Thursday, September 27, 1990
You will conform, damn it
To be nobody-but-lyourself}-
in a world which is doing its
best, night and day, to make you
everybody else-means to fight
the hardest battle which any
human being can fight, and never
stop fighting.
- e. e. cummings.
Mr. cummings wrote that in a
letter to a high school newspaper
in 19SS. Since Cummings has
been dead for some 27 years and
probably wouldn’t have taken my
call anyway, I have no way of
knowing if he thinks things have
gotten any better since he wrote
that. But I bet Mr. cummings
would not be pleased with the dry
90s.
We live in a world and a time
where people jump and beg for
anything that someone else
happens to covet. Oh, god where
can I get me a Bart Simpson T
shirt? I want the one that says
Don’t Have a Cow, Man.
Nothing else will do, except
maybe that mass produced tye-dye
with the Dick Tracy! logo on the
back.
And speaking of Dick, where
is my Dick Tracy watch? I would
have bought three of them if they
Where good sense is in the minority
by Mike Royko
You play the jury and decide.
Does Mike Welbel discriminate
in his hiring practices?
Welbel owns a small
business, the Daniel Lamp Co.,
on Chicago's Southwest Side.
He buys lamp parts that are
made elsewhere, and his workers
assemble them in his plant. The
lamps are shipped to furniture
stores.
He has 26 employees. The
jobs require little skill or
education so the pay is low. But
a job is a job. Welbel says that
of his 26 workers, 21 are
Hispanic and five are black.
At this point, some of you
might say: Yes, Welbel
discriminates because he doesn't
have any non-Hispanic white
employees.
Overruled. Welbel's business
is in the heart of the Southwest
Side's Hispanic community. So
most of the people he hires are
from the neighborhood. It's
doubtful that anyone would want
to travel a considerable distance
to work in the lamp shop.
But yes, Welbel does
discriminate. You might not
think so, and I don't think so.
That doesn't matter. Federal
bureaucrats say he does. And so
he's up to his ears in trouble.
It seems that a black woman
applied for a job about 18
months ago. She wasn't hired.
Welbel says he doesn't know
why.
"I didn't interview her. Maybe
had come in neon green, mat
way they would match my neon
hub caps and windshield wipers.
And my personal favorite:
New Kids on the Block pillow
cases?
While I'm on the subject of
music (well, I guess the New
Kids are considered musicians,
kind of) what has happened to
people who wanted to say
something with a song?
I'm not expecting everyone to
sing about peace and political
discontent, but no one is even
trying anymore. Are the 90s
going to be a repeat of the 70s? 1
thought disco died with that
decade. But not even close. I don't
want to hear about the difference
between dance music and disco.
There is none. Pop radio has
gotten so bad that I would rather
listen to marches and string
quartets on WQLN, the local
public radio station.
I heard a commercial this
morning that made me really ill.
A national TV network has
teamed up with a national grease
burger establishment. They have
formed some sort of advertising
pact and have introduced a game.
the plant supervisor did. He's not
here anymore. I don't know why
she wasn't hired. Maybe we didn't
need anyone. I just don't know.”
But he does know that the
woman filed a complaint with the
Chicago office of the Equal
Employment Opportunity
Commission, the federal agency
that is supposed to guard against
discriminatory hiring practices.
She complained that she wasn't
hired because she is black.
And one spring day last year,
two investigators came to his
plant.
”1 told them, 'Here's the
records. Help yourselves. You
can see everything.' What did I
have to hide? I figured that if
everybody who works for me is
Hispanic or black, how could I be
discriminating?
"You see, when I started the
business nine years ago, I used to
deal with the State Department of
Labor or place help-wanted ads.
"Then I got to know these
Hispanic organizations - the
Spanish Coalition and Latino
Youth in Chicago -• and we could
call and say we needed a couple of
people, and they'd say 'no
problem,' and send someone in.
"So that's how I've done most
of my hiring the last few years.
When there's an opening, I call
them and they refer people and we
hire the ones who are best suited
for the work."
That's why Welbel wasn't
concerned when the federal
bureaucrats came snooping. With
an all-minority work force, why
The Collegian
Apparently to win a prize in
this game you have to first pick
up a game piece at the fast
foodery then go home and watch
the television channel until a
secret number comes up. If it
matches the number on the now
famous game piece, you win big
bucks.
