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no_hypocrisy

no_hypocrisy's Journal
no_hypocrisy's Journal
October 22, 2022

Some workers don't "get it".

I've been musing about my late father.

His ultimate and last career was a medical doctor. Nothing wrong with that. (My best guess is that he decided to find a vocation where he could always be the boss and would avoid the risk of termination by another. Small business owner as well as physician.)

And he was fair to his employees at his medical office (office manager, x-ray tech, lab tech, nurses, patient assistants).

But he exuded an attitude of privilege that reflected his general disdain for employees. Specifically I mean that he had no sympathy for unions, for strikes, for collective bargaining, organizing. To him, it was akin to socialism, even communism (if he even understood the difference).

My father was a worker twice, perhaps three times, in his life before medical school. He was a chemist at a cement factory. He was an usher in a movie theater (where he say "Gone With The Wind" about 40 times). If you count the Army, that's three times. (As to the latter, he decided that being a grunt Private was not for him and hastened promotions to get out of that status.)

Having the experience of holding a job vicariously to the whim of one's employer, not making enough money to survive, making one's life dependent on one's employment, I can't understand how a person can turn his/her back on his/her experience and resent when one's former peers request then demand better working conditions, more security, more money for a decent lifestyle.

I can understand how Bush Jr., TFG, Trump Jr., Ivanka, Eric, etc. have their extraordinary sense of privilege. They were born into it and know no other way of life.

But my father, I just don't get it.

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