"Who's in charge here?"
Dam Builders extract desired special treatment, giveaways, and concessions from businesses through complaining. They strike when businesses are at their most vulnerable, when they are at their busiest. The plan is to build a dam across the cash register/customer service desk, hurting the business's bottom line, until they get their way.
The nature of the dam builder's complaint does not matter, but observation has found that in most cases, the company is in the right. Dam builders will memorize a given company's policies and procedures, but are unable to remember any that might negatively affect their case. They are less concerned with the letter of the law than with the spirit of mercy, as to how it applies to the white sweater they bought and washed with a red baseball cap and now want a full refund for because well, just look at it, it's pink.
Dam builders never accept any answer except ‘yes’ as final. Instead, one level of management after another (going from shift manager all the way up to CEO for all the dam builder cares) will need to come up front just to tell them no.
Dam builders count on the line of customers behind them pressuring management to give up a refund. The longer it takes, the more people in line, the more managers behind the register, the less it seems to cost the store to give them what they want. In most cases dam builders get their way. But often, kitchen and waitstaff will spit in their food.
There is a case in
"I'm too sexy..."
-Right Said Fred
The Female of the Species...
An out-sized number of dam builders are women, who are either attractive or who put considerable time and effort into their appearance. They are unconscious dam builders**. They always expect to get their way and they don’t care who else is inconvenienced. The rest of us are just extras in the movies of their lives anyway, so they expect us to stand around patiently until they get their way. They are not counting on the large numbers of customers swearing under their breaths to put pressure on the storekeeper to give them what they want. They believe that there is a ranking system, and that they outrank you. Only someone more beautiful than they can give them bad news. An unattractive person cannot tell Paris Hilton that she's going to have to take her shoes off at the TSA check. It's like a private telling a general he's not allowed in the officer's club. The general is going to want to hear it from someone a little higher up the line.
So it is with the beautiful people. You're just not pretty enough to tell her that your store will not give her a refund for the sheets her chihuahua peed on. She's going to need to hear that from someone who's prettier than you or who at least has enough power in equivalence to her self-perceived level of desirability. If you happen to be the highest ranking person, she will complain to your superior that you insulted her whether you said anything insulting or not. You have acted in a most disgraceful way, by not accepting the currency that she has counted on since she was jail bait. You stupid person, you. She eats for free, she goes everywhere without paying, she is given clothes just making them look good. You should be fired for not being smart enough to see that and not being hot enough to give her bad news.
It's not a deliberate tactic, on their part, to gum up the works. It's just unprecedented for them to be refused anything. It’s emotionally unsettling for them to be told no. After dealing with you, they will check on themselves immediately to see if they are slipping. They get ugly (pun intended) when they feel their looks are being rejected. (See: Ashlee Simpson at McDonald’s).
Alpha Males
Male dam builders also tend to have excessively high estimates of their actual value to society. These are the "alpha males." Alpha males are actually chimpanzees, but don't tell the "alphas" that. Also don't tell them that the human equivalents of alpha males in human society are usually in prison, because they will sneer at you like you're completely stupid.
Alphas look like penises: muscular (although in atrocious shape cardio-wise) with shaved heads. Most of them start going bald in their early twenties (it's all the testosterone, they want you to know) but even those who have hair will shave their heads to make themselves look more alpha-like. These alphas can be found in the manliest industry in the world, the financial sector, where all the big penises are. Notice that most men who actually have "macho" jobs, like firefighters, bull riders, and Star Wars memorabilia collectors, don't act this way.
The alpha is the linchpin of the Western world, according to him. American Consolidated Scrap Metal will fall apart without him. He also has a few other irons in the fire. It's clear, to him, anyway, that they need him more than he needs them.
