Don't Order Through Amazon Because Owners Think Their Employees Are Indentured Servants

Amazon just dropped an odious noncompete
rule on its workers after The Verge exposed
the clause, which technically would
prevent former Amazon employees from
working anywhere else for 18 months after leaving.  

Here's another reason to hate Amazon.

The giant online retailer had a horrible non-compete clause for warehouse workers that, if strictly enforced, would prevent them from working pretty much anywhere else for 18 months after leaving Amazon.

The Verge exposed this horrible work rule last week.

Amazon announced a day after The Verge article  appeared that it would get rid of the non compete clause.

I'm sure that's only because of the bad publicity. They probably would have had that clause forever.

When the publicity dies down they'll probably either reinstate the policy or come up with something more odious.

Here's how the clause worked, according to The Verge. 

Seasonal employees at Amazon warehouses had to promise not to work at any company where they "directly or indirectly" support any good or serve that competes with those they helped support at Amazon, for 18 months after their brief stints at Amazon ended.

Since Amazon sells basically anything, it almost seems like workers after leaving Amazon couldn't work at anyplace that sells anything.

That would be really tough to do, wouldn't it? Given that most businesses exist to sell something.

"It is quite broad in its scope," says Orly Lobel, a professor of labor and employment law at the University of San Diego, who has studied noncompetes extensively and reviewed the Amazon agreement.

Non-compete clauses can be great and totally legit, if focused properly.  If somebody learns specialized insider information at Company A, that corporation doesn't want the employee to quit and immediately go to a competitor and spill all those secret trade beans.

Usually, people who are under such non-compete clauses can go to work right away for another company, as long as they're not a direct competitor in that specialized field.

Amazon, however, takes things much farther than that, and targets a huge class of workers not normally subject to non-compete requirements.

The Verge article, quoting Lobel, said there could well have been more at work with this non-compete language than just trying to protect closely held company data:

"Although companies may push noncompetes on low wage workers to keep trade secrets from leaking, there's also a more cynical explanation: to simply deprive competitors of employees to hire,  according to Lobel.

Noncompetes can also depress workers' wages. Traditionally, a key strategy to keep employees from defecting to a competitor has been simply to offer competitive wages, but a company that uses non-compete agreements can feel less pressure to pay well."

Well, you gotta hand it to Amazon, then. They found a creative way to screw the little guy, again.

Of course, the workers involved in the Amazon non-competes could have declined to take the job in the first place.

But most low income people, desperate for jobs and money, don't read dense legalese they sign. Or they figure they have no other options, or that these noncompete agreements are just the way things are.

Once hired, the workers feel stuck.

Says Lobel in The Verge article:

"People very well might decide that, despite their unhappiness with their job, despite the fact that they think they can do better with another employer, they might decide that it's just not worht the risk and that they should just lay low."

Yep, that's a mild form of indentured servitude in my book.

As I noted near the top of this post, The Guardian newspaper reported that Amazon said it was ditching the non-compete agreement shortly after The Verge publicized it.  Amazon said they didn't apply it to hourly workers, such as those that work in warehouses anyway.

Then why did Amazon make them sign the stupid thing? (See above.)

Of course, I'm suspicious. That Amazon folded on this so quickly suggests to me they have another sneaky way to screw low wage employees up their sleeve.

Besides, this type of non-compete was probably unenforceable anyway. Plus, it's not known to have been actually enforced on Amazon low wage workers

But the warehouse workers didn't know that. They also figured they'd have to hire lawyers to fight it, and who on a near minimum wage job can afford a lawyer?

Besides, courts have sided with Amazon in the past when it comes to screwing over or not screwing over workers.

In warehouses, workers had to go through a security screening before they left their shift for the day to make sure they weren't stealing stuff. That part is fair enough.

But this would often take a half hour or more of waiting in line and such for each worker, and they weren't paid for it.

Last December, the U.S. Supreme Court said this was OK, because the time waiting to be screened wasn't an "integral and indispensable" part of their job.

True, but it should have been free time. Unless Amazon warehouse workers all thought they would like nothing better to do on their time off from work than hanging around warehouses waiting to be checked to see if they were thieves.

I know other major companies don't treat their employees well. (Hello, Walmart!)

But Amazon seems to just have disdain for its rank and file workers.

I don't call for boycotts. Do what you want.

But for me, I will NEVER order anything through Amazon. Unless they start treating their employees with maybe just a little respect.

I'm Starting Arguments Over What Are The Best Songs Ever. Just Because

While idly clicking on sites on the Internet, I stumbled on BoingBoing.net featuring a video of Dusty Springfield performing "Son Of A Preacher Man."

Gawd, I'd forgotten how good that song is.  A few people might call the song tacky or sacrilegious, but I call it as awesome as it can possibly get.

Here's the video, then scroll down below that, I'll start more music arguments.





While being unproductive, I also stumbled upon a dreaded listicle at the Huffington Post regarding the top 10 albums of the 1960s and 1970s. 

(Yes, despite my complaints about click bait listicles, I get sucked into them sometimes, too.)

