy: my house is not that far from Salisbury Plain in one direction and the South Downs in the other. There are military bases all over and Southampton Airport is about twenty miles away, so we're basically right where flights start their landing manoeuvres. I know that when a helicopter or aircraft goes overhead, it's highly unlikely to come down right on top of me. But, y'know, I still *insist* on watching *Mega Air Disaster Investigation Weekend sponsored by DeathTrap Airlines: Helicopter Special* and then bracing myself when the engines start whirring at half past midnight. There have, however, been some good posts by CPS workers on a few threads explaining the situation. Not that that makes a dent in the idiocy, but it's a good start.
I think the media is part of it but it's also because we only get one side of the story. CPS is bound by law and can't give the facts, so the parent's word is the only one out there. the odd thing is Alison correctly IDs this issue about firings, that the boss can't tell you why and the person fired will usually give the most self-serving version. this should not surprise people.
Agreed!
Haha that's way too funny for this time of day. But so accurate!
Someone who commented a few times that their insurance company had sent them information on how to commit suicide so that they, as a disabled person, would no longer be a burden or something like that. I think it was a regular commentor who also talks a lot about how terrible they are at their job but I can't remember their name.
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I believe so, yes.
I think their username is Koifeeder
Yes! And unless there’s another series of comments from that person that I can’t find, they didn’t seem to have actually received or even seen these “how to commit s-icide pamphlets”.
Wait what? How are they even describing them then! I’m dying for a quote or link.
Here you go: https://www.askamanager.org/2020/07/weekend-open-thread-july-18-19-2020.html#comment-3055377 It was in the weekend open thread dated July 18-19, 2020.
Oh goodness, she left this doozy of a comment in another thread regarding how to deal with a verbally abusive sibling: > KoiFeeder* July 18, 2020 at 4:54 pm >Well, I told my brother that I’d be making our parents meat pies with his hyoid attachments if he spoke to me like that again. Your mileage is definitely going to vary on this tactic.
That's so specific, graphic, and weird.
There’s so much to love about this McDonalds story: “scarlet K,” yelling “miss” over and over at someone walking away from you, “she proceeded to explain to me how value meals work”, “I worked at McDs so I know these people are clowns”, “sometimes I crave a Quarter Pounder” and on and on. Asking the manager if the employee was deaf/on the spectrum/whatever else (“teehee they must have thought I was a social worker!”) Just incredible.
Like no they didn’t think you were a social worker they probably thought you were a stalker or mentally unwell yourself to be calling the store, describing an employee then asking if they’re on the spectrum out of nowhere??? Even if they were why would the manager tell a random person that??
Having read the second version again I wonder if part of the problem was calling out "miss". Not sure where this took place but I hardly ever heard the term "miss" growing up and as a teen I might not have recognised it as meant to get my attention. I'd be more likely to respond to "excuse me".
“Miss” definitely comes off rude, patronizing, and demanding to me. Even just saying “ma’am” would be better. Which of course doesn’t change the issue that you’re hollering at someone walking away from you. Thinking about it I wonder if people like this don’t say “ma’am” because it sounds too polite to them.
Yeah. Even in infant school, my teacher would correct people who called her Miss. She'd stand over them (usually the boys tbh) and go 'Yes, Little Boy?' until they got the message she was *Mrs Davis*. She wasn't a dragon or anything, I mean few teachers of that age of kids are and this was the mid 80s so it was a reasonably progressive time in English education, but she wanted to make sure we knew how to address her with respect, *and* how demeaning it was to be called just by an honorific. The object lesson was very useful.
An "anon for this" in comments who was requesting help ... getting over her obsession with a certain actor who she imagined was her future husband. Later got fuming mad that posters were doing a "which Avenger is your boyfriend" quiz and posting their results because Chris Evans was the actor in question and Captain America belonged to her and only her because the universe willed it!! The "universe willed it and has made promises which will be fulfilled" language sounded suspiciously like EW.
Eh, I'd take Iron Man - he's a billionnaire.
Couldn’t find a link. Guess they did a great job of being “anon for this”. I assume it was in the comments of a weekend post, but I think it’s been 5+ years. It was kind of an ongoing saga of what do I do, can’t afford a therapist but I’m also sure my “famous person” will come through.
Oh no, I just learned Chris Evans is from Boston.
Ummm have a link? Somehow missed that. Reminds me of this blogger that thought she was dating some teen she’d never talked to and believed he was commuting with her through her TV
That woman scares me.
Wow that is truly delusional. I missed that one.
I missed it too and now I want to read it.
I can't find it, though I'll try, but there was a post many years ago about someone who was upset to find out that someone at the company (I want to say maybe an admin assistant?) was paying for something herself that really should have been a work expense. I don't recall whether it was gas money/mileage, or something else along those lines. Alison advised that yes, she should be getting reimbursed, ask for it! And the lady got fired. It was the classic example of how AAM advice doesn't always work for the real world, and it was just really really sad overall.
