This is a short one, as much an inquiry to readers as it is a post. If you’ve read the chapter, “Sudden Asshole Syndrome” in HHIFA, you’ve seen my friend “Alex” and I dissect “dicks,” “douchebags,” “pricks,” “cocksuckers,” “scumbags,” “assholes” and even the British variant of “cunts.”
One form of rodent’s missing, and it’s the type who vex us most. Walk through your day in your mind, naming the species of every irritant you encounter. Seven out of ten will be “tools.” They’re ubiquitous. Any office, any room, with more than a dozen people has at least one tool in attendance. And try as you might to avoid him, the son of a bitch will find you. He’ll seek you out, corner you, infect whatever it is you’re doing… irritate, infuriate, drive you to the edge of violence – talking about nothing, needling, whining and inflicting his views on your person. God help you if you work with the bastard, or worse yet, he’s in your department. You’ll dream of choking him purple, of leaping over the conference table and crushing his larynx like a walnut… Saving the rest of the race from enduring another moment of this nails-on-blackboard personality, with its pointless, needless interjections, its niggling irrelevant critiques and persistent failure to notice that Nobody Wants to Listen to Anything It Has to Say.
But where do these creatures come from? What defines them, makes them what they are? You know one when you see one, of course. But there has to be a common tether, some shared form of dysfunction that binds all tools together.
I looked for that link when I was writing HHIFA. Researched the issue for weeks, because to write about office malfunctions, one has to address the tool. He sits at the base of most problems in every corporate structure in the country. Attrition, delay, low morale – the tool’s been involved somehow. Infighting, disruption, malpractice – his fingerprints are in there somewhere. But it’s rarely ever direct. The tool works more like a cancer, sabotaging from within while appearing utterly harmless. And the harrowing thing about these organisms is the probable lack of intent. Observe the tool in nature and you’ll know, he rarely realizes what he’s doing.
Which is exactly why my research came up blank. I couldn’t pin a profile on the tool, and then it struck me… That’s his defense. He’s everywhere and nowehere at once, the Keyser Soze of corporate malignancies. In the interest of actually, finally answering the question, “How do you define a tool?” below are a few interviews I took which were included in an early draft of the book. Maybe they flesh the animal out. Maybe not. Maybe you can do better. I’m all ears.*
Harris. Latex dynasty heir, Analyst. Washington DC.
H: “A tool bothers you. Their chief attribute is being annoying.”
PL: “Anybody can be annoying. Douchebags are annoying.”
H: “Yeh, but a douchebag’s a real flagrant dickhead, and kind of a buffoon. A tool’s aggravating, but not that over the top.”
PL: “That’s a fine line. How does a tool compare to an asshole, then?”
H: “Assholes are usually directly irritating. A tool’s mostly indirect. But I guess tools could be a passive aggressive subset of asshole.”
PL: “But isn’t that really a prick?”
H: “No. A prick’s in your face. A tool’s annoying even when he’s not being a tool to you. It’s more a state of being than any specific behavior. Listening to a tool talk to someone else can be annoying. They’re like really bad karaoke. You feel like you have to leave the room.”
Donika: Literary Editor, Enabler. New York City.
D: “The best way to describe a tool is lack of authenticity. I hate to define them in relation to nerds, but the two are so frequently confused I kind of have to… A nerd knows he’s not cool and does his own thing. A tool is trying to be something. He’s a geek who thinks he’s really fucking cool, or is trying to be. Does that make sense?”
PL: “What do you think a tool’s trying to be?”
D: “I don’t know. I don’t think the tool knows. Whatever he’s not? They kind of lack a real identity. You never know what you’re getting with a tool. They shift to fit the moment and they don’t leave anything to show where they’re coming from.”
PL: “Like what?”
D: “Like anything. Nerds tend to be a creative types. They build things. A tool’s more a critic. He tears things down to make himself feel better.”
Les: Society gadfly, Investor. Washington D.C.
L: “Tools don’t ‘play’ the game. They believe in it… buy into it.”
PL: “How so?”
L: “They miss the bigger picture. They fight battles, not wars. And they always have to be right.”
PL: “You mixed two things there.”
L: “No I didn’t. They’ve always got something to prove, just within a very narrow game. They live in a really small universe, and they love office politics.”
Alex: Performance Artist, Acquisition Specialist. Left Coast.
A: “Chet. Chet from Weird Science.”
PL: “Anthony Michael Hall’s character or the other guy? And weren’t they both nerds?”
A: “No. Chet was the older brother. Who the fuck played him? Shit. Give me a second… Bill Paxton. Bill Paxton’s character.”
PL: “Chet wasn’t a tool. Chet was a dick. Classic, archetypical dick.”
A: “When was the last time you watched the movie?”
PL: “Few years ago I think.”
A: “Do you recall Chet getting any ass?”
PL: “No.”
A: “Exactly. He picks on the nerds and then when the computerized super-chick shows up… What was her name?”
PL: “Kelly LeBrock.”
A: “Nice. Anyway, when she shows up, Chet shits himself. He can’t handle her.”
PL: “Chet’s a meathead. He’s not a tool.”
A: “Chet gets no action, has no friends and hangs around the house, in hunting gear, beating on a couple geeks. Chet’s a fucking tool.”
_______________________
*If we get enough funny and insightful responses, we’ll throw them into a follow-up piece. Either way. I’ll be diligent about getting the comments up fast to keep any discussion building to what will hopefully be a complete definition.
From what you described, the ‘tool’ is the Dwight Schrute character from “The Office” or probably more accurately his counterpart in the British version, Gareth.
Their humourless nature, their inability to relate to others except in a system whereby there is a perceived hierarchy and their social myopia create a kind of small-minded douche – which I assume is your ‘tool’.
PL: I can see Gareth, but I wonder, does Schrute dance to his own drummer a little too much to be a true tool?
By the way, don’t run with my description. It’s my inability to fully flesh out this subject that’s led to this inquiry.
I found myself agreeing with Les, Dinika, and Harris in your piece. Perhaps instead of fitting neatly into a set definition, a tool is one of those unique creatures that, similar to pornography, falls under the description of “i know it when i see it”?
PL: I think it’s describable. And I think in the act of defining it, people will draw the picture of what drives the rest of society crazy.
A tool desperately wants to be best friends with everyone. He might hang around with people, but no one really considers him a close friend.
A tool is friends with a lot of women he wants to sleep with. He never will, but he’ll do everything in his power to sabotage their boyfriends or cockblock anyone else who comes close. He’ll do it all with a smile on his face like he’s looking out for them.
A tool thinks he’s hilarious. So much so that he doesn’t realize he’s the only one laughing.
A tool is really nice. So nice, so insincere, so much desire to strangle them.
PL: I think some of that trends over into dick and douchebag, but the “friends with chicks to try to sleep with them” thing is spot-on. Nice call.
I take note of my reaction to their behavior.
If he, upon having a perceived victory over another person, smirks in such a way that I know that it’s the highlight of his day (if not week), and I, in the face of this frankly pathetic realization, feel not pity but anger at his condition…
Then I’m dealing with a tool.
PL: That describes just about every variant of degenerate who enjoys office politics, which necessarily labels one a tool.
Not sticking up for dicks, douchebags, pricks, cocksuckers, scumbags, and assholes – but they seem genuine in their annoying behavior – unlike tools. That may be what Donika was getting at.
I think all tools are douchebags, but not all douchebags are tools (sounds like part a standardized test question).
PL: Agreed. Except for the douchebag. He’s not genuine. The douchebag is defined by his desire to make a spectacle of himself behaving in an anything but genuine fashion. He’s more a malevolent court jester with no eye for punchlines.
I think a tool is someone who takes their life and themselves too seriously.
I’m thinking of someone like a gunner. They not only think that all of their opinions ought to be heard (so as to educate those around them), but they also think that making the comments is an incredibly important thing to do, as though finding a minor flaw in something said by a professor 2 minutes before the end of class really contributes to society.
In law firms they’re the people who think it’s a virtue to working long hours on tedious assignments, and they look down their noses at people who perform in any other way. They think it’s better to happily cancel their plans than to ask if a memo really needs to be in that night, or if it can wait for the following morning. They don’t believe that if your work is done and business hours are over that it might possibly be okay to go home and have a life.
They can’t stand the idea that what they are or what they do isn’t important. I don’t mean in the type of way that most people want to have an impact on the world, to do something that will be remember. They need for their life, right that moment, to be incredibly important and will find any way of convincing themselves that it’s true.
