“It’s not a principle if it doesn’t cost you anything”
Also just curious about your deeply held principles in general.
No political grandstanding please.
I have a fairly strict policy of being honest and not intentionally deceiving people. This cost me back in my 20’s when I was working a call center tech support job for dial up internet.
Our management wanted 10 minute handle times even for tier 2 calls. I was a tier 2 rep and this was in windows 98 era so I would have to walk grandma’s through uninstalling their entire coms stack and clearing certain registry components and reinstalling them. For grannies I could get this done cleanly in 1 hour. My managers would occasionally swoop over and tell me to tell the customer I had to look up something and call them back. This I would not do, it would make me seem less confident in the fix which grandma already had to be encouraged and made to feel they were in capable hands to undertake and what if we got a typo in the phone number or we can’t get back to them so they’re left with their computer largely bricked for internet.
This resulted in me getting demoted, then promoted again to be demoted and then ultimately moved to a different department that had much more relaxed handle times while still performing a tier 2+ experience for an extra dollar per hour. So in the end it was a win but the yoyo happened at a very financially unstable time for me so it was rough
Not using Meta ‘products’
I got fired for filing a discrimination lawsuit against my employer for barring me from wearing the kilt I’d worn at least 2-3 times per week for two years. The banning was because they decided it was not “professional attire”, but all the yoga pants, miniskirts, and sleeveless dresses are just fine.
There’s a lot more to the story including a trip to mental health urgent care and the actual firing call happening while I was on FMLA.
What is FMLA?
Family Medical Leave Act. Let’s you leave work and get paid for a period of time (I believe at a reduced rate) if a family member is having medical issues.
I mean, wear what you want by all means, but as a Scot who’s worn a kilt a handful of times at very formal occasions it seems pretty odd to wear it on the daily. To each their own, of course, but it is a bit unusual. What made you decide to push ahead with this, knowing that your work wasn’t keen?
I’d been wearing it to work for 2 years prior to this. I also worked at the same company over 10 years ago in a department with a strictrr dress code and wore it for 3+ years in that role.
The meeting about the kilt happened the day before the c-suite were coming to visit the office from out of town, which I suspect was the real reason for it. Last time executives came visiting I brought up pay equity and raised the matter of inflation, COL pay adjustments, and merit raises when they got done telling us how well the company was doing and that our te am had a direct effect on boosting stock value. I got pulled into a meeting first thing next day to tell me I could not discuss salary with fellow employees, which is a violation of labor law and company policy. My ethics complaint about that was swept under the rug and when I cpntacted the NLRB (national labor relations board) to report the violation of the law the respondent basically said they could file it but the odds of the complaint going anywhere vs a company this size was almost zero.
Yay USA!
I’m having a hard time finding a job that aligns with my ethics. I was a software developer, and it seems that everything that’s hiring right now is stuff that would make me feel like garbage.
I considered taking a job as a help desk for an advertising library. I figure I could do a really bad job of it, and take a big chunk of my salary to donate to adblockers.
I earn about 30% of what I did five years ago, and prices have only gone up. I’ll probably become homeless if things continue, that’s pretty darn inconvenient.
I just want to make dumb little video games to feed my family, but I’m too burnt out from my soul crushing minimum wage job to make dinner.
Look into space/aerospace/embedded. They still pay well and you get to write software for cool shit.
Honesty is a big one for me.
Doesn’t always mean speaking the whole truth but not saying anything that’s untrue. This has led to a handful of situations where I would’ve prefered to tell a white lie but I didn’t.
In the long term honesty is almost always better for everyone involved.
This is my main thing as well. Always telling the truth. Even when the consequences of telling the truth reflect poorly on a choice or decision I made. ❤️
During my military service I constantly fought against idiotic traditions and doing things the stupid and inefficient way. I had read the regulations manual carefully to back me up and presented my cases respectfully with proper conduct.
I always started by quoting the relevant regulations, so they had to hear me out and could not officially punish me for my “disobedient queries”. This got many of the regular staff royally pissed off at me, some just found my resilience amusing and a few younger offiicers even showed occasional support for me. I knew very well that nothing big would change, but I actually did manage to get rid of a few small things that were just hassling disguised as training.
My service friends thought I was crazy for stirring things up in vain, but I took good care that I never got them in any trouble. The only “punishment” they could give me was that I was always given the assignments that were considered most unpleasant and I was regularly sent on long range recon excersizes with my men, so I would be out of sight for most of the time. I loved those long trips in the woods.
I also quit my first real and well paying job out of principle a week after we got a new manager. I had been there for 5 years and really liked the work, but after the new manager gave us a list of changes he wanted, it became clear to me that it was time to leave. It would have been entirely impossible to fulfill my duties properly with the allocated resources and time. I could have done the work badly, sure, but this would have led to the customer leaving us for other services. I did point this out to the new manager when I was cleaning my desk. “Just because you cannot do doesn’t mean that someone better couldn’t” was the only response. They promptly lost the customer and 3-4 others also quit the team in the same year.