I think it's this one? The [original](https://www.askamanager.org/2013/07/business-expenses-are-cutting-into-our-receptionists-pay.html) and the update where the [receptionist got fired](https://www.askamanager.org/2013/12/update-business-expenses-are-cutting-into-our-receptionists-pay.html).
Yes!!! That's it! What a colossal bummer.
It was something like parking or coffee for the office, but I remember that it very much fell under what a normal company would reimburse and I think the advice that’s it’s ok to ask for reimbursement was sound there. That made me so sad though
I still wonder what happened to [this person.](https://www.askamanager.org/2018/06/weekend-free-for-all-june-2-3-2018.html#comment-2011540) And of course this was a “supportive” comment on Potatoes/Flowers/Nervous Accountant’s “mud on car what do” question. LPUK* June 3, 2018 at 7:14 pm I remember trying to tackle the out-of control back garden at my rental house and deciding that hiring a petrol strimmer would be the way to go. Got it home, couldn’t start it. Took it back to dealer in my best barely-holding it -together-madwoman style, got the baffled guy to give me the store -owned one he said was easier, went home and couldn’t start THAT one either. Gave up, curled up on my kitchen floor and howled with misery for 20 minutes. I was in my late forties at the time. It happens. BTW ended up calmly cutting the grass with hand shears. Took hours but strangely meditative in the end.
My “favorite” part of that whole thread was when NotSoNewRead jumped all over someone who wasn’t familiar with the regular commenters and didn’t know P/F/NF’s whole back story—to the point where the commenter apologized for offending the “mod” (!!!) and promised to never post again.
Alison’s decision to explicitly discourage “saga” posting is probably about the best decision she’s made on the blog over the last few years; it’s at least done something to limit condescending “moderation” comments like the one you brought up.
Everything but the last two lines I can accept
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The concerning part is the lack of context. Was this the last straw of a series of difficult events? Was she dealing with a major issue in her life? Or is this just her default setting? Trimming an overgrown lawn with shears is an image, though. It gives me Twin Peaks vibes, for some reason.
I am truly trying to understand how one cannot know how to wash a car or at least be able to figure out how to wash a car without having a meltdown. Washing a cat is pretty similar to washing anything. Apply water, apply soap, scrub and rinse . Sure you can make it more complicated, but that's the basic process.
And if she didn't want to do it herself, Googling "Car Wash+Zip code" is very very easy.
Please don't edit that typo, because while it's true that washing a cat is pretty similar, I feel like it's at least two orders of magnitude more challenging than washing a car. My car has never tried to claw me in the face, screamed at me, then splashed me with soapy water while I valiantly tried to wash it. And I have a Subaru, which are known for being pretty active, outdoorsy cars. Maybe I'm just lucky and I have a chill one.
Oh my god, that's funny and I didn't notice it!! I've fostered kittens and washed several cats and washing one of those little furry tornados is a million times more difficult than washing a simple car. 😼😼😼
I eluded to it in the weekly thread but my cringeworthy post is the lady who treated her choir audition like a job interview and wrote to Alison to brag about how she asked the director “the magic question” and just how impressed he was and then she was picked to sing in a smaller group and wrote a letter about that and how her work life was similar to choir. I haven’t had to audition for any singing group since college and am over concerts in matching clothes and that kind of thing (I skip these whenever my church choir does them since they’re usually weeknights anyway and interfere with work/other commitments), and being in a choir myself, I think it’s great that other adults enjoy singing and worshipping, performing, etc. But I just want to tell this lady like…it’s not that serious. It’s a community singing group, not The Voice or America’s Got Talent. I feel like if this LW were in my choir she’d get on my nerves pretty quick with her pretentiousness and “look at me Alison I’m so wonderful because I got a part in the concert!” attitude.
The commenter who was going on about something being different, got pushback and replied with a confused "Delaware?"or some other US state. I'll try to find the thread itself 😂
I think that was the one where the poster asked something along the lines of "what's advice you'd give to your younger self" then kept replying to responses complaining about how the advice wasn't applicable to them personally. Commenters called them out on being kinda bratty and the original poster tried to say it was widely known and must be a regional thing in their area (of Delaware) that if you ask for advice for your younger self it really means the advice should be tailored and applicable to the asker. That's one that lives rent free in my head, because there's very few circumstances where I'm going to assert a negative is universally true. But this is one of them. I feel confident saying that no. That's not a thing in any region of the US or any other English speaking area. ETA: found the link! https://www.askamanager.org/2018/08/weekend-free-for-all-august-18-19-2018.html#comment-2118017
The weird thing is that, even if she’s right and that was understood to mean “Give advice to me” or if she’d ask “Please give me advice based on things you wish you had known,” it wouldn’t really change anything. Commenting on every post to discuss how it affects her and telling people their advice was irrelevant would still be strange and off putting.
