All right, I finally did it. I broke down and bought an
ergonomic keyboard. I simply can’t keep up with the pace of the UNCG soap opera
if they are going to keep churning out news at this rate. I really am going to
have to ask for health insurance and a pension if they keep me working full
time like this.
The News and Record reported yesterday that Chun
has filed a grievance with UNCG.
The irony was not lost on me. I think it would have been
considered heavy handed as a story line even in the world of daytime
television, but this is reality where no such bars on the purest melodrama
exist.
Chun’s angle is that she was fired because of her age (68)
and her ethnicity (Asian). She certainly wasn’t fired because of her abilities
(insignificant) or her strength of character (absent).
One of her primary complaints isn’t that she was innocent of
royally screwing up but that she wasn’t extended the courtesy of being allowed
to resign or retire rather than be fired.
Wait, I’m tearing up and I can’t see the screen clearly.
Okay.
In other words, she is the first one that has been dealt
with appropriately. That has got to hurt.
Somebody more fluent than I in the subtleties of this system
might need to fill us in, but I would imagine that if you retire or resign you
get a different set of benefits than if you are fired. At the very least you
get to save face.
Something that doesn’t happen, of course, if you are carted
away in handcuffs and your mug shot is posted for all the world to see.
But I digress.
So, she wasn’t given the velvet handshake. Also, she says,
she doesn’t know why she was fired. And she didn’t have anything to do with the
UNCG3 anyway. And Paul Mason made her do it.
I’m having a hard time processing all of those different
angles at the same time. She didn’t do it, except for that they made her do it,
and she doesn’t know why they fired her, but she didn’t do it anyway, so it
doesn’t matter. I think that’s the argument.
Pulling together all of his talents as a university
spokesman and after a lengthy incantation to invoke the muses, Joe Gallehugh
responded bravely on behalf of UNCG with words that are sure to echo through
the ages much as the speeches recorded by Tacitus in his Histories that the
university couldn’t comment.
Chun is showing some backbone in refusing to allow others
off the hook and go silently. Of course, it would have been helpful earlier if
she had brought it to the public’s attention that Paul Mason had demanded to
know the names of those who had filed grievances against him and pressured her
to dismiss the matter. Also, apparently her supervisor, Charles Maimone created
a hostile work environment – something Chun suddenly seems to clearly understand.
But if she wants to call out the whole rat’s nest, I would
advise everyone to put on goggles and gloves because it’s going to get dirty.
Maybe Lyda Carpen can offer Chun some pointers about going
through the grievance process. But I wouldn’t be surprised if Carpen is too
busy these days to have time to help.
