Graphic design = a dead field

Before the idiots at Indeed a/k/a Indeediots killed the forum, I saved all the design-related threads in a folder and have been trying to find the time to transfer them here (they aren’t available on the Wayback Machine). Hopefully I’ll get to that over the next few months. In the meantime, I’ve pulled out one specific comment by frequent poster RandomEmployee (no, that’s not me, and if they’re reading this I hope they don’t take offense at my republishing their comment without their permission, lol) who left the following comment in the "Graphic Design: A Dead Field" thread which really nails what the hell happened to this field (comment was in response to a previous comment, at the top in italics).

_____________________

"I think most of your woes can be attributed to the e-globalization of the workforce."

It's not really that. I'd say foreign workers have probably the LEAST impact of all to the graphic design industry. Here's what happened between 2005 and 2010, in no particular order:

1) Everyone and their brother bought an iPod or iPhone or iMac

^^^ This led everyone to believe, quite overnight, that they KNEW what made "good" design. Nevermind the fact that Apple churns out stale, sterile, lifeless, Helvetica-like, plain, boring designs over and over (Apple does good stuff, sure, but they are not the pinnacle of design) -- this popularization of a brand held as a sacred cow in design led the "normals" to think they could do design as good as the professionals.

2) Adobe kinda screwed professionals over

^^^ In their desperate attempt to steal the publishing business from Quark, which had a 95% marketshare from the 90s until 2004 or so, Adobe came out with the Creative Suite. Now, they had design collections before, but never this cheap. For about $500-600 you could now get Photoshop, Illustrator AND InDesign, whereas QuarkExpress 4, IIRC, started at $599. What this did was suddenly let smaller companies and individuals who never considered design software before have the top 3 or 4 major design programs for a fraction of what it used to be.

3) After 2000, you didn't need a Mac to do design

^^^ Up until Photoshop 6 and Illustrator 9 I believe, you had to deal with all sorts of issues in converting files, having different fonts (PCs did't really like Mac Postscript fonts) and even Photoshop/Illustrator/etc. versions of the same # didn't always have parity feature/support-wise. But 2000 or so onward, Adobe's programs played nice with each other, and if you didn't need Quark (let's say InDesign was good) and you had your fonts you needed as TTF or OpenType, PCs were perfectly fine. Even now, no one NEEDS a Mac for design. That's a lie.

4) Direct Mail died

^^^ Direct mail companies employed TONS of designers. Sure, it was low-rung, not-glamorous work, but it employed tons of designs all over the country. When people stopped getting mailboxes full of stuff, these companies went away, taking design jobs.

5) Phone books died

^^^ Phone directory advertising, production and printing was a huuuuuuuuuge business. And for many professions -- like plumbing and HVAC and lawyers -- it still is as valuable now as it was then. But before everyone was online 24/7 in the mid-00s onward (when broadband internet hit the majority of households across the US), the local phone book was the key info hub. And these books were created at a local or regional level, and these suckers were hundreds if not thousands of pages every year.

6) Catalogs and weekly salespapers died

^^^ Remember JCP and Sears' Christmas catalogs? What about their catalogs in the Spring/Summer? What about all those random mail order companies that had catalogs? What about salespapers? Those things were sometimes dozens of pages long, and varied all across the country. Tons of designers employed by companies that did those.

7) Newspapers have mostly died or just shrunk in size+printing intervals

^^^ Remember how thick the Sunday paper was? Remember how there used to be a daily paper in nearly every town printed at LEAST 3-5 times each week? Remember how these used local designers for production of the paper and design of local ads? This was decimated over the last decade especially. Thank Craigslist, mostly because most newspaper $ was generated by Classifieds.

8) Magazines have mostly died or just shrunk in size+printing intervals

^^^ Same as newspapers, but even worse. Remember when Computer Shopper was about 1.5-2" thick for like $5/issue? Remember when EGM and GamePro were 400+ pages each? Remember when magazines that wanted to stand out were large format? Remember how good the inside of Rolling Stone smelled, especially when they had cologne/perfume samples? Remember how gigantic those bridal magazines used to be? Remember in Borders and B&N, even up until the mid 00s, when they had probably 100' or more of magazines on 4-5 shelves and how dozens of people would be looking at them/buying them? Remember getting those direct mail magazine order forms, where you'd check the box and sign up for multiple subscriptions at a huge discount? Well guess what. Everyone 2010 onward especially only wants Twitter news and stuff from Kotaku, Huffington Post, NYT, Reddit and WaPo to name a few. Magazines struggled a bit in the early 00s, but social media and a few outlets controlling the narrative and doing TERRIBLE work outside of reporting news stories (anyone with two braincells knows journalism and proper writing/research/fact-checking in stuff now is garbage compared to what it was. Perhaps magazines (outside of niche or B2B) can't exist nowadays if website usage is wide spread, but it's very clear now that READERS (consumers) are cheapskates and will not pay or wait for good content. They just want instant news for free with adblock on and can't possibly wait even a week or two for a proper, more balanced analysis of anything. And magazines employed tons of designers.

9) Web design is all but dead

^^^ It's all Themeforest $15 themes and companies only want the cheapest of the cheap WordPress site w/ specific pre-made plugins and a Facebook and Twitter page too. You can barely convince companies to even spend a little bit of money on proper corporate branding. All they want is SEO and to look like every other boring site.

10) Identity systems? Psssshhh...

^^^ What company even cares about a proper identity system now? How many companies or individual business owners would even spend $100 or more on a proper logo that is researched and tailored to their business and corporate vision? Sure, some ad agencies with big clients like zoos, hospitals, etc. can still get expensive identity work, but everyone else? Odds are, the business owner will either make the logo themselves or their nephew will do it.

And don't even bring up stationery/letterhead/business card/etc. design, which would all tie in, because...

11) Local printers are dead.

