Hi Richard,
Are you just targetting the legal profession or would you welcome reasoned abuse hurled at folk from other walks of life?

I live in the UK and have to say that there are quite a few candidates on this side of the water...

-- Softie (softie@thegallowgate.com), July 19, 2000

Answers

Yeah, if you're accepting assholes of all genres, I have an officious librarian I'd like to add to the list. Our town library opens at 11 a.m., and since the door was unlocked we went right on in, only to be berated by a little twit who informed us that the library was closed and that in the future we should pay attention to opening and closing times. When we told her the door was unlocked, she said she didn't care; she wasn't paid to help us until 11:00 (it was 10:52). Mind you, we hadn't said a single word to her and were only returning books. I wanted to let her know that as taxpayers we are contributing to her salary and aren't happy about our money going to some condescending, small-town librarian with a big stick up her ass.

So yeah, I'd like to add her to the asshole list.

-- Gina (vs6599@netscape.net), July 21, 2000.

Every library I've ever been to has an after hours drop off for returned books. Perhaps this particular library does not. You may wish to write this up and put it in the suggestion box. If the library also does not have a suggestion box, a letter to her supervisor and one to the local newspaper would be in order.

Nonetheless, Gina failed to follow the rules, rules not placed into policy by the librarian but which fall onto her as part of the responsibilities she has as part and parcel of her duties. And yet you find reason to call the librarian an asshole. Interesting. You created the situation by failing to heed the rules - marked plainly on the door, I'm sure - and in your infinite wisdom tag the librarian as an asshole.

Do you realize if you had slipped on a wet floor and sued the town, the librarian would more than likely lose her job for having allowed you into the building prior to official hours of operation? Perhaps this has happened to her before somewhere else? Perhaps she was ill and a bit cranky? Or someone close to her has a terminal illness which requires long hours of caretaker duty after working at the library, which saps her strength leaving her a bit stressed out?

There are myriad possibilities for acting less than graciously in any given situation. I know. I acted ungraciously once for about 17 seconds back in the Fall of 1986. Fortunately, no one named Gina was there to label me an asshole.

There's still time for that yet. :0)

-- Rich (howe9@shentel.net), December 05, 2000.