Pierced out of work

You shouldn't confuse speaking freely with a lack of maturity. One of the things I love about A2K is the candor. Fat chicks in tight clothing turn my stomach too, but you'd never know it unless I told you. At my office I interact with people strictly within the guidelines of professional a work environment. I don't talk about politics, religion or any other subject that I see offending someone. Babies make me smile, meanness makes me frown, sexy women make me horny and seeing some piercings make me queasy. All are gut reactions that I don't necessarily share if I think it's inappropriate. None of these reactions have any bearing on my maturity. I would like to continue believing that A2K is a place to open up completely, instead of putting on some PC front.

damn bill, I didn't mean to strike a nerve, really

dyslexia, in my opinion; Your avatar suggests you are a man who will speak your mind with little or no thought given to what others think of you. Your words do little to dissuade this rationale. Personally, I lend additional credence to the words of any person who is not afraid to be judged for who he is. I wouldn't change a thing. (Unless of course you are applying for a public orientated job :wink: .)

No worries bi; I don't offend that easily... just clarifying.

That tells me you'd probably do a fat girl in tight clothes as long as it was in private.........

(Quick apology to Bi abt crossdressing. I keep getting you confused with Slappy. You're the drug related comments and his are the sex related ones. Sorry.)

Dys, I can't imagine you ever becoming a grumpy old man. I'm three years behind you and I have the luxury of running a business with 30 employees: age-20 to 55; race-white, black, latino;
hair-black. blond, blue and none; sexual orientation-none of my business; piercings & tattoos-quite a few on some; none on others. And, oh yes, I have a couple of goth androids.

The key features I look for in new employees are honesty and enthusiasm.

I am fortunate that my stores happen to be in a pretty liberal part of the country (Virginia?). Well. I take that back. We have a customer base that tends to be pretty open-minded. I have never heard anyone say "mutilation...turns my stomach.
Girls piercing their belly buttons. I won't set myself up to be grossed out on a daily basis."

They keep me young. Fascinating people.

LOL bi...For the record; I'm as comfortable shooting pool in biker bar where beer still costs a buck, as I am at a black tie affair. My mind equates piercings with self mutilation, not style, and my gut reaction is a gut reaction... not a choice. If it were a choice; I'd choose not to give a rats ass what anybody looked like. (imagine all the attractive women if that were the case!) :wink:

i knew if left to your own devices bi-youd come at least half way.
That comment about goths wasnt BY me, it was a line from south PArk wherein uncomformity as a Goth kid was assured by attaining conformity in their own goth attire. It was a joke son.
If you ever get a job as a lawyer, teach in a science dept of a u, work as a physician in a hopsital emergency ward, or work as a PM in an engineering company let me know what company thinks that such facial mutilation is looked on as professional.
I may be wrong, but i know of no such places.
Even Technical jobs like drilling or drilling helpers (at least ones i work with) dont allow any facial metal work if the drillers are in level B suits or higher (safety you know) Safety equip must be put on and off quickly, metal rings and barbed wire catches the strapping

l do make allowances for fashion statements like A (as in single )earring. when your ears begin to resemble a spiral notebook or tongues and chins or eyebrows are sporting knobs of metal, then , youre failing the first test of presentability to the decision makers of the real world

entertainment types, i suppose, are proud to sport these accoutrement, i have no say in that industry. neither do you have a say(or i might add, a clue) in the bulk of the professional world. Youre passionate about this , i see. i, like occom, dont think about it much. in fact, whenever I see a kid or , sadly, some older person with a three ring bounded ear, i usually cchuckle to myself, why? because it seems to me to be only about calling attention to oneself thats all.I see it in my classes each year, and as the students get closer to their grad defenses, they begin shedding their sparklies as they start interviewing.
i did it in my own way when younger, but as I grew up Ive recognized that this too will pass like the pattern of ridiculous fashions that young men wore in the 17th century. theres nothin unique about it, its conformity of a high sort. Theres no statement or deep meaning that comes with this, thats why i can demand that such metallizing isnt going to get one a job as a pE or PG in my company. I really dont G.A.S. about whether earring cliques would develop in a barroom. If someone comes to me with a job application and credentials , chances are he/she has already been given curriculum advice from their grad school advisors such as
'uh lose the facial hardware in the real world" . It goes along with the admonition that 'if you seek employment in the private sector, be careful, they require results"
If that person gets to our interview process, we advise and further request that they do likewise. If they refuse, then theyhave the opportunity to seek employment elsewhere. We ask our employees to work unattended for months in foreign countries, if we cannot establish some sort of chain of report on such simple assed matters as this , then I and my board cant trust them with making large dollar decisions correctly.
Its as simple as that.All life is a test, and , sometimes , you dont proctor yourself

I doubt the avatar makes much difference, dys. I don't recall the first one you had on a2 - a big blue eye, maybe? Anyhow. . . . The first impression remains, except for knowing you are not a chick after all.

actually farmerman I'm not passionate about it at all. I find it amusing that people equate piercings or anything like it as immature, calling attention to oneself, sad, why is it any of these things? some people are more extravagant and flamboyant than others, and that's it period. I look as I look because I like it, and I'm having fun, even after 50 years. No other meaning.

