I’m a business consultant and I meet a lot of different types of people. I’m well aware of topics I shouldn’t talk about with clients like religion and politics. And I know there are certain words or terms I can’t utter simply because I don’t want to get fired or sued. Keeping my mouth shut isn’t easy for a guy like me, but I’ve managed to do it for 15 years now.
Then there was today…
I was talking to a manager from my own company. He works in another division so I don’t see him very often. We were talking about how difficult it was to get the company health plan to pay certain bills. They make you call this number, then that number, then send this form in, then that form in. Then, just when you think they’ll pay, POOF, they loose your claim and you’re back to chasing them around again.
I said it’s like chasing Lucky for his bowl of Lucky Charms.
That pissed him off. It was a pleasant conversation until I said that. It seems 300 years ago his ancestors came to America from Ireland, and me making a comment about a kids cereal commercial which contains a leprechaun is a slur about Irish people and is no different than calling a black person a you know what and so on. I said all that?
Leprechauns are mythical beings. What’s next? Am I going to offend someones ancestory by saying something about unicorns? If I say something about Santa Clause am I offending people who live at/near the North Pole?
If someone says they want to hear from the “Peanut Gallary” should I get pissed because I have red hair and they are making a slur against red heads by mentioning something from the Howdy Doody show? How far is this political correctness crap going to go? Is Lucky Charms cereal going to be banned? How about Irish Spring Soap? It’s not like I said “getting the insurance to pay is like trying to pry a whiskey bottle from a dirty mick”. About 8 years ago I got halled out on the rug because I said to my then supervisor that my company car was making a queer noise. He went nuts and wrote me up because I used the word queer (no shit! I am not making this up! This company is run by a bunch of over sensitive idiot liberals!:mad: ) By the way, that supervisor left the company to start his own consulting firm and he failed! He’s flat bankrupt broke now!
Anyway, after todays incident I told Mr. McSensitive that I was sorry if I offended him and didn’t mean anything by it, then I walked away while he was in mid sentence. This nit picking stuff really pisses me off. I wanted to come home and eat a big bowl of Lucky Charms, but that stuff even made me puke as a kid. Can’t stand marshmellows you know.
Who knows what the guy watches. Probably the Lifetime channel.
This is kind of hard to explain but, even though he is A manager, he is not really MY manager. He works for the same company as I, but in another division which is totally seperate from the division I work for. So, even though he is 2 ranks above me, I’m not exactly sure I could call him my boss because he is in no position to give me orders or assignments or anything like that, yet he is still ahead of me in title. Clear as mud, right? Aren’t huge, faceless corporations fun?:rolleyes:
As well you should have been! We from the GLBT Agenda, Cabal, and Circuit Party Commission will not stand for anyone using the word “queer” under any circumstances. The correct expression is “it was making a homosexual noise” or “a gay noise”, or “a lesbian noise” if your car is female.
You ought to be slapped, sir. And woe to you if you ever use the word “niggardly…”
Ok - I was going to give you a chance to explain the comment but now I just can’t stop thinking about it. So here is my ASSUMPTION of what I think you meant. Please correct me if I’m wrong. I realize that you actually have no idea what this man watches on tv so…
If a man does indeed watch Lifetime - television for women - that implies that he is gay. (The way you said it implied that you think this is a bad thing?)
and/or
anyone who watches Lifetime - telivision for women - is somehow inferior to those who don’t, that the channel has no substantial qualities and therefore is worthless.
Well, Lifetime is the channel for women (they even say it is) and it’s crammed with shows about sensitive issues. My wife watches it all the time but I find most of the programs annoying.
No, no, no. Who said anything about being “gay”? I’m talking about the over sensitivity of some of the characters on some of the shows on that channel. Of course, I’ve only seen the channel in the background while my so was watching, so maybe I’m wrong about it being crammed with shows about sensitive issues. Just the few I’ve seen were.
This guy is not gay. He’s quite the opposite. He likes the ladies.
Quite trying to make it seem like I’m ranting about an issue (this time homosexuality) when I am not.
You can feel free to let him know that his claiming the right to speak for the Irish just because his ancestors were here 300 years ago would be considered just as offensive here as your leprechaun comment. Probably more so, in fact.
