Originally published on 22 March 2022.

Alright. It’s been awhile, eh?

Seriously, it’s been over a year since I last posted anything on here, but something moved me to add to the Asshole Hall of Fame. Obviously there are many, many contenders who will get inducted in the coming weeks and months – Boris Johnson, JK Rowling, Vladimir Putin – but last week something in the UK happened that pissed me off in a very specific way.

For my US Readers, here’s a little synopsis courtesy of the NY Times.

A British ferry company laid off 800 people with immediate effect on Thursday, many of them over video, leading to international travel disruptions and condemnation by government officials over its plan to cut service and replace staff with cheaper labor.

Now, I know that many of my fellow US citizens think of Europe as a great place for workers. And in some European countries, that’s true! But England is one of the works places in Europe for workers. Seriously! I’m not kidding! No really, it sucks! But we do have like five weeks of mandated vacation leave (and free basic healthcare that isn’t tied to our employment) so that’s pretty sweet. There are ostensibly worker protections, thought they don’t kick in until two years into a job (we felt that one hard a couple of years ago).

In England, if a company is going to lay off more than a few people (known as making them redundant), they are SUPPOSED to enter into consultancy to see if there are other jobs available, other options or perhaps ways to prevent some of the lay-offs. P&O apparently didn’t do that. They told everyone to come to work, played a video message, and then seem to have had not vastly underpaid, unwitting replacement workers standing by. The owners claim financial hardship has led them to this point, but the company literally paid out millions in dividends in the middle of a pandemic.

In addition to being an example of just utterly shitty corporate practices, this is a great example of why companies that provide public services like transportation should generally not be privately owned. Obviously governments can (and do) screw things up all the time, but at least there is some opportunity to hold them accountable. Private companies aren’t accountable to the end users of their services or to their employees – they’re only interested in profit. And the market doesn’t magically lead companies to treat their employees well or even offer a quality service to their customers. If they’re the only game in town, we’re stuck with them. It’s also a great example of why we need much stronger protections for workers, and companies need to be held accountable when they violate existing protections.

So welcome to the Asshole Hall of Fame, P & O. You deserve it.

Originally published on 6 May 2019.

Late last week, the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) upheld the (misogynistic and racist) International Association of Athletics Federations(IAAF) rule about testosterone levels in women racing in middle-distance athletics events. While the ruling applies to all runners in that category, it’s clear that the ruling exists because Caster Semenya is a better athlete that some women, and those women decided to complain about it to the IAAF.

For those of you not familiar with the issue, Vox has written about it here. Another article that gets at the heart of the issue is this one by Ruth Wood. It is true that Caster Semenya may have a natural advantage because she has increased testosterone levels, but it is also true that there are loads of other natural advantages that male athletes have. However, those are celebrated while Semenya’s are literally legislated away to the point that she’s being directed to take unnecessary pharmaceuticals so she can continue to compete.

That’s bullshit, the rule is ridiculous, and the people who are cheering the CAS ruling are, to be frank, acting like assholes.

The example used by many people (including a Washington Post article that is behind a pay wall, so I may be repeating some of what is said there) is Michael Phelps. The man has an abnormally large wingspan and produces 50% less lactic acid than the average person. If we are to deem genetic gifts or abnormalities as unfair advantages, then shouldn’t Phelps be required to, I don’t know, wear some sort of contraption that adjusts for his wingspan? Or take medication to make sure he produces more lactic acid?

No? Really? What’s the difference?

I’ve seen some people argue that this comes down to who gets to be female and who gets to be male in sport. And yes, the discussion about transgender athletes is one to have, because we now know that gender is a spectrum and doesn’t always conform to the one assigned at birth. But the thing is, Caster Semenya is not transgender. She is cisgender. She happens to produce more testosterone. And she’s used that advantage to make herself a better athlete. That should not be an issue.

What’s so disappointing here is that the issue is most commonly argued by white women, many of whom are not as good at running middle distances as Caster Semenya. There’s a bitterness to their complaints, as though if not for this injustice, they would have a gold medal. But that’s horseshit. One of the women who is most vocal about this, Lynsey Sharp, came in 6th behind Semenya. So, you eliminate Semenya from the field and come in 5th? At the expense of taking down a talented black woman for no defensible reason?

