Sunday, December 21, 2008

Bullying


I do not know why I did not write about this before. I guess I was trying not to think about it because it was so painful and unavoidable. When I reported bullying to Human Resources of XYZ ( name not published because of the fear of reprisal) company in Toronto, I was told by HR person that she is an "expert on bullying". I knew right away that she was a bully herself, trying to convince me that I was not really bullied. She asked me: Do you know what bullying is? And I said: I know. The bullying is when you know that you are bullied. She was so hard trying to look professional, and I was so hard trying not to say anything bad about my boss, for whom I knew was the mastermind of the bullying plot. I read everywhere that it is not smart to say anything bad about your boss, even if he is a pure evil, so I followed that advice. Even more so, I said nice things about him, hoping, as any victim is always hoping, that this will elicit some empathy on his side. No, it did not happen. After I reported bullying the things got much worse. It was actually a group bullying, I called it mobbing, by three people that I sat with in the same cubicle. They were constantly taking turns in making personal remarks about me: how I talk to my son on the phone, how I say words, more subtle remarks but very clear to me that no matter what I do they will not show any respect for me and my good work and all the help I was offering to them. For me this all thing became somewhat exepriment "in vivo". I was saying things that I was hoping will improve the situation, showing interest in their shallow conversations, tried to share some stories that I thought will show to them that I am also a human being with a little bit different but similar interests and concerns as theirs. The only one thing I could not do, is to go to their level, because I cannot make fun of other's misfortunes. And when one of them commented on the death of the boy who run away from home over disupute with parents over xbox 360, when she referred to the dead boy as "that ass kid now knows better", I had to keep my mouth shut and bite my tongue, because whatever I wanted to say to her could not convey how much discusted I was with that comment. And so on, I could go on and on. If you do not understand by now what I am trying to say, just stop reading it here. Well, Human Resources came back to me with the conclusion that "there was no evidence of bullying". I said I would be suriprised if they found any. I resigned next day. Some will call it victory for the bully. I call it staying alive. Because, seriously, these people are so mean that they would not mind taking your life. It is true, and it is happening right now.

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