BE AN INDIVIDUAL

I saw Happy Feet with my wife tonight and despite myself I enjoyed the movie.

The quick synopsis is the oddball penguin who can dance is hated by his group and after he saves the day they all love him.

It is an underlying theme in our American culture that the bold and rugged individual can fight against the tide and ultimately win over people if he/she is right. We teach this in our culture and preach diversity out our a**.

Then comes corporate America and the politically correct crowd, which says if you don't go along we will move you along and out the door. In the real world diversity means it's okay if you are a transgendered Latino lesbian, but you still need to think the same way the corporation does. My years in corporate America taught me that diversity in appearance is okay, diversity in thought is verboten.

I was always a maverick and it played well at times, but when push came to shove the corporate American life and I did not fit hand in glove. I work for a privately owned company today and feel more at home in this environment (nothings perfect).

I had a long rant that I wrote about how we are taught one set of values and then corporate America and our political system shows you those values do not work, so we are either corrupted by the system or become outsiders. I prefer being the outsider. My rant was written years ago and one of my favorite lines was that when your boss says it's raining out and the sky is blue, everyone goes up on the roof and pisses off the side of the building to prove your boss right. One corporation I worked for would make changes and ask what people thought. So you would raise you hand and point out problems and they would say you are wrong. When the system is implemented and what you said goes wrong they hate you because you showed that the emperor had no clothes. In fact often even if it doesn't work you are supposed to agree that it did.

I would rather fall on my sword and die on a principle then to leave behind what I feel is the right thing to do.

So have Happy Feet and change the world or at least maybe one or two minds.