Working For The Man
Greetings from the downslope of the credit crunch… That greasy freewheel towards realising that everything in your house is nothing more than a pawn-able bauble in the face of no food and – worse – no liquor. It is at times like these you can just about swallow working for the man… As much as you hate them, they are the reason why you don’t go home to a street corner and have to think about terribly inventive ways to use your asshole to gain money. They are the reason why you aren’t known as “Crazy Dave from down the way, the one who will beat himself up for pennies” and in times of tight belts we all do well to remember that. No longer can we entertain the fantasy of quitting in a spectacular explosion of sour grapes and moving to that BETTER job across the street to gloat at our former slavers. That better job doesn’t exist any more… The building was closed down because they could no longer pay the rent and have had to downsize. The developers circle like the vultures they are, ready to build a series of luxury apartments that can only be bought up as second homes for yuppies that consider a trip to where you live as some kind of safari…
I too now work for the man and internalise the mental breakdown that this reality causes in all of us. It is worse for me as I am now an employee of my city council, meaning I am office bound and surrounded by cretins. It is the way of the council that you fail upwards – the only people who get promoted are the terrible fuck-ups that have spent nine or so years staring at photographs of their many waterhead children while they work and have asked no questions, their inability to progress misinterpreted as a quiet inner steel despite their continual failure at even the most basic of aptitude tests. But we live in times where the most important person in the world struggles with children’s books so maybe it should come as no surprise when these buffoons are moved into that bigger office, where they have room for more pictures of more kids with glazed eyes and can sit around being carried by some smarter, delusional subordinate.
Yes, when it is public money you’re spending, what real pressure is there to spend it wisely? An ethos that only fucked a few now fucks everyone globally and the final irony is that it is our money that is requisitioned to bail these pigfuckers out. We just operate within the culture of fear and perfect our shit eating grins… Ho ho ho. I apologise for this dark cul-de-sac. These thoughts belong in another place in another time. I was making some humerous observations about working for the man. Besides, comedy is a requirement in times of economic depression or times of international crisis, even if it isn’t that funny. It would be remiss of me not to oblige.
Any analysis of working for the man needs to include an answer to the question “Who is the man?” that invariably comes up. I can’t tell you who “he” is, but I can tell you some facts that might come in useful. The man is not always a man – increasingly they are women but it is still correct to refer to them as he. The man will only speak in jargon and slogans. There is sign of the man at ground level – if you look upwards you always see the man. Despite this fact the man will ALWAYS be stupider than you are, no matter how stupid you ultimately are. The man will tell you to do things such as “pretend that your working” when you have nothing to do. The man only measures thing by how well they follow protocol, not by the results to which they lead. The man is a figure of pity and ridicule because he doesn’t even know he is the man – he believes that he is a kind of benevolent figure, a good person when you scrape away all the outer layers of skin. He doesn’t entertain for a moment that if you did this you would reveal an android…
Sound familiar? It should – because in one way or another we all work for the man. The secret is to find something in work that keeps you sane and gear your entire working day to pursuing it. I had a friend who was working for the Electricity board back in the day and he would send out crank letters to clients… Bizarre ramblings that would tell the customer that they could retain energy by drinking their own urine, or that businesses could generate enough energy to power a PC by sticking an immigrant on a bicycle wired to a dynamo and pay the peddler less than the cost in energy. It was his oasis of calm amid the insanity of the office hustle and bustle. Rules that don’t make any sense, tedious work and the ideas that management put into place to try and fool you into thinking you have it good. Such as the dress down Fridays that are supposed to inspire loyalty and improve morale, while at the same time highlighting the ridiculous conventions we all are supposed to buy into. But it’s OK because we all get to leer at the Office ride’s ass and wonder on what payday night out we can get ourselves cosied up to it.
Yes, you have to find something to occupy your time if not your mind. Council workers are not only stupid, but they are incredibly ugly… At least two of the guys in my department have mail order Thai brides that don’t belong on their deformed arms… But I did manage to find something other than hammering Cadred forums. Some beautiful piece of skirt that works way down in the post room. She brings me my mail and I like to lurk nearby as she reaches down to pick heavy parcels that have sunk to the bottom of the sack. If I see her make a break to the toilet I might go press my ear up against the door and listen to the soft porcelain tinklings… Not for any perverted reasons you understand. Just to make sure she is real. If you saw the other gargoyles that swanned around the office you too would wonder if she was a figment of your imagination. She works on the franking machine and once I have thought up a suitable pun – something better than “franks very much” at least – I may even speak to her…
Working for the man is a motherfucker. The only way out of it is to become the man or to be so good at something that the man eventually has to deal with you on your terms because they need what you have for their own ends. In the meantime keep yourself as sane as is possible by any method you choose to do so. Just don’t get caught. There is no room for goofing off down the dole office.