Tools are people who don’t understand that they can walk away from someone trying to pick a fight. Tools laugh too loud, stand up from their seat, or make flailing gestures at comedy shows to let everyone around know they approve of the jokes. Tools have “haters.” Tools have the holy spirit. Tools flock to meaningless titles, elections, and anything with a quantifiable value. Tools order shots of Johnnie Blue loud enough for everyone to hear them do it. Tools need you to know who they’d do, as if it were even option.
I think a tool can be defined as someone who has bought into the myth of their own self. They’ve drunk their own Toolaid.
PL: This is excellent. And the ending is great. I couldn’t agree more, or articulate it any better.
In my experience, the worst part is that The Tool haunts you beyond the office. Have a favorite band/beer/drink/bar/blog/show/barber that you mention in passing to another coworker? The Tool will seize on this and ruin them all for you within a month. Favorite sports team? Favorite LOCAL sports team? The Tool will turn their empty life inside out to demonstrate their affiliation to the point of making you sick at the sight of the team’s uniform.
They are co-branding whores. Social badge junkies with no concept time. They jump on whatever will score them an instant of comradery without considering how it contradicts everything they have said in the past, and disregard how it might limit them in the future. Their only sense of “others” relates to what they need to do to position themselves between everyone else and the boss to tweak an “‘ata boy”. They’re never really put in charge, but never let themselves be reduced to the roll of “labor” on a project.
If I had to pick a character from a movie, The Tool is Doug Neidermeyer… Gunned down by his own troops the instant societal politeness (or a paycheck) is no longer around to keep everyone civil.
This is The Tool (with Hipster sensibilities) sitting no more than six feet from me right now, who came in on his day off to do absolutely nothing. You couldn’t have posted this at a better time. Muchas gracias.
PL: You’re welcome. Though I think Neidermayer might have been more a Dwight Schrute-like freak than a tool. But I guess he could be a hybrid.
The “social brand” thing is a great point, and one I think people involved in social media and corporate society need to pay attention to more than they are. “Integrity” is not a “Personal Brand.” There’s a difference. I have a “Personal Brand” I use to bring in money for myself, but it’s not completely me, and I only use it when absolutely necessary. My default is to be accurate with people. I try to do that as much as possible, and I think that’s the decent way to behave. You only manipulate when you’re around manipulators. If I’m dealing with a person who’s using the Dale Carnegie playbook (it’s obvious), I’ll reluctantly do so. But I’d rather try to be forthright as much as I can. The fixation with being as “marketable” as possible is turning social media into a circle jerk of toothless feel-good cheerleaders trying to one up each other with happy horseshit Tweets about how “Everything is Sunny!” or “We’re in a new paradigm!” because they’re afraid having any sharp opinion might cut off a potential audience. Same obviously goes for the corporate world.
When nobody speaks bluntly, what’s left being said isn’t worth the effort your ears expend processing it. People whine like hell about censorship being inflicted by a government hand. Guess what? We’re letting our own fears of alienating future sources of income do it for us. Look at all the self help drivel in the marketplace. People are obsessed with how to market to one another, and consequently, few people will actually say, bluntly, what they see going on. Keep your insight to yourself, lest you offend the next possible client.
In the most literal sense, a tool gets used. According to the first urban dictionary definition, “One who lacks the mental capacity to know he is being used.” However, since entering the vernacular as a descriptor for people, it has come to take on many sub-meanings. Two main recurring themes occur in any analysis of tools: possessing low self esteem and being a poser. The former likely leads to the latter. Tools lack the confidence, initiative, and individuality to represent their own thought to the world. They either have no good ideas or are afraid to share them.
…or, put another way…
In the context of asshole genus, tools are the species demonstrating a unique combination of sloth, anxiety, and stupidity. That is, when an average asshole pisses you off, he/she is likely motivated by malice and self interest. A tools might piss you off with similar self interest, but their transgressions are more often born from laziness and insecurity. The reason they are so often taken to conformist behavior is a combination of exactly those two factors. Laziness prevents them from developing any worthwhile contribution to society. Insecurity prevents them from contributing any ideas to society, for fear of being shot down.
PL: Damn, this piece is bringing out analyses rendering my musings pedestrian. Nice comment.
I’ll try an example.
I worked with the walking definition of “tool” during the summer after my second year of law school. He turned a simple 50 state survey into a 6 week ordeal in an effort to impress the horrendous wench who assigned it to him. After a few days of him complaining about how hard and huge this project was, my co-workers and I found a Westlaw 50 state survey that would have gotten him 95% of the way there. He wouldn’t use it. He proceeded to complain and let us know how hard he was working for the rest of the summer.
He and one of my non-tool coworkers joined an insurance defense firm after graduation. Despite standard practice at the office and direct insults from the head of their practice group, he wore a suit every day. Including a Saturday. Last I heard, he had sent a sarcastic and insulting e-mail to his secretary describing how she should carry out some task more properly handled by him. She quickly forwarded it on to his boss. I don’t think it’ll be long until I get an e-mail about the firm canning him.
PL: A person who brags about how hard he works immediately flashes “Fool” or “Liar” above his head to me. People who actually work hard don’t talk about it. And people who work too hard usually have to do so because they aren’t working smart.
My question is: Can a Tool be self aware? Can one look in on himself and know that he is both shallow, fake and hated or is it a prerequisite that to be a tool, one must buy into the role completely; totally unaware of the effect on his surroundings.
My belief is what seperates a tool from the other lower forms of 21st Century male rests on the concept that they are completely unaware of their behavior. One can still be an asshole, douchebag, etc. however, there is still a hint that they are aware of their consquences beyond their own universe. I believe that to truely define a tool, it must be one who completely fails to recognize (even when conforted) that his actions (or inactions) have consquences that cause the rest of us to think “Maybe Van Gogh was onto something….”
PL: Yes, with caveats. Every man has know his weaknesses deep down. Right now, somebody is reading this piece and recognizing himself, and people having the capacity to be entirely different entities on different days of the week, some are recognizing moments when they were tools. I know I am. I’ve been one here and there. I look back at some postures I’ve taken during immature or unaware portions of my life and cringe. It’s growing beyond them and spotting the tool that separates you from being a tool. The tool knows what he is on some levels, but he has nothing else, right? I mean, what else is going to be but what he pretends to be? Can’t take a comedic actor and throw him into drama overnight. The tool would have to work mightily to overcome his malady, and he’s not going to do that. His solution will be to never look in the mirror, and assume that to emulate what he’s emulating is just smart career posturing – that if they expect you to be an overt caricature, you need to be one. After he does that for while, he forgets he’s a tool. And so it goes…
I agree with Les, tools are actively trying to *be* something, if that makes sense. They take all these archetypes seriously, they want to be whatever it is they’ve decided to hold up as a goal. That’s why they’re so hard to pin down. A tool banker emulates what they see as a Banker, a tool lawyer a Lawyer, a tool graduate student a Graduate Student. Or, in a social setting, they latch onto identities like Player, Man’s Man, Partier, Intellectual etc. Going from what BL1Y wrote, they’re loud about it because they want you to know what they are (or are trying to be). They need you to confirm it for them, they need feedback, they want to be noticed.
In short, they lack their own identity and all the annoying shit is them trying to create one.
PL: I like this. I’m of the opinion the only tribe ever worth joining is the one that tells you to take the good pieces of every ideology or ethos offered by any group and cobble them together into your own. Lennon started down the right track with “God,” but it all got muddy from there. I think he spent too much time getting loaded with Harry Nilsson, and that fried the remainder of his head. Too bad. Between that and the theme he started with “Imagine” (annoying song, but conceptually great lyrics) he might have had a great concept album about why man’s natural evolution – if he is to evolve to a higher level – is to not believe in any set of rules or roles given to you, but instead to take everything a la carte, with the only baseline being ST. Francis’s old admonition about being Decent.
Someday we’ll get past the bad sides of all the silly ideologies so many will so willingly swallow. Take a few thousand more years, but we’ll grow beyond the need for narratives. Hopefully.
The tool has the ability to make you look like the bad guy.
They somehow, beyond logic, have ingrained themselves to the supervisor, and his supervisor, as a stand up, can do type person. They have to integrate themselves into any type of team-wide project. Usually this is to the detriment of the people who have to do the work.
As in most workplaces, the boss, is probably a nice guy, and does alright managing people, but doesn’t know the nuts and bolts of the operation like the people doing the work. They might make a suggestion of a change that upper management wants, everyone grumbles, but it gets done. The tool is that one sorry motherfucker that adds a suggestion like that where it isn’t needed, but again, due to their ties to the boss, the boss decides to implement it along with everything else you’ve just been assigned to do. And in doing this, the tool becomes tied into this project in an intrusive and unavoidable way, where as had they not opened their mouth, they could be marginalized to minimize the damage they could potentially induce to the project overall.