With the help of an old friend I landed a new, little less paying job but with vastly better benefits. Been there since.
I run Linux on main. Started 2 months ago because it represents the kind of world I want to live in. I’ve stuck with it despite the fact that it feels like I’m computing on hard mode at times.
As someone who switched to Linux full time around 2001 and still has to deal with windows, Linux is easy mode. Windows is a pain in the ass.
I want my stuff to work and be reliable and that is linux.
You will eventually come to that realization given some time.
Out of curiosity, how come Linux is so massive on Lemmy? I signed up several months back and didn’t specify any specific interest as far as I can recall, but it feels like I’ve joined a Linux community that has a side-interest in the rest of the world!
We’re using an alt social media platform, it’s more likely that we’d also use other alternative services as well, especially when Lemmy users seem to be more tech savvy than most. It doesn’t help that Microsoft and the other tech giants are forcing the use of anti-consumer features when you can use Linux in the same way without being forced to use features you don’t want to use.
I refuse to use Meta or Google anything. Cuts me off from a lot of people and is pretty inconvenient, but I have to make it as difficult as possible for those rat fuck companies to exploit me.
Not being on social media (except this one obviously, and generic messaging apps). Missed out on a lot of potential friendships because of not having insta, or snapchat, but it’s something I just can’t bring myself to do.
EDIT: I wish it was more normalised to share phone numbers instead. It doesn’t have to be reserved for dates ffs. However people of younger generations seem to think it’s weird or unnatural to ask for someone’s phone number etc. Either that or people just used Signal instead - no number required.
You’re not missing anything. Those platforms aren’t useful for talking to your friends anymore.
Digital privacy can often be a bitch. But I just turn every “why don’t you just use X” as a chance to proselytize for people to take back what privacy they can.
I’m sure, like when I do that, that they totally understand and love it. /s
Well they shouldn’t try and sell me on their privacy invasive bullshit if they don’t want to hear about my privacy respecting bullshit. They start it, you think I want to hear it any more than they do?
Not using or buying anything by
- Meta
- Amazon
- Apple
- Netflix
- Spotify
- X/Twitter
- Target
- Hobby Lobby
- Starbucks
- Chick-fil-a
It can sometimes be inconvenient. Mostly because friends and family still use them.
Pretty good list, but why Target? Do I need to add another to my list?
Target is under a national boycott because after George Floyd’s murder they made a big deal of increasing racially equality though a huge commitment hiring more black employees, selling goods from black-owned businesses and suppliers, and so on. The minute Trump got elected they canceled all of that and denounced “DEI”. They are the corporate poster-boy for throwing away values for MAGA, and drive the rest of the industry in the same direction with their example.
They’ve also allowed ICE to use at least one of their Minneapolis locations as a staging/preparation area for their kidnapping operations.
I ratted out the VP of the Utah chapter of Pride at Work for being an aggravated sexual abuser. I was inconvenienced because he kicked me out and then my life imploded.
I highly suggest reading my posts from the beginning if you want to see how much my principles have inconvenienced me.
It’s been “fun.”
I was working part time as a tutor in a community college. I had applied to work for AT&T or maybe Ameritech as a tech. It would’ve been a very good job, but I had to start training full time around late April or May. I had some students that were really relying on me to help them prepare for finals. I asked if they could put me in the next class, but they said now or never, so I told them I had to turn them down.
They gave no shits, of course, but it was a big deal to my students. And the school that was having trouble staffing math and electronics tutors. It changed the course of my life, but things turned out just fine, eventually.
I applied for a tech job with AT&T years ago. It was nuts. They had a big bunch of us meet at an office building for testing. Before we started the tests, this woman spoke to us, talking up the company, telling us how lucky we’d be to get a job there, etc. I think she’d brought a couple other people to tell us how great it was. Then she casually mentioned that they had a ridiculously high turnover rate because they fire people for just about anything, which is why they’re always hiring. If you’re late one day because you have a flat tire, or miss one day because you’re sick, even with a doctor’s note, you’re fired. The test was simple. I finished it quickly and got everything right, but when they emailed me to set up a second meeting, I just deleted it. No way would I want a job like that.
My parents were changing ISPs and we were told by the guys doing the connection that a cell phone number was necessary. We have been with this ISP a few times before and a cell was never required (we change when the other company has a sale).
I was the only one in the family with a cell at the time.
This happened a short time after I started degoogling so I had no problem saying no when someone asks me for personally identifiable information. I asked the tech “I just got home from work, what would you do if I wasn’t here?” and “Not everyone has a cell phone, you must have a procedure for those people” He seemed dumbfounded by my questions and refusal to hand over a cell number.
