My soapbox: The customer isn't always right

Where’s my soapbox? Time to pontificate.

Consumers have a huge lesson to learn.

No, the customer is NOT always right. When companies get less micromanaged and greedy, and consumers smarten up a bit on the topic of LIFE, only then will this platitudinal public service nightmare end.

Public service and retail workers spend entirely too much of their time bending over to take it in the ass from customers who, themselves off-the-clock, are suddenly unable to relate to their own frustrations and needs (yes, I said "needs") as a worker. What is going on? You people spend eight or more hours a day frustrated with the neediness of the common man, but the second you clock out, you become him?

It's as if, for some consumers, that waiter or clerk taking care of their needs is only a "person" in the true sense when they are off the clock or are, themselves, a co-worker of said consumer. Regardless, the instant they are off the clock, that co-worker becomes a machine, or one of "THEM." So how should things be?

Let me put it this way: when I clock out, I clock OUT. However, that is not to say I go out to lunch the next day and perch myself in a booth at Denny's (for example) only to remain gleefully unaware of the hard work being put into my experience by the people on the other side of that counter; that ever comforting buffer zone we use to separate ourselves from "Them," and to forget that tomorrow we will have to wake up, punch back in, and go back to work just like those other saps behind the counter.

What an insufferable waste of time this garbage creates . . . . When I go to Starbucks and I order a chocolate croissant to have it heated up, only to drop it on the floor after it is handed off to me, I am not going to pester the barista who gave it to me for a new one, only to have him dig another one out of the pastry case, prep it, shove it in the oven for ten seconds, take it out, put it on a plate, and give it to me all over again when I see that he has a line of people who all want the same thing, only for the FIRST TIME. I will wait patiently until I can see there is no line anymore. After all, what is two minutes? I will not ask a clerk to void my last transaction because it came off my credit card after I realize I DID have cash, especially when I come back down to earth and realize that I am simply the first in a line of ten or twenty more.

"The customer is always right." Who feeds this public perception, this asinine proto-philosophy so clichéd as to be found on countless cheap, faux-engraved plaques ordaining the walls of organizations the world over (all of them relating the story of how one man's "dream" became what we know today as Marie Calendar's)? Greedy corporations, that's who. Psychopathic, multinational hubs of ZERO accountability that are, unfortunately, the nation-makers of the future. Corporations which, if they continue to run amok unchecked, will undoubtably become the forgers of identity for every man and woman and child on this earth. That is, if they are continually allowed to shape life as we know it and green-lighted to proceed trampling on the documents that have formally recognized the "natural rights" that come with being human (a notion which only took the duration of human existence on this planet to be recognized, that's all). Corporations are "moneyed monsters," to quote Andrew Jackson; they are mechanized terrors oiled by the blood of the workers, and the way they patronize the public sickens me. And it's been this way for a long-ass time. They promote this behavior. They encourage it because they want repeat business. I can see why, but it is a damaging philosophy, both to already stressed out workers (particularly in today's economy, where it has been shown that, on average, one worker is increasingly doing the work of four) and to consumers who fork over cash in exchange for goods with a dash of condescension. Will this change? Not soon, in my opinion. Corporations are entities, and, like Legion, have the luxury of saying "we are one from many." No one has to answer for mistakes, because the ones with their finger at the button are not answering calls from distressed or angry workers or customers. No. They are far removed from that recourse. Angry workers themselves are answering the calls. To make things worse, THEY are given the luxury (although it is anything BUT) of saying "I'm sorry. I don't make policy. I just work here." In the end, what we have is a collection of nameless, faceless, blameless entities all making up something much bigger than themselves, and that "something" operates without emotional recoil, empathy, morality, or a sense of personal accountability, not because is it by nature evil (although we could entertain that thought . . . ) but because it is amoral. This, by definition, is a psychopath (See "Mark Achbar and Jennifer Abbot's "The Corporation").

Sometimes the customer is WRONG. Sometimes everything doesn't end with a bottom line. Sometimes, people want more choices. And on, and on, and on ad nauseum. What a nightmare we've created for ourselves.