Thursday, May 26, 2011

Diversity Thursday

Why not Esperanto? From a Fleet Spy - redacted where needed to protect the insane.
-----Original Message-----
From:
Sent: Tuesday, May 24, 2011 13:57
To: __ALL PERSONNEL
Cc: _OFFICERS; _ALL ENLISTED; _FCPOA; _ALL CPO
Subject: Commander's Suggestion Box

All,

Based on your feedback and so you have an ability to communicate directly to our Admiral, there's now a Commander's Suggestion Box and CMEO Box (see SEPCOR from CPO XXXX for you to confidentially recommend new ideas and/or general concerns.

The Commander's Suggestion Box is for everyone to use and is located beside the CMEO box in the rear vestibule of Building N-23. There are temporary suggestion forms (yes, the forms that arrived with the boxes are written in English and Spanish) for your use (name is optional) however, if you only have time to drop a piece of paper in the box, that too will suffice.

Very Respectfully,

REDACTED

___________________________________________
CMEO BOX EMAIL:

ALCON:

The CMEO Concerns box has been placed in the vestibule in the rear of the building near the refrigerator. Please utilize it as an anonymous means of addressing any CMEO issues or concerns you may have. I am standing by for any questions.

V/R
Aren't we all.

24 comments:

Grumpy Old Ham said...

<span>yes, the forms that arrived with the boxes are written in English and Spanish</span>

Uh, boss, this one is the post that really needs the blood pressure warning.

Anyway -- maybe some enterprising soul could relabel the box as "Waste Paper Recycling Bin".  It would probably serve a more useful function then.

OldCOB said...

We have a box for Continuous Improvement Recommendations outside my office.  The forms are in English only despite a large percentage of hispanic employees.  Why?  Because we're an American company! Not some jackwagon collection of hyphenated, fence-sitting douche bags who can't grasp the concept of e pluribus unum.  What's next?  Announcements over the 1MC in English and Spanish?  What a load of $hit.

LT B said...

I walked by and labeled it "Basura" after I pressed "2" for Spanish.

Why don't we also have Tagalog on the forms?  What about our Philippino brothers and sisters?  No love for lumpia? 

Hey, douche nozzles!  One language is necessary for unity of command, conveying throughts and orders in times of stress, um, say like a main space fire, or severe flooding or incoming fire.  See, clarity of communication and accuracy of information are important.  So while you idiots don't put yourselves in harms way, there are those of us that do so please do not encourage making the US Navy, like those in the story of the city of Babel. 

Benjamin Walthrop said...

I read this a different way.  It sounds to me like suggestion forms were ordered (and possibly the box itself) from a commercial outfit and the forms that arrived (labeled as temporary in the email) came in both English and Spanish.  That was a "feature" that was perhaps not required or desired since they have been labeled as temporary.  This looks like an attempt to address concerns similar to those voiced below while more appropriate English only forms are acquired.  Perhaps I'm wrong.  I've never been a fan of a command suggestion box anyway, but having never been a CO my perspective on that issue is subject to additional perspecitve.

CDR Salamander said...

Wow.  I hope not.  Why spend all that money on forms when 5-minutes with a YN3 and a b&w printer will do the same.

Aubrey said...

There was a great bit in "Neptune's Inferno" where one commander described having to make sure all the deepwoods Georgia boys were on the same watch so they could understand each other...

pk said...

i hope that these guys have learned the first rule of suggestion boxes: don't make the top sittable in any way shape or form. (cuts down the more odorus sugs.)

C

Benjamin Walthrop said...

Hard to argue with that.  I think it goes something like this:

1.  Commander gets caught thinking outloud by subordinate.
2.  Subordinate takes commanders verbal musing for action.
3.  Cannonball polishing ensues.
4.  Polished cannonball is delivered, and although it was not really the CO's intent the resources have been spent.
5.  Repeat.

The cannonball polishing cycle applies to a number of activities beyond suggestion boxes (which I still believe have only dubious value).

Anonymous said...

Benjamin,

Just how many times, and how many indicators are you going to ignore, in giving the benefit of the doubt regarding bending over backwards to make sacrificial offerings at the altar of Diversity?

Just some subordinate being overzealous....  not a chance.  This is in perfect keeping with the CNO's priority.

