Like countless others - many of whom have doubtless posted to this site - my introduction to the cruel, avaricious and gluttonous reality of capitalism (or the World of Work, as the high school film strips used to say) came at Newark's lone McDonald's restaurant. As introductions go, Capitalism made a VERY bad first impression; in fact, if it had bent me over a steam table and proceeded to give me the old in-out, in-out it could not have made a WORSE impression.
This all occured between the summer of '82 and the end of the summer of '83, immediately before I went off to college. Uncle Ray was still alive - barely - and so McDonalds still possessed most of it's pseudo-fascist sheen. I happened to have the grave misfortune of working at a restaurant that was part of a franchise owned by none other than Al Bernardin, the inventor of the tasty Filet-o-Fish and Quarter Pounder sandwiches. In fact, the latter of the two was originally test marketed in the city of Fremont, right next door to Newark. This is, of course, yet another reason to avoid Fremont at all costs.
Being from the old school, Al was given to proselytizing his nitwitted "management team" into the one, true faith: The Customer Is Number One. In fact, if I didn't know any better, I could sware I once heard him tell our Tom Cruisesque store manager to "blow the customer, if you have to." Of course, what he probably said was "keep the customers flowing. You have to!", but with Al one could never be sure about such things. One thing of which you most certainly could be sure as a McCrewMember was absolutely merciless treatment at the hands of the Assistant and Shift Managers. One of these, a vicious it-starts-with-a-"C" named Ivy Whittaker actually had the gaul to give an employee a hassle for leaving when said employee was called by her mother and informed that her father had just had a heart attack. Ivy icily informed her that she would need to bring "proof" of this medical emergency to "excuse" her "absence". A copy of his EKG, perhaps? Ivy never said.
Then there was Tom Pinnocci, our store manager. A complete moron who was incapable of doing anything after high school but join the army and marry the first girl who would spread her legs for him, Tom nevertheless acted as if he were some sort of commanding officer in a war zone rather than what he was: a third-rate man in charge of selling fourth-rate food to people who were, frankly, too stupid to know better than to eat it. Tom was good at one thing, though, the sort of thing that all such men are good at, which is to say following rules. None of us was ever allowed to take a food item about to be thrown away to eat as we went on our breaks. Why? It was a Rule. None of us could ask to take a break until management instructed otherwise. Why? It was a Rule. None of us kids who worked as closers were paid after 10 o'clock, though we were routinely there at least until midnight. Why? It was against the law for us to be there to begin with, so why leave a payroll record??!
I could go on and on and on and on, but I won't. I'm now in my thirties and working in a gratifying field of the high tech industry; I'm far away from that Roman slave ship of a kitchen. I was enormously pleased to hear about this site, and the fact that McDonalds actually was stupid enough to pursue the McLibel case. Enormously pleased, but not the least bit surprised. I know from hard personal experience that the arrogance of these people knows no bounds. It is my profound hope that now that Ray Kroc burns in Hell...uh, I mean, has passed away, his legacy's insane growth plans can be stymied by the results and aftershocks of this suit.
None.
