On Compassion

For some people there seems to be a need to seek revenge after being hurt in some way. All logic and sensibility is forgotten and the desire to inflict pain or discomfort or inconvenience ignites. I am not one of those people and it is hard for me to understand.

For example...

I recently started working in an office in Manhattan. One woman was hired at the same time that I was and we alternated days. As the weeks went by I began hearing stories of how this other employee was slacking on the job; coming in late, taking frequent smoking breaks without leaving someone to cover the desk, talking on her cell phone, saying rude comments to some of the clients. It finally came to the point where the office manager had to let her go. She was not doing a good job of representing the office image.

Last week, at two in the morning, the manager received an email from this woman claiming that she was clearly fired due to superficial reasons and was threatening to sue on the grounds that the office was sexually discriminating.

Obviously this woman was upset. It's a very tough economy at the moment. People are having terrible times trying to find work. She was given notice but it was a new job, there was no severance package. She is a single mother, and she was only working part-time. This woman did not have the means to find a lawyer to take the case, that the office had any discrimination was a fabrication on her part. She was trying to black-mail the office.

Now, my initial reaction was exactly this, "That is so sad."

But then I started to try to think of her position. She was bitter and trying to get by, and provide for her child. Could it not be viewed as an action of pure survivial?

But then I thought of her under-performance and realized that no, she was seeking revenge.

If one is in desperate need of money, of a job then one should know better than to take advantage of a kind health-care practice. One should take responsibility for one's job in order to secure the position, to secure the comfort of being able to pay the bills, to eat, to survive.

(the idea of 'survival of the fittest' is coming to mind not only because of the absurdity of this situation but also perhaps because one of my coworkers is reading Darwin's Origin of Species...)

What intrigued me the most about this situation was my manager's reaction and how it eventually morphed.

The initial response was gossiping about it for a good hour at the office. Oh the incredulity, anger, confusion!

Emotional.

The next response was getting on the phone with the practice's lawyer and finding out the logistics of the situation and discussing how to make the threat go away.

Practical.

The next response was brainstorming all the ways to make this woman regret ever trying to mess with the office.

Retaliation.

(revenge on the revenge)

A few hours passed before the manager came back out of the office with a composed email to be sent back to this woman. It said, in many more words,

"I understand that you are upset, we were only doing what was best for the office in letting you go, I apologize for the short notice but you even admitted to not doing your best work, we were lenient with you for a while but you never stepped up to the plate so how dare you try to take us down. I realize that you are in a bad financial decision and want to have compassion for you. I don't believe you are doing this because you really believe us to have legal issues. I want to give you a final check of $---- to help you get on your feet again and find a new job. Still, I want you to know that what you tried to do, even if it was out of desperation, was low, unreasonable, and outrageous."

Compassion.

The manager ultimately was firm but took the higher ground.

Watching my manager's thought process over the entire situation was infinitely entertaining but also enlightening. It made me realize that I was proud to be at an office with moral standards and rationality. It could have easily been blown out of proportion.

What it really did for me though, was to confirm my need to think before I act. Sometimes we don't like to acknowledge consequences for our actions. And when it comes to revenge... what's the point? Maybe it's all those Sunday School lessons still in my subconscious. The idea of forgive and forget, compassion and humility over the "eye for an eye" principle, because

if everyone was getting what they deserved with that kind of mentality, we would all be blind.