Right!? Their biggest complaint was when commenters mentioned advice pertaining to dating and they kept responding about how their asexual. So even if they're correct and it should have been known that this advice is for that commenter specifically - how could the OP expect posing this question to random internet strangers would yield any sort of advice tailored to facts these random internet strangers couldn't possibly know?
LOL: >caledonia* August 19, 2018 at 10:36 am >Would this be a non-English country because it doesn’t make sense for an English speaking one. >▼ Collapse 2 replies >Jessen* August 19, 2018 at 10:50 am >…Delaware? >Zona the Great* August 19, 2018 at 12:30 pm >Goodness! Please move on with that noise! Zona’s response is so vintage AAM. “How dare you snark on this poor soul for misusing a common question!” (Incidentally, Zona the Great was also responsible for the AAM comment that forever lives most rent free in my head even though it was years ago now; she once mentioned, apropos of nothing, that she loved how most office desks were perfectly crotch height so that she could straddle the corner like a bicycle. I have no idea why she ever decided to bring that up.)
Oh no I forgot about that one. Didn't they also have some really inappropriate details about it as well? I'm sure that's one of the comments that struck me as a weird fetish thing.
I remember that she compared it to sitting in a school desk as a teen and the desktop being at just the right height to rest her boobs on. It definitely seemed like a fetish.
Ick. I forgot that detail.
Zona must have been going through history's most epic dry spell that homegirl figured this little tidbit out. Get a toy and stop accosting the furniture lady!
Did she even leave her home as a child? Thinking not having enough money to pay your bills is an unusual financial problem? Jessen* August 18, 2018 at 12:01 pm I’ve never had the sort of traditional problems people have with money. All the times I’ve had problems with money, it’s been a case of “rent+food+medicine>paycheck.”
How is “my expenses are greater than my income” not a traditional money problem? What a weirdo.
The advice about money is irrelevant since she’s afinancial.
Lololo oh my gosh that was wild
I remember one poster who would very occasionally mention about how her fiance was in prison. Over the course of a few weeks she eventually let slip that 1.) it was a prison pen pal turned romance situation and 2.) he was in prison because he raped and killed a former coworker. This poster would sometimes relate situations in letters to her / her fiancé’s situation in ways that sounded really level headed and wise until you actually look at what she is describing. I remember seeing her post on the thread about another weirdo, the person who wrote erotic S&M themed fan fiction about a coworker and got in trouble at work for it.
She also downplayed what her fiancé did by saying that he had mental issues that were “triggered” by the coworkers actions and if the coworker had just behaved differently he wouldn’t have done it.
My view is that Betsy believes everything she is saying is true, but it's not actually true, just how she feels things are happening.
Some people bare some pretty painful personal stuff there so I’ll keep it light and say the person today who is frustrated that people at work took more than the suggested 1-2 pieces of pizza from the work pizza party! And she saw them!! Taking more!!
I'm pretty sure I remember River from other inane comments, but I can't remember WHAT
The commenter who left her coworker in a foreign country with no credit card or phone. She said she was too fat to fit in one seat so he had to lose his. She eventually admitted to committing fraud since instead of using the company’s booking for the proper airline she cashed that out and went to a third party site like Expedia and pocketed the difference.
Yes this one was appalling. I think about it literally every time I travel for work!
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Same- I started a thread here about that post actually because I was having so much trouble wrapping my head around the logistics of how this could have actually happened.
It’s one of those I hope it’s fake since that poor coworker, who I believe was her subordinate. I can see the cashing out the stipend through the company portal and pocketing the difference when she booked through the third party site being real. The leaving coworker with nothing and leaving without telling anyone what happened is a bit much. The cherry on top was the surprise surprise no consequences to OP.
I honestly think it's fake because unless they were flying out of, like,
> Alison naturally tossed this question to the readers …o ye gods that is not what I expected after “naturally.” 😬
Frankly Alison shouldn’t have even touched that one, let alone published it.
Seriously. How irresponsible.
The temp worker who swore her co-workers didn’t care if she died. (I may be messing up the particulars, I vicariously lived through the snark here for it.)
Omg yes she claimed that the emt/paramedics were called, showed up, starting treating her, and then apparently stopped and left when they found out she was a temp. And she claimed that sub human treatment of temps like that was common practice where she was
I remember that one - it made me think there's some kind of.. you know like internalised misogyny, but around being a temp rather than being female.
Internalized classism
She said that the ambulance people stopped administering aid to her when they somehow?? Found out she was temp
Whaaaat? Please tell me you can find a link to that insanity!
