"Thank you" as a brandishing of control

"Hey, thank you for all your work today. Really great stuff."

a+++

hoo boy

otm

Having had managers who would rather have walked over broken glass than said "thank you" for anything, I would prefer to hear a genuine "thank you" any day.

very ilxy thread concept

I miss the old days when we had thread categories, I would put this thread into "Unnecessary Umbrage"

I thought it was going to be the more literal variety of this, like THANK YOU FOR NOT SMOKING, or "I'll thank you to leave the premises now"

I can't get the mental image of Tracer getting offended by the Golden Girls theme song out of my head

it's more the "really great stuff" which is difficult to say without being condescending.

"Thank you for finally turning this paper in a week past deadline."

Goodbye, hello, thank you: ilx's overthinking of pleasantries continues apace

(The hello thing may have been a joke but I'm less sure of that now)

To be fair, the Golden Girls theme song would feel REALLY sad and guilt-trippy coming from someone you weren't actually that fond of

More like brandishing of control tempered with conventional statement of gratitude.

Is it me, or does "thanks for your help" almost always get misconstrued as sarcastic when seen in written form?

I wrote that to someone the other day in earnest, and worried all night that she thought I was calling her out for not helping or something.

I'm going to tell you that you've got the wrong phrase listed here. Something you can work on next time.

You're welcome, btw.

It's the presumptive nature of the thanking you for your assistance (or whatever) that rankles.

That literally makes zero sense.

hesitate to contribute here, but have any of you managed someone else's work? or trained someone?

yes, thank you for your input goole

I have. I thank my staff all of the time, but I also give kudos to their boss every time they do something excellent because I like positive reinforcement. Plus it allows me to be brutally honest when I need to be, when they fall short.

Being on the other side of the coin, never being thanked or complimented and only getting criticism used to drive me fucking nuts.

fuckin gah jesus fuck

^thank you for that crucial contribution

http://www.fanx.com/

hey Neanderthal- I really appreciate you taking the time to share that valuable input

You can thank him later.

"Goodbye" for those who must always have the last word

I can imagine this sounding condescending if I hadn't done anything special that day. But if I'd actually been helping that person, and he thanked me... no.

lock thread.

"Brandishing of control"?

It depends on the context and the sincerity with which the phrase is said, something that doesn't come across when it's just text on a screen. Maybe there needs to be an emoticon for "I'm being sincere".

xp Laura Brandishing, "Of Control"

xpost or maybe we could just quit assuming the worst in any given situation, idk

Maybe there needs to be an emoticon for "I'm being sincere".

But of course the smart-asses would use that emoticon when being sarcastic.

http://i.imgur.com/rDVfRb2.gif

my boss never says thank you and in this oleaginous bureaucratic culture his gesture is the equivalent to buying me a beer.

xp Laura Brandishing, "Of Control"

― fashionably early Christmas themed display name (snoball), Thursday, November 14, 2013 1:03 PM (37 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

IRL LOL

To me, the thank you is not an issue in one-to-one situations where one person is clearly the boss, it's among two or more equally-ranked employees or a group of various employees of different ranks. The "last thank you" can be construed as having put some stamp of approval on an outcome, or among equally ranked employees as being "I really outrank you even though we have the same title" which can bring a smug,
careerist overtone to a decision as simple as "who will reply to the client's email?"

I do often use the sarcastic "Thanks in advance!" in blog comments when asking someone to support an unsupportable position.

I always worry that I haven't put in enough humility indicators. "I really appreciate your time." "Please send it when you have a chance." "Please let me know if I can help at all."

Listen, for me I can't worry about what everybody say about me. I'm LeBron James. From Akron, Ohio. From the inner city. I'm not even supposed to be here.

Your like 30 and your spending you're time complaining about video games on a forum full of other 30 yr olds and sprinkled with the occasional gay teen. Guess what I'm gonna be doing when I'm 30. Let's just say first I'll get up out of a 5000$ bed in my waterside mansion on the east coast of japan, awoken by the light of the rising sun that glorious island is nicknamed after. I'll gently lift myself out of bed so as not to stir my beautiful eastern european pale skin dark hair small boobs wife and go to my huge walk in closet. I'll come back out moments later wearing a really expensive italian suit. Strolling down the corridor I come into a room with glass cases full of the trophies of my achievements. I proudly look at all of them and then move into the next room, it's the room with a wall-sized HD display and walls upon walls of DVDs, mostly Anime but with a few Western classics throuwn in there. Jealous yet? Next I move into the kitchen and have my servant make me a breakfast, its usually pancakes with chocolate chips and whipped cream, but today... lets go healthy. Just a few slices of apple, Servant. Thank you. How delicious. Now I'm strolling into the living room about to make for the door so I can go out and enjoy my day at Comiket, but in the corner there I see something. I walk over by the 5000 dollar gaming rig, its turned off for now but later tonight I'll be playing Prostitute Farm Online, max settings and DirectX12. I begin to turn and make for the door again but then i stop and look at the black monitor screen (no less than 40 inches, btw). I just laugh. And laugh and laugh. I'm laughing because the guy who was 30 when I was a 17 year old pathetic yix poster is still a yix poster, meanwhile, I'm living the literal dream. All because I shoot for the top. Deal with it, bitch. YCS.