Most tools, know a tiny bit about everything, and a whole lot about nothing. Usually they have nothing outside of work, or a miserable existence, or they’re henpecked, or have managed to alienate anyone who would be a friend. There’s something where they’ve managed to make a mess of everything not work, so they’re going to do their best to make themselves a shining star at work.
They’re the kind of person who will argue with you even though you’re right. You could have e-mail upon e-mail of proof of what exactly happened, and what was to happen, but the tool operates outside of channels and goes directly to the boss and changes it up, even after the change up was suggested and shot down in the e-mails by the people on the project.
They’re a line jumper in the corporate workplace.
PL: You’ve basically described about 1/2 of litigation associates. The problem is, the other half don’t elbow them in the mouth when they pull the shit you’ve referenced. If we’re to cure ourselves of tools, isn’t it the duty of the decent and non-annoying to box the pricks out of the paint? Few seem to do that, and that needs to change.
Yes, I’m a firm believer that corporate environments should be more openly bare knuckled. If it’s a knife fight, and it often is, have it in the open. Fuck the behind-the-closed-doors lobbying and power plays – let people kill each other in front of everyone… open air “Octagon” style. Secrets and sneakiness ruin morale and invite litigation. I’ve worked around blunt, nasty people, and frankly, I liked them. It’s the political maneuvers who make things annoying. You have to go into their offices and confront them, and then they shrink and lie and the minute you leave they get right back to what they were doing. Rinse, repeat, rinse, repeat again… An endless cycle of time-wasting, slow burn, passive aggressive bullshit.
Two words: Kanye West. Think about all of his prior behavior and public statements that have made him the embarrassing spectacle, rather than respected “rap artist”, he is today.
PL: I can’t say I fully agree, as he might be clinically insane. Some of the shit that guy says evidences a Jesus Complex and paranoia run amuck.
QUOTE: PL: You’ve basically described about 1/2 of litigation associates. The problem is, the other half don’t elbow them in the mouth when they pull the shit you’ve referenced. If we’re to cure ourselves of tools, isn’t it the duty of the decent and non-annoying to box the pricks out of the paint? Few seem to do that, and that needs to change.
Yes, I’m a firm believer that corporate environments should be more openly bare knuckled. If it’s a knife fight, and it often is, have it in the open. Fuck the behind-the-closed-doors lobbying and power plays – let people kill each other in front of everyone… open air “Octagon” style. Secrets and sneakiness ruin morale and invite litigation. I’ve worked around blunt, nasty people, and frankly, I liked them. It’s the political maneuvers who make things annoying. You have to go into their offices and confront them, and then they shrink and lie and the minute you leave they get right back to what they were doing. Rinse, repeat, rinse, repeat again… An endless cycle of time-wasting, slow burn, passive aggressive bullshit.
—————————————————————————–
Corporate America is the one playground where the tool won’t get beat up.
You try to say something directly, for the benefit of the team, and you’re the one who looks like an asshole who’s discontent (to the boss at least), and the rest of the team is glad you said something, but they’re not going to back you for fear of getting lumped in, or on the bad side of the boss.
You have more chance of getting away with being exposed as a coke addict, and you can explain it off, go to treatment, and still have your job waiting for you, but you try to call someone on their bullshit and you’ll be drummed out of the place, or at very least be put in a bad light.
They way the tool is viewed by the boss is that the tool is a model employee. They can’t do any wrong. Then you get the “get to know them” speech. Or worse, the “you could be more like them” shtick.
The question is how to get around it.
I guess you could always buy a bunch of raunchy skin mags and print address labels with the tool’s home address, affix labels to mags, and insert them in the children’s section of the local library.
Or put them in a donation box that’s headed to a local church.
Otherwise, no standard solution exists to combating these guys due to their ties with the boss.
Granted, increasing beatings until morale improves is a great idea, but today nobody wants to take their deserved ass beating like a man. They all want to get the cops involved when they lose.
PL: I’m a strong proponent of making “he asked for it,” “he was running his mouth off” and “everybody agrees he deserved it” defenses to battery charges when a decent person finally has enough and scatters the teeth of a tool who doesn’t know his place.
I’ve punched people in the face many times, and had my ass kicked as well. It’s an experience everybody should go through, from both sides. Teaches humility (guilt where you really fuck a person up) and boundaries (when some guy shakes your brain in front of a bunch of people and reminds you where you are in the pecking order). We need to get back to the days where that was more common.
I think the problem you’re having is trying to make tools their own group. A dick, an asshole, a douchebag — they can all be tools. They see themselves as, and I resent using this term, the alpha-males. Theyre the shit. No questions asked. As the meme suggests, they are used. In seeing themselves as the kingpin they set themselves up for any and everything. They are the ones that buy the highschoolers booze. They like this task because it makes them feel important and essential but they don’t realize they’re being played.
A tool will:
laugh loudly at a joke that’s not funny
continue laughing at the joke once they realize no one else is laughing
flirt with your girlfriend while you’re standing there, knowing he has no chance with her
criticize for the hell of it
give you a ride home while always insisting you pay gas money
never accept the money when you offer it
make awkward conversation because he’s scared of the emptiness in his head
insist everyone watch cartoon porn
defend his addiction to cartoon porn
go to your house to hang out with your mom
And many more…
PL; I’m not sure a dick or an asshole can be a true tool. He can act like a tool or dabble in toolishness, but ultimately, there’s too much actual confidence there for him to fit into the species.
Regarding “alpha” male, agreed. You’d never an actual one use such a ludicrous term. It’s the kind of nonsense lingo PUA freaks favor.
Tribes and ideologies, and your mention of Lennon/man’s evolution reminded me of this essay: http://www.paulgraham.com/identity.html
When we accept labels we let them shape our thinking. If we shed some of the labels we might create something new and worthwhile. Is the tool the reason we’ve become stagnant?
PL: I wish I had a quarter of Paul’s brains. Also, a very nice guy.
the tool sneaks up on you. think back to the first day you met a person you now define as a tool. you may not have consciously disliked them at first, but you certainly grew to. if asked to define why you didn’t like that person, you may have been hard pressed (at first) to enumerate reasons. after reading these discussions, i think that ‘inherent disgust’ could certainly fit everyone’s profile of a tool. you don’t even need a list of qualifiers. you just hate them.
as many other responders have mentioned, they are certainly servile. much of their energy is spent attempting to impress and identify with others.
one specific example i see: the meatheads at the gym that spend literally as much time hitting on chicks as they do lifting. garden variety tool.
PL: The guy who monopolizes the bicep machines… Always cracks me up. First, having huge “pythons” isn’t going to make you a badass. It actually inhibits flexibility, so if you’re trying to look intimidating, a guy who actually knows how to fight will get exactly the opposite impression. He’ll realize he’ll be able to hit you ten times before you can duck him. Second, if you’re doing it to pick up chicks, unless you’re looking for real low rent stuff, you’re wasting your time.
Perhaps it’s just my experience, but tools seem to have a certain look (in the mid-20s to mid-30s demographic, that is). It’s the look of slow decay. Their personality (or lack thereof) has become firmly established, but they have not yet reached the “overweight office drone” look. They have a little bit of a paunch, and their face is too fleshy. Their skin is sallow, and a bit too greasy or sweaty. Even their hair (however much they have left) manages to look unhealthy.
Gym populations bear this out. There is no shortage of assholes, pricks, douchebags, dicks, etc., but tools are usually in short supply.
It’s another manifestation of their lack of control. A self-aware person knows they are trading health for other things. A tool complains that their work takes all their time and keeps them from being healthy. In their eyes, it’s not their fault, it’s that being a Lawyer/Banker/Grad Student is just so much work that they don’t have time for themselves.
Also, to use another set of descriptors, Dwight Schrute is a geek. He is socially awkward and obsessed with unusual hobbies. He is not intelligent enough to be a nerd, but his obsessions and passions keep him from being a dork. There is probably a good overlap in the dork/tool categories.
PL: Kind of like Lutz from 30 Rock. Or the principal in East Bound and Down. He’s a classic tool.
“I’ve punched people in the face many times, and had my ass kicked as well. It’s an experience everybody should go through, from both sides.”
Today’s male is most likely (though maybe not irreversibly) a tool if each of these haven’t been accomplished by early twenties:
-Won a semi-brutal physical fight (particularly violent, one-on-one sports skurmishes can count)
-Embarrassingly lost a semi-brutal physical, public fight (sports don’t count)
-With at least one specific girl, both had sex and learned something thought-provoking and interesting
-Can easily laugh at yourself in any large group
PL: I got kicked in the face once. That’ll teach you boundaries. Guy scrambled my head so bad all I could offer was “No mas.” Another guy sucker punched me to the ground. When I got up and tried to fight back, I realized he was twice my size, and had every intent of beating me to a pulp. I put the hand up and said, “You win.” No shame in knowing your limits. It’s just reality.