^^^ Thanks Overnightprints and VistaPrint for this. You might find a few stragglers at a local business level like small 1-2 color t-shirt shops and sign companies -- both of which can't be made/done all that much cheaper with online resources (no on online is gonna install your 10' long sign on your storefront). But lots and lots of small printers existed for decades that would serve the local businesses with copying, printing and trimming demands. No more. These places are all but gone. Why pay Bob the local printer and his designer $50 for 200 business cards when OvernightPrints can accept your low-res RGB JPG and give you 500 cards for $10, as long their logo is on the back?

12) Internally, companies don't respect designers anymore.

^^^ Maybe they never did, and just resented having to pay an artist a good wage to make a print ad when the guy on the loading docks is covered in sweat and has back issues as he earns his paycheck. But I think when all these previous things started happening, company owners and VPs and bean counters made a mad dash to get rid of designers ASAP. So don't hire that web designer...just get someone off Craigslist to make you a WordPress site that you can use the cool theme you found. Don't hire a designer to make company brochures and flyers and pamphlets for employees -- just get Wanda the receptionist Creative Suite.

13) Colleges flooded the market w/ design grads

^^^ Look, to train a nurse, it takes a lot of work. Most importantly, you gotta have fairly smart and decently skilled students to properly pass all nursing courses and then the required industry certifications. Guess what? With Design-related programs, everything is subjective. And there's no industry certification to anything, so a guy who sucks at Photoshop and a trained designer is equal in many employers' eyes as long as they can apply the radial blue filter to make that cool effect the owner likes. As a result, colleges all over churn out hundreds and hundreds of design grads on a state-wide basis every year, and most of these kids have a terrible grasp on typography and basic branding and visual communication work.

14) The Great Recession killed any chance of previous print/web designers transitioning to something else

^^^ Because barely anyone was hiring designers, and often downsizing/outsourcing design work, suddenly all the designers who worked in the 90s-00s had nowhere to go. They didn't even have a chance to finally move into management or even a more generic Marketing dept worker (or manager) role.

They were simply axed. And they were axed at a time when all industries were affected so not even a new MBA could help.

15) Design isn't really design anymore

The few places that do print design work mostly have designers in catch-all/hybrid Marketing roles, where they spend just as much time dealing with the clients or making proposals or doing overall marketing work and basically doing Production Manager work rather than straight design work. And web designers? Sheesh. For starters, "Web Designer" is a bad title, just because nerds in the Bay area are constantly sniffing their own farts. They are now "UI Designers"...but take a look at most job openings -- they want "UX Designers"...which is just a different way of saying, "No design...you just worry about Google Adwords and pick the simplest/cheapest WordPress themes and plugins to use." Even sneakier, many UX roles want the person do lots of HTML5 work, which is basically JavaScript work, and heavy CSS work as well...far more than any Web Designer ever had to do in the past. Basically, they want a front-end developer who can manage Google click-thru campaigns.

I'm sure I've missed other reasons, but the sad reality is, a perfect storm of industry killing things happened in about 10-15 years, from software/hardware companies screwing over designers...to the colleges...to the lack of industry certification to block phonies (what a waste AIGA is)...to cheapskate/lazy consumers opting for web everything over spending anything locally...to employers killing art departments and thinking Wanda the secretary and her copy of Photoshop being as good as a trained designers.

The industry is a complete cesspool now, and I have zero sympathy for anyone who has entered into it in the past decade or more recently. You're gonna be 30-40 and switching careers out of desperation -- GUARANTEED.

-- End of comment

I guess the Iraqis just don't understand the value of networking

I was listening to an interview with Professor Djene Bajalan the other day about the current state of things in Iraq. Check out what he says at the 39:00 mark...

"I spoke to my relatives there...they were saying 'we just feel like there's no opportunity here, nothing ever gets better'...just the daily necessities of life are very difficult. In large parts of Iraq you just can't survive. It's 45 degrees Centigrade and you're in your house sweating, there's no jobs, and the only way that you get a job is through connections."

Welcome to job hunting American-style, Iraq. 

The latest check-in on that "full employment" claim

I came across this little job (little because the company has under 50 employees) during the last week of July 2019:

Wow, nearly 300 applicants. That alone would seem insane, except it's even worse than that, because eight months ago, in December 2018, they advertised the exact same job, and they received nearly 800 applicants:

Good fuckin' grief. Maybe, per the company name, it's just a monkey running things.

Here's another one from the last week of July 2019:

And, how's it looking in good ole' Stinkassachusetts?

Who on earth can take this job market seriously anymore?

Our useless "job centres"

I recently re-watched “The Full Monty,” which I saw when it came out back in 1997. At the center of these men’s lives was the British version of our local Division of Labor and Training office. Theirs was simply referred to as the “jobclub.” In Stinkassachusetts, it’s called The One Stop Career Center. In Rhode Island, it’s called netWORKri. Watching this movie reminded me of the horrible experience I had here in the US with these dismal and useless entities.

Stinkassachusetts, Part 1

I visited the Norwood location in July 2013. At this point, I had accumulated about 500 rejections over the previous nine months, so panic was definitely starting to set in. The only "assistance" they had to offer was a bunch of workshops that were booked for weeks. The only one that had an opening was the one on writing cover letters, so I signed up for it. I figured that even if I don’t learn anything new here it might be good to get out of the house and maybe meet some people.

The “instructor” spent the majority of the workshop showing us how to properly apply for a job advertised in the newspaper. I am not fucking kidding here. He also exhibited a great deal of cluelessness; for example, after spending a majority of the class discussing newspaper ads and mailing printed letters, he finally got around to discussing responding to job ads via email. According to him, you are supposed to put both your cover letter your resume as an attachment, and in the body of your email state, "Attached are my cover letter and resume." Are you kidding me? No, you put your damned cover letter in the email body. Attention spans are at an all-time low, and chances are the recipient will be too damned lazy to open any attachment. You have mere seconds to make an impression, to lose those seconds expecting them to go through the extra hassle of opening an attachment is just plain idiotic. Then, he went on about how you need to be careful about what version of Word to save your document as. I finally couldn’t bear the stupidity any longer and said, "Excuse me, but if you save it as a PDF you won’t need to worry about word processor versions." His reply was, "What if they don’t have Acrobat?" Rrrrrrrriiiiiiight, because Acrobat is one of those really rare obscure programs that you've gotta pay for! Good grief. I left and never went back.

