Thoughts on how we need to quit catering to peoples complaints

In a recent conversation I said something interesting. I said that “we need to quite catering to peoples complaints”. I went on to say that “Where does the problem lie . . . in the people who complain or the people who cater to these complaints? ”

PROBLEMS

I felt that this catering to complaints is now causing all sorts of problems. It does things such as:

• Its exaggerating problems and making small problems big. Usually, the more something is complained about the bigger it seems to be.
• Its giving the “complainers” a power that they misuse and abuse. Most of the “complainers” are not motivated out of down-to-earth and real issues and are usually the people who shouldn’t be given power.
• It makes complaining worse. In fact, it inspires complaining in some people.
• It creates unfairness. This is because the society starts to only cater to the complainers and their “issues” and neglect everyone else. As the saying goes, “the squeaky wheel gets the grease”.
• It diverts attention away from “real issues”. It seems that many “real issues” are not even addressed because so much effort is done to cater to complaining.
• It creates contempt and disgust. This is felt by the non-complainers who sit and watch all this happen before their eyes.
• It gets people all “worked up”, often over nothing.
• It creates a lot of bad feelings in and between people.

In some sense, the catering to complaining tends to cause something like an “aggravation” in society. I often jokingly say that we must start to “complain about the complainers”.

THE COMPLAINERS AND COMPLAINING

My observation is that most “complainers” are motivated by personal or specific belief-based viewpoints that do not really reflect the population or real-life issues. In other words, their complaints are really personal in origin. It seems, to me, that “complainers”, as I use it here, have several qualities:

• They are treating personal issues as if they are social issues or are reflective of society as a whole
• They are as if “appealing to society” to solve their personal issue

These inconsistencies give “complaining” its irritating and hypocritical quality. It also helps cause other qualities include:

• Many people complain because of some neurotic quality and they use complaining as a means to deal with it.
• For some people, complaining is a means of attacking someone or something for some reason.
• Sometimes, complaining is a means to express dislike of another person, an organization, or system.
• They are often motivated by beliefs that are not reflective of the rest of the population.
• A common trait is that they get wound up with trivial details and minor points that most people don’t care about. In fact, they often get horribly wound up in details even to the point that they complain about something as simple as an expression or a word.
• A “complainer” often complains repetitively and often. Some people practically make a life out of it. It’s not uncommon that the complaining goes on and on and on. It can sometimes be like an endless pounding or “having things shoved down your throat”. I’ve seen cases where people will cater to the complainers just to shut them up.
• Often, nothing satisfies the complainers. You can give them all they want but they will often only find something else to complain about. In this way, there is often no solution to their complaints.

What all this does is put into question the motives and intentions of the “complainers” and the sincerity of what they are really complaining about. It seems that they use complaining as a means for some other issue or dilemma. I sometimes speak of this as “frivolous complaining”. What this shows is that complainers are seldom sincere about what they are complaining about.

THE COMPLAINING COMMUNITY

The internet and social media has caused the creation of what can be described as a “complaining community”. This consists of a group of people that are bonded by the social media in their complaining. This gives them a sense of unification, identity, and allows them to complain en masse. In this way, it can create something like a “sub-culture” with a perceived “cause” and “power”. The result of this, it seems, is that it can intensify the complaining and make it more “forceful”.

The complaining community can also create, on the social media, internet, and news, a bad image of the situation that can adversely affect people and organizations being complained about whether the complaining is right or wrong. In this way, the complaining community can do a lot of damage.

THE EFFECT OF BUSINESS

Many companies cater to complaining to avoid anything that might cause a lawsuit or effect business. In fact, I think that many companies are scared not to cater to complaints for fear of what may happen. Much of this, it seems, is a result of the complaining community which can spread discontent very rapidly. Its easier for companies to just blindly cater to any complaining than risk anything that might affect business.

POLITICS AND LAW

It seems that a lot of complaining has been intensified and “justified” by politics and law. To be more precise, by associating their complaints with politics and law they believe this gives them right and, therefore, gives them a power:

• Politics – The use of politics seems to of become prevalent during the Vietnam War protests and has grown since. People found that by, making a political issue out of something, people responded and reacted, generally in their favor. As a result, “making a political issue” out of things became a means of power and influence which only inspired complaining.
• Law – The “lawsuit crisis”, that seemed to of become apparent during the 1980’s, has greatly “justified” many people’s complaints. When people found that they can sue people for just about anything it only inspired people to find fault with people and organization which eventually led to more complaining.

