Work and words.

Man it is almost five in the morning and I haven't come up with anything to write about yet, let's use the old fallback of complaining about work I guess.

My job is basically making sure the rest of the employees at my stand can do theirs, this includes training and being supportive, if some conversations between my cashiers I have overheard can be believed, I am fairly good at it.
It's interesting, you need to be able to talk to people of all ages and levels of work experience, from folks twice my age who are just doing this for something to do, to seventeen year old kids literally on their first day of work ever.

The main thing that strikes me is how utterly stupid some people seem to be, I really don't like being judgmental like that and do my best to give people the benefit of the doubt, but sometimes there is no other possible explanation, like the dude who came back from his break high as balls and assumed I wouldn't notice or smell it, or the girl who decided that she could spend the entire shift in the back on her phone (turns out she couldn't!).

Then there are the people who I am pretty sure have a disability of some sort, or who never learned to read. I am totally cool with working with folks with disabilities, but I really would like to be informed so I can make allowances and not snap at them like any other employee I think is slacking. Over last weekend I had a woman who could not move quickly, and seemed to get paralyzed with fear once the line got long, as it did almost immediately, she also seemed unable to communicate in anything other than an incoherent mumble and was pretty much useless. I felt bad complaining about her and still do, because it seems that the problem was either some form of wicked anxiety issue, or she was drunk as hell, if it is the first problem then I can sympathize, feeling that a bit myself, I mean, perhaps working coffee on a night when you are expected to make like three hundred of them quickly isn't the best place for someone with an issue like that, but if I know what's going on I can at least not make things worse by snapping at her.

Then there are the illiterate, our cash registers are pretty simple, you hit a button and a menu pops up, you select the item from the menu and it is rung up, you take the money. Not exactly rocket science, but to do it quickly you need to be able to scan a list rapidly, and I have had multiple cashiers who seemed unable to do that, more than that they were lost every time somebody ordered something they had never rang in before, but rather than look for it on the menu, they call me over to point it out to them. It's as if they aren't really reading, rather they are remembering what button does what as if it was some game of Memory instead.

Once you get through the learning pains this is actually a fairly effective way of doing the job, as long as you don't mind irritating your stand lead a bit, but it was a major shock to me when I realized it was happening. I have been able to read rapidly and effectively since almost as long as I can remember, I can scan a menu and pick out relevant information quickly, I can read a 400 page book in about three hours, I can even suss out the basics of an unfamiliar user interface fairly quickly, though to be an expert requires more than that obviously, what's more most of my friends and family can do similarly. I know illiteracy is a problem, and a growing one at that, but I haven't encountered it in the wild before and now I am pretty sure I have.

Now there is a distinction between being illiterate, and being functionally illiterate, most people can read at some level or another, for the functionally illiterate, they know the letters, they can read what they need to read to survive(mostly) day to day, but words do not come easy and something like as street sign might take actual concentration to read, these folks aren't stupid by any means, they have been let down by their schooling, and by a society that has been demonizing education for the last three or four decades, when you can read well, you can find so many sources of information, when you can't, you get to rely on what people tell you (you thought I wouldn't bring politics into this? HAH!) it's part of the probably not specifically stated but very real nonetheless plan to keep the lower class supporting the things their betters want them to.

Words bring freedom more than anything else, more than guns, more than money, free and open communication and education is only possible in a literate society. There is a "herd immunity" aspect to it as well, there are people who for whatever reason, can't and will never be able to read, these people must rely on others to get things like news and suchlike rather than relying on shit like talk radio, if they are surrounded by educated people who are able to get information from a variety of sources, it only helps them get the information they need to make informed decisions as well.

It is the most important tool in revolution as well as the basis of education, the rise in illiteracy in America is yet another pathetic failure of our system on a massive scale.

Read a book.