RUSH: This appears in the Big Money section of Slate.com: ‘Al is a 31-year-old consultant whose fiancee is currently unemployed. After a tough day at his New York office, he gets off the subway one stop early and walks the 15 minutes home, just to blow off steam before seeing her. ‘She asks how my day was, but when you sit there and start talking about it and realize you hate your job that day, it’s hard to combat the idea that, yeah, I do have a job, I wasn’t part of the unfortunate many,’ he says.’ Can I set the stage for you? Here’s a guy going home to his unemployed fiancee, he’s so mad about being part of the 91.2% of the people in the country who do have jobs, that he feels guilty about it, so he has to walk the final 15 minutes home to burn off steam so that he’s not in a foul humor when he gets home to see the fiancee.
‘It seems the economic crisis has curtailed the time-honored tradition of venting about work.’ I need to ask you all a question. I know you can’t all answer it. But here we have this story at Slate.com which purports to describe the attitude of a majority or of many millions of people who are working, it just is a burden. You can’t talk about your job anymore because it’s just not fair because so many people don’t have jobs, and it’s just insensitive to do so, and it’s been a time-honored tradition to vent about work but now you can’t. The question is, are you not talking about your job to people who you think don’t have one because you’re feeling guilty? I would say to this 31-year-old consultant whose fiancee is currently unemployed, ‘If it’s this bad, if the fact that you have a job is causing you this kind of stress, if you have to get off one stop early the subway before you get home to blow off steam, just quit. Quit the job and go on unemployment and feel better about yourself.’
‘A 28-year-old writer says, ‘I’m really careful about complaining to my friends about anything work-related, because half of them have recently been laid off, so it’s particularly sensitive. If my mother asks me how I’m doing and I complain about an annoying thing at work, she tells me to basically suck it up because I should be happy to have a job.’ And she is happy to have a job. But, she adds, ‘It does make me feel stuck, because if you’re convincing yourself you’re lucky to have a job, it makes you feel like, ‘I’m lucky to have this job, but this is all I’ll ever do.”’ Good grief. The mind contortions that people with too much time on their hands are going through here. And, of course, this is all very good. This is a new sensitivity. I know those of you new to the program are listening to me talk about this, and you are wondering why I’m being so caustic of these people and their feelings, ’cause I think this is childish. And it’s the wrong kind of attitude to have in a circumstance like this. Folks, we are the United States of America. It stands for something, it means something. It’s the greatest nation on earth and we’re not going to stay this way with tiny, lily-livered paranoia, coward-type attitudes like this.
Whatever happened to the idea of inspiration and motivation? Yeah, it’s one thing to be sympathetic for somebody who’s down on their luck at the moment, but after that, what do you do? Do you join them in their circumstance so they won’t feel as bad? How is that helping you or them? And furthermore, how is it helping the country? On the other hand, if they’re out of work, and you still have a job, and you’re afraid to talk about it, do just the opposite. Talk about it and inspire them. There’s work out there. There’s money with people’s names on it out there to be had. It’s the United States of America. People are getting jobs every month. Yeah, there are people losing jobs, but there are people that get them every month as well. It’s not a zero-sum game out there. But beyond all of that, this kind of attitude is not the stiff upper lip and backbone that built the country. I feel for these people in a way that maybe you don’t understand. I resent and I feel sorry for them at the same time that they have been seduced into feeling this kind of guilt. Guilt does nothing for anybody, and this is self-imposed guilt.
You know, guilt is one thing, but if you create your own, if you’re just out there telling yourself negative story after negative story after negative story, you’re gonna be a mess. You’re going to be no good to anybody, including yourself. And to start feeling guilty about having a job when other people don’t, the solution’s real easy, real simple. Quit yours if the guilt is just too much to bear. Commiserate with the unfortunate all you want, but then do what you can to get them out of that circumstance. To feel like you can’t talk about what went on at work whether it’s good or bad because it will make somebody who doesn’t have a job feel bad? It’s senseless to me. ‘No, Rush, you’re misunderstanding. It’s the new sensitivity.’ No, it’s not a new sensitivity. It’s been around all too long: ‘An attorney at a top New York law firm, ‘I’m actually starting to resent the fact that I’m not allowed to hate my job, I’m not allowed to have a bad day, because I’m supposed to be so thankful to have a job at all.”
He’s starting to resent the fact ‘I’m not allowed to hate my job?’ Who is preventing him from hating his job? Who in the world is he granting the power to make him hate his job? He hates his job, but can’t say so. Why? Is somebody zipping his mouth? He’s doing it himself. I guess everybody’s constantly asking everybody else how they’re doing in the economy, and if you say you’re doing just fine, why, that’s just the most insensitive thing you can say. I don’t know, folks. This kind of mealy-mouthed attitude about things and overwrought, self-focus and concern and invented trauma, invented stress is designed to make people think that they’re good people and so forth, but this is the exact wrong way to go around and approach and deal with this kind of problem. It’s been building.
BREAK TRANSCRIPT
RUSH: Here’s Alex in Austin.
Alex, welcome to the EIB Network. Hello, sir.
CALLER: Mega dittos from Austin, Rush. It’s a pleasure.
CALLER: Thank you, sir.
RUSH: Listen, I just want to say that you, Hannity, the Great One, you guys inspire me, and, you know, we’re there, and it’s guys like you that just kind of keep things rolling here. I appreciate it.
RUSH: Thank you, sir, very much.
CALLER: But I wanted to comment on the young lady with the job situation, you know? I was out of work for about a year and a half. It cost me my house, my car. It cost me my fiancee. It cost me everything.
RUSH: Well, it’s not all bad then.
CALLER: You know, I just couldn’t sit around. I took the last hundred bucks, and I had to start a company so that I could have a job so that I could pay my bills. And, you know, here I am. I’m not going to take any government money. I’m not going to take any handouts.
RUSH: Well, wait a minute! You mean you went out and you started your own company, or you created your own job?
CALLER: With a hundred bucks.
RUSH: Do you know how insensitive that is? We just had the story that people are feeling guilty who have jobs. You could have been happy as hell to be unemployed! That’s the new status symbol. You had to go out there and blow it? You had to go out and find a job while others can’t? How cruel could you be!
BREAK TRANSCRIPT
RUSH: We learned earlier in this hour, ladies and gentlemen, that the new chic thing to do is to feel guilty when you have a job. You’re supposed to be guilty that you have a job when others don’t have a job. So let me ask you a question. You people who are, quote, unquote, ‘in shape,’ when you find yourself amongst a bunch of people who are not in shape — maybe a little fat, perhaps obese, do you feel guilty? Do you feel guilty? Do you feel guilty talking about how you just came from your workout and you’re going to go take your quick boost energy supplement drink and all. Do you feel guilty while somebody’s eating a Big Mac and fries? No. What do you do? You look at them and say, ‘You pig! You slob! How dare you eat that stuff? Look at me! I’m the epitome of good shape.’ Yet when we have a job, we are guilty, and when we run across the unemployed, we say, ‘Oh, God! (sobbing) Oh, God. I can’t tell you about my job. It’s such a horrible, rotten thing. I know. My job so rotten! It’s bad that I have a job and you don’t. Oh-ho-ho, please forgive me! I want to talk about my job, but I can’t!’
But if you’re thin and they’re fat, you call ’em a pig and you tell ’em how to live.
Can somebody explain the difference to me?