To me, the thing that separates the tool from the various subspecies of asshole is that the behavior of the assholes is the act of will. Assholes, for the most part, know they’re assholes, and they like it that way.
Assholes and the subspecies thereof enjoy humiliating others. They find enjoyment in, well, being assholes. That’s why they do it. That’s at the heart of it. Douchebags enjoy the negative attention that their douchebaggery brings. Pricks get off on spreading around petty amounts of misery. They’re the ones picking on the cashiers and waitresses of the world. Dicks are so named because they like fucking you, and take a sense of personal achievement out of it. Scumbags enjoy taking advantage of others in situations where the victim has to take it. The thing about these guys is that these guys all love this shit. Their assholery is a conscious act of will. They mean to do what they do.
A tool is different. Tools don’t always mean to be like they are. Sure, some tools are assholes. No denying that. But most tools don’t mean to irritate seven different kinds of fuck out of you. They don’t mean to turn your day into a minor branch of hell. They’re not trying to spread petty misery around like a disease. He’s scared of something, and toolishness is his response. Maybe he’s insecure and trying to drag everybody down to a level he’s comfortable at. Maybe he’s emulating what he thinks the “cool” guys do in a desperate attempt to be cool as well. Whatever the reason, the tool HAS a reason why he’s doing it. He’s not inflicting pain, misery, and irritation on the world just for the sheer joy in doing so. It’s just an unfortunate side effect, and he may not even realize what he’s doing.
I suppose the short form would be that assholes get off on acting like an asshole, but tools are acting out in the most irritating way possible in response to some social fear.
And that’s part of what makes tools so hard to tolerate. You can write off a prick as being a prick, and at least when a scumbag or a dick fucks you over, there can almost be a type of enjoyment in the rage he inspires. It’s a righteous feeling type of anger, the kind that has you barreling down the highway at 90. But a getting fucked over by a tool just leaves you with that low level feeling of hate that grinds on the soul and leaves you feeling worn out.
PL: Oh yeah… The guy who fucks with waitresses or bartenders, or picks on employees under him, is almost always a tool. The guy in the fraternity who reveled in hazing kids? Huge tool.
A tool is a know-it-all who knows nothing. A poser who wishes he is more than what he is. The tool tries too hard. I agree with Harris’ analysis in that a tool is not to the same level as a douchebag. The tool is harmlessly annoying and pathetic whereas the douchebag is confrontational and over the top, generally leading to harm of some sort. Tools I can deal with, douchebags I despise.
PL: I see your point, but I reach an opposite conclusion. Douchebags can be ignored. Everyone knows they’re douchebags, and universally everyone ignores, and marginalizes them. We’ve all had this conversation with a co-worker at a new job: “What’s up with that loud, obnoxious guy?” “Oh, Bill? He’s a douchebag. Pay him no mind.” The tool, however, can be inoffensive enough at times, or pathetic enough, that no one will ostracize him as roundly as they will the douchebag. That’s one of the more annoying aspects of tools – that often, as much as you loathe them, you feel too sorry for them to let them have it double barrels, between-the-eyes. And that lack of criticism keeps them perpetual tools.
you spelled bill paxton wrong
which category does that fall under?
PL: “Typo.” Thanks.
Tools are the masters of hard, sloggish work that doesn’t need to be done. I knew a toolette back in college (UK, high school senior for yanks) when me and my best mate joined the student government to pad our university applications and build a better life by stealing office supplies.
We got in through lying about what we could/would do in power, slagging off the people we were running against and just a touch of election riggery.
When we did get in, we found most of our promises were unpossible. That meant the only important things were the end of term/half term parties. Everything else was noise.
The staff member assigned to us and the toolette had different priorities. One of their bugbears was the national student union cards we handed out. These things were artefacts, useless items that couldn’t be used as ID and were redundant for claiming discounts. That year the picture had been removed from the front, and you couldn’t even slyly try to create a false ID with one. The only reason so many students were involved was that we had been forced to tell them the cards were super-important when they enroled, and only a quarter bothered to collect them when they were issued.
We got a bunch of blank cards that needed to be filled in with a marker pen, making them even more useless. Staff member and toolette decided we needed to fill them in during our office hours, and more often if possible. When it was me and my best mate’s office hours and we were confronted with filling in a stack of 50 useless cards and dealing with the various window lickers who wandered into our office, it went like this:
ME: Can you be bothered with any of this bollocks?
SLOCO: Bugger all this lark, let’s go into town and get some lunch. Thorntons are handing out free samples. Anyone important enough to contact us knows our phones.
Toolette would have none of this. She not only spent her entire office hours doing these cards, but would come in during free periods and do them then. She’d be outraged that only her and the resident prick could be bothered to do them. Whenever there was a problem with work not being done, she’d go on about how she spent so much time doing all the cards as evidence of her dedication. She managed to raise the bar for what we needed to do without actually being productive.
You barely had to do any work in the association. The important thing was for Sloco to say ‘party’, entertainment to ring up a nightclub, me to send them a cheque and comms to put a bunch of posters up. That was excellent since exams were close and we wanted to get into uni. Toolette tried to make it into a six hours per week unpaid commitment for no other reason than to feel important.
PL: I used to work with an old lawyer who described what you’re citing as the difference between “motion” and “progress.” I worked under him with another associate who had killer billables. He always found “tasks” to complete. Problem was, the tool’s realization sucked because, as the older lawyer used to note when he was cutting time to send bills to clients, that associate was a whole lot of “motion,” minimal “progress.” That might be why law firms tend to collect so many tools. One can survive for a long time creating billable units doing nothing of consequence.
These people litter law firms and corporations all over the country. And they know they haven’t the mental horsepower or desire to do the heavy lifting and decision making that goes along with creating “progress,” so they do everything in their power to protect their jobs by trying too hard to ingratiate themselves to management and talking about all the “work” they’re doing. In so doing, they get in the way and annoy the hell out of people actually trying to reach a result. You wind up sitting at meetings, listening to them blather about what they’re doing and everybody’s thinking, “What a fucking tool.”
But what can we do? Fire them all? How would our social safety nets handle True Corporate Efficiency where the eighty percent of workers doing little and riding the coat tails of the talented/effective twenty percent were terminated?
Rand is right. The majority of society has to be “carried” by the few who can do the serious lifting.
I agree with the consensus that the defining feature of the tool is the obliviousness of the tool to the offending behavior rather than the behavior itself which could usually just as accurately describe the dick/douche/asshole/etc. Although tool behavior does tend to be a little less in your face than the others.
As an example I have a boss who’s a total and complete tool. He’s kind of your stereotypical rabid progressive liberal who despite coming from a quite affluent background likes to consider himself a champion of all things “common man”. However the fact that he pretty much loathes all things common man (beer, guns, football, television, strip clubs, etc.) is completely lost on him. He’s an otherwise nice guy, intelligent, and ridiculously well educated but he seems to think that this complete lack of consistency makes him eccentric or interesting. Nope, that and his condescending attitude pretty much makes people want to avoid and/or choke the life out of him.
I think it’s the inner conflict within yourself that makes the tool that much more soul crushing. You can’t just write them off as fuckwads so you feel kind of guilty for wanting to push them down a flight of stairs but the feeling’s there all the same. You want to hate the tool in the way you hate the dick/douche/asshole/etc. but you can’t because he lacks the intent and that makes the situation positively maddening. It’s kind of like when you’re nice to an outcast kid at school and the kid is so starved for friendship that he/she decides you’re now BFFs. There’s usually a reason underlying the kid’s social issues, that all else equal you want nothing to do with either, but you still empathize with the kid.
PL: Limousine liberals are amusing. Rather than allow him to irritate you, I suggest stringing him along in political discussions. Inevitably, those sorts will start to spout DailyKos-like gibberish. I can listen to that stuff all day. I find the self-righteous and certain fascinating. Hell, it spurred a lot of my desire to write. When I did contingency work, I heard some wild left-wing political rants. “Believers” say some amazing things.
On the third paragraph, astute, and agreed.
PL: But what can we do? Fire them all? How would our social safety nets handle True Corporate Efficiency where the eighty percent of workers doing little and riding the coat tails of the talented/effective twenty percent were terminated?
Rand is right. The majority of society has to be “carried” by the few who can do the serious lifting.
Jack: I think you may be jaded by your experience in law there a little. In my limited experience these tools tend to be fairly rare, but bad enough to create a massive impression of failure. It’s not so much 20% of the people doing 80% of the work as it is 20% of the people creating 80% of the inefficiency and bullshit.
