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83gigsof90semocore-blog · 5 years

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Bonus post: Everybody Hurts - Review

So the letter D is going along nicely, but before that I'm going to do something quite different, namely a book review.

My hope is that my pseudo-academic academic style will be complemented nicely by exploring what other people have written on the genre. I hope to do more of these eventually, but probably not at a too steady rate because I can be rather lazy when it comes to reading.

Everybody hurts is a book published in 2007 that was written by Leslie Simon, who at the time worked as an editor for Alternative Press and Trevor Kelly who worked as a staff writer, also for Alternative Press. The book is actually quite different from my blog in many respects. Aside from the obvious ones, it isn't specifically focused on 90's emo but instead on what in 2007 was considered contemporary emo. Also unlike my blog it's focused on emo culture (the cover says "an essential guide to emo culture") as opposed to just music.

Some background: The 4th wave, Real Emo and the death of Scene culture

Part of what makes this book interesting to me is that it's very much a product of its time. The story that it tells about the music and community surrounding it is incredibly different than what would have been told in the 90's and even more so today.

So, first some basics: Emo is a very broad term that at many points have meant different things. One popular way to categorize it is by splitting it into 4 (or 5) waves. We have the first wave which refers to the offshoot of hardcore-punk that is the origin of the genre. The second wave is much more influenced by indie, alt-rock and pop. It's much less overtly punky, depending on where you draw the line between first and second wave. The third wave (which corresponds to the time period when this book was written) consists to a large degree of pop-punk and poppy post-hardcore. This is the period of time in which emo music was the most commercially successful and emo culture was properly cemented in the public conciousness. Finally, we have the fourth wave also known as the "emo revival". Now, this is where things get interesting.

As the name implies, emo revival was a movement concerned with bringing back emo to an earlier stage, namely the second wave. As such, many people associated with the revival where to some degree self-concious about the way "their" genre was misinterpreted as being about something else, namely third wave emo. Emo culture at the time was often mocked and the more commercial emo music wasn't looked upon favourably in underground circles. Fourth wave wasn't just a re-embrace of the values of the second wave but a rejection of the third wave.

I should also mention that this isn't nearly as true as it used to be now that enough time has passed for people to be nostalgic sooner than derisive, although it's an assumption that is very much woven into contemporary emo culture.

The history of emo as told from a fourth wave perspective would generally look on the third wave as an embarrassing parenthesis that we'd be better of forgetting. Some people have even gone as far as referring to the bulk of the third wave as "fake emo", being emo in name only while failing to embrace the core values of the genre sufficiently to be considered part of it.

So, this is where this book comes in. Being written in 2007, instead of viewing third wave emo as a heretical misstep, it's treated as the logical conclusion of the genre.

Emo as an identity

Another contrast with modern-day emo culture is it's treatment of emo as almost more of an identity than a music genre. This is also very typical of the time period. I'm born in the mid 90's, and my first exposure to the word emo (as I remember it) was when I was perhaps 10 or so and a friend told me about "a group of mentally ill people who dress in black and self harm". Not even a mention of the music! From then on my pre-pubescent self was mostly exposed to Emo as an identity. Sure, they had a special type of music that they listened to, but it wasn't any more integral to their emo-ness than their fashion for example.

Fast forward to today and I would never unironically call myself or anyone else "an emo", and I don't think almost anyone else would either. The understanding of emo that you find by modern fans is of something that might have cultural connotations, but is ultimately a style of music at heart.

While the authors where a lot more familiar with what emo in general than my 10 year old self and also saw music as a more central part of it, it is very informed by the view of Emo as a broader identity and only a small part of the book is actually about music.

My impression

The book starts of with a foreword by Andy Greenwald, author of Nothing feels good: Punk Rock, Teenagers, And Emo, a book that I'm hoping to eventually cover on this blog.