Typically, the more a complaint can be associated with politics and law the worse it gets . . . and more persistent. By associating their complaints with politics and law the people feel they are “justified”, “right”, and have “power”. This gives their complaining a “righteous” quality. It also makes some people feel that this association makes their complaints legitimate and “real”. In some respects, it deceives many people into thinking that their complaints are important. This no doubt is one reason why many of these complaints are so odd-ball and bizarre. They think that citing politics and law makes their issue more legitimate and important than it really is. As a result, it has this tendency to cause a lot of the complaints to appear utterly ridiculous.

THE CATERING

To cater to complaining means that a person, or organization, does something that ends, or tries to end, the complaining. My observation is that this is usually done because of things such as:

• To shut them up for some reason or another, such as it may affect business
• Because it becomes associated with politics and law and they don’t won’t to get wound up with it, such as they don’t want a lawsuit
• Because they don’t want a bad image created about them, such as that which can be created by the complaining community

You’ll notice that most catering is not necessarily done because people believe in the complaints or what they are about. This means that most catering is not done because they believe the issues of the complaints matter but because they want to avoid the effects of complaining and what it can do. There is no sincerity in catering just as there is no sincerity in complaining.

THE COMPLAINING SOCIETY

All this has created what I often call the “complaining society”. Everywhere you go people complain about this, that, and the other thing. They complain about trivial things, stupid things, and things that don’t matter. And, everywhere your turn, these complaints are being catered to. It seems, to me, that this society is caused by a vicious circle:

Complaining>>>Catering to complaining>>>Inspires more complaining>>>Creates more catering>>>and on and on it goes around and around

The “complaining society”, it seems to me, is a society that has had to change and accommodate itself to this endless complaining/catering vicious circle. Because of this, it develops qualities such as:

• Since complaining does not reflect society and its issues it tends to make the society revolve around other issues and things that are often irrelevant or don’t matter
• It creates an accusatory society that can be volatile, intimidating, and in-your-face
• It can create a quality of apprehension and fear, as people and organizations do whatever they can to avoid complaints
• There often develops a contempt and disgust as some people, who see the effects of all this, can see what’s going on

THE LEGITIMACY OF COMPLAINTS

We must remember that some complaints are real and involve some legitimate issue. That is to say, complaints shouldn’t just be discounted because they are complaints. One of the problems with complaints, nowadays, is trying to determine if they are legitimate or not. There seems to be a spectrum:

• They are obviously legitimate
• Its a matter of opinion
• Its nonsensical

Most of the complaints, that I see, are of the last form. Many are obviously nonsensical. There are some that are a matter of opinion and how you want to look at them. Every so often you see some that are legitimate.

Some qualities of legitimate complaints include:

• Its usually said in a manner of a “statement of a problem”.
• This statement is usually directed to specific people or organizations that may solve the problem.
• Their intention is to end the problem.
• It seldom involves politics or law.
• Its over something that seems realistic and relevant.

They seldom have that irritating and hypocritical manner of “complaining” but are usually matter-of-fact and practical. Sometimes, though, a legitimate complaint can start to sound like “complaining” particularly if nothing is done about it. At a certain point it can get “desperate” and emotional. In that case, people can start to do an “emotional complaining” that can sound like “frivolous complaining”.

CEASING THE COMPLAINING/CATERING VICIOUS CIRCLE

I tend to feel that we need to cease the complaining/catering vicious circle. This means a number of things:

• To cease any “frivolous complaining” that we may do
• To cease catering to complaining

I’ve found that, with any complaining (including ones we do ourselves), the first thing to do is to determine if the complaint is legitimate or not. If it is the later then the best thing to do, I’ve found, is to ignore the complaint or not pay attention to it. I’ve found that most “complainers” are relying on people to respond. They found complaining gets a response so this is why they do it. If you don’t respond then they usually stop complaining and, as if by magic, the complaint tends to disappear. This means, more or less, that what they are complaining about isn’t as important as they make it out to be. I tend to feel that this is the case with most complaining.

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Copyright by Mike Michelsen