You’d think a place I left ten years ago wouldn’t have any power over me, but they’re still playing their same games with my wife.

What a fucking joke.

A few years before I left, the owner changed from one brother to another, and unlike the original brother, who was very hands on, and respected work, the new one brought in others to run it for him.

I gather he’s largely absent now, and has left the running of the joint to this incredibly narcissistic piece of shit he brought in who destroyed the whole “work hard, do the right thing” culture in favour of one that emphasizes pettiness and sycophancy.

One thing I am not is a fucking sycophant. Others can lick that brown, but I’m only doing that for a woman I’m trying to get off. Some ego-driven prick can go fuck himself.

Anyway, after a couple of years of busting my ass, doing all the work, the right things and watching as others, who had done nothing but kiss up move on past me and take credit for my work and ideas, of watching friends and co-workers, good people who worked hard, get fucked over and stigmatized because they didn’t lick this man-child’s boots, I left.

Unfortunately, my wife stayed.

She’d dropped into a nice space where everyone left her alone to run her team. Hell, I’m not sure they even know what her team does, despite it being kind of critical. This man, to whom she is a direct report, hasn’t talked to her in four years.

FOUR.

YEARS.

Could you imagine having a boss that didn’t bother to speak to you for four years? Well, in this case, it’s a fucking blessing.

Unfortunately, by law, they were required to create a pay equity chart, ensuring they weren’t paying women less than men for the same job and so on (they were, surprise). Mostly, they used it to reward themselves and their sycophants, but in doing so, they left my wife completely off the list, and the team she runs on the same level as the custodians (a huge slap in the face for a highly specialized group of porting experts).

Well, despite the fact that she didn’t want to make waves, because of the quiet little nook they’d found themselves, she was compelled to ask by her team and her own need for a raise, which everyone else seemed to have gotten.

She didn’t do it rudely or aggressively. She just said: hey, my team has questions about their place on the list, can you explain or re-evaluate? Oh, and also, you’ve left me off the list.

She didn’t ask for money or promotion or anything like that. But all the other leaders of specialized teams were listed explicitly; several bumped in pay. She wasn’t even on the list. Maybe it was an oversight.

Well, guess what?

This motherfucker and the other ass-kissing sycophants and petty pricks who made the list decided “HOW DARE SHE”.

I mean, dude. You fucked up. You forgot her on the list. Just put her on the list. Simple oversight. It doesn’t actually even require the bump in pay (though it probably should). Just add her to the list.

Nope.

Vindictive motherfuckers, for having the temerity to point out that they missed her on the list, they’ve gone on a hellbent drive to destroy her and her team, removing people, automating shit and screwing around her hours.

Oh, and that pay equity list? After six weeks of no answer, they came back stating your team is where it’s supposed to be, and despite you being the leader of the team and having explicitly written out a hundred things you do beyond what your team does, we’ve decided that your duties are not sufficiently different enough to require your own classification. Never mind the fact that as leader, her responsibilities are different, that she’s got more responsibility, more accountability and that EVERY OTHER LEADER HAS THEIR OWN DESIGNATION.

Nope.

Fuck you. You’re not on the list.

Everything that’s happened since she reached out has been a product of the vindictiveness of small, insecure men and their tiny… egos, aghast that someone who wasn’t an asskisser dared to question them.

Keep in mind that she didn’t even want to point it out. Her team begged her to say something. I told her she should, because maybe it was just an oversight, not reckoning on the fact that this piece of shit and his cronies were truly this horrible of people.

And she didn’t ask aggressively. She was as demure as she could be, like a timid little mouse begging for the tiniest little piece of cheese, off a block big as a house. Four years of no contact, and the first time she reaches out, they set out to destroy and punish her and her whole team.

For asking the questions they were supposed to ask about placement in the Pay Equity act. Fuck sakes, they requested feedback, specifically if they missed anyone.

That fucking place is the shits, and that man has absolutely destroyed any culture of doing the right thing or being, you know, good people. I’d love to come back one day as a consultant bent on culling the wheat, because ninety percent of upper management would be gone the first day.

Useless, overpaid, insecure pricks who contribute nothing and make everyone else miserable.

Christ, the PTSD from that place is strong; my blood pressure jumps 10-15 points just thinking about it.

What bothers me most of all is the choice being put to her now, and it’s complete shit. Stay silent, play ball, let them abuse her and punish her and her team, or fight back and probably get canned.

And as she’s said, we don’t have that fight in us anymore.

Sure, we could tie that up in legalities for years, but man, who has that kind of time and money? I know the HR guy there; he sculpts dismissals around the fact that they’ll challenge the company’s garbage behaviour in court. He makes the initial offer big enough that fighting back means losing money, for lesser reward. He’s told me this, to my face, back when I was running their tech support.

Let ’em come, he says. We’ll throw so much money at it, drag it out for years. We’ll bankrupt them before they ever see a dime or a decision, and when they get it, it will probably be less. Take that, minorities and other people we’ve bullied and/or screwed over.

Where’s the justice in that?

Is this what the Pay Equity Act was meant to do, Canadian government? To allow pieces of garbage another outlet to punish those they don’t like, to bully and silence them into subservience, with the threat of ruining their lives consistently hanging over their heads in the petty, tiny hands of a insecure egotist whose narcissism and need for constant validation overruns everything he does?

There is no justice in this world unless pieces of shit like that are held accountable for their godawful behaviour, and can no longer use their positions of power to silence good, hardworking people just trying to get by.

It’s fucking criminal.

Target: 800 words
Written: 2276 words, novella: The Mungk

Read: Hail To The Chin: Further Confessions Of A B Movie Actor, Ash Williams
Comics: Untold Tales Of I Hate Fairyland v2 5, I Hate Fairyland v2 11-13
Music: The Rolling Stones Rock 'N' Roll Circus, The Stones et al