Then we get to the first chapter, titled ideology. For a second I (foolishly) thought that it would be a Žižek-style examination of pop-culture or something, and got very exited. Reading a few words below, we get a faux dictionary definition of the word:

ide•ol•o•gy n a body of ideas and social needs that separates you from your parents, the pep squad, and Dave Matthews Band fans.

Žižek was never this snarky.

After appropriately adjusting my expectations, snark is a constant background noise in the book. It's sometimes funny, sometimes making fun of a target that deserves it, sometimes an excuse to not treat a subject seriously and sometimes something that has aged quite poorly (ableist slurs stand out like a sore thumb, something it generally didn't in 2007).

The book is divided in 9 chapters, discussing everything from emo ideology, emo fashion, emo literature to emo eating habits and oh right, actual emo music. I generally found that the book was quite well researched (although it is an entertainment book, so it's not exactly done with any academic rigor) and that the authors where happy on going in to detail on most of the subjects they brought up. The facts and anecdotes that make up every chapter are accompanied by either helpful advice ("Don't put on a band shirt right after buying it from the merch table, you'll look like an emo novice") or snarky commentary ("Let's say that a guy and his crush watched One Tree Hill a week earlier with a group of seven of their friends. Never mind that there where nine people in the room. In emo terms, this was a date.")

One section of the book is about emo blogs. Just for fun, let's see how my emo blog measures up:

[From the section "how to emo-fy your blog" [...] you're going to want to look over your text and ask yourself a series of questions before hitting the "submit" button and releasing your deepest, most intimate thoughts into the world. Those questions are as follows:

Does this read well?

Am I making my points in a clear and efficient way?

Did I use actual paragraphs?

Did I capitalize all the words that need capitalisation?

Is this what my life is actually like?

Ok, 5. doesn't really apply but for the others it seems like I'm doing fine. So far, so good.

If you answered "yes" to any of these questions, you should probably scrap your post and start over. Ideally, a good emo blog post should be over dramatic and a bit abstruse. You know the magnets you see on fridges that people sometimes assemble into bizarre phrases? That's what emo posts are supposed to look like

Well, fuck.

Chapter 6: Music - a review

While it can be anywhere from amusing to interesting to read about everything from proper show etiquette to Emo porn sites (yes, seriously), this being a music blog first and foremost I'm gonna give some extra attention to their taste in music.

They have a section titled "Essential Emo Records 101". So what does it consist of and what do I think of it?

Rites of Spring, S/T

Embrace, S/T

Sunny Day Real Estate, Diary

Jawbreaker, Dear You

Lifetime, Hello Bastards

Texas is the Reason, Do You Know Who You Are?

Weezer, Pinkerton

The Promise Ring, Nothing Feels Good

The Get Up Kids, Something To Write Home About

Jimmy Eat World, Clarity

So far, so good. Lifetime is almost never talked about these days, but Hello Bastards is still a solid record. Mineral, American Football and Cap'n Jazz are all absent, although American Football and Cap'n Jazz weren't very popular until a long time after they split, so it's not that strange I suppose. They would be impossible to not include had the list been written today though. All the bands are accompanied by some text. For the first two albums they snarkily remark that they're not so much good as important historically. I believe that this comes from viewing the history of as stepping stones to what it was when this book was written and not with an attempt to see emo as it was at the time which I think is disappointing although not very surprising.

