Office antics abound in the CSU Bakersfield Culture of Silence - By N.L. Belardes

She walked into the president’s office with a tape recorder. There was a university reporter too. I won’t say the year. The president began spouting answers. He admitted that he wanted to turn CSU_ into a Latino university, that he wanted the entire 4th floor of the university library to be his offices. He admitted his favoritism to Latinos. All while the tape recorder was running. Then he said, “That was all off the record.” And then he demanded the tape. “I’ll have to take that,” he said. There was an argument. The reporter and his helper refused. Why had he said what he said knowing full well a recorder was running? And then the president said, “If you don’t hand over the recorder I will have you both expelled from the University. I can have that done.”

And so they handed over the recorder. (True story, though I won't say which campus)

It was an office moment worthy of television…

One of the most popular shows on television is The Office. You get to hear all the gossip—watch it unfold, really. And you get to see characters whisper fears of their boss, have crazy relationships, all behind the scenes, as not all the characters know what’s going on with everyone else.

Don’t worry. It’s just television.

But what about the office gossip where you work?

Cubicle Dweller tells her tales every so often about Bakersfield office life. I even have a book titled Cubicles that I think would be a smash hit. Why? It’s about office antics, office romance, office craziness... Even Matildakay rants about her office in her “Invasion of the management consultants” and “Valley of the Crows” blogs.

Yet there’s more to real life Bakersfield office gossip than just what you can find in the excerpts from my book, Matildakay and Cubicle Dweller’s rants on office interaction. Believe it or not, there’s a lot of Bakersfield university office gossip. And it’s all documented in a blog titled, The CSUB Voice.

But who is the voice? A collection of office ranters? A selected few intra-office haters? Faculty? Staff? Professors with a vengeance? Haters of the administration? Disgruntled pen pushers?

You get a lot of gossip in the CSUB blog, and it’s all public information. And it’s hilarious. Oh for the less ambiguous stories though. Much of it is told to protect people in their various positions and offices, so you don’t always get the juicy details. But if you start reading, especially in the "Culture of Silence" blog, and ensuing comments, you will get more than you bargained for. Think higher education is about educating the students? Think again…

Read the comments about racism, sports over the deep end, Division 1 blues, overpaid administrators, Arciniega vs. Mitchell, executive assistants with big hair and too much lipstick, office talk gone haywire, name calling, political naysaying, incompetent leadership, and my favorite overblown stories of a university with a graphics department that doesn’t want a graphics department, oh, and the infamous flying blue pen!

I now present you all with CSUB's disgruntled office voices in the "Culture of Silence"…
*Note: Don't think all the comments are from 2005. They're not.

This entry was posted by N.L. Belardes, on Tuesday, November 14, 2006. You can leave your response.