# It Is Not -MY- Equipment That's The Problem **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [October 12, 2009, 7:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/it-is-not-my-equipment-thats-the-problem/513567 "2009-10-12T19:08:47Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 7\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Shot\_From\_Guns](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ccd318/32.png) [@Shot\_From\_Guns](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shot_From_Guns)\ **Post date:** [October 16, 2009, 4:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/it-is-not-my-equipment-thats-the-problem/513567/41 "2009-10-16T16:45:12Z")
> [@Lynn\_Bodoni](#): > > Yes, yes, it’s hard to find a job, we all know that. However, “the company makes me lie” holds just about as much water as “my commanding officer ordered me to (rape, torture, whatever) the enemy”, which is to say, none. And even if your personal morals are such that you are happy to lie in order to do your job, especially if lying makes it easier to do your job, you might consider this…a company which requires its employees to lie to its customers obviously has no ethics. What makes you think that they’ll be any more ethical in its duties to its workers? For a while, my mom was stuck in a job she hated, where her boss asked her to lie (to clients, about whether or not a shipment of the product was available, to cover up that the boss had screwed something up). Mom hated it, but she had a mortgage and two kids in private school, so the fast-food option some other person so glibly suggested wouldn’t exactly pay the bills. I’m glad there are so many people here who are fortunate enough to be able to choose their ethics over paying their bills, or have never been in that position, but I’m also seeing a lot of high horses. It’s very easy to talk about what choice you would make in a difficult situation that you’ve never been exposed to. And lying to a customer about the origin of a problem is so far down the continuum from raping, torturing, or murdering another human being that your post didn’t exactly gain any credibility that way. ---
**Author:** ![Lynn\_Bodoni](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/e47c2d/32.png) [@Lynn\_Bodoni](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lynn_Bodoni)\ **Post date:** [October 16, 2009, 5:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/it-is-not-my-equipment-thats-the-problem/513567/42 "2009-10-16T17:29:56Z")
> [@](#): > > It’s very easy to talk about what choice you would make in a difficult situation that you’ve never been exposed to. Been there, had to make the choice, yes. My daughter was getting tutored to help her overcome her dyslexia, which was expensive, time critical (she needed to get that tutoring and learn to cope before she could progress in school) and absolutely necessary. I still quit the telemarketing job when I found out how sleazy it was, and surprise! my promised bonuses just somehow evaporated. When talking to other workers, I found out that this company had a history of promising bonuses that never appeared. I tend to think of private schools as luxuries, not necessities. A fast food job usually won’t cover a mortgage, whether or not one is paying for private schools or not, but there ARE usually other jobs out there that won’t require a worker to attempt to bypass someone’s security. I have to wonder if this woman thought up this strategy all on her own, or whether she was instructed to do this sort of thing by her company, though. Lying about when a shipment is not the same as trying to get around security, unless the shipment is vital for life or health. And hating a job is pretty much normal. However, when a job consistently requires its workers to behave unethically, then the workers should quit, for their own sakes. For the record, and just to get on an even higher horse, I also refused to sell my cigarette and gas rations when my husband was in the Air Force and stationed in Spain. We were desperately poor at the time, and could have really used that money. ---
**Author:** ![Shot\_From\_Guns](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ccd318/32.png) [@Shot\_From\_Guns](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shot_From_Guns)\ **Post date:** [October 16, 2009, 7:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/it-is-not-my-equipment-thats-the-problem/513567/43 "2009-10-16T19:35:25Z")
> [@Lynn\_Bodoni](#): > > I tend to think of private schools as luxuries, not necessities. The Milwaukee Public School System is shitty as hell. Anybody who could possibly avoid it did. ---
**Author:** ![Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/left_hand_of_dorkness/32/7156_2.png) [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Left_Hand_of_Dorkness)\ **Post date:** [October 17, 2009, 3:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/it-is-not-my-equipment-thats-the-problem/513567/44 "2009-10-17T15:42:28Z")
> [@Roland\_Orzabal](#): > > **LHoD** , I was with you right up to the point where it became the fault of the final person you spoke with that you’d been lied to by the prior reps. From what I know of you from your posts, that doesn’t seem like you; had you perchance spoken with that particular person before? Well, that’s not quite right. The conversation went something like this: Phone Rep: Hi, we noticed that you recently switched service away from BellSouth, and we’d like you back. Me: No. PR: May I ask why? Me: Absolutely you may. (Long explanation of what happened from start to finish). PR: Oh, I’m so sorry, I feel so bad! (Sounds of copious weeping. Well, maybe not really, but at least a quaver in the voice). Me: I know it’s not your fault, you’re not the one who lied to me and whose incompetence meant we couldn’t post the pictures. But please mark in our file not to call us again: your company performed terribly here. **Shot From Guns** , if you live in a world in which the only way not to criticize someone for unethical behavior is to be willing to pay them not to be unethical, then you’re an idiot. ---
**Author:** ![Bruce\_Wayne](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/22d042/32.png) [@Bruce\_Wayne](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bruce_Wayne)\ **Post date:** [October 17, 2009, 4:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/it-is-not-my-equipment-thats-the-problem/513567/45 "2009-10-17T16:08:01Z")
> [@Harmonious\_Discord](#): > > Our telephone and internet was crap for a couple years. They kept switching the 4 wires from the service box to our house service box. You could barely hear the person on the other end over the loud hum. I would have to reset the internet equipment often enough at times that I installed a remote power switch so i could click it off and on. We finally got a guy that called in for a line replacement of our 40+ year old line to the house. Now the phone is good and so is the internet connection. It only took 2 years to get somebody to change the line, that went extremely bad every time the soil got wet. Thats bad, really bad. If I switch the wires once, a request for a new one gets put in. ---
**Author:** ![Shot\_From\_Guns](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ccd318/32.png) [@Shot\_From\_Guns](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shot_From_Guns)\ **Post date:** [October 19, 2009, 4:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/it-is-not-my-equipment-thats-the-problem/513567/46 "2009-10-19T16:20:51Z")
> [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](#): > > **Shot From Guns** , if you live in a world in which the only way not to criticize someone for unethical behavior is to be willing to pay them not to be unethical, then you’re an idiot. One may certainly **criticize** : one may not **abuse**. ---
**Author:** ![Godinama](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/e95f7d/32.png) [@Godinama](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Godinama)\ **Post date:** [October 20, 2009, 3:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/it-is-not-my-equipment-thats-the-problem/513567/47 "2009-10-20T03:40:06Z")
This thread is sadly lacking in erectile dysfunction. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/it-is-not-my-equipment-thats-the-problem/513567.md?page=2)