Saves the Day, Through Being Cool

Glassjaw, Everything You Ever Wanted

At the Drive-in, Relationship of Command

Bright Eyes, Fever and Mirrors

Thursday, Full Collapse

Dashboard Confessional, The Places You Have Come To Fear the Most

Taking Back Sunday, Tell All Your Friends

The Used, S/T

The All-American Rejects, S/T

Brand New, Deja Entendu

Coheed and Cambria, In Keeping Secrets of Silent Earth: 3

Yellowcard, Ocean Avenue

Hawthorne Heights, The Silence in Black and White

My Chemical Romance, Three Cheers for Sweet Revenge

Fall Out Boy, From Under the Cork Tree

Panic! At the Disco, A Fever You Can't Sweat Out

There are a couple of albums that I personally don't really think qualify as emo even from a third wave point of view (although, maybe I'm just too poisoned by 4th wave elitism) namely Fevers and Mirrors, In Keeping Secrets of Silent Earth: 3 and A Fever You Can't Sweat Out. I do still think that at least the first two at least are quite good so it's more of a matter of being overly loose with the genre. Although, maybe it's worth interpreting this list as more "music that emo people like" rather than "emo music" in line with the rest of the book. I did honestly think that it would be a bit worse in terms of including "non-emo" music so I'm honestly positively surprised. The authors do in my opinion manage to escape with a good amount of emo cred.

One thing that I'm disappointed in is the complete absence of screamo music, although this is once again more disappointing than surprising really.

Final verdict

One helpful question to ask when reviewing any piece of media is "who is this for?". My impression is that it's mostly for people who are already immersed in Emo culture who are interested in laughing at themselves. It is a very silly subculture in many ways (particularly in 2007) and the authors poke fun of this many times. If you can take it in stride, this book might be a pleasant read. You might also learn some things that you have missed.

For people such as me who are trying to puzzle together what emo culture actually was like at the time I find that the snark gets in the way of actually learning things, and I wish that they had taken a slightly more serious approach. The book could also have done with a lot more interviews.

Ultimately I think this leaves the book with a quite narrow audience in the present day, but that's fine maybe. At the time it came out it was actually commenting on something culturally relevant and might have served as a decent primer to the subculture.

Today however, I think that I can only really recommend it to the unhealthily obsessed (like me) and the nostalgic.

#emo

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someonetotaketheedgeoff-blog · 6 years

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15.09.2018 - Journal

(Some of this was written when I travelled with my family in America in the last 2 months)

4.07.2018

I picked a good time to quit comedy… just moments before Nanette. Maybe I’ll actually do something good if I make music instead of making jokes about fucking myself with an ex-girlfriend’s dildo.

I wont stay up late waiting to go on. Or be brutalised by Open Mic magazine on Facebook. Anything not to upset my fragile sense of self-esteem. There’s not much that's funny to me anymore… oh well… who gives a fuck anyway…

… So Liam goes into his little room and quietly dreams up his last open mic set…. hahaha… comedy can get you pretty fucked up! ... who gives a fuck anyway…

9.07.2018

Whenever I’m in a big city all I hear is it whispering (or perhaps screaming) to me - ‘can I just have some fucking money?!’

I wonder how much I’m a product of my own fear. And also how much of what I make is a response to that fear.

It’s mostly been about death for me for the last 3 - 5 years. All I’ve done is use death to explain everything. I’ve used it to draw a line under certain things within myself and the exterior world. Seems lazy to me now.

Is laziness the fear of pain? Is a lack of motivation due to fear? A fear of failing?

It seems fear’s only a good motivator when you’re aware of what you’re afraid of and why.

23.07.2018

Travelling in America/being in America’s like being in GTA but you’re not any of the main characters.

24.07.2018

Not doing anything or not trying IS FAILING!

25.07.2018

Saw a guy stop in the subway, put his bag on the ground and re-adjust himself to get out a camera so he could take a photo of some graffiti on the wall that said ‘I love porno’.

Being in an all black neighbourhood I feel as if the black people are annoyed at me or my presence.

I keep think about the word ‘nigger’ and I keep thinking about the word ‘cracker’.

The current most popular, agreed upon philosophy on slur usage is do not say any word that has negative history associated with it and do not say ‘nigger’ if you’re not black.

Recently ‘retarded’ has been considered more offensive than it used to be and if you happen to use it you’re now accused of being an immoral person and presumably you think people that suffer mental deficiencies are bags of shit and you want to set them all on fire.

I have no problem with discussing words and I’m not even so much of a Doug Stanhope/iDubbbzTV nerd that I think the best world is a world where you say everything all the time in every context.