Benjamin Walthrop said...

Probably about the same number of times other folks overhype the danger associated with what is increasingly an obvious side show of very little relevance or importance.  The Navy's approach to diversity is irritating.  The "program" will die as the leadership changes and the folks who have been brought up to naturally accept people of different skin colors, ethnicities, and race move up the ladder.  The current Navy approach is just not that relevant, and I guess I have more faith in America. 

Given the level of proof that we both have at our disposal, I suppose I think that my narrative in this case is as relevant as yours.

Diverstiy -- Meh.

UltimaRatioRegis said...

It would indeed be of little relevance or importance if it weren't sucking up billions in training and other associated costs, injecting a dangerous and divisive political philosophy, and creating a climate where ethnicity and skin color gives one an advantage over another, in contravention of the Fourteenth Amendment.

Other than that, Meh.

Squidly said...

Ahhh, but it was so comical listening to the GSEs and GSMs rattle off at each other in Tagalog, injecting the occasional english word so I could understand...Wakalakalaka ng gas turbine wakala bayanco bakla...

virgil xenophon said...

Logged in under the "you can't make it up" file..

Squidly said...

Sea story about anonymous suggestion boxes (and their hazards).

XO (a real tool) got off on this rant campaign against "faddish haircuts..."  Never mind the fact that our lone SH 1-week wonder barber school grad couldn't cut hair and was mess cranking... Kept complaining about chili bowl cuts. 

XO had a nasty dandruff problem, and one day comes back to the ship with what appeared to be a botched high and tight (botched because one side was slightly more trimmed than the other).  JOs were convinced he had passed out drunk, but that's another story.

Was standing an EOOW refresher watch (in lieu of my normal slot above decks), and one night we lost an SSDG running in two generator mode, and unexpectedly the now overloaded generator tripped, with the other DGs dead bussing but not taking up the load.  Ship went dark and the UPS failed (later determined due to fried circuitry) so all engineering controls died too.  XO (never qualified EOOW...a rarity even in those days) comes storming into CCS demanding why it failed, not wanting to accept that they system simply didn't work as designed.

Next night, chews out one of my sailors for having faddish haircut (which neither the Chief nor I thought was bad).  

Enterprising JO drops a note in the CO's suggestion box wondering why the XO has a faddish haircut.  At that evening's Eight-o-clock's XO is throwing stuff around his stateroom, clearly disturbed and pissed off.  The rest of us had to bite our lips to prevent chuckling.  CMC later revealed that XO was reacting to to the latest addition to the suggestion box.

LT B said...

Or if we didn't elect an extremely poorly prepared/trained community leader to the head of the Executive Branch almost solely due to his race.  If a White junior senator with his credentials had said he was going to run for POTUS, he would have been laughed out of the room.  Even the head of BET said that, but he was baking Billary.

LT B said...

The engineering drills always had me looking at the Philippino helmsman sitting next to me.  He would look up, tell me what they said, and I'd do the repeat back.  Of course it is a SWO testosterone thing to speak as quickly as possible over the comms but you throw a thick Tagalog accent in w/ it and it is tougher to figure out WTF they said!

One of my guys was married to a Philippina.  She got a pet while he was at work and told him to get parrot food.  Cool, a bird he said.  Nope, she wanted ferret food!  :)   He hated that damned rat.

C-dore 14 said...

@Aubrey, Back on my first ship we had two Filipinos who manned the Link 14 and the AAW vertical plot in CIC during GQ.  They'd chatter back in forth in Tagalog over the s/p phones to pass information and the plot was flawless.  It's all about finding the proper niche for your people.

Benjamin Walthrop said...

Billions in training?  I doubt it, but if you have some facts to back up this hyperbole I welcome the chance to view them.  The topline USN budget is something on the order of ~$165B, so your assertion of billions indicates the tonal based diversity nonsense is consuming multiple percentage points of that number.  I doubt it, but remain open to being convinced otherwise.

