Cordell, Arthur: ECOM wrote:
Freud is reported to have "sometimes a cigar is also just a cigar"
Perhaps the paper towels are not a result of anger or rage at the system, but
just someone in haste or perhaps someone who is a slob.
This is kind of a "projective test", for, as Freud also said (paraphrase):
Diagnosis is not possible "beyond the basic rule", i.e., one cannot
be confident of a person's motivations unless one can get them
to free-associate on the [Freudian] couch.
Slob is a possibility, but there must either be several of
them or the one and only must be quite persistently so. (And remember:
we're talking about a company *full* of persons with advanced degrees here,
many even from other countries where courtesy is
far more valued than "here!)
I guess haste is also possible. but I would expect haste to
result in a wider "scatter pattern", including
"misses" *inside* the restroom.
I really do think [self-]importance is the most probably answer,
including the variant where the persons is "above" noticing
what they are doing. A question here is: Does the person
throw the used paper towel on the floor "for its own sake",
or *to win esteem in the eyes of his peers*? The latter
is probably the more disturbing possibility of the two,
since [at least I hypothesize:} human beings
become dumber as their number grows, so that
a person who throws their trash on the floor out of
personal self-importance is less a threat than a person
who does it "infectiously" for others to see and
emulate and then, by mirroring, to reinfect himself....
This is "a small thing", but then janitors are
"small" [metaphorically, of course, not
necessarily volumetrically!], too, aren't they?
I think it is very sad. I am often tempted to put a trash
can there, but I have so far resisted this action, because --
fasten your seatbelt, folks! -- I have not placed
a trash can in the vestibule for fear that
I would be fired for it!
\brad mccormick
arthur
-----Original Message-----
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
[mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Behalf Of Brad McCormick,
Ed.D.
Sent: Sunday, May 22, 2005 3:05 PM
To: [email protected]
Subject: [Futurework] The banality of evil in the white-collar workplace
Today I documented something that continues to
annoy me at work (silly me!), because I take it
as "symbolic". I turned it into a web page:
http://www.cloud9.net/~bradmcc/GO/mensRoom.html
I simply cannot believe that every day some poor "grunt"
(programmer, technician...) gets dumped on so badly that
he feels he has to kick this particular cat -- although
I'm also pretty sure that does happen on occasion.
Different angle: Architects design persons' lives [or at least
the "flow" which the users of a building go "with" or
"against"]. I wonder
if the architect who designed this particular banal office building
thought of this option which the vestibule to the men's room would
facilitate?
\brad mccormick
--
Let your light so shine before men,
that they may see your good works.... (Matt 5:16)
Prove all things; hold fast that which is good. (1 Thes 5:21)
<![%THINK;[SGML+APL]]> Brad McCormick, Ed.D. / [EMAIL PROTECTED]
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Visit my website ==> http://www.users.cloud9.net/~bradmcc/
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