alt Hacker News>then laughed at her anguish.
anguish? as in, "excruciating pain" or "agonizing torment"?
i dont understand where the "anguish" comes from. he didnt yell at her, berate her, hit her, cause her to be fired, submit a malicious complaint, or anything of the sort. he sent her a long fax. oh no!
if i was in her position, i would shrug and hand my boss the 500 pieces of paper.
if you are just a cog in the machine, it is not mentally healthy to take on the responsibility of more than a cog. caring is the responsibility of non-cogs.
edit: today i learned that sending a long fax is apparently a method of torture, causing mental anguish to the receiver. my bad. profuse apologies to anyone i have sent a longer fax to, i had no idea the mental damage i was causing. i can only hope that god will forgive my sins.
Replies
> if i was in her position, i would shrug and hand my boss the 500 pieces of paper.
yeah honestly. If I was in that position I'd probably think it's funny and just stick the whole stack in a folder and laugh about the dumb process.
This is exactly how it's handled from my limited dealings with the machine. Literally no one gives a shit if you make their job 'harder.' They have an endless treadmill of things to do. Whether it's your 500 page fax or 500 people with a 1 page fax is of no consequence to them. They will work at the same pace either way. In fact their boss might like it because they can try to use it to argue for more headcount which is one of the ways to gain more prestige/power for the managers.
I know the things HN hates most are analogies and anecdotes, but here's a chance to torture myself by offering one. I sat down on day at the BMV, to register a kayak. Literally everyone is my state except the wildlife enforcement officers think the whole idea is absolutely absurdly retarded. This was in a jam packed BMV with a long line. No one but one elderly lady even knew how to do it, because most people don't submit themselves to such a stupid idea as registering their kayak, even though it was required. A lady sat down with me, PECKED all the information in over a period of 15 minutes. Then showed me the form. It had the wrong hull number on it, so I told her, and she had to redo it all over again pecking it in for another 15 minutes.
After this she still got the hull number wrong. Another 15 minutes later, and she got the hull number yet again. Finally She did it again and still got the hull number wrong yet again and I just gave up and accepted the registration she gave me even though it was completely worthless to me. Not a single person at the BMV gave a single shit that this took this long nor the fact it would hold everyone up, everyone has an endless list of shit to do and there will be more waiting for them tomorrow. If it causes the machine to slow down they could not give one single fuck. They are not the least bit bothered.
exactly this. I didn't put you in a bad job; you - and to a large extent, your society - did. you are the face of the machine that I am trying to deal with. if you don't want to be that face, go be the face of some other machine. but if you pick up a phone to talk to a client or customer, you are a representation of an organization, and you will be treated as such. fix you mind to understand that people are trying to find the right things to say to you to get what they need at that moment. no different from someone putting in quarters to get a soda from a vending machine. I do X, I get Y. if there is a breakdown in getting Y, I will try other things beyond X. so, in this example, I tried to be reasonable; I tried to make this simple for me while simultaneously making it simple for both you and the machine you are representing. if it is the machine that prevents you from accepting that simplicity, then explain as much as they let you, apologize like a human being for the failings of the machine you represent, and ignore literally all of the rest of it. you can only do what you can do. they can only get what they can get. no amount of hostility will change the policy, but hostility will surely get different (sometimes better; not often) results than acquiescence. recognize that it's not hostility towards you and - god forbid - enjoy the fact that someone else notices how fucking shitty the machine you work for is. if you're a real superstar, take note of the specific situation and place it somewhere you can provide a collection of specific situations for review.