What I have a massive problem with is the presumption of hate and the pompousness of people downright attacking people that slip out ‘x’ word when a word is still in the process of being fazed out. It’s bloody political correctness gone quickly without open discussion and kindness!

Words are simply the end point of a vortex of shit and ideas and slang and culture. They are the bookend to a concept and when people get really caught up with words it kinda scares me.

The problem with these kinda bullshit discussions (especially on the internet) is that when you argue or discuss this shit the assumed reason for your questioning is that I want to be able to say ‘nigga’ with my friends for some unknown reason. But I don’t and I don’t understand why anyone would want to other than the fact that they’ve been told they can’t or they’re at a Klan meeting.

What I’m confused about is if words hold so much apparent power and evil due to their history then isn’t simply being white the most offensive and on the nose thing you can do? Probably, kinda, yeah.

Yet black people don’t fucking loose their shit when you walk into a room being all white and whiting the whole place up by being white. They simply get on with their lives. I believe the same shit could be applied to words. At least in a reactionary sense… it doesn’t make sense to berate a stranger with venom for saying that the fact that none of the self serve screens in Macca’s were working was retarded. I don’t know if this metaphor works. I’m just slightly confused as too why I get all my information on how to best treat minorities forced onto me from young well off white people in beer gardens. I just sit there and listen for a bit and then I stare into the reflective glare coming off their nose ring.

1.08.2018

Saw a full American fat guy in a servo. He was so fat I had to focus on not double-taking at him by staring intently at the fridge at the Dr. Pepper selection.

He looked beyond human.

13.08.2018

For some reason I am smoking again. It’s a never ending battle. Oh well. Strangely I don’t mind.

I smoked a cigarette I crafted from all the butts I could find in my parent’s house. Something I’ve done probably over 100 times in my life.

I find that I clench my jaw all the time. I’ve only noticed it recently. Through meditating and not doing drugs. I’ve noticed it. I thought I had neck cancer but the strange feeling of ache comes from my constantly clenching my jaw.

I worry that maybe I’ve done drugs and drank for so long now and started at a young age that the tracks within my brain are a little fucked. Or maybe I just have too high hopes for a sober life to be a more peaceful, and mentally stable one. Maybe the only thing I’ll gain is a healthier body.

I’m just afraid of all the horrible shit that’s inside my head. I’m afraid of being unlovable because of my desires and my personality. I don’t want to face in fear of losing Tash and revealing to her that I’m evil.

This seems to be the crux of all relationships. All of them. In the whole world. You know that you need to face the truth to get to the next stage. But it seems it will be so lonely, so terrifying and so cold… we don’t want to see the monsters that might lurk within us.

The thing is it’s almost impossible to have an honest relationship and never have turbulence. You can have a dishonest relationship with turbulence but the turbulence will be about bullshit like - ‘you said you were going to clean the extractor fan in the kitchen weeks ago…’ or ‘stop leaving your guitar on the couch…’ and such things might blow into massive arguments.

Relationships are designed to be a nightmare. Not by anyone in particular but by our hope for them and isolation and alienation we all experience internally in this society.

A relationship is a small life within your life.

Dependant on the extremity of a relationship (and obviously that is a relative thing but for sake of argument we’ll say a relationship where you truly considered that you would commit yourself to this other person until you or they or both had died) it could possibly be an interesting simulation of life after death (at least in an abstracted way).

When a relationship of said extremity begins to fall apart (for whatever reason) it’s interesting to note that you feel as if you’re dying and that there’s in fact no perceivable life to lead after the break up or if their is one it will be hellish and a subhuman existence not worth living.

When you survived a relationship that you’d committed everything to how did you feel?

I assume it was horrendous. But assuming you’re still alive and reading this… you must’ve started to feel somewhat normal once again.

Like awaking from a vivid dream it fades away rapidly. You played a different character, you lead a different life. You feel a horribleness deep inside. Not about the person but about the situation. Is this how it has to be? That the people you commit so intensely to, that you fuck and spend countless hours with then have to perish abstractly and then repressed as they fade into the background sometimes never to be spoken about or spoken to again…

I have a girlfriend now. And it terrifies my to think that the pattern may repeat.

