The Modern Fool

Although most often associated with English courts of Medieval and Renaissance times, the Court Jester has actually appeared throughout history as an important member of Royal Courts around the world.  Jesters came in two flavors, the "natural fool" and the "licensed fool".  The natural fool appears to have been pure entertainment for the court, and was often afflicted with some type of mental or physical disability.  (This period of history was not known for its political correctness!)  The licensed fool was a completely different case.  Their job was to be critical of the Monarch and the Court - often using fairly severe ridicule to make his point.  Court Jesters were given great latitude by their Monarch, allowing them to say things that no other member of the Court would dare to say.  They often made enemies of powerful members of the Court, but as long as they were favored by the Monarch, they were safe.  For example, a story is told of a Persian Fool who, when the Shah asked whether there was a shortage of food, said: "Yes, I see your Majesty is eating only 5 times a day."   Fools were also often responsible for telling the Monarch bad news.  When the French fleet was destroyed by the English Navy in the Battle of Sluys, the French Jester told King Philipe VI that the English Sailors "don't even have the guts to jump into the water like our brave French."

I believe the modern corporation has revived the ancient tradition of the Court Jester.  The modern Court Jester is now known as the advisory business consultant.  The business consultant is now a fixture in the boardrooms of many powerful CEOs and corporate elite.  You have probably seen them - they hover near the seat of power, acting as personal advisors and confidants to their corporate monarch.  Just like the Fools of Olde England, the business consultant is often the only member of the executive team that can truly be openly critical of anyone or any idea without fear of repercussions.  As long as they are favored by their benefactor, they can wield enormous power, and they may have more direct access to the top decision maker than any other member of the executive team.  Very few people outside of the top corporate tier are even aware of the business consultant, let alone the influence they carry.  They are paid to stay behind the throne, and they are often very good at working from the shadows.

From where I'm sitting, that sounds like a pretty sweet gig.  Sure, your picture isn't going to be displayed in the company's annual report - but in many companies, you may enjoy a much longer tenure than the majority of the senior leadership team.  But more importantly, the business consultant enjoys a freedom of thought and action that is found nowhere else in the corporation.  In most corporations today, it seems that to get to the big table, one of the most important skills is the ability to interpret, process and respond in veiled and encrypted corpspeak.  No one speaks their mind and everything that is said must be instantly and carefully analyzed for hidden maneuverings that may result in a loss of status among your peers.  This seems to go beyond mere "politics" - it seems to have risen to the level of a TV drama - every week there is a new crisis, and alliances shift every 10 minutes.

Only the business consultant seems to be above the daily fray.  It's not that they are unaware of the nonsense - they are absolutely listening to, and understanding, the corpspeak debates - it's just that they are much more likely to cut through the BS and say what really needed to be said without trying to hide it within multiple layers of personal ladder-climbing moves.

I find this a curious example of human behavior - and I also find it fascinating that this type of behavior has been present within groups of powerful human beings for thousands of years.  What is it about the human condition that causes this model to so often be repeated?  It baffles me why a corporate president would populate the executive offices with the best minds they can find - and then still feel the need to hire an external consultant as a "trusted advisor".

I suppose it is possible that the executive business consultant is simply another status symbol - like the corner office, the first class travel and the $1000 designer shoes - all the cool kids have at least one.  If that is the primary purpose, that's very disturbing.  These same leadership teams are downsizing employees, shrinking benefits and requiring employees to take unpaid days off to meet analyst estimates - and yet they are paying a business consultant an amount equal to the salary of 3 or 4 employees.

Another explanation is that the use of consultants may be seen by the executive team as a way to reduce personal risk.  When a decision goes bad, it at least gives the president a way to deflect some of the blame - "Hey, I was advised by the best consultant in the industry and we did everything they said to do.  No one could have known this was a bad idea."  Of course, the consultant will be fired, but the president might survive.

I know this sounds cynical - and (of course) no executive would ever admit to these reasons - but I think they make about as much sense as having a roomful of bajillion dollar senior executives that need a consultant to tell them how to run their own company.  At least the medieval courts had an excuse - the royalty was composed of Lords & Ladies that inherited their posts, and eventually, the royal gene pool started getting pretty shallow.  As far as I know, inbreeding isn't typically a problem in corporate boardrooms - yet...

