My #ScottAdams Story

In the 1990s, I worked as an office temp. I logged a lot of hours in a lot of different offices, and I had an instant and accurate way to sense how dysfunctional and toxic a workplace was as soon as I walked in.

I took note of how many #Dilbert comics were pinned up, and where.

If I saw one or two #Dilbert comics scattered around, I knew people had their gripes and complaints about their co-workers, but it was nothing too serious.

1/

The Dilbert Afterlife (By Scott Alexander)

https://www.astralcodexten.com/p/the-dilbert-afterlife

#HackerNews #Dilbert #Afterlife #Scott #Alexander #Humor #Comics

So #Dilbert was my canary in the coal mine. I can’t think of another comic strip that functioned like this. Cathy was drawn almost exactly as badly as Dilbert, but the only thing I learned from seeing that strip in an office was the person pinning it up had body image issues. Peanuts meant the person had self-esteem problems. (Or, contrarywise, they identified with Snoopy.)

6/9

The #Dilbert gauge never failed me. The more Dilbert comic strips I saw, the nastier the place was.

I worked at a one place where Dilbert was banned. Specifically, just Dilbert. Sounds extreme, but the bosses knew exactly what #ScottAdams was peddling, and they didn’t want any.

That office ran smoothly and was among the nicest.

5/9

Whenever I saw a disproportionate number of #Dilbert comics in one cubicle, I knew to avoid that person. They were clearly the asshole in the office, and they were usually on a hair trigger. I once saw a cubicle that was practically wallpapered with Dilbert comics, including several where he had labeled the characters with co-workers’ names, and then pinned them on the OUTSIDE of his cube. Yikes! Steer clear of that dude!

3/9

Further reading: “The trouble with #Dilbert : how corporate culture gets the last laugh”
by Norman Solomon
https://archive.org/details/troublewithdilbe00solo_0/mode/2up

9/9

So I guess the moral here is: #ScottAdams was a thin-skinned, egotistical monster who wrote and badly drew a hateful comic strip called #Dilbert, and all his “humor” punched down, and he used sock puppet accounts to brag about his own genius, and was a racist, and he thought Donald Trump was great...

7/9

If there was even one #Dilbert comic pinned up to a communal bulletin board, watch out! The hatred went from workers up AND management down.

God forbid someone had used the photocopier to enlarge it; that meant they wanted everyone to see how much they hated everyone.

In this last situation, I would usually call my agency at the end of the day and ask if they had any other assignments.

If I saw Dilbert plush toys, I’d just tell my agency I couldn’t continue the assignment.

4/9

If virtually every cubicle had more than one #Dilbert comic pinned up, I knew everyone working there disliked each other. The atmosphere probably wasn’t going to be too terrible for me as a temp, but I wouldn’t want to work there permanently.

2/9