***

We believe the internet is everlasting. Whether we research it or not, whether we know it consciously or not.

As much as we might make comments about Facebook and say things like- ‘be careful uploading those photos of your arsehole… you know that stuff will be up there forever’ I believe we’re secretly subconsciously screeching with joy at the fact that these photo’s will be up forever. As much as people have a disdain about Facebook and social media we adore it’s implied permanence. We believe that Facebook will be around after we’re dead. I say ‘believe’ because do you know how the fucking internet works? Do you know how a website is created? I fucking don’t. I don’t know if the internet would still exist if all the power plugs in the world were pulled out of there sockets. I’m a fucking idiot! A fucking idiot that has faith in the permanence of the internet… I mean… obviously… I write a blog mostly about death and existential dread and it put on… the internet.

The internet is now our saviour. It is the modern sleek titanium, bomb proof, indestructible, deathless park bench where you can scratch ‘L.D. was here’ and have a more solidified faith that it’ll be around for a while. And the longer it hangs around the more eye balls will see it, eye balls connected to a concious brain that’ll have no choice but to think ‘hey that guy was there’… and even if it’s just for one second your existence has been stretched just a tiny bit longer.

(People that love us are what we all orbit around all of our lives. If they happen to reject you at some point or disappear we then break away from that orbit and hurtle through abstract nothingness).

17.08.2018

Going to the pub was a bad idea. I went there thinking - ‘well… I kinda want to have just one drink’. The legs were aching and my poor sense of personal entitlement to some kind of ‘treat’ was raging within me. A very problematic thing for anyone that isn’t fulfilled in the work that that do (i.e. most people). I felt as I for some reason I deserved a beer. Also it was freezing cold. My feet were soaking wet and frozen due to my old decrepit shoes. I continued walking up the street. I noticed I had all these thoughts swirling in my mind. They all flew past me whispering - ‘it’s OK to have a beer’.

I watched them all swirl around in my head. I crossed my metaphorical arms and tutted. As I tutted I looked at the swirling thoughts and said - ‘fuck off… are you serious? You know this’s absolute bullshit. We don’t ‘deserve’ a drink… we don’t even probably technically want one… why are we actually going to do this?’

‘Yeah but we’ll only have one! Not even a pint mind you and then we’ll write a new to-do list and then maybe we see someone maybe we don’t and then we head off home and get down to work for a couple of solid hours before we go to bed’ said one of the thoughts.

‘Well OK… when you put it like that… that sounds nearly OK… but don’t you think there’s a chance that we might throw all that shit out the window and because we actually weren’t planning or trying to get drunk…. you’re going to use reverse psychology on me and then we actually will get drunk and most likely indulge in more heavily than if I’d actually planned to indulge…’ I replied.

‘Look don’t read into it just get into that pub… get a beer… have a cigarette in the beer garden, get out you’re little notebook and it’ll be just a quick little pop in, no worries, blah blah, etc, tomato tomato’ ’

‘Well alright then you’ve swung me round, but surely just like a small drink, like a ten ounce… you know we’re trying to focus on money and we’re only starting to face the fact of how much money we piss away on alcohol and other similar shit…’

‘Yea, yea, yea don’t worry just a ten ounce… don’t you worry about that’.

I walked up to the bar.

‘Yes what can I get you?’

‘Ah… could get a ten ounce of Little Creatures?’

‘Ah it’s actually $5 a pint right now and $10 dollars for a jug?’ she grinned slightly.

‘Ah…’.

I turned to the floating thoughts. I gave them a warning look. They all looked back at me like a pack of hyenas.

I began drowning internally - ‘Ah fuck! Na, na, na, I knew some bullshit like this was going to happen… action stations… we gotta think of some other shit… what else do they have on tap… maybe a stubby? Fuck!’