The Big Lie

Is honesty a dead concept inside corporations?  Why do managers lie to their employees?  Is it all just to protect the company against litigation?  "Open and honest feedback" is a catch phrase in the majority of corporate statements on ethics and values - but I believe the reality is that the vast majority of corporate leaders refuse to give *any* feedback - and when they do - it will be (at best) corp-speak: legally blessed yet completely meaningless.  At worst, it will be a complete fabrication - a lie to satisfy the employee and make them shut-up and get out of their office.

I recently read a blog (sorry - I didn't save the link) by an HR recruiter that said that the primary reason many companies do not provide feedback to job candidates is that often that feedback simply starts an argument with the job candidate and leads to job candidates responding with an abusive reply.  I'm sure that's true - especially when the interview was as ridiculous as some of the interviews I have been on - and you then find out that it was a waste of time because they promoted an internal candidate or they give you a BS reason that is an obvious brush off.  Of course, some candidates are also just jerks - and they would blast back at any failure to be hired.

However, is that really a good excuse for a company not living by their own corporate values?  Perhaps they should change the corporate values to say "Open and honest communication, when it is convenient and doesn't lead to conflict."  In addition, even a system generated "thank you for applying, however you have not been selected for this role" is FAR better than simply providing nothing back to the candidate.  How rude do you have to be to invite a candidate in for a face-to-face interview, then simply never respond to the candidates phone calls or emails asking for a status?  Are you really that busy, or do you simply have so little thought for another human being?  I suspect the latter - because job candidates are not really people - they are just resumes or names in a database.

Of course, it's not just the recruiting process where honesty is dead.  Lack of honest communication runs rampant through organizations.  I pity the poor employee who actually believes the senior executive when they give the "I have an open door policy" speech.  The typical senior executive wants to hear only "It's done" from their employees.  If you are part of the inner circle of a corporate leader, you can see the planning that goes into the half-truths, misdirection and spin-doctoring at the top - of course, you won't see the planning that goes into the spin applied to *you*...

The typical justification for not being honest when speaking to employees is that managers "must do what's in the best interest of the company."  If they actually told the employees that they will all be replaced within a year with lower cost offshore contractors, the employees would all bail and the corporation would grind to a halt.  So, the managers lie.  They say that the future looks bright.  They say that you are a key member of the team that will lead the company into the future.  They say that there are no plans to cut staff.  They say these things at the same time they are working with HR to eliminate your position, meeting with candidates to "upgrade" you for another resource and/or working with offshore staffing firms to move your job to Bangalore, Bucharest or Shenzhen.

Once upon a time, when a company wanted to use a different technology, the project would include training for the existing IT staff so that they would be able to work with and support the new technology.  Now, the existing staff is simply replaced with new resources already trained in the new technology.  If there are still older legacy systems that also need to be supported, contractors are hired until those systems can be replaced.  The IT staff is rotated with the systems, and since the typical life of an IT system is 3-5 years, that is also the maximum time you can expect to keep your corporate IT job.

OK - so looking at this from the CEO's position, what's wrong with this scenario?  He's getting the best IT resources for the lowest cost, and he doesn't have to continuously spend money to train his internal staff.  After all, once they are trained, they might just leave the company for another gig anyway.

I see several issues with this short-sighted strategy:

1. No functional business knowledge continuity - It is tempting to believe that the tech geeks in your IT department don't need to understand how your business operates.  That is dead wrong.  The more the technical staff knows about how the business operates, the better your systems will match your true business requirements.  Translating functional business requirements into technical system designs is the absolute key to any successful technology project.  It is the difference between happy & efficient users, and an expensive pile of useless HW & SW.  Fail to recognize this at your peril.

2. Failure to form a Business-IT partnership - If you have fallen into the fallacy of believing your IT staff doesn't need to understand your business, then it must follow that you believe all business knowledge must come from the business users.  Congratulations, what you have just established is the typical Business vs IT organization where neither understands the other's world, and the business sees IT as simply a group of techies that need to be told what to do.  Conversely, IT sees the business as demanding technophobes that have no clue what they are asking IT to build.  There can be no partnership without understanding, and there can be no understanding without knowledge being shared in both directions.  This requires the ability to build long-term relationships at the employee level - not just at the executive table.

