Tail-carrier-ism

Once, an officer turned up at the residence of one of his employees. The employee was flabbergasted at receiving an unexpected guest of such a magnitude. He was left with no choice but to show his boss in. To crank the visit into an opportunity to win brownie points with the boss, he made a cursory offer of dinner to the boss. The boss affecting humility accepted the hospitality that he would dine whatever available at home on the spot.

Contrary to the rosy hopes of the boss, the curry of potato and eggplant was served. The boss eulogised the benefits of the eggplant to put his subordinate at ease. The subordinate fawned on the boss that owing to the nutritional value of the eggplant, it was their favourite family dish. But the boss, in his heart of hearts, cringed at being served the eggplant curry.

After a few days, the boss knowingly visited the subordinate who greeted him obsequiously. Again, the same cuisine welcomed the boss who couldn’t but help uttering the side effects of the eggplant. The subordinate too recounted the litany of demerits of eating eggplants.

The exasperated boss asked his subordinate why the latter followed suit to him in describing merits and demerits of the eggplant. The subordinate simpered: “Sir, I work with you, not with the eggplant.”

In Miguel de Cervantes’ Don Quixote, Sancho Panza, the loyal squire to Don Quixote, frequently employs flattery to humour his eccentric master. Through exaggerated praise and deferential language, Sancho indulges Don Quixote’s delusions of grandeur, reflecting the timeless dynamic between master and servant.

This is the way of the office world, all the more prominent in our part of the globe because of our colonial legacy — to be head over heels to please the boss who behaves like a colonial viceroy.

Scientists ascribe the symbol Tc to Tecnetium — the name from the Greek word for artificial — the first man-made element. Nature has no room for artificiality. The symbol Tc connotes in workplace jargon “tail carrier”. This epithet is frequently employed to describe the colleagues who always itch to adulate the boss to curry undue favours or belittle others.

In the medieval era, when the kings would stay out of the country either on a visit to a neighbouring country or in the battlefield, the queen or the monarch-queen at the palace was escorted by ladies-in-waiting. One of the maid’s duties was to carry the long tail of the queen’s majestic and humongous robe.

Tail-carrier-ism (TC) has colonial roots in our context. Anthropological studies of the colonised regions reveal that sychophancy (formal equivalence of TC) is found to be more prevalent among the people in these regions. The native people danced attendance on their gora rulers to assume faux social status among their communities.

From our leadership to bureaucracy, all are avatars of royal aristocracy and colonialism as their condescending behaviour and flattery-anointed ego are the telltale vestiges of medieval era. What is more, they are prone to basking in puffery.

TC rules the roost in public educational institutions. The heads are surrounded by blandishing teachers who get their duties delegated to others. Such people take the classes that are governable. They teach fewer periods as they spend a major chunk of their duty time in showering “encomium” upon the boss.

TC causes infection of injustice which is arguably the undertaker of the deterioration of any system or institution. Look-busy-do-nothing attitude becomes the norm in environments wherein paying court to one’s boss replaces the practical work.

Why do people stoop so low to brown-nose their employers? When workers lack dedication to their duty, they ingratiate themselves with the boss. On the other level, those high in narcissism may revel in flattery, viewing it as their due acknowledgement of superiority. However, the people at the helm of affairs must differentiate between the Squealers and the Boxers of Animal Farm.

 

Published in The Express Tribune, March 11^th, 2024.

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