‘Hey this is great news! What a bargain! Don’t worry about it we’ll just drink that one pint and leave… no worries’ cackled the hyenas.

I ended up drinking maybe 5 pints. A bunch of my friends turned up and I talked a bunch of shit for a long, long time. It was as if ‘the plan’ had been completely erased from my mind like the bar lady had men in blacked me with the shine of her bar blade and I was back in the drinking business and also the business of not following my dreams and the business of having no self control.

The arguments in the pub got very heated. I have a few friends that can get heated during argument, (I mean who doesn’t) but I have to say it stresses me out a bit but even more so it confuses me. Every time an argument gets to that stage I don’t really trust anything that’s happening anymore. Your/my emotions are taking over and also everyone’s pissed. I think it’s interesting to me to watch people’s attention spans disintegrate at the pub. The more everyone drinks the quicker a group conversation subject topic can change hands. It’s not hard to do, barely anyone notices it and you can do it in a matter of seconds. You could be having a super intense discussion about anything and if you just interrupt everyone enough and interject a barrage of some current novelty bullshit topic that’s circling you can derail shit very quickly.

21.08.2018

Last week at the pub a friend told me that he basically waits for inspiration. He felt he should never force himself to create anything. Recently I’ve been getting back into the Stephen Pressfield way of thinking that he explains in the book The War Of Art. A book that basically shows you how to be a professional whatever, artist, musician, sports player, whatever. It’s a book that gives tools to fight the part of you that doesn't want to sit down and do the work. In other words it fights the notion of ‘waiting for inspiration’.

Very, very few times in my life have I been struck with overwhelming flaming inspiration to do anything. It happened more when I was a child. When I’d wake up early on a weekend I’d have the inspiration akin to fucking Michelangelo to go and make Lego spaceship car things out of all the see- through green pieces of Lego.

But when you get to around 7, 8, 9, 10 and beyond I think (I’m not a psychologist) you begin to second guess all that shit. You begin to be your own worst critic. Because fascinatingly nearly every kid up until that age will be happy to do a bit of drawing or play various characters in a fictional story they create on the spot. And then it all stops and this horrible awareness kicks in.

I define it as the point where you used to play with toys as a kid in your room. Each character having a crazy back story and way of speaking. You’d play, alone and be completely immersed. Your mum or dad would pop there head into the room to ask if you wanted cornflakes or some shit and you’d be like a focused director waving off an intern - ‘yea yea, sure, just have it on my desk, I’m working right now’. But then something changes around that age and when one of your parents pops their head into the room you freeze and quite your voice. You suddenly feel cripplingly self aware, maybe even stupid. You tell them to go away maybe or wait for them to leave before you get back into to the action.

Then one day you go to the studio (aka your bedroom with a mat on the floor resembling a city that we all had) and the juice is gone, the mojo is gone, you pick up the toys and you try to croak out their particular voice and you just feel stupid, looking quickly back at your bedroom door, making sure no one heard.

All of this stuff reminds me of a Picasso quote [R.I.P. 25.10.1881 - 19.06.2018*] - ‘Every child is an artist. The problem is how to remain an artist once we grow up’.

I’ve always found it interesting. I think encapsulates what I’m saying. Most people have some kind of creativity or at least blissful ignorance of expression at an age and then their brains get bigger or something and they become pimply teenagers that struggle to even walk down the street without worrying about everything detail about themselves and then they learn to just manage that shit as they enter adult life.

*I’ve chose Picasso’s death date to be the release date of Nanette. I can’t really be bothered explaining why that is right now so I guess if you really want to know you’ll have to watch Nanette.

30.08.2018

I’m often confused as to why everyone has an opinion and why you seemingly have to have an opinion.

’I am the wisest man alive, for I know one thing, and that is that I know nothing’ - Socrates

In my college years I used to be a bit of an air headed stoner art wanker and I still am but the difference is now I have opinions on things. Back then I didn’t really have opinions. And I did it on purpose because I knew that I didn’t know anything. However it didn’t really help me socially and it didn’t help in my relationships and it didn’t really help with my self-esteem. Not initially but eventually I started to feel like I was just drifting away into an abstract world of nothingness. People don’t really take you seriously when you don’t have any solid opinions. It’s probably not a ‘masculine’ trait.