Part 2

Despite that gawd-awful experience (probably because I was growing desperate), I decided to give this institution a second chance, and visited the Quincy location in April 2014, thinking that maybe a different location that's closer to the city might serve me a little better (it didn't).

I made an appointment and arrived with the secretarial/administrative resume and cover letter I had attempted to patch together using pieces of my now-defunct design career. I was introduced to a woman who was assigned to me, and I sat down at her desk and briefly explained my situation. I dryly confessed that I was probably going to commit suicide come September if nothing comes my way -- I was merely speaking matter-of-factly and certainly not looking for sympathy as I’ve learned nobody gives a damn when you’re suicidal. Sure enough, she got nasty with me and lectured me about how her situation is no better, something along the lines of "Hey, I lost my career, too, and now look where I am, do you think I wanna be here?" She agreed to have a look at my resume and cover letter, and I returned the following week at which point she presented me with the rewritten versions. Two things that I recall were: 1) the resume was NOT formatted for an ATS, it had columns, bullets, decorative separator lines, etc., all things that will make an ATS reject it immediately because it can't be scanned; and 2) the cover letter salutation was "Dear Hiring Manager." Dear Hiring Manager??? Um, no, the proper salutation for a business letter when you don’t know the recipient’s name is Ladies and Gentlemen for when the letter goes to a group, and Dear Sir/Madam when it goes to a single unknown-gender title.

I walked out and never went back. After a month of serious soul-searching, I enrolled in a CELTA certification course and began to prepare for a new life overseas.

Rhode Island

Recall that back in August 2015 my second gig at Fidelity had come to an unexpected end, leaving me once again without a job. For the first time in my life, I filed for unemployment benefits, and once again I began preparing to leave America to teach English overseas. I immediately received a summons from the state that I had to attend an orientation at one of their netWORKri centers as a prerequisite to receiving benefits. I arrived with printouts of the 1,500 job rejection emails I had received over the previous three years just to see if it would elicit some kind of reaction (it didn’t, not one person acknowledged the fucktardness of my situation). During the orientation they explained that I had to apply for three jobs a week and they gave me a double-sided sheet of paper on which to enter this information (company name/address, date applied, did I get an interview, did I get hired). Secondly, I had to log into their website every week and complete the “did you look for a job / did you get a job” questionnaire in order to continue receiving benefits. 

After the orientation, I sat with some guy at a computer who said he's going to help me get a job. LOLOLOLOL! I said, look, dude, here are 1,500 job rejections, there is NO hope for finding me a job here. He said, "Well, that's all gonna change now because I'm here and I’m gonna help you." I held back my laughter at this (did he really believe it, or was he just good at reciting the same line over and over to others like me?).

Here's what he did for me. He showed me the job posting page on their website. I glanced over his shoulder and saw a list full of jobs that I had already applied for and already been rejected from months earlier. When I pointed at one of them and said that I didn’t even get a phone screening despite being 100% qualified, he asked me the most idiotic question: “Did you call them?” Newsflash, dude who hasn't searched for work in twenty years: It’s NOT 1995 anymore. Not only is there NO way to even locate a phone number or contact person to “call,” but many companies will blacklist you for doing this (it's also not possible to locate a hiring manager for a job that doesn't exist).

He then went over the piece of paper I had to complete itemizing my job applications. And, that was it. Some help, huh? Yeah, just apply online like I’ve been doing for the past three years, that'll do it! Because these 1,500 rejections (on which he wouldn't even comment) don't mean a thing. Oh, but LOOK! Now I've got this fucking sheet of paper where I'm putting the name of the company and address and checking a box saying "Hired? Y/N" – oh, wow, THIS IS REALLY GONNA MAKE A DIFFERENCE! This is gonna make companies take notice of me!!!!! Lookie, Mr. Hiring Manager (*snark*), I’m applying for your advertised job along with 500 other people but I’m using a piece of paper to mark that I applied!

The final act of silliness I had to perform in order to "earn" my unemployment benefits was to attend one of their job-hunting workshops. None of the titles looked worthy of my time – like the usual “how to write a resume” nonsense (I had already hired a professional resume writer to make my resume keyword-compliant, and I was still getting rejected) – but as I had no choice I randomly chose the job interview workshop. Once again, it was full of advice straight out of 1995 along with a few modern tidbits of utter nonsense, like, "Be sure to dress professionally for your telephone interview!" For those attendees who chimed in with bad stories of inconsiderate and incompetent interviewers, the presenter had no advice to offer, further confirmation that “just shut up and take the abuse” is the rule to live by today.

When I returned a month later as required with my completed sheet listing my job applications, I sat with a different person from the guy I met with the first time – what happened to my personal advocate assigned to me and who cared so much about helping me? – and explained that not only did I not get a single interview from any of these jobs but I know for a fact that none of them even reviewed my portfolio (I explained how I have something called visitor tracking on my website). She just listened without commenting, looked over the list, and that was the end of that.

Did anyone in this crummy place actually DO anything to help me here? Like, I dunno, maybe get on the telephone and fucking CALL some of these companies on my list and ask them why they couldn't be bothered to even look at my applications? Oh, heavens, that would require a little effort. Remember, I'm the lazy one here. I'm the one who needs to be humiliated and reminded that it's all my fault that Fidelity fucked me over.

The final infuriating conclusion to this disgraceful display of state government uselessness was the summons to jury duty I received one month later (the court confirmed my name got into their system because I had the nerve to file for unemployment).

