It’s the summer of 2020. I joined my boyfriend on a camping trip to the woods, planning to relax while he worked. We both work in tree removal, but I didn’t have a current project. I accidentally got a job as admin support for my boyfriend’s boss after hanging around the office one day and giving Excel tips. (He didn’t know what Ctrl+F did.)

At first, I helped with building spreadsheets, reports, and sending emails for him. Every day, he asked a new task of me, and every day, I did it well. Eventually, I had developed a schedule and even included running programs to check for mistakes while I took calls to increase productivity.

My boss — the owner of the company — decided he had nothing to do with me there, so he went home (to a different state and time zone) and I ran things. There were about three months of this. I wouldn’t really hear from him except for the occasional, “How much money did we make this week?” or, “Has anyone told you you’re doing a great job?” I’m a very modest person so believe me when I say that I was great at this job. Nothing got by me. I kept everything organized and always knew where to find any kind of information I needed.

A few weeks into the fourth month, my boss came back and brought his family. His wife would hang around the office and watch me like a hawk. If I took too long of a bathroom break or doodled while on conference calls, she would tell me that I was on company time. And honestly, I didn’t mind too much; she was very nice a lot of the time and I’m pretty easygoing.

During a standdown, my boyfriend and I went home. We were having dinner with his family when my boss’s wife called. She was angry from the start of the call. “Where is [Employee]’s paperwork?” she demanded.

I told her it was scanned and in the locked folders in our company files and walked her calmly through how to find it. She then yelled at me for not organizing files. As I said, I always knew exactly where everything was. Everything she asked for, I told her where to find just off the top of my head. She demanded that, due to my incompetence, she wanted to organize all files from now on because that was her job and this was her company. I was a bit upset but didn’t let her know and apologized for any mistakes. Remember, she and her husband had not been present or in much contact for months.

Following this call, every file, paper scrap, receipt, etc., that needed filing, I sent her in an email stating that it needed filing. She eventually told me that I didn’t need to send her everything and to just file it, but I let her know that, due to my history of “incompetence,” I didn’t want to jeopardize the company or create issues by misfiling, and that it was important to me that she did her job so she could be present in her company. She hated filing. I don’t know why she did what she did, but I never let her get out of that hole she dug.

A few years ago, I worked for a furniture store in the back store. My job consisted of unloading and loading trucks, assembling furniture, and placing it on the main floor of the store. After around six months there, my supervisor announced that he had resigned, meaning his post was up for grabs. I had all the technical requirements, so I applied, but they gave the job to another one of my colleagues who had more experience, which was totally reasonable.

After maybe one year, my new supervisor just stopped coming into work for no reason; he just decided he’d had enough and he just left, no two-week notice or anything. So, while the director tried to get to him, I took over the role of supervisor as I was the one with the most experience. That meant that, combined with my regular work, I was now the one telling people what to do and when, doing the schedule, and doing all the paperwork for the shipment. Three weeks later, my colleague was officially “fired” by my director. In those three weeks, I kept doing the job of supervisor, and I was doing it pretty well so I thought that the promotion would come to me, but my director did nothing. I went to see him, explained what I had been doing, and asked if I got the promotion. He answered that I was not qualified, nor smart enough, to do this job.

After some thinking, I just decided that if I was not smart enough to do the job, then I shouldn’t do it, so I went back to doing my regular job, and I also started looking for something else.

Four or five days after I stopped filling in, my director came to see me in the back store, asking why the f*** the job wasn’t being done. After all, without me to organize it, nothing was getting out of the store to be delivered to the clients. I just reminded him of our previous meeting and he told me, “Yeah, I remember that. What I meant is that you’re not qualified to get the pay bonus for the job. You still have to do the job, you idiot!”

