Lace on Race

Notes from The Coronavirus Cubicle: Post 3

Pro Tip For The Bigwigs:

A sure way to show your contempt for those of us risking our lives so you can telecommute and issue edicts from the comfort of your Ethan Allan sectional–

Make your workers walk almost a full quarter mile to and from their desks from the parking structure, making sure they appreciate the empty parking spaces, reserved for the elite, which are thisclose to the building, which will go unused for the duration of this debacle.

Extra points: Accent the hundreds of visitor parking spaces, also empty because no more in person interaction, with balloons and colorful parking tickets and scowling contract security guards.

If you are audaciously ambitious, make sure that any entrances that would make your worker’s lives just a bit easier are closed off to all but the elite, making them walk 2/3 longer than they actually have to.

Trifecta: ensure that there are no places to sit during the long trek; no benches or chairs, so those workers face a low key forced march before they even set their purses down.

Be sure to make them read a email saying how much you care about them, how important they are to your org/company, and how much you appreciate their sacrifice, even as you adjust your robe and drink your coffee from your terrace.

There are ways to enforce social strata even while engaging in social distance.

Lace on Race Admin Staff

One response to “Notes from The Coronavirus Cubicle: Post 3”

  1. Laura Berwick Avatar
    Laura Berwick

    I have never looked at those reserved spaces in quite that way before. But you’ve made me stop and rethink all the various employee parking realms I’ve navigated. You’ve brought to the forefront of my mind an additional proof of how little that “hard work” business has to do with professional privilege. The security personnel, the maintenance workers, the janitorial staff, the front desk reception, all of the people who I suspect were expected to be at work well before the 8am or 9am the rest of us were allowed, and who would also stay late, and who were not in upper salary brackets, those are the people who would get those front spaces if they weren’t reserved. And, frankly, those are the people who deserve them! Pivot to race isn’t far. At my last company I contracted with, security, maintenance, and janitorial were all black and latinx.

    I honestly don’t even know who got those reserved spaces. I never asked. And I often saw big trucks parked in spaces reserved for hybrid vehicles, but those reserved spaces were often empty. I never realized a parking garage was such fertile ground for drawing conclusions about what and who will be respected and valued in the work place. Now I will notice in a new way.

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