"Fuckers" is too kind a word for these fuckers

Dan Lyons has a new book out, Lab Rats. I learned about it when I came across a review on The Guardian. From this review it seems that the book isn't much more than a continuation of the themes from Disrupted. What is worth calling out here is the following observation from the comment section: 

My brother is a very highly paid engineer. The company he works for, and has done for over 23 years, had a factory in Welwyn; he was the head of a department and when his company took over another company they put in place a new head of HR (used to be called personnel), who happened to be the mistress of the new head of operations appointed from the compnay [sic] taken over. 

This woman not only became extraordinarily powerful she started interfering with my brothers workers. He threatened to resign and was offered instead a role as international trouble shooter. A job he holds to this day. The factory was closed two years later. 

The point of this story is HR is now the department with most power in any major company and those who run it are generally responsible to nobody, not even chief executives. Yet any cursory acquaintance with any of the 'literature' associated with HR will show two things: It is full of the worst bullshit you can conceive of; its entire aim is to run complete control of everything that happens in the workplace. 

HR is the source of using terminology such as colleagues, or team members, or listening mode, or going forward, or any distortion of language you can conceive:

https://www.hrinz.org.nz/site/resources/knowledge_base/glossary_of_hr_terms.aspx 

https://www.hrinz.org.nz/site/resources/knowledge_base/glossary_of_hr_terms.aspx

https://www.hrinz.org.nz/site/resources/knowledge_base/glossary_of_hr_terms.aspx 

These fuckers are the reason nobody anywhere can approach any business, such as a supermarket, and ask if there are any jobs. Instead you have to go through a mind numbing process that will include such questions as: What do you contribute to your local community? Do you play any musical instruments? How many languages do you speak? To get a job involving the mentally taxing occupation of filling shelves, telling people where the goods are on which shelves and, horror of horrors, mastering scanning goods at a till. 

I know this because my son went through it. Waitrose rejected him, I expect because he had never been skiing.

Here's hoping this offends every HR sociopath on the planet. It's no less than they deserve.

If I didn't know any better, I'd say companies just don't give a shit anymore

JP Morgan Chase (not exactly your local yokel establishment) advertised this job recently:

Just what the hell is a desinger? Is it something like a desongwriter or a dedrummer or a debassist? (Bonus points if you notice the second glaring error in that title line...)

Hawaiian Electric admits the job it advertised was *fake*

In January 2018, I applied for a design position advertised by Hawaiian Electric (because who doesn't want to move to Hawaii?). Seven months later, on August 1, I received the following email from them:

Aloha,

Thank you for your interest in the Graphic Design Consultant position (vacancy #P2018-27) in the Marketing Department at Hawaiian Electric Company. 

At this time, we will not be pursuing the filling of this position.  The posting has been canceled. 

Please visit our website at hawaiianelectric.com/careers or contact our employment hotline at (808) 543-4611 to explore and apply for future employment opportunities. We appreciate your interest in employment with our company and wish you well in your career endeavors.

Mahalo,Human Resources Recruitment Team

Aloha...mahalo...how about a Hawaiian word for "fuck you?"

Skyrocketing salaries in Stinkassachusetts

Here we have another spectacular opportunity in our booming job market where salaries are starting to really skyrocket:

Award Maker, Henry's Jewelry & Awards - Lawrence, MA 01840
Here is the list of requirements:

• Bilingual – English and Spanish written and spoken (Required)

• Strong Math Skill

• Being Creative!

• Knowledge in Microsoft (Excel, Word, etc.)

• Knowledge in graphic design software like CorelDRAW, Photoshop

• Knowledge power tools (drills, circular saw, etc.)

• Available 6 days a week (Monday-Saturday)

So, to recap, the applicant must have creative design experience, must be proficient in specialized design software (which one acquires with a good deal of work experience), must know how to use power tools (again, experience!), must be bilingual, and must be willing to work six days a week (because screw the 40 hour workweek!). 

Salary is a whopping $10 to $13/hr.

Finally, the word is getting out about our fake job market

Congratulations, GE, for getting kicked out of the DJIA

The hype surrounding this company opening an office here in both Stinkassachusetts and Rhode Island was hilarious to observe (it brought back memories of the Fidelity / Rhode Island deal which didn’t turn out so well in the long run for the state of RI).

They advertised for a presentation graphic designer back in March 2018, and I earned a series of waste-of-time telephone screenings. First, I had a phone screening with a recruiter (which always includes the most important question of "what are your salary requirements?"). I then received an email stating, "Congratulations on moving forward in the selection process for the Presentation Graphic Artist role!" -- I really find the use of the word "congratulations" as distasteful here, as (1) I hardly see any reason to be congratulated (I haven't been offered a job yet) and (2) it contributes to making the hiring process feel like a game show where I'm the contestant. The phone interview with the hiring manager was rather uneventful, and at the end I asked what was the next step in the process, i.e., would there be an in-person interview. She could not give me an answer, and instead told me to check back with the recruiter. Now, how on earth does the hiring manager not know whether or not you'll be meeting with them at some point? One month later, I received their rejection email, stating, "We decided to change the requirements and add the need to understand and have experience working with financial reporting and presentations." I have twenty years of experience in working with and designing content for financial presentations (*cough* Fidelity Investments *cough*), so…my guess is that this is just another fake job.

Stinkassachusetts: The same old tired companies posting the same old tired jobs

As I have moved on in my life, no longer tethered to the American job market (thankfully), I no longer have the time or interest in scouring job listings. Today, I thought I’d check in with StinkedIn to see what’s happenin’…is the 3.9% unemployment rate to be believed? Here’s what I saw on the first search results screen:

I applied at ZoomInfo for this same job back in March 2017, and promptly got a rejection email. I applied at Pixels 360 way back in March 2016. They ignored me. System One used to bug the crap out of me with their emails about some fake job that had to be filled "urgently," but when you reply back they ignore you. And, of course, Deloitte has earned its own blog entry. 

My conclusion: Nothing's changed in the job market. If you're looking for a job here, it will always be 2013.