Paula Radcliff, a talented long-distance runner, has also been quite vocal on twitter and before the IAAF. Unfortunately, instead of supporting a fellow woman runner, she’s been upholding racism and misogyny herself. It’s disgusting, and something I’ve noticed seems prevalent in feminism here in the UK: the famous white feminists here have a narrow view of what it means to be a woman, and are often transphobic. It’s not a good look, UK.

So, to those supporting the IAAF rule and the CAS ruling I say this: welcome to the Asshole Hall of Fame. You’re in shit company, so you should probably do something about that.

Originally published on 15 June 2018.

It’s been a few weeks since I last inducted someone to the Asshole Hall of Fame (hey Jeff Bezos, you just got what you wanted — no responsibility for the impact your company has on the city of Seattle! You continue to be an asshole!). So far, none of the assholes have redeemed themselves (in fact, our first inductee, Elon Musk, continues to up his asshole game), and I fear that today’s inductees will be no different.

I give you Asshole Hall of Fame members 56 and 57: US Attorney General Jeff Sessions, and the people of the US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agency.

Let’s start with Jeff Sessions. He has been an asshole since well before I was born. If you’re not familiar with US politics, he’s a former US senator who, when nominated to this role by President Trump, faced some opposition from his fellow senators. In fact, when Sen. Elizabeth Warren attempted to read into the record a letter from Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.’s wife, Coretta Scott King, that detailed why Mr. Sessions was completely ill-suited for a federal judgeship because he’s SUPER RACIST, Sen. Warren was kicked out of the Senate chambers. That’s where the whole “Nevertheless, she persisted” thing came from.

You can read in more detail just how much of a shitty human being he is here (thanks GLAAD!).

You might be asking why, then, am I inducting him now? Well, because he has been instituting new US immigration policies that seem better suited to early 1940s Germany than any society that values all human lives.

Immigration may be a challenging issue, but I’d argue that the US is trying to make it infinitely more complicated than it needs to be. This isn’t a site for deep policy analysis, however (although a girl can dream), so instead of offering up my own thoughts on every possible option, I’m just going to point out that separating children from their parents at the border is morally reprehensible and something only an asshole would order (or do, which we’ll get to with ICE agents in a moment). As is suggesting that fleeing domestic and gang violence should not be a reason to be eligible for asylum.

The only way to request asylum is from within the country you hope to resettle in. The people fleeing dangerous homelands and potentially deadly circumstances are asking for help, and the US is not just shutting its doors, but yanking children through them first and then throwing the kids into, among other places, a refurbished Walmart. It’s depressing, but re-purposing a corporate building to detain brown children is a pretty perfect portrait of the USA right now.

Republicans (e.g. President Trump) have argued this separation is based on policies instituted by President Obama; the reality is that Jeff Sessions only views straight white men (and the occasional fetus) as human; our friends trying to get here from south of the border mean nothing to him. He doesn’t care about the children he’s harming, the families he’s destroying, or the people his policies might ultimately sentence to death.

Sessions’ latest attempt to legitimize his cruel policy is to refer to a quote from the Bible about obeying the law. Leaving aside the complete inappropriateness of using the Bible to justify US law, that idea in general fails to recognize one pretty obvious reality: laws can be immoral. Also, I feel like others have used the Bible to justify some pretty shitty stuff.

Jeff Sessions is a national embarrassment and should be utterly ashamed of himself. He’s a racist, a bigot, and of course, an asshole.

Also assholes? The people who are continuing to implement these immoral policies, i.e., the men and women of ICE. I know that it is easy for me to suggest that people who might need the salary from their job to survive should quit. But frankly, I believe the entire organization (created after 9/11, when the US made loads of ill-conceived policy decisions) is morally bankrupt and needs to be retired. The individuals implementing these orders are complicit in inflicting unimaginable pain and grief of those who are already suffering immensely.