YEAH
RIGHT
The commercial slogan goes
something like: what a great way
to spend your day, get a little pre
processed food, then lie back in
your easy chair and, while the
animal fat hardens in your veins,
watch a little prime time
wiggling, giggling, and gunfire
on television.
Who needs a life when you
can have burgers and breasts and a
chance at those big bucks? Mr.
cummings is, no doubt, upset
that he missed out on all the
should he worry? "I didn't get a
lawyer."
Now he knows why he should
have worried. "Dealing with
those government people is
frightening. They do all the
talking. They tell how its going
MIKE ROYKO
to be. You just sit and listen. I've
never even met the woman who
filed the complaint"
The bureaucrats have told him
how it is going to be.
First, they say he must pay
the woman $340.01 in wages she
lost by not being hired.
Welbel says: "Fine. I'll be
glad to pay her that just to get rid
of the headache."
But that's just for starters.
Sort of a small ante in the pot
The bureaucrats have also
demanded that Welbel pay
$123,991 in back pay.
Back pay to whom? Good
question. The money is to be
glamor, excitement, and fabulous
prizes.
Yeah, its starting to look like
a conspiracy. People not only
love to watch commercials, they
also love to play commercial
games and sing commercial
jingles. They are also quite fond
of wearing their favorite
commercial character.
So what is the big deal? Who
cares if Joe Sixpack and his
Coca-Cola kids drool over
anything they've heard about on
TV? Who cares if there are no
new ideas? Who cares if America
has given away its soul to
advertising agencies? Why should
anyone care about anything that
isn't mass produced and quality
controlled until it is
indistinguishable from anything
else?
There is no big deal. In fact it
is good. People should be spared
the temptation of any idea that
docs not clear the approval of an
ad manager. It is enough for
people to be pop literate.
YEAH RIGHT.
divvied up by six other blacks
who weren't hired and whose
names were found in Welbel's
files. And by any other blacks
who might have applied in 1988
and 1989.
And who are these others?
Welbel doesn't know. Nor do the
bureaucrats.
So the feds want Welbel to
spend about $lO,OOO on
newspaper advertising to find
black people who say they
applied and weren't hired. Then
they can come in and get their
share of the $123,991.
"They told me that I should
have had 8.45 black employees in
1988 and 1989. They said that
within a three-mile radius of my
plant, companies that have 100
workers or more average 31.3
percent black. So I should have a
31.3 percent black work force.
And that's how they came up
with what I owe people who
didn’t work for me."
"And they want me to spend
$lO,OOO on advertising to find
people who didn't work for me so
I can pay them $123,991 for not
working for me."
Is Welbel going to do it?
"I can't. I don't have the
money. To tell the truth, the
whole company isn't worth that
much. That's why I came in this
neighborhood. I got the building
cheap. Nobody wanted it. I have a
non-skilled work labor pool
nearby.
"No, I can’t pay that money.
I'll have to close down, go out of
business.
Page
Oh, by the way, I hope no
one confuses this column with
On the Right Track just because
they both run in The Collegian
and contain the word Right.
Although I'm sure Christine
Spanos, the author of Track, is a
fine person, we tend to agree on
very little. In fact, a Behrend
professor once commented that
Spanos and I have nothing in
common beyond species
identification.
In case you ever have a
question about who is who, just
remember, I'm the one that
doesn't have naturally curly hair.
- R. M. Prindle
R. M. Prindle is a ninth
semester General Arts and
Sciences major whose
columns have run in The
Collegian for three years. His
column appears every other
week in The Collegian.
"This is incredible. I’m a
small operation. I've got 26
minority people working for me.
And here's this federal agency on
my back with some mathematical
formula that I never heard of
before."
I called the EEOC for their
side of it, but they wouldn't
discuss the case. I can understand
that. If I did something that
loony, I wouldn't want to talk
about it either.
So if the EEOC doesn't back
off, Welbel might have to go out
of business. And that will
eliminate 26 jobs held by
minorities. They won't have
incomes, they won't pay taxes,
and maybe some of them will
have to go on welfare, which
means someone else's taxes will
be used to support them.
I wonder: Among all the other
things the Japanese have acquired,
do you think they might have
bought the EEOC?
Ed. note: The National
Press Club recently voted
Mike Royko the 1990
recipient of their prestigious
Fourth Estate Award for a
lifetime of achievement and
devotion to journalism.
Royko is a Chicago
based syndicated columnist
who has won the Pulitzer
Prize. His column has been
appearing in The Collegian
since last spring.