3. Lack of Innovation - It's all well and good to hold the CIO responsible for the long-range IT strategic vision - that's his job.  However, the CIO often does not see the day-to-day technical challenges that are faced by his staff.  It is very common for these daily challenges to drive ideas for improvements in processes and systems that represent the source of innovation within the IT department.  If your staff is composed of specialists in your current technology and augmented with low-cost contractors, you may very well have limited the amount of innovation that will be generated by your staff.  An employee looking at a maximum of a 3-5 year gig has very little incentive to maximize efficiency - particularly if that efficiency means a new technology that will ultimately result in them being replaced with another specialist.

4. No commitment - You are simply fooling yourself if you think your employees are unaware that a new technology means the end of their job.  They absolutely do know - they know because they are not receiving training on the new system, and their role on the implementation project is limited to "data conversion and migration" or "legacy system interfaces".  It will only be a personal desire to do good work that will keep your staff motivated.  You haven't earned their commitment and, quite frankly, you don't deserve it.  You will blame your project manager and the project team for not hitting their milestones - but really, you should be looking in the mirror to see who is to blame.

I'm not an executive (clearly!) but to me, the possible gains from this type of short-term thinking does not seem worth it.  Not when very expensive, business critical systems and projects are on the line.

There is another solution - don't lie to your employees.  If you believe a new system will mean an employee will be replaced, then be honest with them.  Tell them the end date, and give them an incentive package to stick around and hit that date.  The money is a pittance compared to failing to complete the new project.  Companies want it all - they want their employees to be happy little trolls toiling away in the salt mines, and they also want the ability to sweep them to the gutter when they aren't needed any longer.  But it won't work. Even the flying monkeys knew she was an evil witch.

    
  

Corporate Role: Henchman, Evil Sidekick

I often place people I meet into stereotypical fictional roles.  Many fictional authors keep their characters in these roles because it is very easy for the readers to identify the role and build out the rest of the character's personality in their minds without requiring the author to explain why the character made every decision or took every action.  If a character is identified as the evil stepmother, then it's no surprise to anyone that she hates the beautiful stepdaughter.  Of course, the real world is not supposed to work this way.  Real people are all complex beings capable of a wide range of thought, action and personality.  Or are they?

My own character seems to shift - some days I'm the noble but generally ineffective Tonto from the Lone Ranger, sometimes I'm the well-meaning but bumbling Dr. Watson from Sherlock Holmes and other days I am definitely a "Red Shirt" on a Star Trek Away Team waiting to be blasted to smithereens or turned into a block of salt by an alien.  I'm rarely the Hero or the Villain - generally I'm a supporting member of the cast.  In the past, being the trusty sidekick has generally been a good gig - yeah, I get knocked on the head or shot in the leg, but usually, I'm soon ready for the next adventure - and it's much better to be a sidekick than a faceless member of the crowd or an evil henchman.  As the baby mastodon living under Fred Flintstone's sink would say, "it's a living."

However, I have recently run into people in the workplace that are most definitely occupying the role of Evil Sidekick - and they seem to be doing it with glee and gusto - and they are thriving in their villainous role.  These folks are not just aggressive personalities or bullies - they really do believe they need to hold everyone around them down, destroy anyone who disagrees with them and that any aggressive action they take against co-workers is justified and sanctioned by their bosses.

I find this perplexing.  We live in an age of political correctness, corp-speak and brand protection uber alles - and yet - corporate leaders allow and encourage the Evil Sidekick to disrupt business processes, sabotage projects, assassinate peers and work completely outside the "open and honest" communication channels that the rest of the employees are required to follow.  Why?  The typical answer whispered in closed door discussions when the Evil Sidekick is not around is:  "because the CEO/President/C-level VP likes him and wants him to question and challenge the status quo."  Hmm - I have many problems with this explanation.

1. Why does the current corporate culture require an Evil Sidekick to question and challenge the status quo?  In a healthy organization, shouldn't ANY employee be able to challenge the current processes?
   