I just finished reading “Lilac Girls,” and was struck by this passage:

Mrs. Mikelsky held Jagoda [her baby girl] tight.
“Give it to me,” the prisoner-guard said.
Mrs. Mikelsky only held tighter.
“She’s a good baby,” I said to the guard.
The guard pulled harder at the child. Would they tear her in two?
“It can’t be helped,” the guard said. “Don’t make a scene.”
…
“Just take it,” Binz said with a save of her crop.
The guard who had come with Binz held Mrs. Mikelsky from behind while the first guard pried Jagoda from her mother’s arms.”
…
The guard hiked the baby higher on her shoulder and walked back through the incoming crowd.
Mrs. Mikelsky crumbled to the floor like a burning piece of paper as she watched her baby be taken away.”

That’s from a scene that takes place at a concentration camp. And it’s now happening at the US border. It’s a bit of a cliche to refer to people with whom one disagrees as Nazis, but the actions speak for themselves. People who have done nothing wrong (they followed the rules to seek asylum) are having their children taken from them. The people who are doing the taking should be ashamed.

They, too, are assholes.

Originally published on 3 May 2018.

Today’s inductee shouldn’t surprise anyone; he’s been on the list since the beginning. But recent comments — coupled with recent action — have him jumping the queue and shooting straight to the front of the line.

I’m talking, of course, about Amazon founder, Washington Post owner, and certified asshole Jeff Bezos.

First, full disclosure: I have an Amazon account. I watched a lot of free movies on my days off, and appreciated the convenience. Now that we’re in London, we’ve been using it much less often, and are likely to stop altogether. However, much like with Wal-Mart, I’m not going to judge people who find that Amazon is one of the only ways they can access and afford items they need. It’s an enormous company with influence, power, and control spanning multiple nations. It might be hard to escape.

I say this because while it is Mr. Bezos who is being inducted today, it’s impossible to separate him from Amazon and some of the shady practices the company has engaged in over the years. When researching this post, I wanted to link to an article on shit warehouse conditions from a few years ago; I eventually found it but it was near the bottom of the search results because so many more recent articles have come out talking about the crap that some Amazon employees have to endure. For example:

• In the UK, 8% of staff polled contemplated suicide
• They are collapsing at work
• They are PEEING IN BOTTLES because bathroom breaks get in the way of productivity
• In the US, the wages are so low that many qualify for food stamps (something Wal-Mart got shit for in recent years.

This shows that Mr. Bezos isn’t so much a brilliant businessman but an exploitative asshole. If you can’t make money without your employees having to go on food stamps, you aren’t good at business. You’re just good at taking advantage of others for your own personal gain.

And what a gain it is for Mr. Bezos, who made this beyond infuriating comments just this week:

“The only way that I can see to deploy this much financial resource is by converting my Amazon winnings into space travel,” Bezos said. “I am going to use my financial lottery winnings from Amazon to fund that.”

I’m sorry, what?

via GIPHY

This man has (as of 2018) 131 BILLION DOLLARS, and when he looks at this world (and his warehouse employees), the only thing he can think to do with his money is go into space? Look, I get it. I want to go to space, too. And I think that there is value in space exploration. But for a man who runs a company that can’t even figure out how to give its warehouse employees proper bathroom breaks, this is stunningly ignorant.

This kind of blisteringly absurd comment is event more egregious in light of Amazon’s recent attempt to blackmail the city of Seattle. As you probably know, Amazon doesn’t just employ warehouse workers; it also has a large tech side. And that tech work is arguably responsible for much of the economic boom in Seattle. Home prices in the Seattle continue to rise, in part fueled by technology workers with lots of cash. Yay for them!

Of course, there’s a downside to this. Homelessness has increased as rents increase; people can no longer afford to live in Seattle. And services haven’t been able to keep up with the increase in population, partly because Washington State has no income tax. Property and sales taxes fund pretty much everything, and there isn’t enough money to go around to take care of the people living there. So, Seattle has decided that it needs to take some action, and proposed a head tax on large businesses.