Everyone loves HR, right? Right???

Another “Help wanted, but not from older workers” article, this time from The Boston Globe…

Help wanted, but not from older workers: Many struggle to find jobs as employers post openings

As always, the comments section is full of gems, like this thread:

Don't forget Jadelyn, everyone just *loves* the Jadelyns...

Fake job alert: PTC

PTC is another stinky Stinkassachusetts company that loves to advertise the same design jobs over and over. For example, here's the senior graphic designer job they advertised in January 2018:

As always, I met every qualification (including the "preferred" Cinema 4D qualification). Here's what my score was when I ran a keyword analysis on Jobscan:

Naturally, they ignored my application (and nobody from any PTC IP address visited my portfolio).  One month later, they advertised on StinkedIn for an art director. Note the nearly identical job description:

And, here we are again in March, same job, slightly different title...

EDIT, 02/23/2019: One year later, and the scam continues. I see they've garnered 74 applicants (note that StinkedIn kindly added back the # of applicants stat, albeit only on the "preview" window), I wonder how many are the same idiots who previously applied for this fake job...

Boston College: Just another Boston discriminator

Every day another blatant display of age discrimination rears its ugly head in the ugly state of Stinkassachusetts. The latest comes from Boston College, who posted an ad for a (Sr.) Digital Graphic Designer on 02/08/2018 (I'm guessing the senior part is in parentheses because it's optional).

In case you missed it...

Fuck you, boomer

Recall that, back in January 2015, I had just received my first offer to head overseas and teach English in South Korea. At the time, I was still "in mourning" over my dead American life and still a little shell-shocked from it all, so I foolishly shared my story on a public forum, the Over Fifty and Out of Work website, as they were still receiving daily comments from desperate out-of-work older Americans about their plight -- mostly baby boomers, many suicidal. The website owners would then share that message over on their corresponding Facebook page, and this would always bring out all kinds of sympathetic messages of condolences and “me, too!” remarks from its followers. Except, of course, when I did it.  

You see, having been in that dark place of debating suicide myself, I thought I’d post my story as a way of giving poor folks in my situation a light to reach for, i.e., go teach English overseas, so you won’t have to kill yourself. But, quite a few clueless commentators appeared accusing me of the usual “being too picky” and “maybe you should look for jobs outside your field of design” stuff routinely hurled at the unemployed. Amongst the comments appeared one seriously sick reply from someone by the name of Lauri Tilka-Palmer who took offense at my story and said that I should be “grateful” to have my mother’s basement to live in – I had meant to take a screenshot of it, but that comment was deleted (strangely, the majority of those other “clueless” negative remarks are also now gone). So, I attempted to clarify things a bit:

As I read through the comments I found it quite baffling how many chose to zero in on and complain about my “insensitive comment" about “lowly jobs.”  

And then the aforementioned lunatic made a reappearance (which remains posted today):

Whoa.

So, let me see if I’ve got this straight here…you live a life of misery due to your advanced age having relegated you to a shitty low-paying job (like secretary, delivery driver, security guard, customer service rep – yes, those are *shitty* jobs today, because they PAY SHIT), you regularly visit the Over 50 and Out of Work Facebook page to wallow in your misery with other equally miserable baby boomers about how miserable your life is due to the aforementioned shitty job…but, the instant someone says that shitty job you have is a shitty job, you get offended...? Well, gee, if your life is so great then why are you wasting your time on a website which served no other purpose than to be an outlet for boomers to bitch about their shitty life situations due to having shitty jobs and sometimes even confess suicidal intentions? 

I simply could no longer resist the urge to reply un-anonymously (which I eventually deleted because what’s the point):

I am the writer of the original post. I offered the follow-up information only to address what a few had insinuated in the comments in that I might have been too "picky" and should have "expanded" the job hunt to other areas. That's all I was trying to do here. Lauri Tilka-Palmer, I can now see "lowly" was a poor choice of word, and I merely meant it was lowly in salary -- I worked as a secretary the first years out of college. I earned around $13/hour 23 years ago. When I began applying for the same job last year (which I had no problem with since I had done it before), I discovered the salary range was $9 to $12 an hour. LESS than what I earned in that job two decades ago. So, yes, I'd call that salary lowly. And a single woman who lives alone cannot continue living alone on that salary, even with government handouts -- this is what forced me to move into my mom's basement. Again, I find a 47yo adult having to move back in with their parents a very LOWLY situation! I'm sorry you can't see that, Lauri Tilka-Palmer. I came to this site just to share a little of my pain so others can see they are not alone in this mess. I have nothing to be ashamed of -- and I am a firm believer in karma as well. So, good riddance to you, too, as you can be certain I will not be returning to this site. (And thanks to everyone else who left kind and supportive comments, I pm'd those who wanted more info on what I've learned about tefl, anyone else is free to msg me as well -- but Ms. Tilka-Palmer, I will report you for harassment if you msg me.)

I kept my restraint as doing otherwise would have just resulted in my comment being removed and my Facebook account potentially being suspended. I will now address a few of her “talking points” in a more uncensored fashion as I'd like to have done the first time, starting with the SHOUTING IN ALL CAPS part:

THIS IS TO THE 47 YEAR OLD WOMAN THAT IS MOVING TO SOUTH KOREA! GOOD RIDDANCE!

Good riddance to you, too, you miserable excuse for a human life form.

Sorry, but there are a lot of us over 50 that are looking for jobs.

Yes, and they’re not succeeding in finding them, and facing homelessness/suicide/etc. I wanted to offer that there's an alternative of which perhaps nobody had been aware.

I find it offensive that you call jobs lowly.

Who are you, the jobs police? If I want to refer to “secretary” as “the female ghetto of administrative work” (as dozens did here) then that’s my choice to do so.

If you need a job, you take whatever comes along and be glad that God led you there.

Oh, boy, now I see what we're dealing with here, another stupid bible-banging member of the American Taliban.