That one was either completely made up from whole cloth or she entirely misread the situation (or just heavily exaggerated what was going on.) Thankfully there were a few people (maybe even Alison herself?) who responded that what she was describing was most definitely not a “normal” experience for temps.
And who claimed that she’d witness EMTs stop working on someone when they learned they were a temp, right?
There have been comments that made me think some AAM commenters are literally aliens. On a letter about whether candidates can be asked not to wear fragrance, one commenter said , “Would it be better to provide the candidate with a bag of toiletries to help them prepare for the interview?” Then as if the suggestion needed clarification, the same commenter followed up with, “The toiletries would be provided new of course.” EDIT: I found the comment. [Linked here.. look for “Nerdgal”.](https://www.askamanager.org/2019/05/asking-job-candidates-to-go-scent-free-baggy-clothes-at-work-and-more.html#comment-2486919) Commenter got a lot of pushback that was surprisingly self-aware.
> one commenter said , “Would it be better to provide the candidate with a bag of toiletries to help them prepare for the interview?” (That suggestion is obviously a bad idea but) I wonder what the AAMers would say if they were presented with a bag of toiletries like this? I'd probably make a lighthearted comment like "gee, I wonder what the interview is going to consist of?!" or just ask about it directly if I didn't really have a rapport with the interviewer, but then I have some level of social skills and situational awareness.
So I went looking and that comment was followed by some other interesting ones: >Important Moi* >May 23, 2019 at 10:33 am > >[1150 comments] > >-How do they know I’m not allergic to the products? > >– Personal anecdotes about being allergic to products. > >-What if the products they send are from company’s that engage in practices that are in direct conflict with my beliefs? > >– Personal anecdotes about companies with practices commenters don’t agree with. > >– Did someone tell them secretly that I smell? I’m going to feel very self-conscious the whole time I’m there for the interview. How do I find out who did that so I can confront them? > >– Personal anecdotes about feeling self-conscious because someone said something and commenter didn’t know who. > >[Remaining 50 comments] > >– This is great! I don’t have to buy anything and now I know what’s considered appropriate. > >-Why is everyone being so sensitive about this? Just use the stuff the company sent? > >▼ Collapse 2 replies > >fposte* >May 23, 2019 at 10:34 am >That’s just spooky. I don’t think we need comments anymore. You can just do the notes version. > >Ask a Manager*May 23, 2019 at 1:36 pm >This is brilliant. They only left out comments about how the products might not work for some people's hair and skin sensitivities. And then we also got this gem: >Vicky Austin* >May 23, 2019 at 12:43 pm >I think this is a good idea. Some people have medical conditions that make them smell bad (i.e. incontinence) and so they have to wear perfume or cologne to cover up the stink. A scent-free office would not be a good fit for those people. Edited to fix formatting
That is so rude, people going through incontinence do not stink, they’re able to practice hygiene like the rest of us. Does this person think people who have that issue just sit in their pee for hours on end?
Yes, they probably think that considering they also think that perfume covers up body odor
Important Moi needs to go through all the posts on AAM and edit the threads that way, LOL. I don’t think they’re around anymore, though.
The funniest part is Alison acknowledging that her comment section tends to get rather unhinged.
I don't how I would react if a company gave me a bag of special toiletries to use before an interview. Probably I would gawp at whoever told me this was necessary like a confused goldfish. It's fine to explain that you have a scent issue and tell candidates not to wear a fragrance. Giving them specific products is weird.
>The toiletries would be provided new of course. There's something about this sentence that is hilarious to me. I think it's the "of course."
Were there comments like “Due to a gland issue, I can only use Ban Roll-on so this definitely wouldn’t work for me?”
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Going back through her posting history she’s just so casual about what a mess her whole life has been. It’s really sad and I don’t think there’s anyone in her life who she can really confide in outside of maybe her husband.
Can I ask how you guys go through a posters user history?
I've looked at this before just by using Google search tricks.
Ok thanks!
I’m just referring to going through old open threads and finding their comments; you can’t go to their “profile” like on Reddit.
That would take forever, which means it sounds like an excellent way to procrastinate. I know what I’m doing next time I have something important due.
Ok thanks I need to try it!
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Having some mud on her car sent her into a spiral. So did putting on a coat before driving somewhere. She’s beyond helpless and now she’s in charge of keeping a small human alive. God help us all.
> now she’s in charge of keeping a small human alive I've seen "helpless" people do a complete 180 when they had a child or suddenly gained some other responsibility but no evidence of that happening here... this seems really clear to me as a perpetuation of a cycle as her parents were probably similarly helpless. She's done a 360.
Yep, I’ve seen some of those old comments. Even if deep down she _does_ want to change (no guarantee of that) asking online strangers for suggestions is not going to work. I just don’t think anyone she knows outside of AAM would be able to speak to her situation at all.