11 ms·

Not the OP, but I have a few from my workplace: My favorite example was being reminded to wear sunscreen because it is summer. by our "safety coordinator" at an

by dotgov 4y ago

Not the OP, but I have a few from my workplace: My favorite example was being reminded to wear sunscreen because it is summer. by our "safety coordinator" at an all hands meeting. Or the "ladder training", where I was taught to use a ladder. The cause for that is is a "zero accident policy". Which is perceived as a good thing, and how could it not? Accidents are bad. Never mind the absurdity of a zero accident policy. Criticizing a policy like that very quickly puts a "reckless and dangerous" stamp on you, as the only reason accidents do not happen is the policy. The policy leads to reams of paperwork being filled out which creates a need for more administrative personnel and as those people get paid to do that, it is in their best interest that it stays that way. So if you think about lifting that 50 lbs box as a healthy adult in prime physical condition, you better ask your safety coordinator first, because if anyone sees you, you will get a slap on the wrist. My theory is that at the heart of what I am describing is fear. As long as the company can demonstrate that the employee was instructed to play it safe, they have the upper hand, should it come to a lawsuit. And I have a hunch that it also has to do with philosophy. Some people believe that the world can be a safe place for everyone. And they will control and subdue to make that a reality. And they are right. Lack of action is safe. What they fail to see is that it leads to stagnation and death.

