Just one of her most excellent writings on the continuing miserable state of the economy, and the victim-blaming that is keeping it that way. I admire her no end:
A confirmation of ugly attitudes towards the poor...
Tuesday, August 9, 2011
Tuesday, July 26, 2011
It's Not You! It really, really isn't...
Check out this article from Yahoo:
You know you're just a worthless, unemployed, lazy bum!
This issue has concerned me for a long, long time. I knew all about the unemployed being discriminated against, because like so many of you, I was and still am one of them. I recall having gone to an interview at a music start-up about a year after being laid off from Apple, and you know what the arrogant yuppie twit of an interviewer said?!
"Ah I see, you were laid off just when the market crashed in 2008. Interesting!"
Wow, I'm glad my life crashing down around me made such a neat little case study for him. He's lucky he wasn't in a dark corner with me when he made that fucking smug observation...
For one thing, it's not as though this was some new revelation. I knew I'd been laid off at the worst time imaginable, and so did Apple. I know I'm not being paranoid when I say I was well aware they had it in for me. Life is not easy in the corporate world if you're not a saucy little corporate whore, and announce that you never will be, not for all the bonuses and perks in the world. But I do know that brown-nosing comes very easy to some. I worked with more than I can count. The stench got pretty bad, believe you me. The ones I knew at Apple were clearly reporting to my superiors that I was in no way alright with being Crapple's 'Permatemp bitch.' So that's likely what happened there. I hope they are enjoying the 'eau de poo' wafting 'round the office. They likely don't even notice any more. But then, that's pure unadulterated Evil for you...
For those of you who are, you know, NORMAL and not begging of someone's acceptance every damn second of the day, or willing to sell your first-born to your boss, just know that this time, it truly is not your fault. I wish there were a way to reach out to you other than this blog. For now, all I can do for the truly down-and-out is give a few measly dollars to a soup kitchen every now and then. It is specific to my neighborhood but hey, as they say, you gotta start locally.
Don't even worry if you've had to resort to doing something considered 'criminal' or socially unacceptable to survive. Do you think corporations have ever gone by the letter of the law? This is no time to apologize for wanting to LIVE! I know, in the jobs you've all held before, you generally had to ask your boss permission to even breathe, let alone have the audacity to inquire after a promotion. I've been there, believe me. You used to believe that if you elected a well-heeled and well-spoken man as President, that he'd look after your rights. He wouldn't let any entity, corporate or otherwise, step all over you and your family. But it turns out you were wrong about that too, because after you elected him and during the worst recession you can remember, it seems that every damn time you turned around, he was attending yet another fancy luncheon with the Chamber of Commerce. Sadly, we are all starting to come around to the brutal reality that there is no 'benevolent leader,' and we must at once survive this disgraceful betrayal together and map out a future in which ourselves and our loved ones not only survive, but thrive.
Just promise me something. Even if you are not actively engaged in some sort of anti-corporate or other activism, please take care of yourself and your loved ones, no matter what. Reach out to your friends who find themselves out of work as a result of this insane, inequitable, corporate cock sucking circus of a culture. It will indeed make you a better human being for having done so. Lie for them, if you have to, so they can keep that roof over their heads. Even if it means you have to pretend you worked with them in the past. You know, you've probably lied many times for your employer, an entity that after all, does not in any way possess the realness or intrinsic value of a human life. It's likely the lie was even bigger if you worked or work in sales or marketing.
I guess what I'm asking is that the remaining decent people left turn the tables on the establishment once and for all, which may seem like an overwhelming request. But I don't think it's impossible. Even a few well-meaning individuals can bring about tremendous change. Fight for what is real, and you will see illusory power structures fall, as mighty and grand an illusion as they may seem to be. Liars and cowards are actually pretty easy to defeat, once you get the hang of it. This is your time, and mine. We may be temporarily miserable, but we'll survive and we'll make sure the corporate lie is exposed once and for all, and for all to see.
You know you're just a worthless, unemployed, lazy bum!
This issue has concerned me for a long, long time. I knew all about the unemployed being discriminated against, because like so many of you, I was and still am one of them. I recall having gone to an interview at a music start-up about a year after being laid off from Apple, and you know what the arrogant yuppie twit of an interviewer said?!
"Ah I see, you were laid off just when the market crashed in 2008. Interesting!"
Wow, I'm glad my life crashing down around me made such a neat little case study for him. He's lucky he wasn't in a dark corner with me when he made that fucking smug observation...
For one thing, it's not as though this was some new revelation. I knew I'd been laid off at the worst time imaginable, and so did Apple. I know I'm not being paranoid when I say I was well aware they had it in for me. Life is not easy in the corporate world if you're not a saucy little corporate whore, and announce that you never will be, not for all the bonuses and perks in the world. But I do know that brown-nosing comes very easy to some. I worked with more than I can count. The stench got pretty bad, believe you me. The ones I knew at Apple were clearly reporting to my superiors that I was in no way alright with being Crapple's 'Permatemp bitch.' So that's likely what happened there. I hope they are enjoying the 'eau de poo' wafting 'round the office. They likely don't even notice any more. But then, that's pure unadulterated Evil for you...
