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She was a World Bank Employee. That Figures

Image result for wmata metro map

That woman who tried to get another woman fired for eating on the train was a World Bank employee.

You may have heard of this. It was one of those 15 minute social media sensations. 


A World Bank employee who is also an author (not just a hobbyist -- she had a book deal pending when this scandal broke) tweeted angrily about an employee of the Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority (WMATA) whom she had seen eating on the train. Apparently that is verboten. 


The WB employee tweeted about this and mentioned the employee's obnoxious response to a question on the subject, right at 9 AM on a workday. So I would imagine she had just gotten to work when she did so. 


So far, no biggie. What makes it something of a biggie is that the commuter sent a complaint to the WMATA. It replied. "Thank you for catching this and helping us to make sure all Metro employees are held accountable. Can you confirm the time you were on the train, the direction you were headed and what line you were on?”


She complied, with the time, direction and line. And line.  


Let us contemplate the significance of this for a moment.

Though it is understandable that she was ticked off at the working stiff -- tweets expressing workday ticked-offedness are a staple of the medium -- it seems wildly excessive that she should actually provide information likely to get this working stiff identified and disciplined, perhaps fired. She played the ignoble part of a 'snitch.' 


I don't know what her job at the WB entails, but it seems fitting to be that this snitch has such a position as her "day job." That she was a writer as well I find personally embarrassing, so I'll focus on the WB angle. 


She presumably isn't part of the top tier of WB leadership (or she wouldn't be taking the subway to the office). But she does work at an organization of global reach and aspirations, a citadel of the "central planning" of other people's lives, the lives of the masses conceived of AS the masses.


A single working stiff having a bite out of turn ... THAT she couldn't handle.  Not because it was against some barely-enforced rule, but because these people can't  be allowed to show even so much individual initiative as that involved. 


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