Anyway, I can't really disagree with any of the albums on the list.

There's "Tapestry" by Carole King. "Born To Run" by Bruce Springsteen is there. The title track is arguably my favorite song ever. I'm not super crazy about "Songs In The Key Of Life," by Stevie Wonder, which made the list.

The best song on this Huffington Post list is "Rumours" from 1977 by Fleetwood Mac. I listened to this album obsessively when it came out.

Huffington Post outlines part of the reason why "Rumours" is so perfect:

"Take two impossibly attractive American singers, add three blues-minded Brits, give them a ton of cocaine, and make sure they all sleep with each other."

Remember, this is the 1970s we're talking about.

The Rumours album contains the best song to listen to when  you're pissed off, called "Go Your Own Way."  I like to scream along with it when I hear it on the truck radio.

"You can go your own way
GO YOUR OWN WAY!!!
You can call IT 
Another lonely day
YOU CAN GO YOUR OWN WAY!!!!!!"

It's also the perfect song if you've broken up with someone and you're glad he or she is gone.

Luckily, that's not a problem for me, because as far as I'm concerned, my husband is stuck with me forever, but that's another story.

But anyway, if you need help remembering this song, here it is. Then below this video, is maybe the list that will cause the most arguments about music.




Here's the sort of listicle that is sure to cause an argument about music, if you're not already fighting.

The BBC recently conducted a poll, asking what is the best cover of a popular song - you know, a famous song re-done by somebody else, usually who is also famous.

Anyway, the winner in the poll is the Pet Shop Boys' version of "Always On My Mind"

"Always On My Mind" IS a great song, no doubt about it. The most famous version is by Willie Nelson, but his was a cover, too.

Elvis Presley released a version in 1972. Michael Buble has done it. So has Shakira.

Alvin and the Chipmunks even did a version, but I seriously doubt that was ever a contender for the best cover of a song.

For the record, I hate, hate, HATE!! Alvin and the Chipmunks. Just had to get that off my chest.

"Always On My Mind" was written by Wayne Carson.  He told Parade what the genesis of the song was:

"In this case, 'Always On My Mind' happens to be one of those things that, universally, everybody on the planet has been there, you know. And it struck me at the time. Everybody touched base with that one. It was just magic that it was so simple and so right on the button."

So here's "Always On My Mind" by the Pet Shop Boys. And some concluding thoughts below that to get your musical argument into high gear.




By the way, critics often say the best cover song is Johnny Cash's version of "Hurt," written by Johnny Cash. That came in at Number 2 in the BBC poll.

I'm personally intrigued by Cash's version of one of my favorite songs, "Personal Jesus" By Depeche Mode.

As you can see, we can easily get in the weeds arguing what is the best song, the best cover, the best version, the best this, the best that.

So let's start the argument. Your favorite song? Your favorite album? Your favorite cover? Tell us.

We love fights over things that won't change or ruin the world. 

N.Y. Kindergarten Play Cancelled Because We Have To Train Kids To Be Brain Dead Cubicle Dwellers Early

The big news this week out of Elwood, New York is that the Harley Avenue Primary School kindegarten class will not be putting on its annual show like it's done in past years.  

The letter announcing no kindergarten
show in a New York school district
because students were too busy being
fed rote lessons to pass standardized tests 

According to the Washington Post, the kindergarteners have no time for such frivolity as learning to work together, collaborate, or heaven forbid, do anything that smacks of art.

The letter sent home to parents is pretty breathtaking. It reads in part:

"The reason for eliminating the Kindergarten show is simple. We are responsible for preparing children for college and career with valuable lifelong skills and know we can best do that by having them become strong readers, writers, coworkers and problem solvers. 

Please do not fault us for making professional decisions that we know will never please everyone. But know that we are making these decisions with the interests of all children in mind."

Um, excuse me, but I AM going to fault you. Putting on a show mimics real life work experience. You have to read, write, work with others and solve problems that are not predictable like in a classroom setting.

One person who commented on the Washington Post article said it best: "Since when is reading a script, interpreting a part, following directions, coordinating activities with others and presenting in front of an audience NOT age-appropriate career readiness training for Kindergarteners?

I guess the problem is you also have to be creative to put on a show. Yes, creativity is important in the world of work, but that doesn't seem to be the goal of the U.S. educational system anymore.  Plus, the students might find it interesting, and want to learn more about this. Or it might inspire them to ask questions about any other topic.

We can't have that.

It seems whenever a school becomes embroiled in some controversy, administrators at this school did not respond to the Washington Post for comment. There seems to be a culture in public education of being wimpy and just hiding when someone has the audacity to ask about the reasoning behind the way our children are taught.

There's good reason to question the way they're taught.

As the Washington Post article notes: "This didn't come out of the blue. Kindergarten (and even preschool) has increasingly become academic - at the expense of things such as recess and the arts - in this ear of standardized test based school reform. 

In most states, educators are evaluated in large part on test scores of students (sometimes students they don't have) and on showing that their students are 'college and career ready,' the mantra of the Obama administration's education initiatives." 