For those of you who are, you know, NORMAL and not begging of someone's acceptance every damn second of the day, or willing to sell your first-born to your boss, just know that this time, it truly is not your fault. I wish there were a way to reach out to you other than this blog. For now, all I can do for the truly down-and-out is give a few measly dollars to a soup kitchen every now and then. It is specific to my neighborhood but hey, as they say, you gotta start locally.
Don't even worry if you've had to resort to doing something considered 'criminal' or socially unacceptable to survive. Do you think corporations have ever gone by the letter of the law? This is no time to apologize for wanting to LIVE! I know, in the jobs you've all held before, you generally had to ask your boss permission to even breathe, let alone have the audacity to inquire after a promotion. I've been there, believe me. You used to believe that if you elected a well-heeled and well-spoken man as President, that he'd look after your rights. He wouldn't let any entity, corporate or otherwise, step all over you and your family. But it turns out you were wrong about that too, because after you elected him and during the worst recession you can remember, it seems that every damn time you turned around, he was attending yet another fancy luncheon with the Chamber of Commerce. Sadly, we are all starting to come around to the brutal reality that there is no 'benevolent leader,' and we must at once survive this disgraceful betrayal together and map out a future in which ourselves and our loved ones not only survive, but thrive.
Just promise me something. Even if you are not actively engaged in some sort of anti-corporate or other activism, please take care of yourself and your loved ones, no matter what. Reach out to your friends who find themselves out of work as a result of this insane, inequitable, corporate cock sucking circus of a culture. It will indeed make you a better human being for having done so. Lie for them, if you have to, so they can keep that roof over their heads. Even if it means you have to pretend you worked with them in the past. You know, you've probably lied many times for your employer, an entity that after all, does not in any way possess the realness or intrinsic value of a human life. It's likely the lie was even bigger if you worked or work in sales or marketing.
I guess what I'm asking is that the remaining decent people left turn the tables on the establishment once and for all, which may seem like an overwhelming request. But I don't think it's impossible. Even a few well-meaning individuals can bring about tremendous change. Fight for what is real, and you will see illusory power structures fall, as mighty and grand an illusion as they may seem to be. Liars and cowards are actually pretty easy to defeat, once you get the hang of it. This is your time, and mine. We may be temporarily miserable, but we'll survive and we'll make sure the corporate lie is exposed once and for all, and for all to see.
Saturday, July 2, 2011
Oh, the sheer misery of Crapple :( Will it never end?!
Look what they're doing now. I used to think that although I was treated like shit when I worked at their headquarters, that maybe, just maybe at least the retail workers were getting a fair deal, but alas, I was dead wrong:
Apple retail worker woes
Apple retail worker woes
Wednesday, June 15, 2011
Why fighting the corporate beast may just be the most difficult thing you could possibly do right now (and why you still must do it)
Ah, corporate culture, the beast we go to bed, eat and shower with every morning. That lowly thing we engage in communion with because by now it is so intricately woven into our lives, we don’t know where we begin and where it ends. Go to any blog questioning, for example the corruption of tech companies, and try as you might to be just as critical, you feel you cannot because you are typing your messages of protest in a machine sold to you at a considerable markup by one of these companies. You feel like the most primordial slime, the ultimate hypocrite. Alright, perhaps that was a bit dramatic! But you get my point. Though you do your damndest to be an ethical consumer, corporate products are simply too tied in with your very survival for you to ever mount a successful opposition. Or is that really so?
I actually have suffered greatly as a result of my own personal protest against a high tech behemoth (which you know by now is Apple) that almost seemed to go out of its way to abuse my rights as an employee. I had been misclassified as self-employed and worked for them full time for three years without benefits. I am hardly the only one hit by this awful ‘Permatemping’ phenomenon, and it is indeed a rather long story. But the end result was that because I had my say-so regarding some very basic labor rights, they laid me off; sent me packing and did not even allow me to retrieve my things from my desk. I was notified on a Sunday, and the following Monday, my personal effects were shipped to me via FedEx, mostly broken. A nerve was definitely hit there, but I paid the price. And there was a real arrogance on their part, to think that a ‘little person’ like me would just go away like a tiny kitten with its tail between its legs and have nothing further to say, or that an ‘average’ person would not have the chutzpah or the resources to fight their considerable empire and influence.
Now I have a relative who works for them under the same exact conditions. She is just as angry, but somehow has maintained her composure, perhaps out of fear she could not find another gig in this piss poor economy. Should I have done the same? Because I spoke out, I am still living like a madwoman in a rent-controlled shoebox, in a poor neighborhood. But if I had sucked up, could I have looked myself in the mirror in the morning? There is literal whoring of the body and then there is whoring of one’s very soul and convictions. The latter is the smelliest and most infernal beast by far. So I made a decision to take what little dignity I had left, and run with it. And here I am, just another poor person, but at least keeping my principles inviolate, aside from owning the machine I am now typing this entry on.
