No GMO
It helps to know some Lonely Island to get the joke in the subject line. -Ed
The citizen initiative in Oregon that would require labeling of GMO foods is polling very tight. It’s still within the margin of error and the undecideds but the nays appear to be holding an ever-so slight lead over the ayes. It is already the most expensive initiative in Oregon’s history. The nay money is pouring in by the millions. Companies like Monsanto, PepsiCo, Mead Johnson and Dow AgroSciences. Isn’t that telling?
As this process is proceeding apace, I thought I’d take a few moments to splice one last point on this important issue.
One thing is being made excruciatingly clear. The people who make food don’t want you to know what the fuck is in there. They don’t want you to know how it’s made. They don’t want you to see how they treat animals. (See so-called Ag Gag laws.) They want to hide unpleasant-sounding ingredients, things they know you decidedly do not want to hear about, behind clever euphemisms like “natural flavors.”
Which would you rather eat? All new fortified Tasty Anus or “natural flavors.” Gosh golly gee willickers. What sounds better in your tummy?
So I thought it over and decided, what if the debate was presented like this?
Suppose I was the food industry and I invited you over to my place for dinner.
I might try to do something nice, assuming I actually gave a shit about you, and find out if you have deadly allergies, like peanuts. After all, I’m not out to kill you, right? I want you to enjoy your meal.
Maybe you tell me that you don’t like yams. Are you allergic? No. Will it kill you? No. You simply don’t like them. That’s all.
How should I react to your humble request? What are my options?
Well, I could honor you as a person and forgo the ingredient. Hahahah! Thanks for the tripe laugh! We all know that’s not gonna fucking happen. Seriously, I didn’t just fall off the pesticide-resistant turnip truck yesterday.
Don’t be so goddamned naive. My dinner is a business. It’s kill or be killed. Nothing matters except profits.
What choices does that leave me?
I could simply say, “I’m not telling. Are there yams in here? You’ll never know!!!” That’s called being a good host.
My other option is lie. Hide it. Distract. Obsfucate.
What would you do? Isn’t this a nice way to treat each other? Doesn’t this sort of attitude help make the world a better place?
I make. You eat. Shut the hell up about it. I’m your host, Mr. GMO. By the way, I can’t believe you ate that. Ha ha ha!
My lies and hate. It’s what’s for dinner.
The Ingrate Pignorate
This was intended to be one of those oh so clever moments. I pumped the word “sales” into my thesaurus and was going to clutch in my dirty little fingers veritable proof that “sales” was synonymous with words like deceit, lie, fraud and what not.
Dammit. This thesaurus is defective. I never should have listened to that salesperson who told me it was unabridged.
One time I learned an important lesson about sales. I’ve told this story before but this time I’ll try to tell it shorter and better.
I worked for a big company. They needed to modernize an entire department. The estimated cost of the project, in 1995 dollars, was $25 million. To put that into perspective, later I ended up living in a small town that considered adding a much needed new bridge across a small river at a cost of $15 million in 2004 dollars. So yeah, the project was pretty big.
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Work Job
The “Work Job” is a sexual act of the most scurrilous and despicable nature. It involves finding a partner, known as a boss, turning around, bending over to touch your toes and waiting for it. The rest? It’s so heinous I can’t even think about it, much less describe it, not even to liven up this post for your entertainment. Sorry, I just can’t do it.
I’ve noticed something. When I make predictions and statements that are born out to be 100% correct, the universe covers me in a pile of shit as way of thanks. When someone like Karl Rove makes predictions that are dead wrong, he is given somewhere between $90 to $160 million of other people’s money to throw down a toilet hole.
Something tells me it should be the other way around.
Take the topic of bosses and jobs, for example. I’ve been preaching the way things are for quite some time. Did anyone listen to me? No!
There are a few keys moments I can remember in my life. For a lot of folks they remember where they were when JFK was shot. Well, I’m too young for that. For me, those watershed moments are things like the Challenger space shuttle disaster, the morning of 9/11, and the SCOTUS ruling on DOMA.
It turns out there’s one more for that list. The day that Gallup released data indicating that 70% of American workers hate their jobs. No shit. Really? Now you’re justing repeating things I’ve already said! I made that case a long, long time ago, only more eloquently.
Where’s my piece of the pie?
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Staff Infection Meeting
I once quit a job over a staff meeting. True story. I’m sure it’s documented here on the blog somewhere, but long story short, they made us on the 6am crew stick around for a 5pm meeting. I asked, “Is it important?” Our managers assured us it was. “You have to be there,” they said.
The meeting started and the first item of business was rolling out birthday cake for our safety director. At 5-fucking-o-clock. It’s not like most of us would be consuming dinner any time soon.
Then, for the icing on the cake, the rest of the hour was consumed by our managers reading memos to us. Line-by-line. Word-by-word. Like we were in kindergarten or something. Memos that had previously been delivered to our inboxes. Memos I had already read on my very own. It was worse than an insult to our intelligence. It was calling us babies.
After the meeting I opted to go back to my desk rather than heading straight home. I sat there and wrote out a memorandum of my own. Perhaps you’ve heard of it. It’s a classic piece of Americana called the letter of resignation. I plopped that puppy on my manager’s desk and then called it day.
Good times.
In another place and another time there was another staff meeting. This one involved the quintessential management tool known as the employee survey.
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Termination Tuesday – All Good Things
Sponsored by Preparation H.
Termination is such sweet sorrow.
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Termination Tuesday – The Super Bowel I
Sponsored by Preparation H.
Termination Tuesday – The Spinal Four – Week 2 – Slaughter Conference
It’s time for grizzly bone-crushing fun!
Shouts from the Abyss 
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