Until recently I had lived my whole life with short hair, and in the last two years decided to try growing it out to see if I liked it. Currently it's long enough to reach my collarbone, perfect hair for growing out too: not too wavy, very thick and oily. I've grown more attached to long hair than I anticipated though, and it just started to hit me with what happened today.
I was at an interview with a state-local chain of supermarkets called Save Mart (or FoodMaxx, or Food4Less (gotta love mergers)) and everything was going fine until the interviewer brought up the concept of hair. Now, I haven't been employed in 2 years. I'm alive, but desperate, and I was even willing to lose my hair if it would just get me a nice steady job, or so I thought.
The way they phrased it was really scary. There was a second manager in the room, and they both immediately started talking about how I was going to need to cut it to the point where it wasn't touching my collar. This was the only issue that they both spoke strongly about at once, before I even had a chance to react. I was a bit puzzled at the sudden intensity and the wideness of their eyes. When someone's eyes widen they're supposed to be frightened, right?
I said I'd be happy to trim it so it didn't touch my collar when I had it safely tied back, and they said that was okay. Then they said it had to be short enough to not touch the collar without being tied back, as if they hadn't made the earlier statement. I don't like people who try to push you for more concessions after you concede--it's dangerous to concede to those people.
So I internally sighed and killed any chances I have of getting the job (I'm sure) by asking if I couldn't tie it back when that was safer to keep it out of the food. The next words that came out of their mouth made my gut sink in despair, "It's company policy." Now I'm a reasonable person, under the delusion of being a synx, so I'll be happy to sign their contract once I see this company policy I'm being contractually bound to, that makes comments on hair length apparantly. This reasonable company policy, that has reasons for everything and isn't written by rich, fat, wealthy, pigheaded executives.
I then noted that I'd seen someone with long hair working the register, and it got even worse. They said only people of my type had to cut their hair short, whereas others did not. Short hair on the basis that we don't want it to flop on the halibut display is very reasonable, but this? This was something else entirely. They were requiring me to have short hair, when someone else with the same job would not be required to have short hair. I'm not talking a well trimmed ponytail, or a tastefully curled braid bun. I'm talking no longer than one's shoulder, loose and you just can't do anything with hair that short! And the worst thing about it is for no reason at all I'm required to do it, in a statement of pure, malicious discrimination.
It gets worse too. You remember that company policy they were going to contractually bind me to? Apparantly not even employees governed by it are allowed to look at the company policy. They said it was "on our website or something" and sure enough it wasn't. I looked on the library computer in vain for any company policy. I did find a legal summary of a court case in which the upper management of Save Mart required their employees to seek redress of grievances from "team leaders" instead of the employee's union, then got caught instructing said team leaders not to redress any grievances. No policy though, not a word for the good or the bad.
Then I talked to a librarian, asking if she could find the Save Mart company policy, whom workers are bound by. So she actually called Save Mart. When she asked if she could get it, they said "Why do you want it?" and then, "Is something wrong, why do you want it?" when her answer was, "I just want to look at it." Then they played phone tag for a while, and finally the Labor Relations Board of Foodmaxx wasn't at the office so she left a message. Finally she called the actual store, and they gave her some more B.S. now saying it wasn't available to the general public.
Incidentally, if anyone could forward me a copy of the Save Mart/FoodMaxx/Food4Less company policy, I'd really appreciate it. Maybe I can clear up some of the hurt feelings and misinterpreted worries I am expressing here.
So I'm afraid that Save Mart failed my interview process. It's sad too, because that store's a local chain not a multinational, and it's nicely air conditioned, and they are looking for work. It might also be telling that the employee's lounge was not air conditioned, who Save Mart managers really care about. Anita and Tim, I think their names were? I'm curious now though, I want to see if I can get my hands on this "company policy" of theirs, to see why they're trying to keep people from seeing it, and yet binding people to it by condition of employment.
These are the people who "earned" the right to hire people by the way. They "worked hard" and "built themselves up" without hurting or crippling anyone else along the way. It was all their own "hard work" and "perserverance" you see. That's why they get to decide who to physically mutilate and who to leave alone, because if you don't agree with them, they won't give you the money you need to survive. All that money they have, if you take it from them you are wrong, because they clearly deserve it far more than you do, and they deserve to decide how you act, look and live, because they're so generous to give you a salary.
*grumbles* And people wonder why I'm Communist...
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