jfim 4y ago
The reminders to be safe are to ensure that people don't grow complacent about things that are dangerous. Our school has a mandatory safety training before students go on internships, and the reason for that is that interns have died in the past. A lot of things can be dangerous at work (including ladders) and not everybody is familiar with the associated hazards. Ladders, compressed air, electricity, machinery, confined spaces, chemicals, dust, and so on are all things that are dangerous, and the fact that they injure or kill people every year even though they're known hazards is a testament that people are too complacent around them.
- Aeolun 4y ago
  > The reminders to be safe are to ensure that people don't grow complacent about things that are dangerous. Which doesn’t work, since now everyone gets complacent about the training instead.
Teever 4y ago
What's wrong with telling people to wear sunscreen? What's wrong with ensuring that people know how to use a ladder safely? What's wrong with aspiring to have zero accidents in a work place?
- impendia 4y ago
  Wearing sunscreen is excellent advice, I do it consistently myself. In my opinion, it's highly appropriate to offer advice like this to friends and family. But it would grate on me to be told this, or to be given advice on any other non-work matter, by my employer. It suggests a sort of paternalism that is out of line, and I would immediately assume ulterior motives (e.g. saving on health insurance bills) rather than genuine concern.
  - Teever 4y ago
    Would you prefer an employer who didn't give a shit about your well-being and treated you like a lump of labour to be wrung of all economic value and tossed aside when there's no more to get from you? Like is it really so grating that someone tells you to do something good for yourself, even if their reason is because it's good for them? Really?
    - impendia 4y ago
      If someone, i.e. an individual person whom I know in real life, gave me advice then I would happily listen. This includes bosses or coworkers. But when it is coming through a bureaucracy, by mass email from someone whom I don't know (if it is signed by a named individual at all), I would be less happy. Maybe this reflects excessive cynicism on my part towards large organizations. I recognize that not everyone feels the same way.
      - HWR_14 4y ago
        > But when it is coming through a bureaucracy, by mass email from someone whom I don't know (if it is signed by a named individual at all What if it comes from XXX in HR, who just lost a family member to skin cancer and decided to use their corporate authority and "send to all" powers to remind everyone to use sunscreen. What if it comes from a new study that shows that monitors cause skin cancer and it's new information most desk workers don't know to use sunscreen at their desk? What if it comes every year in the "get ready for Summer" info packet? What if it came with a reminder to be careful on Friday half-days that you weren't expecting? I'm not sure what the cynicism is geared towards? It's impersonal? Isn't it a benefit that these aren't people who think you personally don't know to use sunscreen? You said you questioned their motives. Would it help if you knew the people in HR and knew they were legitimately trying to help you? Would it help if they said "hey, don't get sick and raise our premiums. It comes out of the same pot off money everyone's bonuses come out of"?
WalterBright 4y ago
The US judiciary is far too friendly to personal injury lawsuits. The prevailing atmosphere is it's never the injured person who is at fault, it's always somebody nearby who has money.
- Kranar 4y ago
  How do you know this to be true? From a cursory search it looks like 95% of lawsuits for personal injury never make it to trial, so the judiciary is never involved in the vast majority of cases. Of the 5% that do make it to trial, only 56% of them result in any award for the plaintiff and if you look at the breakdown [1], that's because of auto accidents which can hardly be said to be a case of "blame is laid on the person who has money", especially when you look at how much money is awarded in such claims. Premises injuries has only a 39% success rate. Product liability has a 38% success rate. Medical malpractice has only a 19% success rate. What do you know about the judiciary that leads you to your claim? [1] https://www.cloudlex.com/tips-and-tricks/personal-injury-cases-to-trial/ https://www.cloudlex.com/tips-and-tricks/personal-injury-cas...
  - WalterBright 4y ago
    How about the playground equipment at schools has all been wussified due to lawsuits? Or kids' chemistry sets that went in the 1960s from an advanced chemistry course to little more than kitchen recipes? All the result of lawsuits. Then there was a painter who fell off his own ladder while painting Steve Ballmer's mansion, who successfully sued Ballmer for zillions. And people in general who carry millions of dollars in liability insurance. As for "not making it to trial", people often settle out of fear of what would happen in court, not because the lawsuits wouldn't get traction in court.
    - Kranar 4y ago
      I think you're just making things up based on an unfounded and certainly unsubstantiated perception of reality. Do you have any reference for your claim about Steve Ballmer? I tried numerous different ways of searching for it and none of them produce any kind of result. I also tried Bill Gates, Mark Zuckerberg, and some other rich tech CEOs but nothing comes up. Once again, you may have heard some kind of anecdotes or stories and mixed things up in your mind to create an image of what you think is real, but the actual statistics and facts do not back up your bold assertions. For example, it's not lawsuits that put an end to the chemistry sets of the 1960s, it's the Toxic Substances Control Act together with the The Toy Safety Act that removed the use of lead, poisons, acids and other toxic chemicals from chemistry sets that were marketing towards kids. Had nothing to do with lawsuits but rather due to legislation. If you want actually want to blame something for the decline of the modern chemistry set, it has more to do with policymakers concerns about their use in illegal drug manufacturing than it does with any kind of lawsuit.
barrysteve 4y ago
I'd argue it looks like fear, but really it's fusion. People want to fuse all their needs together into one hive-mind reminder system so they have more time and energy to spend on work. Smartphones and management are all too happy to help. People can't see the self-evident anymore. The Kantian and Nietzschian thing-in-itself is dead. People have to be told not to walk into boxes otherwise they will, while they dream of some heavenly work project in their mind. How do we control it? Zero accident policies, you gotta remember not to walk into boxes and you gotta remember to slap on sunscreen, as if the material world only starts to exist again in people's minds when you mention it.
- dotgov 4y ago
  First we killed god, now we try to kill the thing-in-itself. Probably a lot harder to do the latter. I appreciate your perspective on this, I hadn't made that connection before. When you put it like this, I wonder if this fusion is a force that acts counter to individuation, basically being part of "something bigger", the workplace replacing community?
Spooky23 4y ago
That’s about insurance, while someone might care about your safety, they spend to save and reduce liability. It varies by state as well. In New York, for example, any third-party work related fall from a height can be the company’s responsibility. You you need to have a bunch of procedures around ladders and lifts to get insurance or avoid excessive rates. A zero accident policy means that you don’t accept employee injuries as part of the job. There’s usually a safety committee and they look at root causes for accidents, and processes to control them. From a company POV, I have no idea what your physical condition is, but when you something stupid like deadlift and transfer that 50lb piece of equipment on a ladder, I have to pay for it. I worked at a place years ago where the procedure to decommission a hard drive was to puncture the platters with a drill press and remove the electronics with a pry bar. All good until an IT guy got metal debris in his eye, and required extensive surgery. Turns out the IT folks removed safety equipment to make the process faster, didn’t wear eye protection, and had the press improperly situated. Correcting any of those things would have prevented that accident - and they were fubar because no process existed to question it, and everyone felt comfortable doing what they were doing. It may seem like infantilism, but there’s a guy who suffered and continues to suffer from an eye injury because nobody was accountable for his safety.
jiggawatts 4y ago
I once worked in the head office of a mining company in an IT role. There was a guy wearing a hard-hat standing next to the stairs with a clipboard taking notes to see if people were holding on to the handrail or not (as per corporate safety regulations). You see, there must be "one rule for everyone". The head-office suits can't be seen as discriminating against the plebs at the mine sites. It's a perception thing, people won't obey if it's "rules for thee, not for me". So... I got a talking to by HR for a solid hour because I didn't hold the handrail when taking two steps down to the cafeteria.