In an earlier Washington Post article on Feb. 6 reporter Valerie Strauss wrote:

"This doesn't leave much time for play. But even to the extent we want to promote meaningful learning in young children, the methods are likely to be counterproductive, featuring an emphasis on direct instruction of skill and rote rehearsal of facts. 

This is the legacy of behavioralism: Children are treated as passive receptacles of knowledge, with few opportunities to investigate topics and pose questions that they find intriguing. In place of discovery and exploration, tots are trained to sit still and listen, to memorize lists of letters, numbers and colors. 

Their success or failure is relentlessly monitored and quantified, and they're 'reinforced' with stickers or praise for producing right answers and being compliant."

By conspiratorial mind believes this is the point of teaching children this way--so they're not the type of person who grow up to be the type that ask questions and agitage for answers.

No, educators and industry and politicians don't meet behind closed doors and dungeons to make kids docile. But our current society, with its so called one percent, with the concentration of power and wealth among a few oligarchs, really, don't want people asking questions about this state of affairs.

So they encourage the kind of climate that ended the Harley Avenue Public School Kindergarten show.

As a side note, notice how the letter kind of asked the parents not to question the judgement of the administrators who canceled the show. ("Please don't fault us making professional decisions.") They're trying to teach the parents, as well as the kids not to rock the boat, not to question, not to probe.

If we don't teach children to think on their own, to ask questions, to pursue their passions, if we don't teach them to be creative, to gather strings of information into a cohesive theory or conclusion, they won't rock the boat as adults.

Our society needs boat rockers, really. But those in power, some of whom have way too much power, don't want that.  They don't want us to ask questions, criticize, analyze.

If they create a world of humorless, robots and minions disguised as people, they can continue to take advantage of all of us.  

Video Proves 2013 Country Music Was Mostly Just Cliches

Believe me, there is such a thing as an incredibly well crafted, well written, catchy, wonderful country song.

Unfortunately, like a lot of genres that are pretty mass market, most country music recently has consisted of tired old cliches. Which is why I generally don't listen to Top 40 country radio stations.

Want the proof? Watch this video that shows that in 2013, country music was only about trucks, dirt roads, riverbanks and hot girls in tight jeans.

Yawn:

Really? Obama Commits Crime of Fashion. Impeach!

Say what you want about President Obama. Everybody does anyway.  Some people are fans, some are not.  Fair enough. Praise him  his policies or condemn him for his political positions.

However, according to one fashion writer, Ellie Krupnick, Obama committed the ultimate sin, a crime of fashion: He dressed without paying the least bit of attention on being fashionable.

President Obama seen here
apparently committing
an impeachable offense:
Being not fashionable.

He committed the crime on a recent brief vacation to Hawaii.

Wrote Krupnick:

"President Obama, bless his heart, was basically a mess: baggy pleated khaki pants and a billowing turquoise button-down shirt... with short sleeves. Oh, and it was tucked in. With a belt." 

Those are Krupnick's italics in that passage, by the way, not mine.

She went on:

"We can tolerate a bright hue (Michelle Obama has certainly worn her fair share), but with men's clothes, fit is key. Obama's shirt is too big around the waist, the shoulders and the sleeves. The pants are too roomy at the top, too long at the bottom and wrinkled to boot."

Oh the humanity!  We're stuck with a president who is incapable of being sufficiently fashionable! America is over.

Yep. Our president is a failure. Not for any foreign policy decisions, economic plans, or opinions on social issues.  The real problem, apparently, is he doesn't dress fashionably enough. At least not for Krupnick.

The photo of Obama's crime of fashion is in this post. To me, the outfit he's wearing does its job. It's fine. Unremarkable. Except to fashion police.

This happens too regularly, more so to women, though. There is this bizarre expectation in some circles that no matter how busy somebody is, (and Obama sure is busy) they're supposed to agonize day in and day out on whether their clothes look Just Right.

Look, there's nothing wrong with fashion and dressing up beautifully and creatively if that's what you want to do. Fashion can be beautiful and interesting.

And yes, we want to be presentable and dressed somewhat close to appropriately for whatever situation we're in.  Some people take casual too far. Look to the site People of Walmart for examples.

 But what I hate, hate, about a number of people in  the fashion industry is the extreme cattiness. You're subhuman if your clothes don't look exactly right. Please just stop that sense of exaggerated horror they express if the outfit somebody is wearing is so last week.

This is why I don't dress fashionably.  Actually I kind of want to have better, nicer clothes sometimes. I wouldn't go for the latest fashion, just something that's classic and looks good.

But why bother?  Those classic and good looking clothes clearly wouldn't be good enough for the fashionista gestapo. That wouldn't exactly hurt by fragile, sensitive soul. But why reward these nutcases with something to condemn? T-shirts and Carhartts it is. Deal with it.

I'll just go through life paying attention to the stuff that matters. Just as Obama presumably focuses more on governing, not fashion.

Because guess what: Contrary to what some in the fashion industry would have you believe. Appearing as someone's idea of perfect is not what most of us want to, or need to aspire to.

I repeat: Deal with it.