Dodging Bullets
Via Mr Muldoon in the comments, a shocking revelation:
Not so much overlooked, I think, as warning signs heeded.
As we’ve seen many times, pretending to be a they does rather send a message regarding neuroticism, pretentiousness, captiousness, and the likelihood of disruption. If job applicants in effect announce that they expect anyone nearby to indulge their tedious psychodrama and pretend along with them, this will not always be met with enthusiasm. Demanding that others lie – and ignore or contradict the evidence right in front of them, daily – is, in short, rude. An act of hostility.
Contrary to Ashton Jackson, the author of the article quoted above, and contrary to Ryan McGonagill, the author of the report cited in said article, it’s not a matter of “how much work there is to do around diversity, equity, inclusion and belonging in the workplace.” And I very much doubt it’s about pronoun-stipulators finding themselves disqualified for “being authentic.” It’s more a matter of whether employers would be wise to hire, and trust, people who signal their narcissism, their unrealism, and their inclination to manipulate others.
And employers would do well to remember that The Pronoun Game, so much in fashion, is very often an attempt to bully others, to exert power, by making them say things, publicly and repeatedly, that they don’t for a minute believe to be true.
If an illustration is required of how things can go awry, readers may recall the infinitely charming Ms Amber Leventry, a “queer person and educator,” a professional them, who managed to be outraged by the fact that she had been asked not to swear and scream in the workplace. This appeal to reciprocal courtesy, and preference for not being assailed with bellowed epithets, was denounced as both “tone policing” – a wickedness “rooted in colonialism and white supremacy” – and an effort to crush underfoot the rights and wellbeing of transgender people.
When not expecting deference and “validation” for her frequent fits of temper – one might say bullying – Ms Leventry encourages her own small children, aged seven and nine, to shout profanities at passers-by who may have voted Republican. So, obviously, the perfect employee.
Update, via the comments:
EmC adds,
Well, if a job application includes imaginary pronouns and claims of themness, I think one could treat it as roughly equivalent to the words I like to shit on the carpet. Signalling, as it does, insufferable pretension or serious mental illness, or some unhappy combination of the two.
But in the minds of Ms Jackson and Mr McGonagill, every employer, and every workmate, has time for this shit.
And every employer, and every workmate, wants to be held to ransom with workplace meltdowns and threats of self-harm if the absurd made-up rules, which can change arbitrarily, at seemingly any time, several times a day, aren’t obeyed.
Update 2:
In the comments, sH2 follows the links above and finds this, one of many such examples:
A complication that necessitates the wearing, and frequent changing, of colour-coded bracelets:
To which, sH2 replies,
Well, quite. One has a finite lifespan and only so much goodwill. Best not to piss it away.
And note that Ms Jackson and Mr McGonagill make no provision for such scenarios, despite them being very much in fashion among the “non-binary” demographic, and competitively so. It would seem that Ms Jackson and Mr McGonagill believe that no degree of farce would be too much, and employers should simply accommodate and indulge any level of derangement and manipulation, regardless of the impracticality and expense, and regardless of the disruption, and regardless of the impact on the employer’s own mental health.
And so, we arrive at a situation in which employers and employees would be obliged to closely monitor the mood swings of their unhinged workmates, regularly checking pronoun-bracelets and pronoun-earrings, and other pronoun-stipulating accessories, as if they couldn’t possibly have anything better to do. Lest they be faced with some hair-trigger umbrage and operatic drama, or get summoned to the HR department and then scolded for being insensitive and insufficiently inclusive.
And a happy, utopian workplace would surely follow.
I sometimes wonder how anyone over 16 years old can believe such rot. You’d think that people who live in the real world would know this by their teens.
Best bit of trolling so far this month.
“Naked berserk criminal” seems to be a growing phenomenon.
The ultra-liberal Southern Poverty Law Center is a terrorist organization. No, really, it is.
Very few people live in the real world anymore relative to just a few decades ago. Younger people are on various versions of the dole, college being one, criminal and similar under-the-table activity, and now the number of children of parents who made decent wages who either don’t need to work at all or if they do, they aren’t paying rent or a mortgage or payed for their first couple of cars. Thus holding a proper adult job with adult responsibilities is just not a thing. I see this in my community as the parents die off and their adult children move into the family home, sometimes brothers and sisters living together again. They may work for groceries and recreational stuff but the need to fully support themselves or provide for their children and their children’s education is greatly reduced.
On our local Nextdoor app area/group someone reported that a man was naked and jiggling his junk around at a retention pond next to one of our local Lowes hardware big box stores. The excuses people were making for such were horrible. “For the most part they are harmless”, “The stigma of mental illness…”, “But the overwhelming number of people with mental illness can and do lead normal lives…”, “So? Was he hurting anyone?”, “Better to swing around his junk than a gun”, “Live free or die, he’s not hurting anyone”, “Did they kill someone or hurt someone? No? Then move along”.
This is the society you get when you don’t push back.
…she advocates “dismantling western civ”…
Yes, but it is the utter depravity of an alleged “sex therapist” even suggesting that paying women to be drugged so she could “get her kink on” might be a good idea being bruited about on state owned TV is more appalling.
What’s worse, the leftists and psychotics and depraved sickos are increasingly forcing normal people out of psychotherapy/social work degree programs.
she advocates “dismantling western civ”
She and her ilk are succeeding, aren’t they, though?
Ah, Ms Sonalee Rashatwar, an “Instagram therapist” and woman of surreal girth who denounces “intentional weight loss,” and claims that dieting is a form of “sexual violence” based on “Nazi science.” A self-styled undo-er of Western civilisation, who insists that her own health problems are the result of “weight stigma” and “white supremacy,” and nothing whatsoever to do with her frequent, prodigious feasting.
she advocates “dismantling western civ”
In her case presumably by sitting on it?
I would guess that to a large extent their success is based on displacing responsibility and providing modish, ready-made excuses for those who find the prospect of even basic self-possession somewhat alarming.
And so, rather than changing a situation that’s making them unhappy and neurotic, i.e., being very fat, feeling unattractive, and wheezing while climbing stairs, the self-styled activists choose instead to shout at the rain. Because losing weight would require effort and a little self-discipline – and an admission of error – whereas shouting at the rain – in this case, denouncing “whiteness” and demanding that Western civilisation be fundamentally unmade – only requires pretension and dishonesty.
Doing the obvious, the thing that might actually work – dialling back on the carbs and sugar, and taking an occasional brisk walk – is likely to be construed as low-status drudgery, at least by their peers. It’s hard to frame routine self-discipline and overdue course correction as terribly exciting or radical. It also requires a time preference that extends further than the next feast or fit of self-indulgence.
Instead, they choose contrivance and resentment, framed as activism, and thereby status. Say, by complaining about people who take selfies from above so as to avoid double chins.
Close. Their success is based on displacement. Both literal and figurative. Figurative being both literal and…well you get the picture. Again, not to be snarky. Their success is that 80% of success/life thing. The showing up. Their reasoning is pathetic but it does not need to be sound. They simply need to present themselves as a large group of people. And be present. A herd is intimidating. It may be a herd of dumb cows but the herd is still a force to be reckoned with. Sure they lose a few of the weaker ones here and there but they are overall safer in their numbers than even the much more cunning lone wolf.
Still waiting for an explanation, however implausible, of how stigma could cause the health problems associated with obesity. Reasons not needed, just shout the magic incantations and your guilt will be absolved.