He's bought some real estate through the Carleton Sheets program and learned to hypnotize people with his teeth like Tony Robbins, and he lives a Purpose Driven Life like Rick Warren said, while he's learned to Unleash his Inner Warrior, it's his wife's idea that he go to Dave Ramsey's Financial Peace University, but he's no follower. He's a leader. So when you tell him that you cannot take back the underwear he has taken out of the package and worn, he's going to have to speak to somebody a little higher up the chain of command than you, darling. What he wants is to get invited into the manager's office. That's where he does his best work, like that time he cried and cried until his boss agreed to give him one more month to get his crap straight or he'd be fired. The alpha is certain he can take command of every situation and force it to reward him regardless of how wrong he is.
If he does manage to get your boss to give him what he wants, he will make a point of coming back to your workstation to rub your nose in it.
See also: celebrities, athletes, politicians, lawyers, doctors.
Tip for dealing with the above type of dam builders:
Don't refuse their requests. Tell them they are being upgraded. If you're a flight attendant dealing with an alpha, tell them you're upgrading their seat. DO NOT move them to first class. Give them an extra bag of peanuts, or a pair of slippers. They immediately become much more docile and compliant.
There's No Call for That Kind of Language
Those are polite dam builders. The rude ones start screaming and hollering and demanding to speak to the CEO and majority stockholder of the corporation. They don't complain so much as make demands, as if they were Somali pirates. In fact, that is how they move. Unless they get what they want, the store will not be able to function correctly. Nobody needs to get hurt, but they will inevitably either threaten physical violence or to call a lawyer. Sometimes both.
Observed at Wal-Mart, in the spring of this year: a big guy (275 pounds, mid 40s) in a Jesus t-shirt attempting to return a small car battery that he’d used on a large truck. After the battery died, he allowed the acid to overflow all over it, then let it sit in his garage for well past the three month warranty. The battery was a health hazard, dangerous acid fumes adding strength to an otherwise logically weak argument. He threatened to kick the asses of both the salesclerk (95 pounds, 25 years old) and an assistant manager (170, mid 50s). Your humble correspondent should add that this was on a Saturday afternoon, when there was a line of cars half a mile long.
First, the customer lied about being a friend of the manager’s, but could not actually remember the manager's name. Then he demanded that the manager, who was off (supposedly) come to the store so the customer could talk to him. Then he wanted contact information for every executive in the Wal-Mart corporation. The assistant manager actually stood his ground, and the dam builder eventually stormed off cussing. There was nothing else for him to do but enact the violence he’d been threatening, get arrested, and still not get his refund. Your humble correspondent has never been prouder to be a Wal-Mart shopper.
"You think I'm licked. You all think I'm licked. Well, I'm not licked. And I'm going to stay right here and fight for this lost cause. Even if the room gets filled with lies like these, and the Taylors and all their armies come marching into this place."
- Jimmy Stewart, Mr. Smith Goes to Washington
Frank Capra's Mr.Smith Goes to Washington is the ultimate dam builder movie. If you haven't seen it, Jimmy Stewart is a pedophile, er, a physical fitness enthusiast who likes to hang out with young boys who gets appointed by a political boss to fill a Senate seat. About to be impeached for misconduct, he filibusters the Senate for hours while his little victims, er, supporters deliver the honest news to the voters of his home state. Every dam builder can quote every line from the filibuster scene verbatim, whether they have seen the movie or not. This isn't movie dialogue, this is the words of justice written on their very souls. If they can hold on just long enough, justice in the form of an upgrade to first class for the flight they just missed will present itself. All the dam builder needs to do is persevere, just long enough, and to prevent everyone else from getting anything done.
The polite ones never raise their voice or insult anyone. They simply don’t give up. Observed two years ago at a supermarket: a woman complaining about the Kroger’s brand spaghetti she’d bought. The correspondent failed to catch her complaint, but she not only brought in the box, she also brought in the (empty) jar of sauce, the pot (spaghetti and sauce still inside), and half a loaf of Italian-style toaster bread. She wanted a refund for all of it. Your humble correspondent failed to add that this was around
*Remember, that's the Lehigh Pub,
**Correspondent deserves credit for not making a very obvious joke here.
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