There are snowflake stories…and then there are snowflake stories. Often times most are in the same level absurdity and intensity. A white person wore a sombrero; cops were drinking coffee at a Starbucks, or name any so-called cultural appropriation violations based on the rules of these morons, it’s all there. And no, they don’t get to throw that term back at us when we complain about those who trash law enforcement, the American flag, or any number of cultural events and traditions that normal people celebrate or cherish. No one cares about a white person being a Mexican for Halloween. It is, however, more controversial when you burn a flag in front of a mass of people because…‘orange man—bad.’ Conservatives get angry when you attack the country. You, crackpots, get mad over Halloween costumes. Go to bed, morons.
Yet, this snowflake meltdown is slightly more unusual. Apparently, telling someone they spelled something wrong is a triggering event. It’s the Chernobyl of snowflake meltdowns. It’s that, plus helicopter parenting, which formed a toxic cocktail with this story that was detailed in a lengthy, LENGTHY Twitter thread.
Carol Blymire is a communications consultant, public relations professional, and an all-around jack-of-all-trades in this field. Earlier this month, she detailed a meltdown at a client’s office, where some young woman was very, VERY upset that she was told that she spelled hamster with a “p.” She explained to her boss that she has always spelled “hamster” “ham[p]ster” all her life. Well, that’s good; it’s still wrong. Her boss was by this account, professional and understanding, but this crazy gal just wouldn’t let it go. She called her mother (yeah, you read that right), and proceeded to criticize her boss for telling her that she was wrong about the word. She put it on speakerphone too, so everyone could hear these ramblings. It gives pause concerning the future of America if people get this worked up about an edit.
Here is a hopefully short synopsis of something that happened this week that I still don’t understand (1/?)
— Carol Blymire (@CarolBlymire) July 12, 2019
In office space near a client, a young woman was meeting with her boss. She was (by my estimation) in her late 20s.
— Carol Blymire (@CarolBlymire) July 12, 2019
The boss (also a woman) was giving her feedback and reviewing edits she had made on something this young woman wrote.
— Carol Blymire (@CarolBlymire) July 12, 2019
They had been speaking in low tones, but their volume got louder toward the end of the conversation because the young woman was getting agitated about a particular edit.
— Carol Blymire (@CarolBlymire) July 12, 2019
They had been speaking in low tones, but their volume got louder toward the end of the conversation because the young woman was getting agitated about a particular edit.
— Carol Blymire (@CarolBlymire) July 12, 2019
That particular edit was correcting the spelling of “hampster” to “hamster”. Apparently she had used the phrase “like spinning in a hamster wheel” in this draft (presumably) speech or or op-ed.
— Carol Blymire (@CarolBlymire) July 12, 2019
The young woman kept saying, “I don’t know why you corrected that because I spell it with the P in it.” The boss said (calmly), “But that’s not how the word is spelled. There is no P in hamster.”
— Carol Blymire (@CarolBlymire) July 12, 2019
Young woman: “But you don’t know that! I learned to spell it with a P in it so that’s how I spell it.”
— Carol Blymire (@CarolBlymire) July 12, 2019
The boss (remaining very calm and professional), let’s go to https://t.co/n2ZU5Uuuy3 and look it up together.
(mind you, this is a woman in her late 20s, not a 5th grader)
The young woman insists she doesn’t need to look it up because it’s FINE to spell it with a P because that’s HOW SHE WANTED TO SPELL IT.
— Carol Blymire (@CarolBlymire) July 12, 2019
The boss says, “Let’s look over the rest of the piece so I can explain the rest of my edits.”
— Carol Blymire (@CarolBlymire) July 12, 2019
They do, and I can see the young woman is fighting back tears.
The boss is calm, cool, and handles this with professionalism and empathy.
Boss says, “I know edits can be difficult to go over sometimes, especially when you’re working on new kinds of things as you grow in your career, but it’s a necessary process and makes us all better at what we do.”
— Carol Blymire (@CarolBlymire) July 12, 2019
Boss gets up from table and goes to her office and the young woman can barely hold it together.
— Carol Blymire (@CarolBlymire) July 12, 2019
She moves to another table in the common workspace area, drops all her stuff loudly on the table top, and starts texting.
A minute later, her phone rings.
It was her mom. She had texted her mom to call her because it was urgent, and I’m sure her mother maybe thought she was in the ER or something.
— Carol Blymire (@CarolBlymire) July 12, 2019
She then ... PUTS HER MOM ON SPEAKERPHONE. IN THE WORKPLACE.
She bursts into tears and wants her mom to call her boss and tell her not to be mean about telling her how to spell words like “hamster”.
— Carol Blymire (@CarolBlymire) July 12, 2019
You can read the rest of the thread here. It’s just unreal. You can’t make this up. And while we usually preface an event worth mocking with “laugh or cry,” this is just straight-up insanity.
“I worry about how kids are being raised sometimes. I really do,” tweeted Blymire. Yeah, no kidding; this is nuts.