Their effects are so pervasive because although everyone instinctively thinks ‘there’s something wrong with this tool’s idea’ it’s not until a week or two later after a massive shitstorm has been kicked up and the person above is simultaneously infatuated with the tool and wants to remove random individuals for their comparative lack of working ethic that everyone figures out exactly why the whole thing was so stupid. They take advantage of your manic schedual/lack of interest in the issue so you initially pay them little thought. By the time you figure out that they had just initiated another grind producing scheme it’s too late and the damage is done. Everyone is left feeling like they’ve just been hit by a slick conman.
PL: The tool as an unknowing, omnipresent monkeywrench… I can go with that.
By the way, I didn’t mean to imply that 80% of people in offices are tools. Just that 20% of people do the heavy lifting. The remaining 80% is made up of many different types.
“That’s one of the more annoying aspects of tools – that often, as much as you loathe them, you feel too sorry for them to let them have it double barrels, between-the-eyes…”
I think this comment of yours is key to understanding why the tool phenomenon is so aggravating. There’s something pathetic about a tool that triggers the more noble instinct of pity along side those of anger and disgust. This establishes a feedback loop whereby your own sympathy for the tool makes you pissed off at yourself, which makes you hate the tool etc, etc. That’s the hook- you often can’t help but get emotionally invested in someone’s toolishness. Now why does the tool appeal to our finer sentiments? This is where it gets ugly. Perhaps it’s self-recognition, the feeling that “there, but for the grace of God, go I.”
PL: In that sense, the tool exclusively preys on the most decent. A careless sort would think nothing of blasting a tool. The tool learns this quickly, after being blasted, and thus focuses his annoying behaviors on those least likely to call him out on it. One could say this awareness shows intent, which robs the tool of any right to pity or sympathy. But you can never tell if the tool realizes how diabolical his behavior is in that regard, or if it’s just a subconscious survival mechanism. Which takes you back to square one…
I agree with most of the posts here in the sense that a tool is undefinable; a person lacking the character traits of a douche, an asshole, or a cocksucker, all the while inspiring a hatred that is all the more annoying because you can’t put your finger on why that mother fucker is so irritating. But I think being a tool goes beyond merely annoying the piss out of you, it has to do with their upbringing and how they’ve capitalized on it. A very successful person is almost never a tool. Neither is a very poor person or a working class person ever a tool (I went to public school in rural KY so I consider myself an expert on working class). More, a tool is someone who has had life presented in front of him as a open book, an oyster ripe for shucking, and chose instead to spend their time on this earth focusing on the unimportant, the inconsequential, and worse than that let you know on no uncertain terms how important whatever nonsense they’ve chosen to involve themselves in is (I consider people without the advantages I’ve described to be disqualified from the tool talk because typically life doesn’t present people of a certain socioeconomic background with the same advantages I’m talking about). I recently read Malcolm Gladwell’s book “Outliers”, wherein he describes what people like Bill Gates, Steve Jobs, the members of the Beatles, have in common. The long and short of it is that these people, in addition to being very talented, had certain breaks along the way that allowed them to capitalize on their talent and they had the good sense to ride that all the way to the bank. I think the most annoying thing about tools is were they presented with the same breaks that the people in Gladwell’s book not only would they not capitalize on them, but when someone came around shortly thereafter that did take advantage of the system and made a fortune or gained worldwide acclaim, they wouldn’t even recognize that the same opportunities were presented to them, they were just too much of a dodo to realize it, and they’d whine and cry about how unfair life was that some people “get all the breaks”.
PL: I’m a believer in randomness, but I also think it can be surfed to one’s advantage. You’re never painted into a corner in this country. At the very worst, there’s bankruptcy. Few nations are as forgiving of entrepreneurs and dreamers as the United States. Hell, its the ability to fail and try again that made us. The breaks never end. What ends are people’s desires and energy to chase them.
People settle, and that’s totally cool. At a certain point, if things are going okay, it might be time to stop being a seeker, accept that you’re not the next Steve Jobs and embrace your Manager slot at the cracker factory. That’s admirable. But whining that you never had the chance? That’s entitlement thinking, a subconscious belief we ought to have a Handicapper General at the wheel… that we all deserve something simply because we happened to have been conceived by our parents. And just as willingness to try and fail and strike out on your own built this country to what it is, that entitlement thinking is what might just bring us down.
(Think I’m being unduly negative? Read this: http://www.theatlantic.com/doc/print/201003/jobless-america-future ).
I think there’s something to be said for the entitlement mentality being part of the cause of a Tool. I recall my time as a Systems and Networks guy at a company, putting in some effort to get an entirely new network installed and running before the next day of business – I know some people here consider ‘working above and beyond the call of duty’ sad but I defend myself by saying I was paid in liquid overtime.
I remember this one woman in HR who would blunder into other offices, asking people to do work which anyone with half a brain could see was fluff to kill time with, and asking in that infuriating manner whereby she’s already leaving with a nasal “thanks!” before you can even open your mouth to give her two-word advice involving sex and travel.
I can be a prick at times, but I’d gladly be a prick over being a Tool. She tried to make me fiddle with the fonts and margins on a useless memo for her as she was late for a company-paid lunch meeting, but I simply told her, “Daddy’s working. Fuck off.” I think I was just sick of her buzzing around people doing real work like a goddamned mosquito, expecting them to drop everything for her critically important fax, and whether she should use Arial or Times New Roman.
Does an inflated sense of self importance that’s inversely proportional to the amount of work you actually do, combined with the floating around in orbit of actually busy people to look like you’re working make you a Tool, or just a bitch?
PL: HR is a strictly functionary division. Those hired to it are chosen and trained to do the dirty (firing) and dull (administrative dreck) work management doesn’t want to. When androids with basal intellect can be created to replace workers, HR will be the first line of white collar employee to become extinct. Overnight. The myopic attention to the rote and procedural required to work in the area almost requires the hiring of sycophants and pests you describe.
I like the definitions so far, but the hallmark of a tool as I see it is the chameleon like quality they exhibit in shape shifting to attempt to fit whatever situation they are in. Unlike douches and assholes, who bludgeon their way through life in conformity with an internal code borne of bullying and confidence, the tool has to resort to other means to achieve their objectives.
Usually, those objectives are to become VP or something of that nature. It’s the opposite approach of assholes who will say “I deserve to be a VP because I’m the greatest fucker here.” The Tool instead says ‘If I become VP, I’ll be the greatest fucker here.’
They are masters of knowing when and where to change, and have long eschewed the idea that consistency is the path to success. Early in their lives, they typically were passed over. Not because they were disliked, in fact, sometimes to the contrary, but because they’re inconsequential. Such perceptions breed a need to ‘find success’ in order to be whole. They are never ‘who they are’ because ‘who they are’ is so dependent on the situation. If talking to a superior, they are obsequious. When talking to a co-worker, they are courteous, and when talking to an perceived inferior, they are unbearable.
They are men and women for all seasons, but always half a season behind. They didn’t fit in anywhere growing up, so instead of focusing on who they are they try to focus on how to be accepted in every situation. They lack the confidence necessary to be malicious, they are straight opportunists. But whereas assholes and douches act out of self entitlement, the Tool needs the acceptance of others to accept themselves.
I may be restating some other definitions (so I won’t specifically cite here) but the above is how I typically identify, and deal with, a Tool. The best way to deal with a Tool? Don’t. If you’re not a tool yourself, he will identify you and react accordingly. If you have to deal with a Tool, I always pull out my ‘white toast without butter.’ Give them nothing to work off of, like a chameleon, they need a background to work against in order to hide well.
If that background is missing, they can only go ‘white.’
Just my two cents, and great piece PL.
PL: Great line: “When talking to a co-worker, they are courteous, and when talking to an perceived inferior, they are unbearable.”
The measure of a good and decent human – the kind of person you’d want to be around and you’d trust – is how he/she treats people above, below and even with him/her. A solid person with some balls will act the same way to all three groups. You can give criticism to people above and equal to you without burning bridges if you’ve some basic social skill. And you can offer the same to people below you constructively, without being a dick. As long as I live, I’ll never understand what kick a person gets from belittling “captured prey.” What fun is it to pick on the guy who can’t fight back? Isn’t the challenge in finding a way to topple the guy above you, or at least battle an equal? The kind of people who haze employees, frat pledges, or anyone in any hierarchy below them have always struck me as benign variants of the types of creepy kids who’d abuse animals.
The better kick from having power over someone is not using it – knowing you have it, knowing they know you have it, and never using it. Some will say, “How else can you enforce standards on employees?” I say, if you have to abuse workers, you’re a failure. You’ve failed to earn enough respect to cause that employee to work at peak capacity for you.
