Im not an overy rebellious type by any means, but at times a particular situation can seem so assinine that the best response to out-stupid it. Anyway, here’s my latest.
One evening about a month ago my wife and I headed to the hospital where she works. I had an interview for a part-time job. She was going along for the ride and to show me the quickest way to get where I needed to be. Apparently hospital policy for after hours is to have everyone sign in and get a visitor badge/sticker. :rolleyes:
We did a quick sidestep and started to bypass the hall monitor but she called out that she had a name sticker for us.
“No thanks” Thought that would stump her.
Didn’t work though, she insisted we sign in. I signed as Joseph Smith*, and dropped the sticker in the the trash around the corner. I live on the edge, I know.
Well I would say you didnt do much in terms of “civil disobedience” Still I know the feeling.
Try for example “scaring” a policeman into not giving you a ticket because your “someone important”. Or having someone take a university language test in your place since you dont know enough french to pass.
Why do you characterize this as “civil disobedience” as if you’re stopping a tank at Tiananmen Square? You were just being a fairly obnoxious ass to a person trying to do their little job and your wife was foolishly aiding you in this pursuit.
I’m with you, astro. Obnoxiousness. Thes days, what passes for civil disobedience would make Thoreau turn in his grave. Maybe it’s just that we are too complacent as people these days and deserve whatever happens to us (myself included), so we get our jollies by being obnoxious to people who are just trying to do their jobs. “THERE!!! I showed that lower-level functionary who’s the boss around here, by gum! Aren’t you proud of me, honey?”
Try talking to a Wal-Mart employee about unions, though, and see what happens to you. I guarantee if you talk long enough, a Manager will ask you to leave the store. Come back the next day, and do it all over again.
And as for the OP: “Out-stupiding” something is not civil disobedience. It’s just being stupider that the person or thing you think is so stupid, and that’s just stupid.
Mr Babbington, try McDonald’s… they’re as bad or worse than Wal-Mart. The one (Canadian, i think) McD’s that almost successfully unionized was immediately shut down. Info from Fast Food Nation.
Poor word choice maybe. I certainly did not try to pass this off as striking any great blow for liberty.
Taxguy I got an offer. :rolleyes:
Mr. Babbington I preferred to think of it as making a point. If the purpose of this rule was security, a sign in sheet and a visitor sticker is laughable at best.
Obviously the first step towards total fascism. Resist, resist. Visitor badges are signs of the lumpen proletariat. Obviously, all hospitals should be outlawed as being lackeys of the ruling class. Let’s get rid of the patients too, since with no hospitals we wouldn’t be able to take care of them anyway. I’m all over this civil disobedience shit. Next time I go to Starbucks, I’m going to jump line. Keep the faith, baby.
Man, I deal with Air Freight for a living. Air Freight is cargo that gets shipped on Airplanes, sometimes on planes that have passengers. If anyone knows about silly security measures, it’s me. The only thing that cargo has to do to get on a plane is have a little piece of paper that says that the company that shipped it is registered with the U.S. Government. That’s SILLY. But do I make a point of not sending my stuff without the silly “bomb sheet?” No, I do not. Because that would be stupid.
So call your thread “Your Experience With Making A Point,” not, “Your Experience With Civil Disobedience.”
It’s true that signing into places is totally pointless. Indeed, most of the security stuff we got through is 100% useless stuff done just to give the public the appearance that people are trying. But that’s still not civil disobedience. Astro’s right about that.
I’ve been to my share of protests… my first act of civil disobedience was protesting my high school’s new hat policy (that is, a no-hat policy) as a freshman. I put one on after lunch, was told I’d be marked absent from one class if I refused to remove it (I didn’t, and had a LOT of fun answering every question the teacher asked in an effort to demonstrate the silliness of her marking me absent when I obviously wasn’t). I got sent to the principal’s office the next period - the teacher wasn’t mad, he was following the rule and probably knew it would help me make my point. Hell, I wasn’t even smart enough to think of that.
I did remove it after I spoke to the principal, there was nothing else to do. I did see that there was a list of other students who’d been sent there for the same reason that day. I was #4. It was planned as a big protest, and then a bunch of the seniors who came up with the idea remembered they had tests that day.
There was revolution in the air, my friend. At my high school we struck and actually picketed to get the cafeteria to remove the mint jelly from the dessert pears. We had a consensus of opinion. We all hated it. We were outraged. It was 1971 so we took our grievance to the streets and won one for the people. Sort of.
They took the icky green stuff off for a week and then everything returned to the status quo. A valuable life lesson, I though.
Still I know the feeling.