by dotgov 4y ago

jfim 4y ago

The reminders to be safe are to ensure that people don't grow complacent about things that are dangerous. Our school has a mandatory safety training before students go on internships, and the reason for that is that interns have died in the past. A lot of things can be dangerous at work (including ladders) and not everybody is familiar with the associated hazards. Ladders, compressed air, electricity, machinery, confined spaces, chemicals, dust, and so on are all things that are dangerous, and the fact that they injure or kill people every year even though they're known hazards is a testament that people are too complacent around them.

Aeolun 4y ago
> The reminders to be safe are to ensure that people don't grow complacent about things that are dangerous. Which doesn’t work, since now everyone gets complacent about the training instead.

Teever 4y ago

What's wrong with telling people to wear sunscreen? What's wrong with ensuring that people know how to use a ladder safely? What's wrong with aspiring to have zero accidents in a work place?

impendia 4y ago
Wearing sunscreen is excellent advice, I do it consistently myself. In my opinion, it's highly appropriate to offer advice like this to friends and family. But it would grate on me to be told this, or to be given advice on any other non-work matter, by my employer. It suggests a sort of paternalism that is out of line, and I would immediately assume ulterior motives (e.g. saving on health insurance bills) rather than genuine concern.
- Teever 4y ago
  Would you prefer an employer who didn't give a shit about your well-being and treated you like a lump of labour to be wrung of all economic value and tossed aside when there's no more to get from you? Like is it really so grating that someone tells you to do something good for yourself, even if their reason is because it's good for them? Really?
  - impendia 4y ago
    If someone, i.e. an individual person whom I know in real life, gave me advice then I would happily listen. This includes bosses or coworkers. But when it is coming through a bureaucracy, by mass email from someone whom I don't know (if it is signed by a named individual at all), I would be less happy. Maybe this reflects excessive cynicism on my part towards large organizations. I recognize that not everyone feels the same way.
    - HWR_14 4y ago
      > But when it is coming through a bureaucracy, by mass email from someone whom I don't know (if it is signed by a named individual at all What if it comes from XXX in HR, who just lost a family member to skin cancer and decided to use their corporate authority and "send to all" powers to remind everyone to use sunscreen. What if it comes from a new study that shows that monitors cause skin cancer and it's new information most desk workers don't know to use sunscreen at their desk? What if it comes every year in the "get ready for Summer" info packet? What if it came with a reminder to be careful on Friday half-days that you weren't expecting? I'm not sure what the cynicism is geared towards? It's impersonal? Isn't it a benefit that these aren't people who think you personally don't know to use sunscreen? You said you questioned their motives. Would it help if you knew the people in HR and knew they were legitimately trying to help you? Would it help if they said "hey, don't get sick and raise our premiums. It comes out of the same pot off money everyone's bonuses come out of"?

WalterBright 4y ago

The US judiciary is far too friendly to personal injury lawsuits. The prevailing atmosphere is it's never the injured person who is at fault, it's always somebody nearby who has money.

