As a former zookeeper we would hear this a lot. “If you don’t study hard you’ll end up cleaning poop for a living.” It’s the one time we’re allowed to go off on the visitors. I once heard my boss rant for five minutes at a lady, in front of her kids, about how he had a Master’s degree, how people literally worked there for free, and how dare she judge people without bothering to know anything about them. Later that day his boss came by and said, roughly, “She told us what happened. Thanks for not throwing anything this time.”
I can count on one hand the amount of times I have gone off on people, but employment snobbery gives me the rage. I was showing the new kid how to use the fry scoop at McDonald’s “.. like this, and then just sort of hold it perpendicular and give it one tap..”
And the new kid sniggered “isn’t perpendicular a bit of a big word for McDonald’s?”
Something in me was just so annoyed by this 16yr old who was learning to work right next to me and somehow felt above us? Fuck that shit. I pointed at the people just on the floor and went off, “she’s a 4th year law student, she’s the primary career for her terminally ill daughter, he raises 100,000 for charity every year, she manages 3 stores and more than £16mil in turnover a year. What the fuck do you do?”
He just sort of mumbled “I didn’t know”
“you shouldn’t have to know, you’re not better than us. So. You tap it once and then move it here to release…”
“I didn’t know.”
“You shouldn’t have to know,”
yes to all this because workers can be educated and intelligent, but also, even if workers are formally uneducated or dont know big words that doesnt mean they arent equally deserving of respect
Zookeepers bust their asses shoveling shit and feeding apex predators so you can stare at an elephant without flying to Asia or Africa.
Fast food workers bust their asses surrounded by hot ovens and boiling oil so you can get food quickly without having to make it yourself or even learn how.
Janitors bust their asses cleaning up the most vile things humans can do to a public room so you don’t have to tiptoe around human waste everywhere you go.
Mail carriers bust their asses going door to door in near-fatal heat/cold and have to deal with the possibility of getting attacked by your poorly-trained pets so you don’t have to drive to the post office every single day.
Warehouse workers bust their asses making sure YOUR latest Amazon crap doesn’t just disappear into thin air.
And retail workers bust their asses coddling and picking up after you like your parents because none of you know how to read a price tag or stop deliberately miss-shelving things you never wanted.
But sure, go ahead and act like you wouldn’t be dead in a week without these people.
There’s no such thing as a low-skill job, just under-appreciated jobs.
I could never be a janitor – the amount of physical work they have to do is insane; let alone the knowledge of chemistry to know which cleaning supplies are used where (and how) and how to safely use and dispose of them. I wouldn’t last a single day.
Yet people often treat them as if they’re invisible, which is why I make a point to go out of my way to smile, nod, and/or say a cheery hello whenever I pass a janitor.
When we were kids, Mom always my brothers and I “You can do anything you want. I don’t care if you are a ditch digger, but you are goi8ng to be an educated ditch diggerl For about 15 years, I was an educated carpenter, and also an educated dock worker! Laz