I have to admit, I still wonder how he thought that would work. Still a bit dumbfounded, I just told him that if I wasn’t going to get paid for it, I certainly wouldn’t do the job, and that considering we were already short staff with my old supervisor gone, he should be a bit more polite. Apparently, this was an unreasonable request, a total lack of respect to him, and worthy of firing me. I still don’t get how that would fix anything, but hey, he’s the boss.

I packed everything and left, knowing that the back store — which needed five people to operate — was now down to three, with the most experienced worker having a total of four months’ experience. It only took my boss one day to call me back, telling me that maybe he had gone overboard and that perhaps we could arrange something for the promotion.

I replied that I would not be coming back since I had a few interviews lined up. I hung up while he was still cursing at me.

After a few months at my new job, I heard some surprising news: the store had closed down after two other back store employees resigned. I have to admit that it felt good to see my old boss finally get what he deserved.

We work with heavy machinery, some of it pretty hazardous. The whole shop floor requires safety boots and chemical-resistant overalls, and some areas also need earplugs and safety glasses.

The company has decided that, because people walk between these areas and a sister site recently had a bad eye accident, the whole site will now require safety glasses.

I don’t think it’s a big deal — it’s clearly for our safety — so I wear mine without complaint. 

Some people, however, have taken massive issue with it and routinely don’t wear them or wear them on top of their head.

It has gotten so bad that anyone who “forgets” their glasses at home more than once has to go home unpaid. Anyone who refuses to wear them gets written up. Repeat offenders get escalated through the discipline process.

Most people comply. Of those that don’t, most only get told off once, but one guy constantly complains, constantly takes his glasses off when he isn’t being watched, and ridicules everyone for wearing them.

One day, [Coworker] gets caught again wearing his glasses on top of his head, this time with his head inside the machine he is cleaning, where there’s a massive risk of getting something blown into an eye.

He storms back out of the office and throws his safety glasses across the workshop. The manager sees this and follows him out, shouting after him. [Coworker] shouts back, pausing only to wipe something from the side of his eye.

But he does it with greasy hands not washed since he cleaned the machine. He gets tiny splinters of metal in his eye. Everyone thinks he is joking, but when he starts to scream in pain, they get him to hospital to pick out the metal.

I don’t think he got written up for not wearing his glasses, but I think he learnt his lesson either way.

When I was a freshman in college, I registered for a basic English 102 course that doubled as a humanities credit. I thought, “Great! Two birds one stone,” despite the professor’s online rating for this class being abysmal at best.

I have ADHD and dyslexia, so I have a hard time reading most times but especially handwritten stuff, even my own. I have an ADA allowance on file, meaning I get some permissions to allow me to take classes and function as normally as possible. These permissions include use of my tablet during class to write notes and about an hour longer on tests.

On the first day of class, the professor strolls in with the arrogance and snobbitude of someone who THINKS they’re getting tenured this year. He starts talking and going over the syllabus.

Professor: “There will be no phones, laptops, or technology of any kind in my class. You will write all your notes by hand.”

That isn’t going to work for me, so I raise my hand.

Me: “Can I talk to you privately about the rule?”

That goes over like a lead balloon and he starts getting snippy.

Professor: “Anything you need to talk with me about can be found in the syllabus.”

Me: “I do need to talk to you; it’s pretty important.”

Professor: “Just say it to the class. I don’t have time to take out to deal with whining of any kind.”

Okay, dude.

Me: “I’m dyslexic and need my tablet to do the notes and read the assignments, and my ADA permissions are on file and emailed to all my professors before class.”

Professor: “Yeah, I saw the email, but I don’t care. You can do the work just like everyone else. You’re not special even if you were in special ed.”

The class goes deadly quiet at that.

I’m absolutely shocked at his bold and completely hilarious lack of awareness and care for his job. I stare at him open-mouthed, and he thinks he’s won. He’s got this smug little face like I’ve just been told and there’re no other options or any way he’ll regret his behavior.

One of the girls in class — whom I’ve never met before — finally finds her voice and calls him out in his ableism and lack of decorum, but he cuts her off.