Before this thread, a tool had to be identified through a process of elimination similar to how ALS is diagnosed by ruling other diseases out. Now there’s been consensus with Red’s hypothesis that all tools are douchebags. So we need to analyze 2 douchebags and differentiate the tool according to this list of agreed-upon traits that are unique to tools. Let’s use Jersey Shore “stars” Mike “The Situation” and Ronnie in the following proposed framework.
1) Tools are being used – The product they’re hawking is usually crap: the internal campaign within the company about its “culture” or maybe they’re promoting the latest movies at the water cooler and on social networking sites as a way to show what they think you perceive as cool. What they are unknowingly promoting changes often because they don’t understand cool is a state of being not shifting with trends. We’ll get to their awareness of this next.
Situation – A total douchebag, but he sometimes is playing up to the cameras. He’s promoting himself to get his own show and his Gym, Tan, Laundry lifestyle. The latter is a bit toolish.
Ronnie – A complete tool. Fauxhawks, meatheads, glitter shirts, “Sammi is the hottest girl in the Shore”… the guy is a fucking shill for everything guido. He’s a shapeshifter – angry, fighting, sad, lonely, loving all in one segment of the show – with no personality. Sammi manipulates him by talking shit and getting into fights. He manipulates her by telling her not to trust other people in the house (his office for the summer).
2) Tools take the archetype to the extreme – Lack of self-awareness and a lack of authenticity leads to the tool’s adaptability. Which trait comes first is arguing the chicken and the egg. The manifestation of those symptoms comes from little feeling of self-worth. They work the most hours every day not because there’s work, but because that’s what they think successful people do. They post that they saw The Hangover for the third time because they think everyone says it’s the funniest movie ever.
The Situation – He’s a guido, but he doesn’t talk about how proud he is to belong. He has too big of an ego to talk about a group and the show would have been different without him.
Ronnie – He looks and acts the most like a guido even though Pauly D’s blowout and nickname should have won running away. JWow called Ronnie “the most down to earth” which fits whatever planet that acne-ridden, cum depository is from. To Les’ point, he narrows an already narrow world – guidoes in Seaside Heights was reduced to him and Sammi. He could have been replaced by any meathead and the show wouldn’t have changed at all. His avatar in the show’s beginning credits was him laughing.
3) Arrogance about their shill skill – Possibly the most grating personality trait. If only it was self-promotion like other douchebags. Instead we deal with a condescending attitude toward others that only a true believer could conjure. This is where we get BL1Y’s “the myth of their own self.” The tool epitomizes the person who not only thinks he is the starring character in the movie about his life, but he is deluded to believe every other character in the drama should be more like him for a climactic ending of total peace and harmony in the world.
Situation – He is not nearly as self-deprecating as he should be. When he got too defensive he was being a tool, but he gave some props to people on the Reunion show when they busted on him as he grows into a more watchable douchebag.
Ronnie – He’s regressing. During the Reunion he tried to get into a rivalry with The Situation and couldn’t even articulate why he was better except how some random slut in the house liked him. Instead of a comeback line when he gets put down, it’s just “yeah whatever, bro” because a taste of his own haterade is petty to him.
4) The sheer hopelessness of their plight – It’s like they don’t know how the world works. This is why we feel sad for them when we are on break from being annoyed by them. They live in the world of office politics because their social lives fall of the cliff within two years of entering the workforce. That’s when their college friends stopped feeling the need to hang out with the tool because they no longer live together in a dorm. The same thing happened to the tool’s high school friends he lost touch with by the second semester.
There was one particular tool I know who cockblocked so many people unintentionally that we just called him The Shield. This tool had a Masters in Communications, but couldn’t figure out why he was always rejected for jobs and never promoted at his current one. He came up in conversation when my friend (who knew him longer) just said, “He has a Masters in Communications and he has no communication skills!” I’m not going to go into the MA in Comm part, but what do you do when someone gets worse at what they are studying to get better at?
Situation – Along with Snooki, he’s going to command the most money at club appearances and may even be given his own show at some point.
Ronnie – He’s Sammi’s boyfriend. There is nothing else noteworthy about him except getting into a bunch of fights. He’s going to be a mope the next season.
And speaking of tools, let’s talk about this guy that watched every episode of Jersey Shore twice and posted about it on some lawyer’s website…
PL: What can you say of the guy who wrote the piece you’re commenting on, then? Fuck it – we’re all closet nerds. Anyone who isn’t isn’t worth knowing.
Nice call on the “I work so hard” thing. Of all the dumb comments a person can offer, it’s top five. The only time it should be used is as a complaint, as in “I fucking hate this. I can’t work another fucking weekend. This is no way to live.” To brag about it is simply absurd. Why would I care? What would you expect me to think as you brag about something like that? Gee, Bob works a lot. I wish I worked as much as Bob. I’d really like to work at something tedious and mind-numbing as much as Bob does. Maybe if I put my nose to the grindstone, I’ll be lucky someday and it’ll get stuck there like Bob’s is, and I can brag about having to go back to work after dinner to make copies like Bob does.
I’m actually thinking, Bob, you’ve already hinted at how much you make in previous conversations, and I’m not a math genius, but the calculation at hand isn’t all that tricky… In fact, it’s simple enough that even on my fourth gin and tonic I’ve figured out that if you’re working as much as you claim you are for the salary you are, you’re getting paid something along the lines of $50 an hour. And that would be all fine and dandy if you were sacrificing the time for the big money you wouldn’t get at other $50 an hour jobs. But you’re not. You’ve got an expensive apartment you never see and an expensive car you never drive and you buy single malts and cigars and I have to ask, Bob… Why didn’t you just pare it down and start an HVAC installation business? Those guys make a similar hourly wage, can own their own business in a few years and have about three weeks more vacation than you do.
Twain’s quote about keeping your mouth shut to avoid appearing a fool applies to discussions about how hard you work tenfold. If it’s your best bragging right, you need to seriously re-evaluate your existence. I’ll say it again: “I’m working so hard” = “I’m not working very smart.” Unless you’re fishing for a person like me to reply with, “Well, congrats on being enough of a dipshit to buy into a factory-worker billable hour circa 1880 business model,” talk about Anything else.
Your last visit to the doctor. Jesus… tell me about that. Even that’s more interesting. “Wellll… I had this sharp pain in my arch… and my podiatrist says it comes from leaning to the left too much. Or maybe the right…” Yes, even that is more interesting. I’ll be thinking, Maybe, just maybe, Bob’s podiatrist is hot… And he’s going to tell me about the prostate exam she gave him. Unlikely, yes. Highly. But one can never tell. I didn’t go to medical school. How should I know modern podiatry standards? Those sort of things can happen, and it’s that hope for surprise that keeps people like me alive and always looking on the bright side.
Tools smile too much. Their defining trait is their lack of a real personality. Instead, they shop around and try to emulate the characteristics of how clever/successful/well-adjusted person should act. And they think that they have figured it out, quite content and impressed with themselves for having it all figured out.
Again, you’re right to note that they aren’t mean or aggressive, which would put them in one of the other categories. Their lack of a personality means that they don’t enjoy anything they do in and of itself, but live off of others’ validation of their artificial character. And if people don’t call them out, because they are too agreeable to confront, then they are confident that the whole rouse has worked.
They constantly have to perform this show to live up to the image that they created, but often they are very happy with themselves for pulling it off.
PL: They aren’t mean or aggressive, but they will knife you in the back. I’ve sat in meetings where partners would rip on an associate to other associates. There was always that one tool who was really into it, chiming in about why the associate being discussed sucked. The tool completely missed the unspoken rule – that the bitch session was for the partner to vent about an associate, not for other associates to do so. The only thing the tool conveyed to the partner was that he had no loyalty to another person he worked with, and was pretty much an amoral cipher who:
1. Desperately wanted to feel powerful; and
2. Would say anything he thought would vault him ahead.
Tools didn’t realize they were creating the ammunition the partners in this bitch session would later use in other bitch sessions about them. “Nobody likes a rat. Keep your mouth shut,” isn’t just a line from Goodfellas. Works everywhere… And the people with whom it doesn’t work? The people who want you to screw over a co-worker or will reward you for saying whatever seems the best political thing at the moment? Those are the last people to whom you want to be hitching your wagon. They’ll hit their Peter Principles soon enough, and when they do, they’ve no one around to catch them, and they fall All The Way Down.