thank you based goole

Here's how it breaks down:

- For a thank you to an equally-ranked colleague who is performing a function within their normal job responsibilities, I often use "cool" or something else.
- I do use thank you for an equally-ranked colleague who is performing one or more of my allotted tasks, or something I would otherwise have to take on.
- In meetings and groups, I use "have a good day" or "have a good weekend" as a means of reaffirming the cohesion of the group without resorting to being perceived as a last thank you-er.
- To superiors or people in different units for which the rank on the org chart is unclear, I avoid using thank you unless, again, they are performing a task that would have ordinarily fallen to me.
- To people of lower rank than me, I use thank you in one-on-one situations where someone has, say, produced a report I asked for, but avoid avoid using it when faced with larger groups consisting mainly of peons, grovellers, shit eaters, or lackeys because it can create the wrong impression.

Just a few slices of apple, Shit eater. Thank you. How delicious.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nx2G3OCVRNk

Also this one

"Go home! What are you still doing here??!"

The release date for "prostitute farm online" keeps getting pushed back :(

My OP was about someone who's more or less on your level, when you haven't done anything very remarkable

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GhzMUKznZo0

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iyNU608RuF4

My OP was about someone who's more or less on your level, when you haven't done anything very remarkable

― TracerHandVEVO (Tracer Hand), Thursday, November 14, 2013 1:09 PM (2 hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

noticed in office/corporate life it's a routine and subtly mandatory thing to say "thanks" after any interaction involving work (meetings, calls, w/e). sort of like saying "excuse me" when you come w/in 18" of someone for any reason.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y2PtsSKE4mY‎

goole that's true, but this thread is not about just any old thanks you might dispense or deploy, it's about thanks wielded as creators or enforcers of heirarchy

The offensive thing here isn't the "thanks", it's the "can I assign you some work even though I'm not your manager" that precedes it

thrankles

That its come to being offended because ones work associates take the time to show the fucking courtesy of THANKING them for something they did... I dont even. Christ.

And I dont know about other workplaces but sometimes where I work we *do* assign work to each other because shit, you might be busy or sick or whatever. I'm sure as hell going to thank anyone who's got my back in that situ.

"assign" is the key word here; asking someone to help you out is different IMO

y'all get pretty irrationally angry at some really innocuous things

Me, I am greatful for thanks from anyone at work because most of the time I work my ass off and no one notices/cares/thanks/rewards me.

'(could you please) do this'

(you do it)

'thank you'

(mistaken feeling that one was not just obeying orders, but acting graciously, flowers within you)

Next up: 'the'

fuck a definite article imo

specificity privilege

Can I speak with your head of acquisitions, thank you?

That its come to being offended because ones work associates take the time to show the fucking courtesy of THANKING them for something they did... I dont even. Christ.

Again, this isn't about simple or sincere gratitude expressed, it's about demonstrative thanking as a way of reinforcing who requests that things be done and who does them

This particular flavour of thank you would not be foreign in the mouths of those who ask "Hey, how busy are you right now?"

i guess some are just not familiar with this device

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DHHKU4znvo8

I think my thing is that people I work with believe I would murder them if they pulled this shit on me

"Hey, thank you for not murdering me today. Really great stuff." *gets murdered*

Hands up if you haven't deployed the pre-emptive thanking manoeuvre in difficult/escalating battles with people at utility/phone call centres.

must be doing it wrong, i usually say "fuck you in advance for not listening" and then leave a dead animal on their doorstep later that evening

The cat in me finds that kind of a mixed message

"hey, thank you for this week."

every week.

can we change this thread title to "Tracer Hand works with an asshole"?

hahaha

lol. sorry if this has become my like, colleague bitchfest livestream.

YOU DONT GET TO TELL ME WHAT TO THANK