Reminds of a Dylan Moran bit:

‘Men; strong opinions with no information’

#Relationships #Facebook #America #Retarded #Dylan Moran #Someone To Take The Edge Off #liam donnelly #American Fat #self esteem #nhilism #death #Journal #The Pub

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mrsteveecook · 5 years

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should I push my job-searching friend harder, fired coworker was looking at colleague’s burlesque photos, and more

It’s five answers to five questions. Here we go…

1. Should I push my job-searching friend to tell me what’s holding her back?

A good friend of mine was let go from her job (one in her field that she’s had since we graduated college, also located in our college town) in March. At the time, I asked for details, but she didn’t offer much and I didn’t feel the need to probe. She said that it wasn’t ideal, but wasn’t upset at the timing, since her and her husband were relocating to a different, much larger city (the one that I currently reside in).

She and her husband have since moved down … and she still has not been able to find a job in her field. To ensure she had at least some income, she took a part-time retail job and has been doing that ever since.

I’ve tried quite a few times to assist her in her job search by reviewing her resume, sending her relevant job postings and advice from your website, etc., but she still hasn’t been able to find a position in her field. This doesn’t really make sense. She had great experience at her last job and was there for ~4 years, and her field is a growing market with many positions available. I’m starting to suspect that there’s something else that’s holding her back, and her husband has somewhat pushed me to help her more (I have a background/experience in job development). But when I try to ask, she gets slightly defensive and the conversation shuts down pretty quickly — which is unfortunate, since I can see the toll not getting a job in her field is having on her.

Do you have any suggestions for how I can help her? Do I just need to push past her defensiveness to really get to the bottom of what might be going on (not applying to enough jobs, issues with how she left her last job, etc.)?

Do not push her! You’ve reached out and tried to help, but she’s shut down the conversation, which is her prerogative. Trying to push past her defensiveness would be disrespecting the boundaries she’s putting up. She may just not want to talk about it, and that’s okay. Her husband is the only one with standing to insist that she talk about what’s going on (since it presumably affects him fairly directly), but he can’t outsource that standing to you and pressure you to pressure her.

Respect her boundaries, and trust that you’ve made it clear you’re available if she wants help. Meanwhile, focus on being her friend, not her job coach.

2. A recently-fired employee was regularly looking at another employee’s burlesque pics online

We terminated an office employee this week who was always just kind of creepy and walked the line of inappropriateness with his jokes. He was fired for something else, not because of any complaints.

Today I went through his computer because a) we need a lot of files from it b) he didn’t password protect it c) we need to know what websites he has work accounts for, etc. But oh man, he didn’t log out of or delete his browser history. As I was looking through his Chrome history to see what websites he frequented for work, I discovered that he found a coworker’s – who does burlesque – web page which has ALL KINDS OF nudey pics in it. He was regularly looking at these photos of her. This is not necessarily on his work computer, but likely his personal phone because Chrome syncs browser info. So it’s not necessarily about company property. (I also saw numerous porn sites and google searches for steroids, and I was only looking up til Dec 1.)

But the thing is … I should tell no one, right? Because he’s already fired? And because maybe the burlesque coworker gave him the link? I definitely don’t tell any bosses, and I maybe don’t need to say anything to her? I don’t want her to be in trouble. If I say something to her, it can still be considered sexual harassment, even if I’m just warning her? But no need to tell her because what she doesn’t know won’t hurt her? And she has it out in public because she wants to?

We don’t have permanent, on-site HR here, but our “home office” has acting HR people that we don’t communicate with much. I just … tell no one, right? Or document it somehow?