I’m 27 and ‘tool’ has been a part of my vernacular since middle school. Back then, tools were literally tools: they were something to be used. If you hadn’t done your homework, the tool would let you copy it. Or you could use him to indirectly accomplish tasks you knew would land you in hot water, like stealing a copy of the exam off the teachers desk. But the relationship used to be symbiotic; in return for his utility, he got to hang with you. But a grown up tool is a different, far worse animal. They bring absolutely nothing to the table other than bullshit: “Hey bro! I just spent the weekend in Miami with these two hot 20 year olds and they were on my dick like white on rice!” Like hot 20 year olds would double team a 38 year old dude who lives with his parents without being paid for it (this guy is actually real and, swear to god, not only lives at home but just bought a 2007 CLS 550 with 40 thousand miles on it that his dad cosigned for.) Tools are easy to spot but tough assigning specific criteria to. Since I, unfortunately, reside in Tampa, spotting a tool is easy. Pointy shoes? Check. Embroidered collared shirt? Check. Sunglasses indoors? Check check check. Fucking tool.
PL: Florida Tool is indeed an awful breed. Pennsylvania’s a flyover geriatric ward with minimal, if any culture worth lauding, but your state’s brand of idiot? Having spent a good bit of time there, I can’t offer you sympathies effusive enough. I don’t know what it is, but you’ll rarely meet Dumb like you do in Florida. It’s really quite amazing.
Good call on the car, too. A prime ride for species. Just affordable enough that almost anyone can easily grab one, but still exclusive enough to get the average mall rat’s skirt off.
I looked up “tool” in urban dictionary and got this:
One who lacks the mental capacity to know he is being used. A fool. A cretin. Characterized by low intelligence and/or self-steem.
That tool dosen’t even know she’s just using him.
http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=tool
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That’s pretty much what I think of when I hear the word tool. I don’t think of someone who is mean, but rather just dumb. They are a sucker in a con game where no con game exists. They are just a plain sucker. No matter what the situation is, they are butt of the joke, the person who gets short end of the stick, or one left holding the bag.
For example, let’s say you are hitting on a girl and some other guy approaches you, hands you some money, and tells you to order drinks for all three of you. A normal guy would know the man is fucking with you to steal your girl and make you look bad. A tool thinks it’s a good deal because he’s getting a free drink out of it.
PL: That’s why you hand her the money and ask her to pick up the next round. Then ask him whether he’s into MFM. That should clear the prick away quickly.
(One hopes. If he says yes, you’ve got a seriously uncomfortable issue on your hands.)
Scientologists.
PL: Are primarily Hollywood careerists looking to milk the inside handshake the group provides to punch their career up another notch.
The word “tool” describes exactly what they are. These people are unknowingly being used like tools; specifically, they are manipulated by large systems and social institutions. They differ from pawns, who are used by an individual for some clear purpose. Some examples:
Tool: The guy who happily payed several times too much for a t-shirt because that shirt had a popular brand name written in big bold letters across the chest.
Tool: The guy who lives for office politics or his job in general. Because this is his whole world, he believes he can never quit or take vacation without causing disaster. He thinks that everything that happens at work is a big deal, and cannot step outside of that realm. He was also probably sorely overdressed at his job interview.
Tool: Someone who unconsciously plays into a stereotype. For instance, a guy who wears way-too-tight pants because he is a skateboarder, or an inner-city black teenager who says he’s a gangster because that’s what he sees other people doing.
Tools don’t think about why they do things. Therefore, tools are not aware that they are tools. They simply do things because that is what the system urges them to do. They do not step back to see the bigger picture.
PL: Efficiently and very effectively said. Nice.
Hey, Thanks for your review of my story on the attention crash board. If it wasn’t for you, I wouldn’t have bothered trying.
How many more Nuggets ya got left? Such a shame they had to be just that.
PL: I have quite a few still left. There’s never a shortage of incomplete ideas.
Hell, I have a whole book full of crazy, stream of consciousness stuff I wrote when I was supposed to be in class during law school. The nuggets from that are endless.
I didn’t know that was you when I reviewed it. You should keep writing. You have a nice touch and great rhythm to your stuff. It moves, and that’s a big thing with good writing. Few writers can make their shit flow quickly. Keep at it. And thanks for that compliment. That’s among the most genuinely flattering things a person can offer.
Also, if you made a Venn diagram out of “People who are Tools” and “People who enjoy Two and a Half Men”, you’d just end up with a circle. I have personal experience with this.
PL: Charlie Sheen, however, is too sui generis to be a tool.
I am a tool for dropping Latin there. But I can’t find a phrase that fits so well.
I think a common trait among tools is the inability to read other people. A tool doesn’t realize when somebody is uncomfortable or annoyed by his actions. Most normal people recognize when they do or say something to embarrass, annoy, anger, or hurt somebody else. Tools usually fail to realize this, and the only explanation I can think of is a lack of social skills. However, I have to disagree with the theory that tools always act without intent. 90% of the time this is true, but there are times when a tool acts with intent in the completely misguided belief that it will have a desired result.
An example that pops into mind is from a job I had a few years back. The engineer/officer of this small company was a 45 year old tool who was always making sexual comments to the 20 something year old girls in the office. This guy would email these girls links to porn and tell them that his wife wanted to find a young girl to bring into their bedroom. None of the girls wanted to complain because they all believed the guy meant no harm and just didn’t realize what he was doing wasn’t normal. I always thought the guy was just a computer nerd/pervert, but either way he illustrates the tool perfectly. If he didn’t know that what he was saying would freak out women half his age then he’s a tool. If he did know and his purpose was to attempt to get with one of the girls, again a tool. You can be a tool by not realizing how your actions affect other people, but you can also be a tool by believing that your actions will accomplish something when in reality they will produce the opposite result.
On the rare occasion that the tool does realize what he is doing is causing another person discomfort, the tool believes that his actions are justified or at least beneficial to himself. An example of this type of tool is the guy at the bar who tells your girlfriend that she could do better than you. This guy actually believes that he is helping himself by making you look bad and himself look good, but to anyone with a brain it’s clear he is clueless. Usually the same type of guy that thinks money or a nice car is a prerequisite to getting laid. Pretty similar to some of the comments above that mentioned the tools affinity for superficial relationships.
PL: Social malfunction, a form of undiagnosed, malignant autism… Hence, the high percentage of tools one meets in law school and the profession. “I will follow a track, act according to behaviors I believe flesh out the stereotype of the consummate intelligent professional, and in so doing be exactly that. If this somehow conflicts with the social behaviors of those around me, I will nevertheless hew to the caricature. For I know, others will as well, and statistics are on my side, and though the rest of the world may shake its head and laugh, at least in the peculiar hierarchies of What I Do, there will many like me.”
As to the 45 year old, I’d say that’s trending toward douchebag. But to the extent he was laughed off by the women, indicating an insignificant stature (if you’re at all attractive or capable of pulling that threesome off, you could never make those jokes), I see your argument about him being more tool than anything else.
A confession… I actually tried to pick up a girl once by saying, “Him? You can’t be serious” while pointing to her boyfriend at the bar (they were a very lopsided couple). I was very drunk, it was inexcusable and she ripped me a new asshole in front of a bunch of my buddies. The guy tried to pick a fight with me as well, but that came to nothing, as it was a crowded bar and somebody broke things up quickly. After a moment or two of realizing what an absolute dickhead move that had been, and the staggering whiskey tab that caused this aberrant behavior, I was really fucking embarrassed. As were my friends. “Mason” from the book was with me, and being someone of better character than I was then, he let me know (after laughing about the scene) I’d been a huge fucking Tool. So… Nice call.
Haha yea we’ve all been there and had our tool moments, but like you said somewhere before it’s being able to recognize them that separates the normal people from the tools. A real tool would continue to make the same mistake over and over again. Alcohol, especially when young, has that unfortunate side effect of helping to bring on those tool moments.
PL: Perhaps they’re mildly insane… Doing the same thing over and over, expecting a different result.
I wouldn’t say that the tool can’t read people. I would say that he can’t make the leap from “That person is offended/angry/embarrassed” to “That person is offended/angry/embarrassed because of me.”
This is why you will often hear tools say such things as “What the fuck is his problem, anyways?” They don’t know that the problem is them, because they can’t make that connection between their behavior and the reactions of others.
In a way, I suppose you could say that a self-centered viewpoint taken to an extreme is at the root of the tool. They’ve got some sort of social fear driving them, and they’re so focused on that fear that they can’t really see how their behavior is affecting other people.
PL: I don’t know. I think that’s too much credit. If you’ve seen one act in their usual obsequious fashion, you’ve surely spotted the tool’s superior cringing with embarrassment at the tool’s effusive display. Everybody in the room sees the boss demonstrating through body language and reaction an obvious loss of respect for the tool, and disapproval of what the tool’s doing. And yet the tool prattles on, oblivious. That’s a sign a sign of a person who hasn’t the slightest clue.
