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Comment by mjrbrennan | Hacker News Reader

I guess inkjet printers are good for something after all!

Was there any reason...why he did that?

Continued: (Was on-site earlier and didn't have time to type the rest as, crazy enough, this was just the beginning of what turned into years of encounters)

Before I could react to the printer landing at feet (I was frozen) he yelled almost exactly "Don't you ever fucking walk into my office like that again, G T F O" so I slowly stepped out and shut the door. As I said, it (door) was cracked open, and the entire front of the office was a large single pane of uncovered clear glass, so it's not like he was on the phone or I walked in on something.

For certain half the floor heard it, but not a sign of life in the hallway of about 12 other offices. I immediately walked straight to manager/CFO's area and rather calmly (in shock) explained what happened. It was short and sweet as was the experience. He apologized and said to please not worry about it or take it personally, that the person was simply/unfortunately "like that" and best to leave him alone and forget it ever happened, and that he would talk to the CEO about it to have him put in a word. I'm professional, I had worked Hollywood for long enough to know of his type (first time experiencing anything like that though) so I remained calm and treated this like a test and said "no problem, never happened."

The story made its way around the office and people simultaneously joked about it while saying they were sorry about the experience too, and echoed my manager's advice to leave him alone. Fast forward about a year and one day he was gone. No one talked about it. I'm guessing the company finally got enough on him to terminate without worry of blowback. He was a partner and probably had a decent contract in place.

Now, something like 5 years after that (I had moved on to greener pastures) I was out front of a community volunteer bike shop chatting with the team. They were sticking around after-hours to let a metal salvage person take away some old/rusted inventory. A beat up old van with metal junk piled on the roof parks nearby and who walks out and over to us?? It's the guy, I recognize him instantly and as his eyes meet mine I say with a big smile "firstname-Fuckin-lastname, how the hell are ya!" and this time he is frozen, turns right on a dime, and starts power walking back to the van. I follow saying something like hey hey, come back, no hard feelings, but he must be so embarrassed he runs the rest of the way and jumps in the van and peels off. I heard he never came back to that shop again. He went from partner at a well funded firm to east LA metal salvage work. It was such an amazing feeling. I do feel for him though. As someone pointed out in comments he very likely had a mental or drug related issue. What a wild world.

Signing off.

Cool story, but why end it gloating over someone else's misery?

That’s not gloating.

> He went from partner at a well funded firm to east LA metal salvage work. It was such an amazing feeling.

I read it as such. Any specific reason that you disagree?

It probably fits an exact definition of gloating “X experienced Y, and I felt amazed.” But it’s a pretty minimal statement. Gloating, real gloating, requires a bit more verbiage. OP just related what would have otherwise gone known by the reader but unsaid. No one should be held to pure stoicism - especially not when a printer is thrown at them.

OP even later expresses compassion for the person. That’s far from gloating. And before someone intones that that is itself gloating - again, you still need more.

Indeed, if you hurl printers at people, there is something so wrong with you mentally, the only fair response is compassion and pity in my view.

Really? You think the rational and common reaction is to express compassion and pity for the person throwing the printer?

I wouldn’t throw printers at people. For one thing, they might throw it back. For two, I don’t violently attack people…

The rational and common reaction is to duck.

depends on the angle the object is coming at you. with a heavy object that's being hurled at your feet the chance that it flies high enough to pass over your head and back if you duck is low.

Don’t you understand how terrible things must be for you in your head to get to a point where you can’t resist throwing printers at people?

Normal people don't throw printers at other people, because they're aware it's against social convention and liable to get them fired (or worse).

And because it might hurt somebody. Actually, that's the main reason people don't do it.

There are plenty of assholes who do shitty things because they're just entitled. There's no need to pathologize shitty people.

That's such a convenient and easy answer.

Shitty behavior is just evidence of shitty behavior. "Throwing things at coworkers" isn't a symptom of any mental illness, and without evidence of actual mental illness, pathologizing such behavior is conjecture at best.

That's such a convenient and easy answer.

It's the feeling of vindication that perhaps there is some justice in the world.

It's hard not to gloat over the misery of someone who, guaranteed, caused at least as much misery to multiple other people.

Why don't we mandate Huxley's Soma for everyone so all anger is suppressed at all times? Really, this obsessive hunting for displays of anger and ruining people's lives over it and the Schadenfreude makes me wonder who the actual psychopaths are.

The psychopath is the one who threw the printer. Someone who can't refrain from violent unprovoked outbursts is unstable. People shouldn't have to put up with threats and such because that's "just they way they are".

People definitely shouldn’t put up with threats. Period.

But psychopaths turn their emotions on and off. They would have a violent, unprovoked reaction if it fit some goal of theirs. Thats the opposite of someone who can’t contain a violent outburst. Just to go on a tangent.

> obsessive hunting for displays of anger and ruining people's lives over it

The man ruined his own life by being an absolute maniac. He has nobody to blame but himself, and to make it out to be a witch hunt is at minimum obtuse and at worst acting as an apologist for dangerous behavior. If throwing a printer at someone who's pleasantly introducing themself seems reasonable to you, please, I beg of you, never work anywhere. It's for everyone else's safety.

No one said that throwing printers at someone is reasonable.

However, I've seen many witch hunts that engage in libel, so the story might have been dramatized. How about:

Office worker X carried a printer when Y entered the office without knocking. X turned around, startled, and dropped the printer near Y's feet in surprise. X curses "Don't you ever effing sneak up on me like that".

I absolutely know psychopaths who'd turn that into a defamatory story, which is easy nowadays since everyone is searching for aggressions of all sorts.

> Why don't we mandate Huxley's Soma for everyone so all anger is suppressed at all times?

We tried that with oxycontin and alprazolam, didn't work out so well in the end.

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