2. Since the Evil Sidekick disrupts and destroys all ideas and processes he does not control, how do you know the results obtained by the Evil Sidekick really are better than a collaborative approach?
   
3. Once the Evil Sidekick has destroyed all his peers and demoralized his underlings - then what?  Where does the Evil Sidekick fit in your long-range vision of a successful company?

I want to make it clear that an Evil Sidekick is NOT the same as a Court Jester.  The Court Jester had an important job - he was an advisor to the Crown to prevent the Court from becoming a group of yes-men.  That doesn't mean the Court Jester is allowed to assassinate the rest of the Court - if he tries - then the Court Jester has become the Evil Villain or the Evil Sidekick.

I suppose one reason the CEO/President/VP allows the Evil Sidekick to run unchecked is because the CEO/President/VP is (of course) NEVER the target of the Evil Sidekick.  He/She is Evil, not stupid!  If anyone complains about the Evil Sidekick, the CEO/President/VP just assumes the complainer is a weak whiner.  The fact that at the same time the Evil Sidekick is whispering in the King's ear that the complainer *is* a weak whiner also doesn't hurt.

The Evil Sidekick is poison to a corporation.  In my humble opinion, a smart business leader does not allow the Evil Sidekick to exist in their organization.  No matter how great a superstar you believe them to be, one employee can never produce enough to equal the harm done by tearing down everyone around them.  They are NOT providing healthy, constructive debate - they are simply jerks.  Excise them from the organization like the cancerous tumor they are!

    

What Happened To The 70's?

The completely laid-back teens from the 70's are now running our corporations with an iron fist. What happened to them? Why are they now overly-sensitive to ANY voices that do not march in lockstep with the drumbeat of the corporate galley-slave task masters?

I was a teenager in the 1970s - and the '70s were a time of great contrasts - it was after the drug heyday of the 1960s, yet my high school was full of stoners who got high at lunch - and drug use by high school kids was significantly higher in 1977 than it was in 1967. Being "born again" was the backlash away from the free love generation, and yet in 1975 the incidence of Gonorrhea was 3X higher than in 1965. The 1960s might have taught everyone how to do it, but in the 1970's more of us actually did it. The 1970s gave us Debbie Gibson, Andy Gibb and the Bee Gees, and it also gave us Van Halen, Ted Nugent and Kiss. It was a strange and confusing time to be a teen - but it was also considered relatively stable compared to the turbulent social upheaval of the 1960s and the worldwide economic and political changes of the 1980s.

The teens of the 1970s went on to create Microsoft, Apple & Dell and we also built the Space Shuttle. They powered the economy that destroyed the Soviet Union and tore down the Berlin Wall. In the 1990s, they were the middle managers who created the internet and drove the dot-com explosion. And now, they are the senior executives who run companies with an iron fist - controlling how their employees dress, speak, act and use the very technologies they helped to create. What the hell happened to them? How did they go from smoking pot, listening to Ted Nugent and having sex in their Camaro's (well, probably not Bill, but other kids were!) to now ordering the monitoring of their employee's email messages & Facebook posts, and purging anyone who does not march to the beat of their Armani-suited corporate drum?

I am very worried about the state of our corporate environment. The college graduates entering the corporate world today must be prepared to suppress their individuality for the sake of the corporate brand they now represent. They will be told that protecting the brand is their most important job - more important than any personal belief or idea they may have. Oh, the orders will be shrouded in corp-speak and called an "Employee Handbook", "Statement of Values" or "Social Responsibility" - but make no mistake, the primary purpose for them is NOT to protect the employees - it is to protect the brand FROM the actions of their employees.

Conform or die.

If we quash all individuality and self-expression, we also eliminate creativity and innovation. And that's what has me so confused. Why can't today's senior executives see the danger? Is it as

simple as the old "absolute power corrupts absolutely" adage? Have they really completely forgotten what it was like before they got their preferred parking spot and corporate credit cards? I do NOT believe that only the uptight do-gooders from high school ended up running corporations. That just isn't the way the world works!