Kranar 4y ago
How do you know this to be true? From a cursory search it looks like 95% of lawsuits for personal injury never make it to trial, so the judiciary is never involved in the vast majority of cases. Of the 5% that do make it to trial, only 56% of them result in any award for the plaintiff and if you look at the breakdown [1], that's because of auto accidents which can hardly be said to be a case of "blame is laid on the person who has money", especially when you look at how much money is awarded in such claims. Premises injuries has only a 39% success rate. Product liability has a 38% success rate. Medical malpractice has only a 19% success rate. What do you know about the judiciary that leads you to your claim? [1] https://www.cloudlex.com/tips-and-tricks/personal-injury-cases-to-trial/ https://www.cloudlex.com/tips-and-tricks/personal-injury-cas...
- WalterBright 4y ago
  How about the playground equipment at schools has all been wussified due to lawsuits? Or kids' chemistry sets that went in the 1960s from an advanced chemistry course to little more than kitchen recipes? All the result of lawsuits. Then there was a painter who fell off his own ladder while painting Steve Ballmer's mansion, who successfully sued Ballmer for zillions. And people in general who carry millions of dollars in liability insurance. As for "not making it to trial", people often settle out of fear of what would happen in court, not because the lawsuits wouldn't get traction in court.
  - Kranar 4y ago
    I think you're just making things up based on an unfounded and certainly unsubstantiated perception of reality. Do you have any reference for your claim about Steve Ballmer? I tried numerous different ways of searching for it and none of them produce any kind of result. I also tried Bill Gates, Mark Zuckerberg, and some other rich tech CEOs but nothing comes up. Once again, you may have heard some kind of anecdotes or stories and mixed things up in your mind to create an image of what you think is real, but the actual statistics and facts do not back up your bold assertions. For example, it's not lawsuits that put an end to the chemistry sets of the 1960s, it's the Toxic Substances Control Act together with the The Toy Safety Act that removed the use of lead, poisons, acids and other toxic chemicals from chemistry sets that were marketing towards kids. Had nothing to do with lawsuits but rather due to legislation. If you want actually want to blame something for the decline of the modern chemistry set, it has more to do with policymakers concerns about their use in illegal drug manufacturing than it does with any kind of lawsuit.

barrysteve 4y ago

I'd argue it looks like fear, but really it's fusion. People want to fuse all their needs together into one hive-mind reminder system so they have more time and energy to spend on work. Smartphones and management are all too happy to help. People can't see the self-evident anymore. The Kantian and Nietzschian thing-in-itself is dead. People have to be told not to walk into boxes otherwise they will, while they dream of some heavenly work project in their mind. How do we control it? Zero accident policies, you gotta remember not to walk into boxes and you gotta remember to slap on sunscreen, as if the material world only starts to exist again in people's minds when you mention it.

dotgov 4y ago
First we killed god, now we try to kill the thing-in-itself. Probably a lot harder to do the latter. I appreciate your perspective on this, I hadn't made that connection before. When you put it like this, I wonder if this fusion is a force that acts counter to individuation, basically being part of "something bigger", the workplace replacing community?

Spooky23 4y ago

That’s about insurance, while someone might care about your safety, they spend to save and reduce liability. It varies by state as well. In New York, for example, any third-party work related fall from a height can be the company’s responsibility. You you need to have a bunch of procedures around ladders and lifts to get insurance or avoid excessive rates. A zero accident policy means that you don’t accept employee injuries as part of the job. There’s usually a safety committee and they look at root causes for accidents, and processes to control them. From a company POV, I have no idea what your physical condition is, but when you something stupid like deadlift and transfer that 50lb piece of equipment on a ladder, I have to pay for it. I worked at a place years ago where the procedure to decommission a hard drive was to puncture the platters with a drill press and remove the electronics with a pry bar. All good until an IT guy got metal debris in his eye, and required extensive surgery. Turns out the IT folks removed safety equipment to make the process faster, didn’t wear eye protection, and had the press improperly situated. Correcting any of those things would have prevented that accident - and they were fubar because no process existed to question it, and everyone felt comfortable doing what they were doing. It may seem like infantilism, but there’s a guy who suffered and continues to suffer from an eye injury because nobody was accountable for his safety.

jiggawatts 4y ago

I once worked in the head office of a mining company in an IT role. There was a guy wearing a hard-hat standing next to the stairs with a clipboard taking notes to see if people were holding on to the handrail or not (as per corporate safety regulations). You see, there must be "one rule for everyone". The head-office suits can't be seen as discriminating against the plebs at the mine sites. It's a perception thing, people won't obey if it's "rules for thee, not for me". So... I got a talking to by HR for a solid hour because I didn't hold the handrail when taking two steps down to the cafeteria.