Bud kept insisting, I kept saying no. He caved and used Dad’s email address.
I don’t burn bridges with anyone. I grew up very isolated and alone and decided early in life to never be part of making people in my life feel that way.
I was the only one to visit my mom at the psych ward despite it being far and us not getting along.
I picked up an abusive ex from a date that had gone terribly wrong late at night.
I stayed on the phone with another toxic ex for a few hours as they nervously went home from a party in a bad area.
There’s lots more examples and it’s pretty much always a pain in the ass, but everyone should have someone to go to. I’m not necessarily nice or dishonest about my feelings, but I won’t leave people hanging.
Dude… you’re an angel. I do burn bridges because some people don’t add good things to my life and mental health. I can’t imagine having to talk to my bio father.
That’s genuinely a great way to live your life. I have some reevaluation do now. Thanks for the homework.
It’s really not a healthy way to live. Plenty of people have told me to cut back on it, including two therapists. I’ve kinda understood that view, but I get stuck at the question of who is worth being there for and who isn’t.
but I get stuck at the question of who is worth being there for and who isn’t.
I think YOU are worth being there for. If those interactions are taking a mental or emotional toll on you to have, then why are these abusive and toxic people from your past “worth it” and you aren’t?
If instead you can have these interactions totally detached from yourself and you are strong and confident mentally an emotionally where there is no cost to you, then I don’t see a problem with continuing.
Yeah, I get what you’re saying. My therapist has said something similar. That said, these things will never have no emotional toll. Nothing in life is free. To be totally detached isn’t being there for someone and that wouldn’t be the right way to handle these situations either.
I appreciate the advice and the time you spent on it, but I do what I do because it’s what the person I want to be would do. Until I don’t want to be the kind of person that cares about even the people that have done wrong by me, I’m gonna keep doing it. I still live my life, pursue my goals, and take care of myself. I just sacrifice a little energy and peace of mind for the people in my life that need it when they need it.
That said, these things will never have no emotional toll. Nothing in life is free. To be totally detached isn’t being there for someone and that wouldn’t be the right way to handle these situations either.
Let me try again to explain what I meant with my statement on detachment. Lets imagine two people:
- Person 1 - They are someone you have no history with, but you are pretty confident they are a regular well-adjusted person just going through life. They’re no hero, but also they are no villain. Lets say you know “of” them, but you don’t know their personality, history, goals, or life desires. Perhaps they are an acquaintance of someone you know.
- Person 2 - This person is from your past that you had a deeply involved relationship with. You trusted them and were vulnerable with them, and this person intentionally harmed you emotionally because it got them something they wanted or perhaps your pain just was amusing to them or made them feel powerful. They used you and threw you away when they were done with you.
Your phone rings, its one of these two people. You’ve expressed you like to help people out in a jam. The person is in a jam asking if you can come and pick them up and drive them to their place of employment:
-
If the caller is Person 1, then you are emotionally detached from them. You have only the slightest of history with them and no bad memories (or good for that matter) of interacting with them. They are totally benign to you emotionally. You’d grab your car keys and head out the door to pick up Person 1 and probably be thinking about what activities you’d be doing afterward or perhaps what you’re planning to have for dinner. There is no emotional cost to helping Person 1 out as you are emotionally detached from them. This is simply an errand no different than going out and picking up a loaf of bread from a grocery store or a bakery.
-
If the caller is Person 2, then you are very much emotionally entangled with them from your shared history and the pain they inflicted upon you. You run through mental scenarios about if this is an emotional trap of some kind. You work the mental angles to see how you need to protect yourself emotionally and physically. As you leave the house you mentally prepare yourself and armor yourself against what this person knows of your weaknesses. You drive there filled with anxiety and worry about how you might be hurt yet again by this person that has caused you so much pain. In the driver’s seat you’re reliving the horrible events from your shared past and feeling those negative hurtful emotions roll over you as though it is happening for the first time. Even if you complete the pickup and dropoff entirely uneventfully, you’re waiting for the other shoe to drop. You drive home worried if letting this hurtful person back into your life will mean more emotional pain in the days ahead. Even without any negative things happening during the drive when they were in your car, this has cost you greatly emotionally, and it can for days afterward.
You are NOT obligated to be a tool of help to those that have wronged you in the past. The world is filled with millions of other people that have done you no wrong. You yourself are worthy of caring. There are so many other people worthy of your attention and goodwill. Leave the toxic people to their toxic lives. They are not entitled to your generosity. If they ever were, they harmed you, and lost any sense of privilege to your kindness. You don’t have to be hateful to them, but you don’t need to continue to invite them into your life at the cost of yourself.