You say you don't think about it, but place yourself by your own words on some sort of higher plane than those who don't meet your appearance standards.

If the real world means grey button down short hair bla bla bla, then it's a real world that has been manufactured by control freaks in my opinion.

One of the few "straight" jobs I ever had was at Babcock and Wilcox where I was in charge of my shift for final inspection of the fuel fillers that ran our nuclear fleet. I had long hair and was a major stoner, but no one cared because I could turn out more fuel fillers faster through the inspection line than anyone else and my work was practically 100% accurate. My long hair mattered not one bit, I had a low level confidential clearance and this was small town virginia in 1968. I met Admiral Rickover with hair past my shoulders, and he shook my hand, talked to me about my work, and went on about his business. The REALLY high placed and self confident people of this world don't give a **** about appearances, just results.

As for me not having a clue about he "professional" world, you are cordially invited to stick that smug remark up your ass. It was purposely insulting. People who make judgements and remarks based on appearances I am passionate about but not patient with.

I have been entrusted to coordinate events for Bellsouth, Glaxo, IBM, Loomis Fargo, Nortel to name just a few, as well as coordinating every Project Graduation ceremony for 200 miles every year. I have worked side by side on every detail of these events with highly placed Human Resources personnel and company CEO's and I've done it with with long hair, piercings and all the accoutrements of the people you consider clueless and substandard. I have found that it's the middle management uptight types that ever have a problem with my appearance, not the truly highly placed results oriented people.

It's being familiar with the "professional according to farmerman and his type world" that made me reject it, and I'm doing well by any standard of measure.

People that wear the kind of fashion you find ridiculous may very well find your sense of fashion ridiculous, so get over yourself fella.

If a bright, disciplined, punctual worker of character is by passed up by you because you don't like his lip ring or eyebrow ring or dreads then you've lost a potential asset based on a gut reaction.

That's short sighted and ignorant in my opinion but if it gives you the warm fuzzy, enjoy. :wink:

I love that response, bear.

well thanks edgar, it was heart felt.

This has been a very interesting exchange of views.

It seems to boil down to personal choice and yes, personal predudice. I personally (I too will turn 60 next year) have never at any stage in my life been comfortable with body piercings, even the single-pierced earlobe to display earrings. I always thought it was a shame for young girls to disfigure their bodies in any way. In the 1950s of course, it was only girls who would do this.
But the difference seems to be this: a pierced earlobe in those days was done so as to provide a secure fixing for an earring, or so I was told.
Nowadays, piercings are done just to have piercings, and the metal shows where they are. Am I wrong? I'm not an expert on this, as you can imagine.

Anyway, pieced tongues, lips and eyebrows I find physically upsetting and there's not much more I can say about that, nor any way I can change it. And, it seems to me that the wearers, many of them, do this partly to alienate people like me, which I find sad.

No doubt that's a big part of why they do it. Mostly, it's style more than an indication of character - mostly.

Hmmmm - in my work (family therapy and individual work with kids and adolescents and their families) - I have to engage with everyone from a three year old through to an adolescent in full rebellion fig, AND their parents - and grand-parents, sometimes - not to mention other professionals - from welfare workers, youth workers, senior doctors, teachers - on and on and on.....

If I wore exactly what I wanted to, I would easily alienate some of these folk - and I need not to do that to be effective. I do not mean that - at fifty - I wanna be a Goth, or wear fifty piercings, or whatever - but I would dress and such rather more dramatically than I do at work!

Many clients would view jeans as an insult - many would view "proper" professional uniform as alienating and elitist. Sigh.

So - what do I do? Well, I wear quieter and more formal clothes than I do socially - however, I wear things that I feel comfortable in and are "me" - that I can get on the floor with a kid in, and yet attend a meeting with a bunch of sometimes hostile other professionals without them simply dismissing me on appearance alone.

