Why does it feel like only bad people win?

[Puppystarfish23]

Im not prefect, I'm not the smartest, prettiest etc but something I've always prided myself on is being a moral person and having a good heart. I might not always be kind but that's natural and I still have my limits.

The only thing is I feel like being nice to people is my biggest disadvantage and it always stops me from getting what I want in life. I used to believe in karma but lately I feel like its not ture. I feel like I get taken for granted, overlooked and underappreciated.

There's this guy at my work called Jake and he's a union rep as well as myself. I became a union rep to help my colleagues as my work treat people terribly sometimes. I can't help but dislike jake he only became a rep to befit himself, he uses it as an excuse to get out of work and look like the hero.

He's a con man in my eyes. He lies, cheats, manipulates people. He constantly frauds the company and takes his girlfriend on training trips and over spends on his allowances and makes the union pay it.

He's done a lot of bad things and he trys to take the moral high ground. He makes out he's a good worker when he frauds his rate and takes credit for others work.

The worst thing he did that made him and me fall out was. We had a trainer at our work who fell into a deep depression after his girlfriend died and turned to drinking. He turned up to work drunk and lost his job. Jake repped this man and tried to help him get his job but unfortunately failed. After his man was fired he told everyone about this man's mental health and drinking problems and told someone I was representing for his work performance to use the excuse he was trained by a alcoholic therefore he doesn't feel confident in the training the company provided. I was absolutely disgusted especially as jake makes a big song and dance about how much he cares about mental health. I reported it immediately as its a breach of policy and just morally wrong.

Updates

14 d

He got away with it and now his going to academy for are union and won a award for recruitig over 100 people.. I got offered to go to the academy to but wasn't encouraged as much since I reported jake and the union took his side and protected him and just said he'd been a "silly boy" he's 36 with a child... ffs. also jake only recruited over 100 people because he stole others recruitment forms and bullied people into signing up.

Updates

14 d

a lot of people see jake for who he really is at work but he has a small cult at work most scumbags like himself who love him because he's saved there jobs. When I reported him, I was harassed by these people and they also kept there jobs. I was labelled a grass for doing the right thing and now have to work with people who have it out for me.

[SteveSmith1985]

I am really glad you wrote this. Sometimes it's hard to know a lot about a person from a GAG question. Usually you get to know one narrow romantic situation, and everything else about the person you have to glean from a conversation about their love life.

This question says so much about what kind of person you are, because it's so overtly an example of your fundamental view of right and wrong.

I've seen your username around GAG enough to recognize it by sight, but as far as I know, I've never had any real interactions with you on here. Reading this suddenly makes you somebody I'd like to know better.

I work at a unionized job. When I first started, I was thinking of becoming involved with the union. I am very glad I have the union I have. I have no specific grievance against anyone, or reason to expect anyone in my union is abusing their position in any way.

I did not get involved because of the politics of it. The fact that it IS run with a wink-and-a-nod. Personal relationships do indeed matter.

I don't know about your workplace, but at mine, the "no snitching" thing, is prison-serious. I can see how you were harassed and mistreated if you appeared to be on the wrong side of the union, or more specifically on the wrong side of people's buddy who happens to be a union rep. It's not right. But I can totally see how that might happen.

I once saw a guy who worked in a completely different location (same union, people overlap, but this dude had to travel) walk into the lunchroom throw a guy up against a wall, and punch the guy right in the mouth. In front of everybody. Not one single person saw anything. Including me.

It was a personal relationship thing more than anything. Everybody liked the guy who threw the punch, and disliked the guy who got hit. Everybody pulled together to make sure his attempt to use the proper procedures went nowhere. (and there are so many procedures and policies in place to make sure that complaint IS heard. Didn't matter).

It's not right, in terms of moral fairness. It should be, and for the most part it is. Again, I love that I'm a member of the union I belong to. I have been pro-union all my life. It's a good thing for any workplace to have, but they are "mob-justice" kind of fair (which is to say... not fair but at the whims of ones social connections, not any objective idea of what's right or wrong)

I can appreciate why you might be discouraged, and be wondering if you're just getting screwed over for being a good person who does the right thing.

It's especially unfortunate, since unions need reps like you. Nobody (overall) wants shitty union reps who steal and defraud its members. The problem is the "culture" within unions. It's personal relationship based, regardless of all attempts to make sure it's not. It's a place where bad people are able to win more easily than in most other circumstances.

You are exactly the kind of moral person union reps should be. But being that puts you in opposition to "the old boys club" mentality that still actually dictates what happens in real-life on the ground. Don't be discouraged because of this. This is an arena where a bad guy has every advantage. It's not based on right and wrong.

I am not going to try and tell you that bad people don't win. We're living in a post-industrial-capitalist society. It's set up to allow bad people to be able to win. You can make a lot of money doing the morally wrong thing. It pays well.

If you mean "win" in terms of wealth, power and material gain; then yes... it does pay better to be a bad guy.

That's not why you've always taken pride in being a moral person. That's not the reason its a good thing that you've got a kind heart.

(I have actually put more hours of thought into this than you might expect; at more than one point in my life)

The rewards for being a good person is not measured materially. It's not something that helps you succeed in the marketplace. It isn't even about fixing those things that are corrupt or wrong. (although I think it's a great thing to do, if you can. Just don't expect yourself to work any miracles).

Being a good person isn't about karma, in my opinion. It's about what kind of impact you have on the people whose path you cross in life. It's spreading that goodness by being a good person. By trying to be kind, and do the right thing.

It is about what kind of affect you have on the world. It affects how people feel about you, think about you, and you do get some tangible reward for that.

It's being trusted, even when someone has no reason to trust you. They can see that you're genuinely a good person, and they will put their trust in you anyway.

I can't even tell you the number of times I experience that. On GAG I experience it constantly, but even in real life, people do tend to trust me very quickly. They're not wrong to do so. I bet that's the case for you as well.

The main benefit is that good people tend to attract good people. Your life is made richer for being a good person, in the good people who seem to gravitate to you. This has been my experience... everywhere I go... in the most unexpected places.

I hope you've had a similar experience. That's what I've come to. The reward for being a good person, is attracting other good people into your orbit.

(not always. There are some good people surrounded by nothing but idiots. Not often, but I've seen it happen. If you're one of those good people... I guess I have egg-on-my-face)

🙂

[PavlovsCogk]

Obviously because they take away from others. They accumulate material only. Their hearts must be as valuable as a fart in a spacesuit, though.

They do not listen to conscience, don't stop even when their unconscious (for example, "ideomotor" movements if they are trying to decide what's good) suggest to be humble, they just power through it.

Rewards for being good are misinterpreted for "karma". No, rewards are more psychic and subconscious mechanisms. Karma is about reincarnation. But that's not the silly "be born as an insect" nonsense either. A realistic rebirth of the SAME soul would be a smart person who uses his intelligence for selfish evil purposes getting reincarnated in a stupider human. Definitely someone will be that.

[Anonymous]

because there's no incentive to being a good person anymore

why be a hard-working chivalrous gentleman when all you get is a sea of promiscuous whores who have been passed around by men who have since then become losers?

why be a virtuous modest lady saving yourself for marriage when even dudes of high caliber are falling head over heels for OF models and IG thots?

why teach kids to be good people when at any point before they're born, they could've been deleted because the law allows it and the mother wants to?

why follow the Geneva Convention to be held more hostage by those following it than by those not following it?

why play by the rules when everyone else is cheating and getting away with it?

maybe at the end of the road, God has something planned for all these immoral people

[NathanDavis]

not in my experience