I too now work for the man and internalise the mental breakdown that this reality causes in all of us. It is worse for me as I am now an employee of my city council, meaning I am office bound and surrounded by cretins. It is the way of the council that you fail upwards – the only people who get promoted are the terrible fuck-ups that have spent nine or so years staring at photographs of their many waterhead children while they work and have asked no questions, their inability to progress misinterpreted as a quiet inner steel despite their continual failure at even the most basic of aptitude tests. But we live in times where the most important person in the world struggles with children’s books so maybe it should come as no surprise when these buffoons are moved into that bigger office, where they have room for more pictures of more kids with glazed eyes and can sit around being carried by some smarter, delusional subordinate.
Yes, when it is public money you’re spending, what real pressure is there to spend it wisely? An ethos that only fucked a few now fucks everyone globally and the final irony is that it is our money that is requisitioned to bail these pigfuckers out. We just operate within the culture of fear and perfect our shit eating grins… Ho ho ho. I apologise for this dark cul-de-sac. These thoughts belong in another place in another time. I was making some humerous observations about working for the man. Besides, comedy is a requirement in times of economic depression or times of international crisis, even if it isn’t that funny. It would be remiss of me not to oblige.
Any analysis of working for the man needs to include an answer to the question “Who is the man?” that invariably comes up. I can’t tell you who “he” is, but I can tell you some facts that might come in useful. The man is not always a man – increasingly they are women but it is still correct to refer to them as he. The man will only speak in jargon and slogans. There is sign of the man at ground level – if you look upwards you always see the man. Despite this fact the man will ALWAYS be stupider than you are, no matter how stupid you ultimately are. The man will tell you to do things such as “pretend that your working” when you have nothing to do. The man only measures thing by how well they follow protocol, not by the results to which they lead. The man is a figure of pity and ridicule because he doesn’t even know he is the man – he believes that he is a kind of benevolent figure, a good person when you scrape away all the outer layers of skin. He doesn’t entertain for a moment that if you did this you would reveal an android…
Sound familiar? It should – because in one way or another we all work for the man. The secret is to find something in work that keeps you sane and gear your entire working day to pursuing it. I had a friend who was working for the Electricity board back in the day and he would send out crank letters to clients… Bizarre ramblings that would tell the customer that they could retain energy by drinking their own urine, or that businesses could generate enough energy to power a PC by sticking an immigrant on a bicycle wired to a dynamo and pay the peddler less than the cost in energy. It was his oasis of calm amid the insanity of the office hustle and bustle. Rules that don’t make any sense, tedious work and the ideas that management put into place to try and fool you into thinking you have it good. Such as the dress down Fridays that are supposed to inspire loyalty and improve morale, while at the same time highlighting the ridiculous conventions we all are supposed to buy into. But it’s OK because we all get to leer at the Office ride’s ass and wonder on what payday night out we can get ourselves cosied up to it.
Yes, you have to find something to occupy your time if not your mind. Council workers are not only stupid, but they are incredibly ugly… At least two of the guys in my department have mail order Thai brides that don’t belong on their deformed arms… But I did manage to find something other than hammering Cadred forums. Some beautiful piece of skirt that works way down in the post room. She brings me my mail and I like to lurk nearby as she reaches down to pick heavy parcels that have sunk to the bottom of the sack. If I see her make a break to the toilet I might go press my ear up against the door and listen to the soft porcelain tinklings… Not for any perverted reasons you understand. Just to make sure she is real. If you saw the other gargoyles that swanned around the office you too would wonder if she was a figment of your imagination. She works on the franking machine and once I have thought up a suitable pun – something better than “franks very much” at least – I may even speak to her…
Working for the man is a motherfucker. The only way out of it is to become the man or to be so good at something that the man eventually has to deal with you on your terms because they need what you have for their own ends. In the meantime keep yourself as sane as is possible by any method you choose to do so. Just don’t get caught. There is no room for goofing off down the dole office.
posted by Richard Lewis at 11:16 PM
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