I'd be glad for anything. There is not a lowly job in this world when you don't have one. Someone has to do the job. There is nothing wrong with being an Admin. Asst., Receptionist, Customer Service Rep, Data Entry Clerk, delivery driver and even something that pays minimum wage. At least you would have something coming in.

I never said it was “wrong” to be a receptionist, et al. As I've written elsewhere on this blog, I spent the first decade of my adult life working in secretarial jobs. I merely stated the FACT that “something coming in" often ain't enough to keep one from going homeless (40% to 60% of our homeless population are employed, d'OH), in which case one has every right to blast those jobs as being shitty jobs, because the pay *stinks*. Perhaps she should work on her reading and comprehension skills.

Maybe that's why you're in South Korea, for your unkind words and calling people's job lowly.

This woman is clearly unhinged. And, no, I was on my way to South Korea because America doesn't have jack shit to offer a large proportion of us anymore, and I'd rather DO SOMETHING to better my situation rather than spew hateful nonsense towards strangers on Facebook.

BTW, I took a quick glance at her Facebook page which seemed to indicate she's some kind of military brat, meaning that she's been brainwashed her entire life to believe that "We're Number 1!" nonsense, so any facet of reality that flies in the face of that illusion is going to set her off. No doubt my "Enjoy the mess you've made, America" comment is what sent her into a tizzy. Sorry, but America is no longer the “land of opportunity,” I wonder if she’s seen that recent report from the United Nations about poverty in America. Perhaps if closed-minded dolts like her opened their minds a bit and considered jumping this sinking ship, they wouldn’t be wasting time on some depressing Facebook page -- and wouldn’t be reduced to begging for money from strangers online to help pay their medical bills:

At least now you are blessed with a job. You should be ashamed of yourself.

Yeah, how DARE I share this story on a page full of suicidal people which could inspire these people to take the same path and thus NOT commit suicide! Seriously, what exactly am I supposed to be “ashamed of” here? YOU should be ashamed of YOURSELF for this sociopathic display of toxic slop spewed at me over absolutely nothing.

I wonder what KARMA will bring you next to deal with. I will say a prayer for you and you should ask God to forgive you for thinking you are better than anyone else with those jobs.

Take your fucking perverted concept of a “god” along with your "prayers" and shove 'em up your hateful ass, you beastly babbitty bougie bitchy bible-banging baby boomer. What I posted was a sincere and genuine effort to help people, and it’s not my fault you misinterpreted that with your diseased mind and soul.

They know they are blessed to have them. I can't believe you said all that you did. Shameful. There will be a lesson learned from what you said to others on here.

The only lesson here is that American baby boomers have earned their reputation.

Randstad admits they like them "young and hungry"

This is the latest "spam job" appearing through multiple staffing agencies in the area this past week. This one, however, uses a few extra terms not in the other ads I'd seen...

Job hunting in 21st century America = Gaslighting

The word “gaslighting” has been appearing quite a bit these days, mostly in the discussions about domestic abuse. I previously shared my observation that today’s job market can easily be categorized as abusive. After reading an old thread on the Indeed forum, and noticing that, coincidentally, the movie “Gaslight” was on TCM this week, I thought I’d take my observations a little further and make a direct parallel between gaslighting and looking for work in today’s America.

Let’s start with the definition of gaslighting. From Psychology Today: 

Gaslighting is a tactic in which a person or entity, in order to gain more power, makes a victim question their reality. It works much better than you may think. Anyone is susceptible to gaslighting, and it is a common technique of abusers, dictators, narcissists, and cult leaders. It is done slowly, so the victim doesn't realize how much they've been brainwashed. For example, in the movie Gaslight (1944), a man manipulates his wife to the point where she thinks she is losing her mind. 

How do you know if you are being gaslighted? Here are the signs: 

1. You are constantly second-guessing yourself

2. You ask yourself, "Am I too sensitive?" a dozen times a day

3. You often feel confused and even crazy at work

4. You're always apologizing to your mother, father, partner, boss

5. You can't understand why, with so many apparently good things in your life, you aren't happier

6. You frequently make excuses for your partner's behavior to friends and family

7. You find yourself withholding information from friends and family so you don't have to explain or make excuses

8. You know something is terribly wrong, but you can never quite express what it is, even to yourself

9. You start lying to avoid the put downs and reality twists

10. You have trouble making simple decisions

11. You have the sense that you used to be a very different person - more confident, more fun-loving, more relaxed

12. You feel hopeless and joyless

13. You feel as though you can't do anything right

14. You wonder if you are a "good enough" friend/spouse/employee/child

15. You find yourself withholding information from friends and family so you don't have to explain or make excuses

I read over this list, and was rather disturbed by how many of these points resonate with me as a job seeker. For example:

1. You are constantly second-guessing yourself

By July 2013, after having applied and applied and applied for jobs and barely getting so much as a phone screening, my confidence began to take a serious nose dive. By September, when that list of rejections hit 500, my psyche was shattered to the point where I began debating suicide. During this whole time, I blamed myself for my predicament, i.e., “what did I do for this to be happening to me?” Because, certainly, it was something I did. It had to be. And, if I can screw up that badly, then I might as well throw in the towel on this thing called life.

2. You ask yourself, "Am I too sensitive?" a dozen times a day

Every rejection email I received would send me into an emotional downward spiral, a cocktail of shock, hurt, anger, and depression. And, rather than developing "thicker skin," with each new rejection, the emotion didn’t dissipate. I tried to calm myself with the usual “they’re not worth it” defense mechanism we’ve all been taught since childhood, but it didn't help.

5. You can't understand why, with so many apparently good things in your life, you aren't happier.

I couldn’t understand why, with all my skills and years of experience, could I not attract the attention of one decent human being looking to hire a designer.

8. You know something is terribly wrong, but you can never quite express what it is, even to yourself.

Even when I had given up and began preparing to end my life, my common sense remained intact, and I knew deep down inside that there was something very wrong going on here. I didn’t know what that was specifically, but I definitely knew it (I even gave that title to my other blog).

