Postby marchale » Fri Jul 29, 2011 12:03 pm
Okay, I can see the point where favoritism could be implied and in a military (or quasi-military) type setting it could be a matter of life and death. But regardless whether fraternization is acted on or not, there's no getting around the fact that a boss will naturally feel closer to some subordinates than others. I mean, look at how much more often Archer dined with Trip and T'Pol rather than say Malcolm or Hoshi. I think the key there is just in being professional enough to not let your feelings cloud your judgement about doing what's right and fair regardless of how you feel about it emotionally. Like even though Archer no doubt favored Trip and T'Pol over other members of his crew, that didn't stop him from putting them in harm's way when it was their turn to go on a dangerous mission or whatever. But thats just a matter of being mature and actng like a professional.
In my own experience, I think both Rick and I acted very professional around work. He didn't show me any favoritism on the job and if anything was tougher on me than others so that nobody would suspect what was going on between us after work. Tim (our big boss) came very close to firing both of us when we were eventually caught, but it had been going on for nearly a year before that happened without anyone suspecting a thing. (Tim had just dropped by Rick's apartment one night after work about a rush job that just came up and there I was so we got caught red handed). But it was ridiculous needing to sneak around as if we were doing something wrong. Knowing you could get fired for who you fell in love with - just how ridiculous sounding is that? Like I said, I tried like hell denying my feelings for him at first, but it didn't help. (BTW, we didn't do anything at work, he just invited me over to his place after work one night and one thing led to another from there, but we kept it totally away from work because knowing how Tim felt about it, we were risking our jobs if we were caught). But it was a serious relationship, we came very close to getting married three times in a little over three years there.
But anyway, while I can see why fraternization could be a challenge in a military type setting where lives could be at stake, if a boss is mature and professional enough to not let his/her emotions cloud their judgment about whats fair and right (such as Archer putting Trip and T'Pol in danger at times rather than risking someone else's life); well, I just find fraternization rules to be rather ridiculous and insulting to the people involved. Both Rick and I felt like what we did outside of work was none of Tim's damn business in the first place, that was our private lives and had nothing to do with work - and for Tim to assign Gerald to be my new supervisor so that neither Rick nor I would take advantage of the situation, that was insulting to both of us. (and I'm sure Gerald felt pretty uncomfortable about it too). I mean, we had been sneaking around for close to a year behind Tim's back (as well as several other co-workers too) and were "professional" enough on the job so nobody suspected a thing. It had nothing to do with the job, that just happened to be the place where I met Rick; though with him being my boss, I tried to deny my feelings for him at first - although that didn't help at all, because you can't control how you feel inside and if those feelings become strong enough, well - I'm not sure if you can control how you behave when you're in love either, I know I gave up trying to control it - like Seven of Nine said, resistance is futile. And I think having fraternization rules are pretty futile too. People will do it anyway, you can't control how you feel inside towards others, you just have to be enough of a mature professional on the job to not let your feelings cloud your judgement about doing whats fair and right there, and that should be expected of anyone on a job, just like showing up for work and doing your job is expected of a person. Ahh, I don't know if Im making any sense here, but it just feels degrading having rules about fraternization, like don't you think I'm intelligent enough to know how to behave professionally, or do you think I'm some sort of low class moron who would try to take advantage of the situation? I can't speak for others who've fraternized, but I wish Rick would've been anyone other than my boss because it really sucked needing to sneak around like we were doing something wrong that almost cost us our jobs at the time. You can't regulate feelings and it's insane having work rules governing your life outside your job; it's not like he was my boss in bed and we sure tried like hell to keep it a deep dark secret around work. Well, thats just my opinion.
Last edited by
marchale on Fri Jul 29, 2011 1:30 pm, edited 1 time in total.