Some of you might recognize this situation - it seems to be very similar to the early 1960s, when corporations hired the Mad Men to make sure their brand was seen only as the corporation wished it to be seen. Of course, it was easier then - there was no internet, no blogs and no youtube that could instantly give anyone's words a worldwide audience. Control the media ads, and you controlled the hearts and minds of the entire world. Unfortunately for the corporations and the Mad Men, the early 1960s turned into the late 1960s - and the corporations became "The Establishment" - hated and shunned by an entire generation.

Is that where we are headed? Another social revolution? It is undeniably true that societal and cultural norms rarely stay constant for very long. We move in cycles - just as the conservatism of the Victorian age led to the Roaring '20s, and the stability of the 50's Happy Days led to the riots and protests of the 60's. I really have no idea what is coming - but I do think we're approaching an inflection point where something will change. Happiness in our jobs and careers is becoming a scarce commodity. We're working harder and longer than at any time since the sweat shops of the industrial revolution gave rise to the labor movements, unions and communism.

I know this sounds very maudlin. It is meant to portray my frustration at the fear & inequality

the average corporate employee (AKA drone)

must currently endure. It appears the old counterbalances of labor unions and entrepreneurial opportunities are weak and no longer effective at limiting the barely legal abuses of the corporate overlords. I'm certainly NOT advocating a return to a time when the unions held huge amounts of power that caused ridiculous inefficiencies in businesses. I believe an employee *should* be paid based on their skill and performance - not only on their years of service or payment of union dues. HOWEVER - when the corporate environment is built to provide all benefits to the top leadership at the expense of their employees, I call BS. That is theft - theft of the employee's skill and hard work without the compensation of job satisfaction and a career path for the employee.

There's no easy answers for this one. The corporate masters will continue to tell their serfs that they should be happy to have any jobs in this time of economic upheaval - and then they will drive home in the Mercedes, Porsches and Maseratis that they bought with their $6 million/year total compensation packages. Meanwhile, their employees are reading the latest email from the CEO telling them that in order for the company to make their forecasts, the employees will have a choice of using 5 days of vacation this month or taking 5 days of unpaid leave.

Let me know when the next generation takes over as our corporate leaders. Maybe the teens from the 80's will do a better job. Then again, maybe not...

The Church Of The Corporate Ladder

It's time to take the gloves off. At the request of a few friends who shall remain nameless (cough *gutless* cough) this diatribe is going to be a bit edgy and address one of the verboten subjects of polite conversations - religion. (pause for collective gasp from the blogosphere) No, I'm not going to debate the relative merits of snake-handling versus self-mortification, I want to talk about the hypocrisy of devout religious zealots who also happen to be part of corporate leadership.

So, first, I'll apologize - if you are a very religious person, you may find some of my comments offensive. Please recognize that I'm not attacking your religion - I am attacking the hypocrites who proudly proclaim their religious beliefs, but are also willing to take out anyone by any means necessary to further their own corporate careers. I freely admit that I am NOT a religious person - 8 years of parochial school saw to that - but I hold no animosity towards anyone who actually lives the teachings of their chosen religion. However, if you are just a wolf using your religion to ambush your opponents - then I suspect your God has a special section of the everlasting fire waiting for your @ss.

Religious corporate leaders really are a strange bunch. I have a hard time understanding how plotting and scheming the downfall of your opponents and your own rise up the corporate ladder fits in with God's divine plan. I absolutely understand how it might fit with the person's master plan. Let's look at the advantages the outwardly religious person might have in the corporate game.

First, there is the obvious - the ability to maintain a holier-than-thou attitude over everyone else in the room. *They* know the *right* thing to do, and anyone who disagrees is clearly aligned with Satan. Maintaining a pious and angelic look on their face is very important in order to pull this off. Of course, there is no outward condemnation of the non-believing heathens in the meeting, but a gentle "I'm not comfortable with the moral ramifications of this approach" is more than enough to get their point across.

They also have the advantage of holding everyone else to a higher standard than they themselves actually operate. They can hamstring their opponents by working behind the scenes on evil plans while constantly pointing out and being outraged at any less than divine actions taken by their foes. This continually puts everyone else on the defensive and makes them less likely to attempt their own initiatives for fear that their plans will not meet the moral standards set for everyone except the devout.