And what does Mr. Bezos’s company do? Immediately halt construction on a new building and threaten to sublease other space it had already leased. Mr. Bezos has decided that if Amazon is going to be asked to contribute to the city it has largely helped to change over the past decade, it’s going to take its toys and go home, like a petulant child who has been told that maybe it’s time to start sharing.

To this I say:

via GIPHY

Mr. Bezos’s staff use city services and the company isn’t paying for it at an appropriate or adequate level. Amazon came to Seattle because of the low taxes, but that’s not sustainable. So unless Mr. Bezos is committed to ensuring that the 40,000 people who work for him in Seattle never get robbed or assaulted (the police are funded by taxes), never fall asleep with a candle burning (the fire department is funded by taxes), never need paramedics (Medic One is funded by taxes), never die (the Medical Examiner is funded through taxes), never get sick (hospital reporting is analyzed by the publicly-funded health department), and never eat at a restaurant (which is inspected by the publicly-funded health department), Amazon needs to pay its fair share.*

The fact that Mr. Bezos and his company can’t — or won’t — acknowledge this reality is disgusting, and the fact that the response to a government proposal is not discussion but whining is shameful. I’m frankly a bit embarrassed for him and the entire Amazon company.

Given all of this, I think it’s pretty clear that Mr. Bezos has worked very hard to earn his spot in the Asshole Hall of Fame. Congratulations! You’re in horrible company.

*Obviously staff are individually paying taxes, and people should have access to services regardless of their individual ability to pay. The point of this paragraph is to point out that an influx of people leads to an increase in service needs, and the corporation that brings the folks in should share in those costs.

Originally published on 30 March 2018.

Up until this point, all members of our Asshole Hall of Fame have been people. Today I’d like the offer up a new and different type of Asshole: The Asshole Holiday. Specifically, April Fools’ Day.

April Fools’ Day is the worst holiday that isn’t based on honoring genocide (I see you, Columbus Day and Thanksgiving). Like, objectively.

It generally sucks, mostly because I don’t think most people who play pranks really think about how their pranks will be perceived, and in my experience, the people who enjoy it are vastly outnumbered by the people who either don’t care about it or actively hate it.

I’m hopeful that because April Fools’ falls on Easter Sunday this year, people will just let it go, but I’m pretty sure that there are plenty of people excited to unleash their unexpected April Fools’ day prank onto their partner or child, so I felt the need to add it to the Asshole Hall of Fame. There may be some version of it where it’s just a fun holiday that people opt into, but we aren’t there yet (and I doubt we ever will be), so until that time arrives, into the Asshole Hall of Fame it goes.

I don’t have a lot of respect for the choice to refer to oneself as a ‘prankster,’ whether all year long or just on certain holidays. I aggressively side-eye parents who hide their child’s Halloween candy and then film that child crying in despair. I cringe when I hear stories about ‘on-set antics’ from an actor talking to a late-night host. I shake my head at the ‘joke’ Facebook posts that pop up each year.

If someone doesn’t play along, they can be seen as humorless, so some grin and bear it. But the truth is, unwanted pranks are usually not funny, and are often downright mean. They create a sense of distrust, and can cause people completely unnecessary stress just for the amusement of others.

In recent years, corporations have jumped onto the April Fools’ train, posting ‘clever’ new products that are usually obviously a joke. But of course they aren’t obvious to everyone, and end up tricking a least a few people. And for what purpose? So we as a society can collectively laugh at someone who trusted someone else, as a bizarre way to make ourselves feel better while a corporation gets free press?

And it’s worse when it’s a friend or family member playing the prank, because the whole premise is that it’s funny to make someone who should trust you feel bad for trusting you. I don’t find it entertaining, and I think it’s actually pretty fucking cruel once you peel back the layers.

That said, I know there are some people out there who love April Fools’ Day. So to you I offer some advice on how to be less of a jerk when playing pranks this Sunday.

1. Do not make up a fake pregnancy. Ever. That is NEVER funny, and falls into a special category of cruel. Also no fake diseases, illnesses, or deaths, either. (These seem less common than the fake pregnancy, but still needed to be said.)