People who like Tool.
I kid (although that band and their fans certainly do drive me up the wall and send me into horrible elitist rants during whiskey blackouts. I certainly dig my own graves).
Tools are always hard to define and using an example is probably the best way to go since there are so many subsets encountered at different junctures of life, or bars for that matter. As per your last example there will always be some tool using an awful pickup line only to get rebuffed but rather than learn from the experience he’ll brush it off and tell his mates that she was below him or must be a lesbian. Then he’ll try again with the same results.
There are so many more types but my brain is barely functioning thanks to my hangover; doubles of Johnnie Black are an excellent idea at the time but hurt my liver and bank account the next day. Once midday rolls around I will drink again in an effort to shake off the pain.
PL: I’ve nothing against Tool. Any band that toured with Bill Hicks is aces in my book. I have, however, heard about their use of algorithms in writing music more than I need to. It’s neat, no doubt, but there’s something unsettling about quant-like reverence for the breaking down of art to its least romantic components. I’d prefer to think the band zenned their work, or not know at all. We’re probably not too far from a day where quants will write songs based on formulas indicating what hooks are most commercially viable.
And that will be the day I move to Greenland.
The main aspect of a tool to me is that they see things in black and white. They’re the type of person who would never steal music off the internet, or buy scalped tickets, or anything even close to that, solely because it’s illegal. To them a girl either Likes Them, or Doesn’t Like Them, and a girl would have to literally say that for them to see. They have no room for subtlety, no finesse in how they say things. They can never catch implications. And it’s because of that that wherever you go, rest assured, there is a tool getting left with the tab.
As a sidenote, they were also the type of kid in school that would do anything the cool kids told them to do, because they didn’t realize that that would always lead the kids to simply treat him with more contempt.
PL: Reminds me of the Slick Rick classic, “Treat Her Like a Prostitute.” http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6hsOSC6RVhk The more you kowtow to co-workers and bosses’ demands, the less you’ll get in return. Do a good job, but hold your ground and say no to projects here and there, unpredictably, and you’ll keep the office confused, but interested, and thinking they need you. Everybody wants what they can’t have.
If a tool is someone who is unkowingly being annoying, then when you know you’re being annoying (a tool), should it be labeled differently? Perhaps the term “toolbag” would work. I got that term from the book “Hot chicks with douchegags.” So I can’t claim it as my own invention, but combining the bagness of a douche with the temporary toolness of a tool seems the right choice here.
Also, I think that fact that you can admit to having your moments of toolness makes you incapable of every truely being a tool. Maybe you would automatically default to the douche, dick, prick, asshole, category, (however temporary) I don’t know. Is a tool ever capable of knowing his own level of toolness? And if so, does that change his status? Self criticism is healthy at proper levels, and to deny ever having your “moments” might put you in the tool category!
PL: “Aloof” was the criticism I got most in the work world. I guess that’s to be expected, as I was spending most of my time hiding my actual self. You reach a certain point where you realize, The reference I’m about to use – the joke – is probably too obscure, or would be seen as something strange, disturbed. I’ll just keep this shit to myself.
“Ho ho… Yes, that is a pretty zany situation, Ed. I don’t know what I’d do if something like that happened to me in zoning hearing.” Shoot me. Somebody on the roof of an adjoining skyscraper, please, put a sniper round straight through the side of my skull. Because if the rest of my life has to be spent listening to shit like this, the only respectable choice is swan diving off the balcony. And Lord, we all know, I’m far too self centered for suicide.
This is how it looks to me after reading the responses.
A dick or an asshole will bludgeon their way through the world. If things don’t work out the way the dick or asshole would prefer, they try to pound on reality until it does fit them. That’s aggravating and annoying, but who doesn’t want the world to fit them better?
A tool tries to change themselves, to be what they think everyone wants. Not only this, but they’re bad at it. They pick up on the wrong cues and can’t quite figure out who they should be. Their awkward attempt to be an everyman means they don’t have the fluidity of someone who knows who they are and so the tool makes friction wherever they are. Tools slow down the workings of whatever organization they are in trying to validate their own worth. Tools sell out who they are, but never really get enough in return to be a full person.
Another defining characteristic seems to be that tools aren’t very smart. Tools are basically flawed chameleons. That makes it extremely hard to recognize a smart tool- a smart tool would fit in well enough that you wouldn’t realize they aren’t their own person.
PL: That’d be a prick… Just smart enough to know his self loathing’s warranted.
A tool is that guy who visited his old high school for no particular reason other than to talk about how awesome college is, after one semester of community college.
PL: True, but we can’t take that theory too far. I’ve a policy here against harshing on Wooderson: http://www.spike.com/video/wooderson-in-dazed/3109906
I always saw a tool as the upper echelon of narcissism. Like a PERFECT narcissist. Oblivious to all and everything but the world they live in. And they are PERFECTLY unaware of glaring hypocrisies, annoyances, dalliances, incompetency, etc…etc…
I work with the biggest tool in the world. She (and ladies are tools too) infects everything with her toolishness. Nothing gets done or ordered but it’s ‘never her fault’…it ’slipped through the cracks’. She speaks horribly of others, tells on people for doing the same thing she does, wears these airs of christian piety while doing everything but what a bible would teach someone…and can never be approached with it or even remotely criticized…since it’s clearly “our problem”. WOW, i’m getting heated just WRITING about her….such is the power of tools
It’s somehow worse than stupidity. Stupid can be worked with…and in most cases is acknowledged by the individual. “I’m sorry, I don’t understand this section of the report, I’m so stupid!” Toolishness is like herpes…that shit will follow them FOREVER.
An asshole can be successful…even appreciated for certain traits. “Oh that’s Steve, he’s an asshole, but damn if he’s not the best dry waller in the three county region” You may dislike the personality but can appreciate the output
A prick isn’t a person, its a temporary state of being: “Brian stop being a prick, go home and sleep it off” Brian’s a nice guy…he’s just inflicted with ‘prick’. Getting laid fixes that the fastest
PL: To be a narcissist, however, you have to be in love with yourself, which requires a unique self, which disqualifies a tool from every being a true narcissist. Not only is he lacking that, he hates the thin suggestion of one he has and spends his every last calorie of energy trying to transform it into something that obscures it.
One of the only nice things about lawyers is most are nihilists. If I had to suffer the pious, I’d have probably required a candy bowl of Xanax in the desk drawer. No wonder you’re getting exercised just writing about it.
Assholes are often successful, but inevitably, they tend to get whacked. Where many others fade out, the office asshole runs a pretty high trajectory, but he or she is making quiet enemies along the way, and when the flank is exposed for even a second, the victims come like the Senators on Caesar.
I think one can be a constant prick. It’s a guy who’s too effeminate and snippy to be an asshole or a dick, which makes him more annoying than either. Pricks get shitcanned out of offices because nobody likes having them around. Even bosses for whom they do dirty work hate having the little rats on the floor.
Your article got me thinking – granted, I’m just gawking from across the pond on this one, but what’s the deal with guys like Joe Stack, George Sodini, etc.? Tools for whom the burden of cognitive dissonance finally becomes too great to bear and pushes them over the edge? Always seemed to me like the tools – not the pricks, dicks, or assholes – are the ones with the most latent destructive potential.
PL: That’s an interesting view. Certainly, it’s the Casper Milquetoasts who tend to go postal. But I don’t know if those are tools so much as long suffering, abused introverts unable to stand up for themselves except in that one, final violent outburst. The tool can be somewhat introverted, but he’s at least intrusive enough to be noticed. Hence, we know he’s a tool, while the simmering introvert’s barely noticed by anyone until the day he shows up with an automatic rifle.
I like, “A tool’s annoying even when he’s not being a tool to you. It’s more a state of being than any specific behavior,” and, “They live in a really small universe, and they love office politics,” from Harris and Les, though Alex pulled the end game with one word: Chet. He’d subscribe unquestioningly and relentlessly to office politics (leading, not even to an interesting downfall, but a slow, predictable [to everyone but him] irrelevance), and is every bit as annoying to know about as to confront. Despite the irrelevance. Maybe a key to defining a tool is frustration in everyone around him over seeing what he can’t see about himself.
PL: As you and I discussed this at length dozens of times, I can’t say I’m surprised you’d flag an underappreciated essential point on the matter. The tool’s imperviousness is his most annoying angle. It’s like he’s intentionally the exact opposite of anything approaching self-actualized. Like he studies and works to remain only fixated on the surface presentation, and yet still unable to get it right.
I think we’re hard wired to to be repulsed by the tool. It’s a Darwinian thing. Were we in clans living in the woods, we’d recognize him to be a drain on resources and find a way to throw him in a swollen river, or off a cliff.