As a fellow Irishman, well, half anyways, I am stunned and humiliated by that remark! It’s because of people like you that everyone asks me if I’m related to Lucky, or if I know where the pot o’ gold is. I would like to wear a green tuxedo but I can’t do it because of the stigma. The nerve of this country turning Ireland’s national icon into a silly cartoon character! I will never get a promotion at my work because I’m stereotyped as a guy who lures little kids around in a wild goose chase, letting them starve to death when I could easily give them a small bowl of something so magically delicious.
And take your fooking hands off me whiskey bottle ya bastard!
I’m a chick and I can’t stand Lifetime channel either. It is a venue for bad recycled t.v. movies of the week. (Which begs the question: are there any GOOD t.v. movies of the week?)
Let the flaming begin.
As far as the Lucky Charms comment goes, I’d say your boss is one marshmallow short of a rainbow.
I’m upset because my ancestors came here from Wales and no one ever makes fun of us, or has ridiculous stereotypes, or mocks our accent. It’s like we don’t exist! You’ve got your drunken, brawling Micks; your penny-pinching, kilt-wearing Scots; your cockney street urchin English; but not a word about the Welsh!Everyone in the UK but the Welsh. Aaargh!
Back to the OP, pk, anyone that would get offended by a remark that innocuous would be too thin-skinned for me to have any further conversations with.
I’m with Esprix on this one. It comes down to a matter of common courtesy.
“Politically correct” started out 20-some years ago as an in-joke among lefties…I remember a fellow jeune Marxiste during my college days winking and saying “I really hate doing this, but it’s politically correct.”
Somewhere during Reagan’s first term the right wing snatched it up and started using it as a term of ridicule which would incidentally allow them to dismiss any more Earl Butz/James Watt-type public embarrassments.
In the best of all possible Republican worlds, I would be free to buttonhole Cornel West at a cocktail party and offer him a slice of watermelon if he taught me some new tap-dancing moves…and if he protested, I could scream that he was forcing me to be politically correct.
Here, August, you leek-sniffing Welsh scumbag, for your pleasure…
“The Welsh character is an interesting study,” said Dr. Fagan. "…the ignorant speak of them as Celts, which is of course wholly erroneous. They are of pure Iberian stock – the aboriginal inhabitants of Europe who survive only in Portugal and the Basque district. Celts readily intermarry with their neighbours and absorb them. From the earliest times the Welsh have been looked upon as an unclean people. It is thus they have preserved their racial integrity. Their sons and daughters rarely mate with humankind except their own blood relations. In Wales there was no need for legislation to prevent the conquering people intermarrying with the conquered. In Ireland that was necessary, for their intermarriage was a political matter. In Wales it was moral…
“The Welsh,” the doctor continued, “are the only nation in the world that has produced no graphic or plastic art, no architecture, no drama. They just sing,” he said with disgust, “sing and blow down wind instruments of plated silver. They are deceitful because they cannot discern truth from falsehood, depraved because they cannot discern the consequences of their indulgence. Let us consider,” he continued, “the etymological derivations of the Welsh language…” But here he was interrupted.
– from the novel Decline and Fall (1928) by Evelyn Waugh.
Who was it that called Lifetime the “Meredith Baxter-getting-the-crap-beat-out-of-her” network? I haven’t had cable for a few years but I seem to remember lots of movies about domestic violence, reruns of Designing Women, and screen gems such as “Baby Monitor: Sounds of Fear” and “A Movie About a Book That Oprah Liked.”
Everyone stop picking on pkbites for picking on Lifetime. He really meant that this guy frequents http://www.susanjeffers.com (warning, have a plastic-lined trash receptacle within easy gagging distance if you actually view this site).
pkbites, your “manager” or whatever his bullshit title is (a friend of mine worked for a shipping company and told everyone his title was “Receiving Head”) is a dumbass. I don’t understand people who LOOK for things to feel overly sensitive about. I think you should (anonymously) fill his office with every tacky sparkly St. Paddy’s day party decoration you can find, and sign him up for some service where he receives a case of Irish Spring every week. Invite Michael Flatley (Lord of the Dance) to come and Riverdance all over his front lawn. Shower him in every imported Irish cliche. Oh, and do it a year from now, so he won’t connect the dots. Revenge is best served cold.
So, we’re the original hillbillies.A bunch of dirty, inbred, singing liars that blow plated silver wind instruments. Thank you, Ike, you’ve brought a grateful tear to this old leek-sniffer’s eye.
