Like a faded dream.

Concerted activity - Federal law protects employees engaged in union activity, but that's only part of the story. Even if you're not represented by a union - even if you have zero interest in having a union - the National Labor Relations Act protects your right to band together with coworkers to improve your lives at work. You have the right to act with coworkers to address work-related issues in many ways. Examples include: talking with one or more co-workers about your wages and benefits or other working conditions, circulating a petition asking for better hours, participating in a concerted refusal to work in unsafe conditions, and joining with coworkers to talk directly to your employer, to a government agency, or to the media about problems in your workplace. Your employer cannot discharge, discipline, or threaten you for, or coercively question you about, this "protected concerted" activity. However, you can lose protection by saying things about your employer that are egregiously offensive or knowingly and maliciously false, or by publicly disparaging your employer's products or services without relating your complaints to any labor controversy.

If your employer pulls this shit, or your manager verbally tries to discourage you from talking about your pay or other material working conditions (benefits, hours/scheduling, safety, etc), write down the details (time/date/who was present/what exactly was said) and file a charge with the NLRB via your local field office.  If employers aren’t held accountable for their bullshit, they’ll keep on doing it.  

Copy and paste the following:

I was musing on the everyday passive-aggression of business emails at work the other day after a particularly pissy back-and-forth with my least favorite coworker, in which we basically told each other to fuck off in plain view of both our bosses (who were cc’d on the whole thing), but because we did it in professional language we can get away with that. So, I decided to make a list of the most common code-words and phrases and what they really mean, for anyone entering their first white-collar business environment who might want help translating or need to know how to deliver a polite, professional “fuck you”.

“I’d just like to get some clarity on this/can you clarify for me” = what the fuck are you talking about/what the fuck did you do?

“Let’s discuss next steps” = get off your ass and make it happen you lazy shitwad.

“Thanks for following up with me about this” = I’m busy and I’ll get to you when I have a moment. Quit fucking riding my ass.

“If you need it sooner than that” = I have my own work to do; do it your damn self if it’s that urgent.

“What’s our timeline on this?” = I have no intention of doing that for you right now. How long can I put it off?

“It’s going to be challenging, but…” = do you have any fucking idea what you’re asking me to do?

“I see where you’re coming from” = you are so fucking wrong

“Would you like to take the lead on this?” = this is not my problem and I refuse to clean up your mess.

“Maybe we could schedule some time to discuss this over the phone” = stop avoiding me and answer the fucking question, asshole

“[Someone on the CC line of the email], please feel free to weigh in!” = I don’t have the authority to tell this shithead how wrong they are. Kindly step up and do it for me.

“It was my understanding that” = we’ve already had this conversation, please shut the fuck up

[thread]

I think it’s worth looking at why bad endings ruin stories. This will be a big rambling thread I’m gonna chip away at so feel free to mute if it’s not your cup of tea #storytalk

I was inspired to write this after @MagnoliaPearl posted something about the ending of Parks & Rec. Which was abysmal. To the point where when I rewatched the series, I stopped before the last season. It’s an ending that felt like a betrayal even though it was a “happy” one

You can’t just toss in good things happening to characters that they haven’t earned. Everyone can’t win the lottery in the last episode. That’s not a happy ending, it’s Deus ex machina that betrays all the things the characters actually struggled for

If you were to draw a story curve, in general a happy ending is one where the characters end up better than where they started but really not too much better. It really depends heavily on how wildly the rest of your graph swings during the rest of your book

Here’s an entertaining clip of Kurt Vonnegut explaining a little tongue in cheek bit about graphing stories that’s actually pretty helpful for explaining what I’m getting at

If you look at P&R that way, it’d probably look a little something like this. It’s easy enough to see where reality breaks

It’s a bit of an exaggeration but not much. The point is, you probably shouldn’t swing too far up from whatever was your highest point during the story. If your previous high was “couple gets married,” then “couple has baby” is a realistic ending. “Couple win lottery” maybe not

Actually, never have anyone win the lottery after the first act. Unless it’s an inciting incident that forms the foundation of the entire story…no lottery. That’s a good rule

But the thing that really got me thinking was why does it matter? The show is over, right? It’s not like I’m then forced to then watch a show about Leslie Knope being President. I think it matters for a few reasons and bear with me here cuz I’m making this up as I go…

One is what I’ll call the Evergreen Ending principle. Which is that even though the story has ended, you need to be able to imagine the characters are continuing to have similar adventures forever. That’s part of what makes an ending feel good, especially for serialized media

Obviously, things will be different because the Real Story already happened. But it needs to be easy to imagine how these characters go on doing essentially the same stuff forever. The only thing worse than the ending P&R gave us would be one where Leslie retires, for example

This is also why I hate epilogues. Like the ending of Harry Potter where they all old and have kids. Let the audience imagine what happens next. That part isn’t for the creator to say. Back off and let your audience take over

If you change too much, even for the better, you’ve also ruined any possibility of the Evergreen Ending. You’ve essentially created a whole new series where everything is different, which only works if you’re then planning to tell that new story

Bad endings can never be fixed. Every other story problem can potentially be resolved. Which I think is why those moments tend to pull back the curtain on a writer’s failings. It’s why writing endings is so stressful

But here’s what I think works. And this is obviously just my opinion and who the hell am I? But I think that when you reach the real end of your story, your plot should be on autopilot. If you’ve done your job, the story will just fly home itself

Don’t try to solve any more problems with plot. Unless you have a twist ending, accept that it’ll be a somewhat predictable finish and that’s okay. The only thing you need to tend to is the audience’s emotional needs. And have those needs reflect themselves in the characters

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