Corporations have had us in bed with them for quite a while now. They have taken that old adage, ‘Know Your Friends Well, Know Your Enemies Better’ and twisted it around so that now we are the enemy being preyed upon, while offered all kinds of ‘new and improved’ products to lure us further into the maw of the beast. This false friend knows us so very well, from our deepest lusts and cravings, to our most unspeakable fears. It puts these up to us as though in a mirror and reflects them back in the most irresistible forms, in whatever flavor or shape we desire.
Are we simply our own worst enemy? If that is the real issue at hand, this beast can indeed be slayed, but only with considerable sacrifice and detachment from our former ways. Rise up and fight it, before it morphs into a different form altogether, as it inevitably will without intervention, stealth and awareness on our part. This new master has a subtlety of mind that we must also cultivate, if we truly intend to fight the good fight. Power knows exactly what it is and how to maintain and perpetuate itself. We must also learn the same skill if we are to keep it from infiltrating our lives and undermining everything we stand for as human beings.
I actually have suffered greatly as a result of my own personal protest against a high tech behemoth (which you know by now is Apple) that almost seemed to go out of its way to abuse my rights as an employee. I had been misclassified as self-employed and worked for them full time for three years without benefits. I am hardly the only one hit by this awful ‘Permatemping’ phenomenon, and it is indeed a rather long story. But the end result was that because I had my say-so regarding some very basic labor rights, they laid me off; sent me packing and did not even allow me to retrieve my things from my desk. I was notified on a Sunday, and the following Monday, my personal effects were shipped to me via FedEx, mostly broken. A nerve was definitely hit there, but I paid the price. And there was a real arrogance on their part, to think that a ‘little person’ like me would just go away like a tiny kitten with its tail between its legs and have nothing further to say, or that an ‘average’ person would not have the chutzpah or the resources to fight their considerable empire and influence.
Now I have a relative who works for them under the same exact conditions. She is just as angry, but somehow has maintained her composure, perhaps out of fear she could not find another gig in this piss poor economy. Should I have done the same? Because I spoke out, I am still living like a madwoman in a rent-controlled shoebox, in a poor neighborhood. But if I had sucked up, could I have looked myself in the mirror in the morning? There is literal whoring of the body and then there is whoring of one’s very soul and convictions. The latter is the smelliest and most infernal beast by far. So I made a decision to take what little dignity I had left, and run with it. And here I am, just another poor person, but at least keeping my principles inviolate, aside from owning the machine I am now typing this entry on.
Corporations have had us in bed with them for quite a while now. They have taken that old adage, ‘Know Your Friends Well, Know Your Enemies Better’ and twisted it around so that now we are the enemy being preyed upon, while offered all kinds of ‘new and improved’ products to lure us further into the maw of the beast. This false friend knows us so very well, from our deepest lusts and cravings, to our most unspeakable fears. It puts these up to us as though in a mirror and reflects them back in the most irresistible forms, in whatever flavor or shape we desire.
Are we simply our own worst enemy? If that is the real issue at hand, this beast can indeed be slayed, but only with considerable sacrifice and detachment from our former ways. Rise up and fight it, before it morphs into a different form altogether, as it inevitably will without intervention, stealth and awareness on our part. This new master has a subtlety of mind that we must also cultivate, if we truly intend to fight the good fight. Power knows exactly what it is and how to maintain and perpetuate itself. We must also learn the same skill if we are to keep it from infiltrating our lives and undermining everything we stand for as human beings.
Thursday, June 9, 2011
Beware the Apple Police!
This comes as absolutely NO surprise to me, but if it is to you, check it out:
Apple's iron fist revealed...
Apple's iron fist revealed...
Thursday, June 2, 2011
Apple, Inc. Tax Evader
Looks like Apple is not paying its fair share of taxes, which is hardly surprising. And it also appears that I am not the only one pissed off regarding the Permatemp issue...
Why Should Apple Pay Taxes? It's So Cool, Dude!
Why Should Apple Pay Taxes? It's So Cool, Dude!
Sunday, May 1, 2011
Do You Know How the Demand for Your Toys Is Met?
My college friend in Ireland sent me a thought-provoking article today on the terrible toll the Western demand for tech gadgets is taking on Chinese workers. I have been concerned about this for a while, and can't believe that next to nothing is being done about it. The story about one worker in the industrial dormitories having to write a confession letter for just using a hair dryer is heartbreaking. We need to be aware of this and also understand that it could easily be us. Corporations don't care who they are abusing, so long as it is convenient and cost effective for them:
Unimaginable worker abuse
The Real Cost of Those 'Shiny Gadgets'
Unimaginable worker abuse
The Real Cost of Those 'Shiny Gadgets'
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