2. Do not make up any story that will cause someone, even for a moment, to believe that their life is about to dramatically change for the worse. So no fake layoffs or foreclosures.

3. Do not make up any story that will cause someone, even for a moment, to believe that their life is about to dramatically change for the better. So no fake lottery tickets.

4. Do not put anyone in a situation where they might be physically harmed. So no switching the hot and cold water taps, or replacing one beverage or food item with another.

5. Do not put anyone in a situation where they might feel the need to physically protect themselves. So no hiding in the backseat of a car, or sneaking up behind someone.

6. Do not post signs that In-N-Out Burger is coming to NYC (Still the cruelest corporate-related prank ever.)

7. Make sure that everyone involved in the prank is on board and okay with the general idea of pranks. Maybe you are part of a group of siblings, or a group of friends who have been doing this forever. (I still think that everyone has to genuinely know that everyone is okay with being pranked, and there can’t be negative consequences for opting out.) In those cases, where everyone has agreed to the ground rules and none of the six items above are involved, then go to town.

Finally, if you’re like me and hate the holiday (or just generally don’t find the day amusing), may I suggest a complete social media and news blackout? That way you won’t inadvertently spread false news. Anything that is real and true on 1 April should still be real and true on 2 April.

So, congratulations inductee number 54, and welcome to the Asshole Hall of Fame. You’re in horrible company.

I’m in the process of pulling some essays from another website I had that I’m shutting down soon. Below is the first of a series from that site, and it was originally posted on 9 August 2017. Wild how relevant it still is…

But sometimes, instead of writing a few dozen paragraphs on a topic, we should look at what some real-world asshole did and then do the exact opposite.

So tonight, I give you our very first entrant. He’s not the worst asshole ever. He’s even contributed some good things to society.

But dude is an asshole.

I give you Elon Musk.

He is the inspiration for this feature. For those of you who haven’t heard, Mr. Musk fired his assistant after she asked for a raise, because he decided he could do without her once he spent a couple of weeks doing her job.

The author of this piece would like us to think that the take-away here is that people should know their value before they ask for a raise.

Nope.

The take-away here is that Elon Musk treated his assistant of 12 years with zero respect. She asked for a raise (something that women are routinely denied  at a higher rate than men), and he decided that instead of negotiating with her, he’d see if he could do her job. He could, so he allegedly fired her because of that.

TWELVE YEARS.

I’d really like to know if he hired someone later to take on any of her duties, or if he redistributed some of her work to other assistants. If so, then clearly he couldn’t do without her forever. I mean, two weeks is nothing in a large company. People cover the work of people on leave often; it doesn’t mean they could keep it up forever.

That’s an asshole move.

There’s also this from a recent book about him, which alleges that he gave an employee shit for missing work so he could do something as silly as witness his child’s birth. Musk denies it.

Mmm Hmm.

But those are just a couple of one-offs, right? I mean, all offices have misunderstanding. Well … allegedly it’s not so safe to work in his factories, either.

Now, he allegedly cares about equal pay , but take a careful look at the language he used: “Principles of fairness and justice are what matter.” I’d be interested in learning how he defines ‘fair’ and ‘just.’

And then there’s the fact that he was an adviser to 45. (Note from the future: he’s more than an adviser this time around). Of course, he eventually quit, but only after 45 confirmed his withdrawal from the Paris Agreement, which will likely end up costing Mr. Musk money.

Look, do two or three instances mean someone is 100% an asshole? Of course not. And regardless, are there bigger assholes than Mr. Musk? Eh, maybe. But the thing is, I’m getting a little tired of us rewarding them. With chairmanships, or glowing profiles about their “work ethics,” or presidencies.

We make excuses for them, arguing that ‘nobody’s perfect.’ And that’s true – nobody is. But we also seem to be totally cool with just accepting people who decide they’re as good as they’re ever going to be. We make excuses for them so long as they give us shiny rockets or pretty phones. We don’t expect them to evolve, or get better at being a person in the world.

That needs to stop.