'Tain't easy - and I often don't pull it off all that well - and, in the end, it is force of personality and sheer knowhow that get you in. But, I do acknowledge that, in my field, I have to be more neutral than I would otherwise choose to be.

Not commenting on what anyone else should be doing - just speaking for my area....

Oh - and I would NEVER wear anything overtly sexy!!!! No cleavage, no expanse of leg.

There's all sorts of taboos and customs to be aware of.
For instance, here's a strange one: it was said to me once, that an engineer or site manager on a construction site should be dressed formally (jacket = coat, shirt, necktie) and this was the preference of the WORKERS (= labour), because they did not want any sloppily-dressed person representing them.

Secondly, on the subject of long hair and beards: length of hair, hairstyle, and presence or absence of facial hair are a matter of current fashion and personal taste, and are differing degrees of a NATURAL state.

Body piercings, unnatural. That's an important difference to me.

dont have a coronary bear. Did you ever consider that your protestations are a bit 'over the top"?
i mean, if I choose to run my business with rules that are appropriate for this industry, that is , after all, my own damn business. ,Dont see me as an extension of your world.
There are a whole battery of workplaces you know little about so to continue this nyah nyah tone would be a bit fruitless. You continue to deny the role that company rules play. You seem to want to make everything a matter of free choice, and its not that way . many rules are there for a real purpose
. I dont think youd find anyone who is really interested in starting a career in which theyve already invested 8 or more years in undergrad and graduate training , willing to distinguish themselves by fighting for the workplace right to dye their hair black and walk around like Pinhead..
Ive made the rules for my company, so i dont have to 'get over myself" its not an option thats worth discussionor even the validity of your opinion.
so when I hire someone its only after a series of interviews, discussions about their research, they give a seminar and we have lively discussions. Some of the facial jewelry types begin to lose their iron shortly after their fisrt interview.
any jo will tell you that piercings at 40 below will sometimes cause major frostbite. My own insurance has riders about safety policiy and demonstration of 100% attainment. They dont allow no deviation either.

A driller for a well known exploration company had a scarf tied around his neck and got caught in the rigs cathead. the engine horsepower is well in the 5 to 800 hp range for a small exploration rig. the kids ear studs caught the scarf and he lost a nice chunk of ear, the real damage was the subsequent infection that the insurance company tied to the "negligence "of the policyholder from requiring certain adornment standards. the company had trouble collecting on injury and they quickly had their attornies redraft safety policies to disallow any body adornments that could pose a safety hazard by snagging a big Ingersoll.
Consider all options when you jump up on your soap box. It aint all rock and roll son.Somebody's gotta be the grownup

McTag- For me, THAT is the bottom line. I don't know where beards and long hair got involved in this discussion. I think that there is something about piercings that are qualitatively different than other forms of independent fashion expression. The first time that I saw my favorite nephew with a ring through his nipple, I felt faint.

My granddaughter has a ring in her belly button. Somehow, that didn't bother me. But a ring through someone's tongue will sicken me physically. I once thought about it, and to me, certain types of piercings are connected emotionally to masochism and torture.

Farmerman you will not get that my soapbox as you put it is not about whether or not you can have jewelry, it's about your smug attitude.

I am a grownup, and I know many people who are pierced, have long hair, etc. etc. who are also grown ups. We have mortgages, raise our children, pay our taxes, cut the grass, do volunteer work in the community and are contributing members of society.

One of my exguitarists is an accountant for a major travel firm. Has hair down to his ass, and pierced ears.

My ex drummer is highly placed on campus at Microsoft. Ditto for him, although he did cut his hair recently because he got tired of it.

I know a lot of clean cut unemployed white trash types too who are hanging out 24/7 in the bars I do shows in.

You can have your rules farmerman and I can have mine and we can still be friends...two of my best friends are clean cut guys who have told me to my face that they find my piercings and long hair ridiculous. One is an IBM executive in RTP, one owns a very successful restaurant in RTP. They wince at my lip piercing and find it as repulsive as you do. BUT they don't think they're more "grown up " than I am, they sure don't think they're somehow better than me, they know me for who I am, and we hang out and speak all the time. At the end of the day, they accept me and I accept them even though our appearances are radically different because appearances don't make the person.

If there are safety regulations and real issues of that matter that make face jewelry or long hair a problem then for the sake of discussion you could tell me so and I would listen and say "You know Farmerman I never thought of that", and then an exchange of ideas would have taken place instead of a pissing contest. How unfortunate that instead you choose to talk down to me from the heights of your wisdom while doing the Superior Dance. Very distasteful. By all means do as you please, but drop the I'm more grown up and mature than you act....it closes out of town.