Escaping the Titanic unscathed

Wednesday, July 31, 2019 I’m unemployed again.This time I’m not completely to blame – although internal politics at my office played a significant part in their choice to chop my head off rather than someone else’s.Sometimes, the universe lines up in such a way that things become inevitable.I’ve carried a target on my back for the last several years, in particular with the change of ownership last year – but even more so when the person who despises me most became by boss and tried at least twice to convince the new owners I was expendable, and even incompetent.Over the last 32 years as a journalist, I always knew I was better respected by the people I covered than the people employed me.But in the most recent case, I’ve become a non-entity entirely because the new owners do not see people as people, but as pieces in a corporate machine, easily replaced, more importantly, easily pressed to do more than we are actually getting paid to do.The recent downsizing was number crunching, nothing personal on the higher levels. The corporation clearly saw my salary as an issue but left the choice for who got chopped on local bosses, and since my boss didn’t like me, I was an easy choice.This was true of some of the others that were giving notice when I was, old adversaries to the local bosses, who found this as a good opportunity to get rid of those they disliked anyway.This trust in local bosses is not new.Managers historically in our society trust other managers regardless of how incompetent or corrupt these managers are.Nobody takes workers seriously enough to actually listen to them, unless these workers make a lot of noise the way I do.Although I have held this job for the last 27 years, I have been fired before, a number of times, only in those instances, I deserved it, mostly for challenging authority.Ironically, each of these events seemed to occur around the same time in the decade, so that the current dismissal is a kind of anniversary of each of my previous events, in 1969, 1979, and 1989. Some jobs I resigned before they got the chance to fire me.Almost in every case, I caused my own demise by pointing out just how incompetent the people who oversaw me were or challenged the corporation mentality that made workers into machine parts and ignored our humanity.I remember how the vice president of Fotomat came to my booth to talk to me after I wrote a long letter to the corporation criticizing the way they did business, or how I got fired from the Garfield Dunkin donuts two weeks before my wedding because the owner was a complete ass and had abused one of the female workers – a similar situation got me fired from the cosmetic company in the late 1970s. I quit my summer job the Garfield Two Guys store before they could find an excuse to fire me. I had challenged them and could afford to, then realized that some of the other workers were looking up to me – and were risking their jobs because I became a kind of spokesperson for a righteous cause, working people. I understood then, that rebellion comes with responsibility, and while I was willing to pay the price, I could not afford to let others suffer.When I wrote a letter to Tony Pro in 1978 about how our union rep was selling out to management, I knew I risked my job. Tony Pro was on his way to jail but took time to fire the union rep (maybe more than that), but I lost my job anyway.I was a constant thorn in management’s side during each of my jobs, because people became invisible, and it was important for someone like me to remind these powerful people than workers are not machine parts, easily replaced, they have families, and their lives are shattered by corporate decisions.That may well be part of the reason I’m unemployed this time, too, since my current boss decided to use the corporate system to try to get me fired – unable to get the previous owners to do it – and I struck back, refusing to recognize my boss’ claims.But I knew in winning, I was losing, and that the whole confrontation with a corrupt local boss was unwinnable ultimately, and that eventually, I was doomed.So, when the corporate downsizing came, I did not resist – it was the least painful of potential events, and let me walk away with the same dignity I always have in such situations, knowing that the victory of the petty local boss will be temporary, and hollow. In the end, letting me and other rebels go also stole the heart and soul of the business, and left a pack of self-serving power-hungry wannabe bosses in place – each aching to be captain of a ship that has already sprung so many leaks that it can do nothing but sink.
It's easy to be a captain of a sinking ship. You need no compass to choose a direction. The only direction is down.Now I know how it feels to be one of the survivors in the life boats watching the Titanic sinking in the distance, saddened by the loss of life, and the tragic loss of a noble ship, but relieved that I have finally managed to escape relatively unscathed, and aware that for the first time in a long time, I do not need to look over my shoulder to see who is taking aim at the target on my back – having left the target on the deck of the ship, and the pack of wannabe captains shooting themselves in their feet as the water rises up around their necks.And while I may feel as if the row to shore is a long one, at least I know I will eventually reach shore, maybe even before my former bosses meet Davy Jones.