Entry #16: Penn and Teller

Penn and Teller are definitely top tier douchebags. They essentially do what I'm doing in my blog (try and present contrary information using tons of profanity and an angry demeanor), but they fall into the categories of corporate interest and pro-technology stances. They're perfect entry-level jerking material for all of those nerdy kids nationwide who major in engineering, thinking their net life worth is defined by their income and our only progress humanity can still achieve is through technology and science. These are the asshats I would send to gas chambers - after I have them engineer more potent gas chambers with which to suffocate themselves. Oftentimes these are the same people who fall under the "predictable atheist" category mentioned in my entry about Family Guy. One of my coworkers tries to tell me that Penn and Teller try their best to have professionals represent both sides of the argument, which is totally untrue. In their episode about organic food they interview some fucking inarticulate hippies outside of a grocery store, and in their episode about Wal-Mart they interview some dickheads who make t-shirts. Of course they also interviewed a higher-up member of Green Peace and the mind behind the High Cost of Low Price movie - but Penn and Teller still try their hardest to make their opposition look as moronic as possible by also presenting the least reputable, least professional sources possible for the side they're against.

I could discuss their episode about organic food, but I already made my entry about organic food, so instead I'm going to talk about their episode about Wal-Mart - which made me want to punch my monitor on numerous occasions. The entire episode panned out like one huge advertisement for Wal-Mart, and reeked of sponsorship and corporate funding. The information was blatantly biased, especially in regards to Wal-Mart employees' payroll.

Let me remind you that they said in their episode the average hourly wage for a full-time Wal-Mart employee is $10.51/hour. First of all, I don't have any statistics or numbers available in front of me - but how many employees are full-time at Wal-Mart compared to their part-time employees? How often do they hire in new employees at full-time? Isn't it common fucking knowledge that Wal-Mart avoids giving full time employment, because in some cases that means they're also entitled to give certain benefits? I know my workplace is hardly Wal-Mart, and I'd safely assume it's a much better work environment - but my employer doesn't hire in any new employees at full-time, unless they're filling a specialized position or they're in a supervisement position. How many of those full-time employees at Wal-Mart, then, have been at the store for years, have trained positions or have supervisement positions that naturally pay more? This is hardly an accurate portrayal of the sort of income they offer.

For a comparison, let's talk about Ford Motor Company. Ford Motor Company is a huge employer for northeastern Ohio, and if you're living in any suburb of Medina or Cuyahoga counties you more than likely know at least one person who works at Ford, or has a relative who does. My dad, for example, has been working at Ford as an electrician for around 15 years. Previous to working at Ford my dad worked at TRW, and when he was first hired at Ford he doubled his hourly wage. Nowadays my dad currently makes over $30/hour, and he always refers to himself as a "dinosaur," because similar positions are becoming fewer and fewer.
Ford is going through a financial crisis at the moment, and every couple months it offers its employees a "buyout" opportunity - where they take a small annual income and paid tuition for a few years in place of their position with the company. When employees take these buyouts they hire new people to fill those positions, but they nearly cut the expected hourly wage in half. Positions that previously paid $17/hour are now being filled for $8.50/hour. Eight fucking fifty for a factory job, and a highly labor intensive one at that!
If we were to use Penn and Teller's bullshit acquisition of statistics and we calculated the average income for those employed with Ford Motor Company, those employees with more seniority would hugely inflate the statistic - not to mention they don't accurately represent what you'd expect if you were a new hire at Ford, even once you reach your maximum hourly rates. The statistic is only full of more shit if the majority of those being polled are nearly all employees with more seniority or trained positions - which is more than likely the case if you're compiling information on people who are employed full-time at Wal-Mart. Their statistics should be based off of part-time employees, their average starting wages, and their maximum salary caps.

Later in the episode, Penn and Teller actually say that we should fucking tear down the downtown areas in cities to build Wal-Marts?! What kind of bullshit is this? They blame politicians and special interest groups for rejecting proposals to build Wal-Marts in their towns, and say something to the extent of "who are the fuck are you to say what's right," or some other relativist shit along the same line. Well, I won't be dodgy in what I'm about to say: most people are fucking morons. Consumers drive the economy, sure, I can accept that as fact. I would go even further and say that workers drive the economy, because it's their paychecks that ultimately pump money into bullshit companies to come out with newer, improved bullshit products that we usually don't need. If the consumers are going to be dickheads and drive 20 miles away to buy all their products at a big box retailer I don't want my quality of life to be hurt in the process. I'll gladly support family businesses and get artisan and high quality products at higher prices, but I'll just be a bit more responsible with my money and not buy too many items outside of necessity. However, if your support of Wal-Mart is going to drive my downtown area out of business and hurt my quality of life, I hope you choke on a chicken McNugget so I can visit your gravestone to personally dig up your grave and fornicate your dead corpse with a broomstick, and then smash in your fucking rotten head with a baseball bat. "Who the fuck are you," Penn and Teller? You're obviously some dickheads who assume that the general population knows what the fuck it's doing, that's why you're making a tv show to uncover all the "bullshit" it supposedly believes.

I want to support quality products, not mass produced shit that's outsourced and sold at non-union workplaces. It would be nice if I could go into a store and its workers actually made the products they're selling, so if I have any personal questions, complaints, or recommendations they could give me relevant fucking information and not redirect me to some other motherfucker or tell me they're unsure.

You know what else really pisses me off? Anti-union fuckheads. My union ensures me a minimum number of hours, and even though it's only 14 hours it's still better than nothing. At one point I worked at Target (and later got fired), and they would schedule me for one day a week sometimes, or they would give me 6 or 7 hours split amongst 3 days. A few friends of mine have worked at Blockbuster, and they had similar issues. One friend of mine actually wasn't scheduled a whole week straight while at Blockbuster. How the fuck are you supposed to do anything, or even make the radical claim that you even have a job if you're only working one or two fucking days a week? How about when I was working at Little Caesars and I would go entire shifts without a single, quantifiable break? My union also offers optical and dental insurance, and minor health insurance for its full-time employees. One of the coolest things about having a union is you're not a total bitch, and unless you're caught stealing your workplace doesn't want to bother with going through all the paperwork and proving just cause behind firing an employee. When I was working at Chipotle I got fired for not reaching the ringing standard at the cash register; I was fucking shaking half the time I working there - I felt so much stress and tension trying to reach that ringing standard. Hey, I just got fired instead of them actually trying to help me improve my speed, calm myself down or give any pointers. You're a motherfucking manager, not a taskmaster. Manage me, tell me how to perform my job and help my performance, not sit idly by and to criticize me and laugh at my attempts. A few of my friends have worked at UPS and FedEX factories, on the otherhand, and been able to get away with nearly anything without getting fired. In my opinion, this is the way things should be. Nobody should be fired unless they're totally unmanagable, they constantly don't show up without calling, they openly quit their job, or they're caught stealing. It's true it can create lazier workers, but it creates less stressful environments for its employees who are the driving bodies of our economy - without their wages paying for bullshit they don't need, capitalism would stop existing. I will gladly pay more money to give workers higher wages, and I will gladly give $8 out of my paycheck to ensure a few benefits, job security, and a floor for my hours.

Maybe the goal of most of these anti-union employers is to make their workers unhappy, so they spend more money on the entertainment industry?

As a closing thought, anybody who is anti-union is fucking worthless and they should be fed their own shit from a trough, since they're already accustomed to low-quality products.