Wednesday, 6 October 2004

Political correctness gone mad.

Sure, that's an overused phrase, but it wouldn't be if political correctness didn't keep going mad.

So I was reading this interesting discussion over at Harry's Place, and it reminded me of something.

I lived in Glasgow for seven years. As visitors to the city will know, Glaswegians swear quite a lot. A hell of a lot, in fact. And it's not just a street thing: they routinely swear at work, in conversation with their employees or bosses. Yeah, there are always some Glaswegians who wrinkle their noses in disgust, but they're a tiny minority.

A friend of mine is the manager at a branch of Burger King in Glasgow. It's tricky to enforce discipline, he says. Burger King have a nationwide policy that employees may not swear at their superiors, on pain of discipliniary action. Except at their Glasgow branches. Burger King's HR department have decreed that swearing is a part of the native culture of Glaswegians, and it would, of course, be wrong to discipline someone for practising their native culture. Therefore, Burger King employees in the Glasgow area are allowed to tell their bosses to go and fuck themselves, and their bosses aren't allowed to stop them.

4 comments:

Andy said...

But of course, the managers will be able to give their employees a punch in the mouth in return, because that's part of the Glasgow culture too.

Blognor Regis said...

But surely a head butt is even more so.

Squander Two said...
This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
Squander Two said...

On second thoughts, I've removed my own comment there, as, informative though it was, it could get my friend sacked. So you'll just have to use your imaginations.