Tell your coworker. Maybe she gave him the link, and maybes he didn’t and would want to know and have the option to lock it down. It’s not sexual harassment to alert her to this (presumably you’re not going to be leering and making provocative comments about her photos and so forth!). You can simply say, “I wanted to let you know that when I was clearing out Bob’s computer, I found he was regularly looking at your burlesque page. You might be totally fine with this, but in case you weren’t aware of it and wouldn’t want coworkers accessing it, I wanted to give you a heads-up.”

I’m not suggesting that you seek advice from HR on this because I don’t want your coworker to deal with any hassle from them, and it could end up playing out that way. So just a simple heads-up to her, and then move on.

3. My boss is trying to manage my diabetes for me

I started a new job in January this year. I love it — the boss is kind (I came from kind of a stressful situation before this), the coworkers are awesome, and I’ve had a great year.

One small fly in the ointment though. I have Type 1 Diabetes. I’ve had it so long I was actually diagnosed with Juvenile Diabetes before the name change. My diabetes is well-managed and well-controlled and has never caused any issues in the workplace, other than occasionally having to have a snack at odd times, which has never been an issue. It isn’t an issue here, either. The thing is, my boss is a micromanager, and he’s trying to manage me and my illness as well. We had a three-day trip in October, and he nearly drove me insane questioning if I was eating as I should, should I be doing anything, did I need to test, etc., etc. It’s coming from a good place, I know that, but Oh. My. God.

How do I say “Dude, I was diagnosed in 1968. I’ve got this” and make him understand that, unless I’m laid out on the floor (which hasn’t happened in years), I really have got this?

The next time he brings it up, be very direct: “Bob, I know you’re coming from a place of concern, but I have this under control and I consider it a private health condition. It’s not something I want to discuss at work. Thanks for understanding.”

Then if he brings it after that: “That’s not something I want to talk about at work! But about (work-related topic)…”

4. Can I ask for a re-do after a Skype interview had technical difficulties?

I applied for a position I am well qualified for that is out of state. I was selected for a first round interview via Skype. There were several interviewers in a conference room and it started out okay but kept getting interrupted because of technical issues. Their video feed froze for a while but they could still hear me. Then I think the audio went out because I asked if they could hear me and no one said yes. Then my feed froze and then my audio went out again. All these issues interrupted the flow of the interview and my own ability to give carefully thought out answers. In my thank-you email to the hiring manager, should I ask for another chance? Maybe offer to fly there on my own dime for an in-person interview?

That sucks, and I can understand why it feels like it put you at a disadvantage! In your thank-you email, though, I wouldn’t ask for another chance, per se, but instead frame it as offering to talk again if they feel it would be helpful. The thing is, they may have heard enough to know that they’re moving you forward regardless (in which case you shouldn’t offer to fly out at your own expense), or they may have heard enough to know that you’re not as strong of a match as they’re looking for (in which case asking for another chance will feel off). But you could say something like, “My sense is that the technical issues on our call may have distracted from our focus on the job and what I’d bring to it, and I’d be happy to set up another time to talk if you think it would be useful. I’m not sure how much of my side of the conversation came through clearly, and I’d be glad to cover some of that ground again if the tech issues got in the way.”

5. Should I tell my boss my coworkers are badmouthing her in another language?

Recently, seven new people were added to my team, most of whom are fantastic to work with. However, two of them, both men who speak Korean, are constantly saying homophobic and sexist slurs in Korean against my boss, who is openly gay. (I can also speak Korean and can fully understand what they are saying, although I don’t think they know that. No one else on the team is Korean.) However, they act polite in front of my boss’ face and to the rest of us, they do good work on projects, and my boss seems to like them. I have told a few of my coworkers about this, but they seem split about whether to report them or keep quiet. I don’t know what to do. Should I tell my boss (and/or HR?) or is this a case of what she doesn’t know won’t hurt her?

Tell your boss.

What they’re doing is disgusting and toxic, it’s not okay to do at work even if it’s in another language, and your boss needs to know. (Plus, you shouldn’t have to hear it yourself.)