Look at one example - let's say in a fit of frustration you send an email to a co-worker complaining about the latest underhanded trick pulled by the resident religious hypocrite. In that email you drop a few f-bombs and point out a few shortcomings in the hypocrite's genetics. If that email were to somehow make it's way to one of the religious corporate leaders (even if it is not the actual target of your wrath) the outrage and retribution will be swift and overwhelming. You will be accused of being "vulgar" and of having morals lower than a crack whore. It won't matter if you have heard many others (including other religious hypocrites) using the same language or expressing the same sentiment - YOU are now the unclean, heathen outcast who will be declared an evil person by EVERYONE who fears they may someday be the target of the Holy Rollers.

I have absolutely no problem with a company being run according to a set of strict religious beliefs - as long as the rules apply to everyone on an equal basis. I may not choose to work there - but anyone who does knows and accepts the culture. What I cannot stomach is the hypocrisy of a company's leadership that pretends to adhere to strict rules - but only when it suits them, or when they know other people are looking.

I wish I knew of a suitable defense against this particular type of slimy corporate toad. However, I really don't have an answer. The best I can come up with is to simply get as far away from that company as quickly as you can. The senior executives CAN minimize the issue - by simply ignoring the sermons and being willing to tell the devout ladder climber to go pound sand. The only thing the halo-wearing scumbags will respond to is realization that their current path does not get them to the next rung of the ladder. However, if the senior executives lack the spine to stand up and tell the righteous reptiles to knock it off, you are screwed and you need to get out before you are branded with a scarlet letter.

It's been said many times that some of the greatest evil has been committed in the name of religion. I would probably modify that statement to say "in the misuse of religion." There's nothing inherently wrong with the vast majority of religions. If they help you get through the day, great. But when religion is used as a political tool for your own benefit, you are a bloated toad who should be skewered on your own pious pitard.

So - how about it? Do you know a particular jackass that claims to be an elder in his/her church, yet is not above bald faced lies and unethical behavior in order to advance their own career? I would like to hear your story of how a religious hypocrite screwed you over during their rise to divine status in the Church of the Corporate Ladder. Leave me some comments!

Language & Hypocrisy In Corporate America

How many of you have bosses that cuss like drunken sailors? Do they drop F-bombs in meetings and everywhere else? If you do, you are not alone - in fact, it is one of the most common taboo words in the English language. It is forbidden in newspapers, forbidden on network television & radio and forbidden by the vast majority of corporate HR policies (check for code words in your policy manual like "obscene" or "vulgar") And yet - most of us hear it spoken nearly every day in those same corporate workplaces.

Let's examine a few of the most respected public figures who have been caught using this troublesome & taboo term:

• Yahoo! CEO Carol Bartz dropped one during a quarterly analyst call.
• Senator John McCain reminds us he was a Navy man.
• Prior to being Vice-President Cheney, he was Salty Senator Cheney.
• Vice-President Biden proves it is used equally well by both Dems & Reps.
• Even a Pretty Woman will drop one (or several).
• Don't heckle Babs at a concert, or she'll lob a nuclear-sized one right on your head.
• Even Tinkerbell's boss, Disney CEO Robert Iger will throw one.

Let's face it - if you aren't afraid your immortal soul will instantly go down in flames, you have probably thrown out an F-bomb at least once.

But in 2009 there are also employees at corporations across America that are being fired for writing an F-bomb in an email. That, boys and girls, is called hypocrisy.

It doesn't even have to be one of those scalding mass emails that the disgruntled Columbine kid sends to the entire company - it happens to employees that send "private" emails to each other. Of course, there is no such thing as a "private" email inside a corporation - many corporations can and do screen employee email boxes - and they can and do fire employees for the contents of the messages they send. (This is the subject of a whole 'nuther article that is yet to be written!)

Why? What is it about this word being used in an email that is so much worse than simply saying it out loud? Good grief, technology-based communication has become ubiquitous to an entire generation - and yet we still treat the spoken work differently than the written. I understand the difference between libel and slander, and the permanence of the written word, but given the rise of cell phone video & youtube, can you really be so sure that your spoken words aren't just as permanent as an email? Every one of those political and celebrity gaffs I listed were verbal - and after a short google search, they appear to be pretty darn permanent to me!