9. You start lying to avoid the put downs and reality twists.

Like many long-term unemployed folks, I had to resort to lying about the gap on my resume when blessed with the occasional telephone screening with some HR twat or recruiter, i.e., “I’m not unemployed, I’m freelancing/contracting/self-employed!”

11. You have the sense that you used to be a very different person - more confident, more fun-loving, more relaxed.

12. You feel hopeless and joyless.

I didn’t realize it at the time, but I was somewhat happy (happy enough, at least) pre-2013 when I was able to land those contract-with-no-benefits jobs which at least permitted me to pretend to have a “normal” middle class life. I used to love shopping (haven’t shopped in years), I loved Christmas (fuck Christmas now), I loved shooting pool with my old team (had to quit because I couldn’t afford the membership fees), I loved reading my monthly National Geographic (had to cancel my subscription), I loved my little condo (I had to sell it and move into mom’s basement). What is there left to be “joyous” about? Only time will tell if the psychological damage I’ve suffered is permanent. 

13. You feel as though you can't do anything right.

Eventually, I began to question whether I was capable of doing anything, including any kind of job, be it designer or secretary or delivery driver or toilet scrubber, despite the evidence of my work history. After all, 2,000+ rejections can’t be wrong, right?

14. You wonder if you are a "good enough" friend/spouse/employee/child

I wondered if I shouldn’t do the world a favor and commit suicide, and thus “decrease the surplus population.”

15. You find yourself withholding information from friends and family so you don't have to explain or make excuses.

When assholes try to be “helpful” with their job advice circa 1992 (“Have you tried a temp agency?”), I have to bite my tongue. Answering truthfully to these fools would lead to me losing my temper and thus make me appear unstable.

______

One of the most insidious things about gaslighting is the denial of reality. Being denied what you have seen. Being denied what you have experienced and know to be true. It can make you feel like you are crazy. But you are not crazy.

My reality has been attacked from so many directions, from the government’s 4% unemployment rate to every person who hears/believes this statistic and says, “You just don’t want a job!” Recall this Reddit asstroll about whom I previously wrote. This was a good example of gaslighting. His message to me was abusive (“the world doesn’t owe you a job”), insulting (accusing me of attacking interviewers when I did no such thing), and not even close to helpful. Had I encountered this creep back in late 2013, I might have permitted myself to react in the worst way possible (as in, I’d have taken it as a sign that it was time for me to end it all).

_______

From Business Insider, here are some of the signs of gaslighting to look out for:

Sign #1: Lies

A gaslighter's main objective is to confuse you. Because of this, they don't really care whether their lies are blatant and obvious. When they say something that is obviously untrue, they will still say it with a straight face.

Even if you have proof, they will often stick to their guns. This is all a tactic to keep you off-kilter. Eventually, they will attempt to make you believe that everything they say is the reality.

It will start off with something as simple as: "I didn't say that." But over time it will turn into something more disturbing, such as threatening to expose you as a liar or a fraud, when really you are neither of those things.

The more sure you are that they are wrong, and the more frustrated you get, the more they will persevere with their lies.

Look at my “fake job alert” posts. Company advertises a job, company rejects you when you apply for said job, company proceeds to re-advertise the exact same job. But, no, it’s not the “same job,” see, it’s got a different number in the ATS! Not the same job at all! Never mind that the description is an exact duplicate of the previous one! Hey, we’re not posting FAKE jobs, not at all! How dare you insinuate such a thing? And we’re NOT discriminating against folks over 30, pay no mind to the pictures on our website!

An even better example happens when you escalate your complaint to the company CEO, resulting in a completely non-apologetic “we’re sorry YOU think we did something wrong” apology – see IBM and State Street.

Sign #2: Isolation

Abusive people like to use the people around you as weapons. According to Sarkis, if you have children, a gaslighter will tell you that it was a mistake to have them. They will try and make you believe that you are worthless, and nothing else can compare to how important your relationship is.

They may say tell you your friend actually hates you, or your brother thinks you are useless. These are almost certainly lies, but when they are reinforcing your mind with the same stories over and over again, some of them may start to stick.

"Gaslighters are masters at manipulating and finding the people they know will stand by them no matter what — and they use these people against you," Sarkis writes. "When the gaslighter uses this tactic it makes you feel like you don't know who to trust or turn to — and that leads you right back to the gaslighter. And that's exactly what they want: Isolation gives them more control."

I have read many stories of unemployed people who were forced to take time off from work to take care of a family member. As a result, they are now officially “unemployable,” because, you see, having a job is the only thing that matters today. To hell with taking care of your family. If you put a loved one's interests over working, well, that just goes to show you aren't worthy of working.

Sign #3: Positive reinforcement

One of the most confusing — and effective — things a gaslighter can do is be nice to you. If someone was truly nasty and insulting towards you 100% of the time, the relationship probably wouldn't have gotten very far. However, when someone starts gaslighting you, they've already established a relationship with you that you believe is meaningful.

"Naturally, the abuse persists, and you’re never sure if it happened," Neo said. "Because the next day, he is so charming or so remorseful — or a mixture of both."

When a relationship starts with someone abusive — often a narcissist, a sociopath, or a psychopath — they will "love-bomb" you. According to a blog post in Psychology Today by psychiatrist Dale Archer, love-bombing is a tactic when somebody showers you with affection, and makes you feel like the luckiest person in the world.

However, the love-bombing, or idealisation, stage is quickly followed by the devaluation and discard stages, where you start to be insulted and wonder where on earth things started to go wrong.

The idea is that when they take this love and affection away, you will do anything within your power to try and get it back. You blame yourself for them changing the way they acted towards you, and you compromise yourself time and time again to get the perfect partner back again. You can't though, because that person never really existed.

Gaslighters will throw in the odd compliment, or the rare gift, to make you believe that it's the real them, and whenever they are angry at you, or abusing you, it's because you did something wrong.