Professor: “If you don’t like my rules, you can drop the class.”

Classmate: “Okay.”

She pulls out her laptop and drops the class right in front of him, and, taking the cue from her, three other students and I do the same, and we all leave class together.

Classmate: “Do you want to go to the dean about this?”

Honestly, I was really shaken. I said yes and we went straight to the office of the dean of students and explained what happened, and we spoke to the ADA counselor. They took the girl’s statement and mine. They discovered that this professor had pulled this s*** for years but nobody wanted to get involved.

Six months later, I heard that not only had the professor not gotten tenured, but he was fired and blacklisted from teaching at the collegiate level.

This story is part of the Highest Voted of 2021 roundup!

Read the next Highest Voted of 2021 roundup story!

Read the Highest Voted of 2021 roundup!

This story is part of our Best Of July 2021 roundup!

Read the next Best Of July 2021 roundup story!

Read the Best Of July 2021 roundup!

I’m nineteen and I work for my neighbors as a full-time nanny for their baby girl who’s about a year old. They have two other daughters who are eight and eleven, but I have been specifically instructed by their parents that I am only there for the baby, not them.

One Friday, I am getting up for work and I receive a text from my boss.

Boss: “[Husband] and I will be gone until noon. You are to skip your 11:00 am break in order to make sure the older girls will be supervised.”

I have just woken up, so I say okay and go to make my coffee. I have a hard time saying no on the spot and it takes me a minute to think through some things.

When the baby goes down for her nap, I text both bosses.

Me: “I completely understand that there will be appointments or things you need to do, but I would like to be asked if taking on three children and skipping my break is something I’m willing to do, rather than told. My hourly rate for all three girls is $20 and that I would like to be paid as such.”

I’m usually paid $15 an hour for watching the baby alone.

I receive a long text from the girls’ mom around fifteen minutes later that basically says they feel as though they have made several exceptions where my pay is concerned, and that she is perturbed by my message. She then goes on to detail three different instances in which they have shown me kindness and feel as though I should’ve made an exception. To top it off, she asks me to reevaluate over the next two-week period whether or not I want to keep my job.

I am really taken aback by this message, so I call my mom and ask her what she thinks. My mom is pissed. She tells me that she used to drive the two older girls to school in the morning along with my sister and would pick them up in the afternoon. I guess there were plenty of times my bosses assumed my mom would babysit after school with minimal heads-up and leave. My mom had to tell them to stop or pay her for her time. I have also kind of felt like they were dumping all their kids on me, especially because I serve as unpaid supervision for the two eldest girls as both parents work in isolated parts of the home.

I construct my own message back and detailed my own five-point list of kindnesses that I have shown the family, including last summer when I worked the same job I work now for $5 an hour to help out when the mom had to take on a summer job. I have also recently agreed to take on an extra ten hours weekly with no increase in pay to show my appreciation for this job. I also tell her:

Me: “I don’t understand what any of what you said has to do with the fact that I need to be asked in advance to take care of all three girls. I’m unsure how what I had said is deserving of a response asking me to reconsider if I want to keep my job. Consider this my two weeks’ notice. I do not appreciate my job stability being threatened over something so minimal. You should use this time to find alternative childcare, and we’ll part as friendly neighbors.”

They pretty much freak out. I don’t think [Boss] was actually expecting me to quit. They try to talk to me when they get home.

Boss: “You stressed me out by texting me in the first place, and I was just trying to make sure you were being properly paid because you made it sound like we were short-changing you!”

Me: “You were. And you shouldn’t have threatened me.”

She looked at the floor and her poor husband tried to do so much damage control. It was pretty awkward.

I do love the little one I babysit, but this has been such a mentally and physically taxing job as it is. I guess this was the straw that broke the camel’s back for me. I’m going to miss the baby, but not how tired I am, and I definitely won’t miss being taken advantage of.