I admit that I have a real problem with hypocrisy. If a CEO wants to run their company by a set of strict family or religious rules - fine, go for it - but don't throw F-bombs during closed door meetings and then act outraged when an employee writes the same word in an email. In my opinion, that is MUCH worse than the choice of a particular word. Either live by the rules you make, or eliminate the rules.

When I write: "What a freakin' jerk", you know exactly what I really mean - in fact, I'm willing to bet a good majority of you subconsciously substituted the main star of this article for the placeholder word freakin'. If I write "What the fudge?", you also know what I meant. In fact, just writing "F-bomb" or "F--- You" provides exactly the same impact and mental image as using the actual unforgivable word. Some might say "Yeah - so why not just use a substitute?" My response is exactly the opposite: If it means exactly the same thing, why is the substitute OK and the taboo word is not? I'm sorry, but anyone who uses "freakin" or "fudge" or "flippin" as a polite substitute (as I have done throughout this diatribe) is a fraud and a hypocrite.

Words are symbols used to convey meaning within the context of their use. I will make the claim that there are no "bad" words, no more than there are bad numbers or letters. It is the intent and the use of the words that is important, not the words themselves. It has been stated that "the ultimate offensiveness of words is determined entirely by pragmatic variables such as speaker–listener relationship and social–physical setting, as well as the words used and tone of voice" (Jay & Janschewitz, 2007, 2008; Locher & Watts, 2005). There are abusive emails that contain absolutely no taboo words - and there are emails full of profanity that are not abusive. Corporations and society in general needs to take their blinders off and pull the plugs out of their ears - it's just a freakin' word!

What Happened To The Holidays?

Humans ruin everything they touch. We take every idea to such a ridiculous extreme that it becomes a defiled parody of the original intent. Independence Day is perhaps the least corrupted holiday left in the United States, but even the 4th of July has become an example of human insanity. I am a rabid capitalist - but this is the dark underbelly of the free market system.

You want examples? Good - every cynic should be ready to back-up their statements with proof.

Have you ever tried to buy a small American flag in October? Good luck. You will probably have to go online or perhaps find a specialty flag store. During the last 2 weeks of June they sell them at every 7-11, gas station and grocery store. Apparently, there are only 2 weeks a year that Americans are willing to purchase our nation's most recognizable symbol.

Is there a weird annual natural phenomenon that causes the worldwide supply of oil to drop during the weeks surrounding the 4th of July, causing the price of gas to shoot up 25%? And on the flip side, when did it become mandatory for 80% of the population to be *somewhere else* on Independence Day? Every July 2, everyone suddenly has this irrepressible need to rush 300 miles away from their home like refugees from a N'awlins hurricane.

I really like fireworks - they are the next best thing to actual explosives (I've been a pyro since I was a kid). But the laws for buying fireworks in Southern California are absolutely bizarre. Selling *any* type of fireworks (even the really wimpy stuff) is illegal in most counties and cities. However a few enterprising cities have made *buying* fireworks legal - as long as they are sold by licensed vendors. Using the fireworks is still illegal everywhere outside the city limits of those towns - but since there are no rules about where the people buying the fireworks come from - the town does a tremendous business during the weeks preceding the 4th. People come hundreds of miles to buy their fireworks from the non-profit organizations that are the licensed vendors. There's nothing quite as satisfying as buying cardboard tubes filled with flammable gunpowder from the Senior Center or the St. Francis Catholic Church. Hey, its for a good cause, right?

Why do we do this to everything around us? We take everything 50% past the point where it makes sense. If 1 pound of something is good, then 2 tons of it must be GREAT. More is always better, moderation is for wussies. I suppose it's another aspect of the silly super-size mentality that pervades today. They don't call us "consumers" for nothing - that is our primary role in the world today - to consume as much and as quickly as we can. When we don't, entire industries fail, and with it goes the world's economy.

So do the world a favor - on this 4th of July drink beer until you pass out - the economy is counting on you to do your patriotic duty!