A dangerous nad devisive political philosophy.  As I tried to make clear before, my personal experience is that the philosophy of seperation  based on tonal qualities has largely been overcome by events, and will continue to slowly fade from the collective experience of most Americans. There is wisdom in the Southpark episode covering this topic and a lot to be said for Morgan Freeman's approach to countering racism.  The Navy diversity push is irritating, but it is largely an effort to slay dragons that have already been mortally wounded.  I have not personally seen anyone get any meaningful advantage in contravention of the Fourteenth Amendment, but perhaps you have greater experience in this regard than I do.  I just don't think it dangerous.  Sad and pathetic really, but not something to be a subject of irrational fear.  If an NSTM is put out in multiple languages then I think there may be an issue.  A commercially procured survey form, not so much.  --Meh.

andrewdb said...

And right on schedule is today's post to City Journal dismantling the recent article in the WAPO getting all upset that SEAL teams are all male.

 See here:  http://www.city-journal.org/2011/eon0526hm.html

UltimaRatioRegis said...

How many sailors and Marines have had to sit through 4 or 8 hours of training?  Multiply that times the loaded salary rate, plus the same figure for work not being done in the roles for which they are employed.... 

Let's see.  We will use the Marine Corps as a ferinstance.  202,000 Marines, give or take.  Each undergoing 4 hours of training for DADT.   Total loss of 8 hours, as the time in the civ work force would be considered non-revenue direct labor.  Say, for argument's sake the average Marine pay and allowances work out to be that of an 8-year Sergeant.  DoD has a cost overhead for each service member of between 115 and 135%, depending on who you talk to.  (In and of itself, pretty good, as employers go.)

That is an average monthly cost, just using PAY, of $2800 x 2.15, to use the lower side of overhead.  Or, $6020 a month.  Figure 180 labor hours (civilians are 160-165), a cost of $33.44/hr to the government.  For 1,616,000 hours lost. 

Total just in LABOR costs, just for the active Marine Corps, of $54 million. 

For the Army, $152 million, the Navy, $89 million, for the Air Force, $90 million.  Counting three quarters of a million DoD civilians, even at the $33.44/hr figure, which is ludicrously low, the cost for the DPMS workforce is $200 million dollars.

Not counting reserves, NG, etc, and using an artificially low labor cost for DoD civilians, LABOR COST ALONE for JUST DADT REPEAL training are more than half a billion dollars.  Not counting the development of the training, the administrative and labor costs to implement and track, and all the other hidden costs that would never be identified by DoD. 

So please, spare me the nonsense.  Implementation of something like JUST DADT repeal across an organization with two million people has an enormous associated cost.  Which comes directly out of the operating budget.

Factor in the sexual harrassment training, etc, and all the diversity recognition nonsense, (such as is in the picture), and, well, you get the idea.  That formation for "Cultural Diversity Day", had it lasted, say, an hour, with a thousand attendees, cost the taxpayer and the Navy budget in the tens of thousands of dollars.  Somewhere in the fleet there is someone who cannot get to a required school because there isn't $800 for travel and lodging.

Anonymous said...

Except the DADT training was only 2 hours, so divide your answer by 4.  So what.  What does DADT have to do with diversity.

LT B said...

Yes nut now add the money required to track training the troops up to that oh so important 100%. The lawyers fashioning the policy the surveys etc. And if you think the DiversiNazis and the DADT Repeal pushers are not of the same mindset, you are incorrect.

UltimaRatioRegis said...

No, 2 hours is a net 4, as you had people two hours in a non-work activity and you lost two hours of work time. 

DADT training and diversity and sexual harrassment and all the other non-warfighting, non-proficiency, PC crap costs beaucoup bucks. 

The assertion was that it wasn't billions.  JUST DADT, if it were two hours, and using the significantly undervalued labor costs I did, costs better than $250 million JUST IN LABOR COSTS. 

That's the so what.  How many warships could $250 million keep at sea for a year?

Salty Gator said...

Personally I'm waiting for the day when CSOSS and EOSS / EOCC are written in both English and Spanish.  And when you try to execute "reachback" you have to press 1 for english or 2 for spanish.  oh, and then what about SIPR Chat?  I should need a universal translator for that. 

It's funny:  all pilots, all mariners have to learn English all over the world.  Why ? Because it is the most common and MOST DESCRIPTIVE language that exists today.  But we're not holding our own people to that standard?

Way to set your sailors up for success.  I guess we'll have the "non-English speaking Sailor of the Year Award" at the next Diversity Gala and Banquet.