Wow, there is so much here to address! Yes, recruiters and HR twats are ever so nice to you when they first reach out to you about your job application. Recruiters in particular go out of their way to tell you they just love what they see in your resume/background and promise you the world, and every call ends where they sound like your new BFF…and then you never hear from them again. With HR, they admit you’re perfect for the job as you’ve got every single qualification in the ad, and they tell you they’ll send your resume off to the hiring manager who’s “looking to act quickly on this job.” And, if the hiring manager passes on your candidacy, they’ll certainly give you feedback as to what was lacking in your experience/background. The next thing you get is a standard regurgitated rejection email (with no feedback as to why you were rejected).

My experience with Bain was probably the best example of this sign of gaslighting. I had two telephone screenings (the “love-bombing” stage), then an in-person interview, then…nothing (“devaluation and discard”). When I finally confronted them, they followed up with the “compliment/gift” of an email telling me that despite my “impressive background” I’m not qualified for the job.

The idea is that when they take this love and affection away, you will do anything within your power to try and get it back. You blame yourself for them changing the way they acted towards you, and you compromise yourself time and time again to get the perfect partner back again. You can't though, because that person never really existed.

Here, I’m reminded of NetCracker. I was so certain the woman liked me and that I had made a perfect impression. When I got that rejection email, I was in a state of shock. I did blame myself -- since they didn’t tell me HTML/CSS coding was now a huge factor in the candidate’s background, I didn’t talk much about my HTML/CSS experience listed on my resume, so clearly this is my fault! I debated replying to them and shouting in all caps that I have no problem using HTML/CSS but realized I’d be wasting my time. A few months later, they re-advertised the exact same job, then again in June 2014. That job never really existed.

Sign #4: Projection

If the gaslighting partner is a drug addict, that's what they will accuse you of being. If they cheat on you, they will say you are the one being unfaithful.

It's a distraction technique, according to Sarkis, because it keeps you on your toes, and makes you feel like you should be defending yourself. You're so busy doing this, the gaslighter gets away with whatever they want to.

Not quite projection but just as perverted, is when hiring managers say that “having additional skills such as X and Y are a plus,” skills that you do indeed have. Then they reject you because having X and Y makes you “overqualified.” Also, companies say they want someone “eager to learn new things and share ideas!” Yet, when I was interviewed by a number of companies (like this dumb place) and it was evident my list of skills was greater than their team’s skills, it was “oh, no, we don’t use that program here and we have no intention of learning that, we expect you to dumb yourself down to our level and fit in with the team.” And then you get rejected because of “cultural fit.”

Companies also write job descriptions where they proclaim they are “looking for the best and brightest” but then stipulate that the candidate cannot have more than a certain number of years’ experience, i.e., “must have 3 to 5 years’ experience.”  So, how exactly are they getting “the best?” How is someone with five years of experience automatically and blindly better than someone with six years of experience, or, say, twenty?

Sign #5: 'You're crazy'

Sarkis says this is one of the most important tactics to look out for. If someone ever dismisses your point of view as "crazy," you need to really consider why they are doing it.

It's dismissive and patronising, and it doesn't take your feelings into account. It makes you feel like you are not being heard. Worst of all, the more often the gaslighter calls you crazy, the more likely you are to finally believe it.

The level of dismissiveness that the unemployed must face is nauseating. Other standard accusations include having a "bad attitude” and being a "whiner.” Again, look at the aforementioned Reddit asstroll, or the politician who claims that the economy is booming so “if you’re not working it’s because you don’t want to work.”

Now, let’s take a look at that Indeed forum thread I mentioned at the beginning of this post. It’s an oldie, having started a full decade ago, and the theme is one with which any job seeker is familiar – “Employers who don't respond to applicants.” Scroll about halfway down the first page, note the appearance of one “Headhunter in Orlando, Florida.” Here we have an ordinary “rant” thread full of frustrated unemployed job seekers airing their legitimate gripes, and an abusive “headhunter” who shows up to tell everyone that everything they’ve observed and experienced isn’t real, calls them “whiners,” and attacks them personally with “I think the reason you are unemployed is your poor attitude and lack of professional experience.” 

Solid irony is a headhunter who claims to be professionally successful yet has oodles of time to spend in a discussion group for the unemployed. It's also become quite the standard these days for one of these "recruitment" folks to appear in a discussion group like this one and hurl insults at everyone in the genuine but misguided belief that this will somehow be construed as "helpful." Gaslighting. Bigly.

Here's a more recent example, in the "Why am I having such a hard time finding a job" thread. Right on cue, along comes "Average_HR_Guy in Michigan" to fling feces at everyone. 

What "just about every piece of research" are they talking about? Because every piece of research I keep seeing reveals continued head-scratching analyses over why wages remain stagnant. A simple Google search confirms this...

Oh, and here's a nice little design job (disguised as a "marketing assistant" role) recently advertised by some affiliate of Sotheby's (not exactly a poor company) in Boston (one of the most expensive cities in America) that pays a whopping $12 to $16 per hour (reminder: $12/hour is what I earned back in 1992).

But, no, none of this is real. "You're crazy! Pay no mind to the evidence!" says the gaslighter.

The desired effect: You're under their spell

Once they've worn you down, the gaslighter will have you where they want you. You'll be agreeable to everything they say and you will no longer question them when they blatantly lie to you. You'll be confused and disoriented, and feel like you have nobody left around you to trust.

"Because you don’t trust yourself, and instead have been conditioned — rewarded or punished accordingly," Neo said. "You fade away into a shell of who you are."

In other words, the gaslighter now has complete control.

  

Luckily, I snapped out of it during year #2 and recognized this for what it was: an abusive relationship marked by boatloads of gaslighting. While I’m lucky to have, er, survived this ordeal, I’m left pondering why America is treating its citizens so miserably. Is the aim to convince undesirables (over 40, unattractive) to commit suicide and “decrease the surplus population?” Who knows…