I received a card through my box telling me a parcel had been left at my local sorting office for me. Not a big deal, but for you US types, basically if the Royal Mail can't deliver something, they'll put a card through your box, you take it to the sorting office, they trade your card for your parcel. Simples.

Now most of the time, they ask me for some sort of identification. Not a problem either, I usually have my work pass on me. I work for a Govt. Agency and the few times I've needed it, it's been accepted by both police, sorting office types, delivery people, you name it. I have never once had it rejected. To put it into context, this pass gets me onto military bases the few times a year I actually have to attend!

So I toddle off to the post office this morning. It's boiling hot, I'm 20 minutes it traffic. I finally arrive and join the queue where our magical scene unfolds.

The lady in front of me hands the sorting office woman her parcel card. When asked for ID, the lady claims she didn't bring any. The sorting office lady said, "Oh it's OK. I've seen you here before!".

It came to my turn. She takes my card and asks for ID. I show her my Govt. pass. She looks at it and says, "No, I need something with your address on it!".

Now, never before have I had to pick up anything from the sorting office which required my address. Neither is it printed on the card, it just states "you must bring a form of identification!" (verbatim). I politely respond that my Govt. ID is acceptable anywhere as well as law enforcement and military installations! In fact, many times, seeing the name printed on my credit card has very often been wholly sufficient. Furthermore, she just let the girl in front of me out without seeing any identification whatsoever! All of this was delivered calmly and in as jovial a manner as I could muster.

So, she point blank refuses and hands me back my card. Fine. Great. So now I have to sit in 20 minutes traffic back, get a household bill and sit in another 20 minutes traffic back. If I didn't need what was waiting for me, I would have let it go for another day, but it's kinda work related.

So I'm back, household bill in hand. She looks at it and says, "Where is the date, it has to be under three months old!". I again stated, "You didn't say anything about it being under three months old and I'm not running backwards and forwards all day."

At this point, she got heated and told me the rules don't just disappear because I can't be bothered to follow them. With that, she threw my paperwork back - literally - out from her counter necessitating me to pick it up off the floor. At that point, I just said, "You know what, I would like to speak to your manager!" After claims that he was on lunch, I just said, "No worries, I will wait over here until he gets back!"

She pissed and moaned for a good 15 minutes, most certainly not calling her manager. I knew very well that she was just trying to get a rise out of me. It seemed she got more and more pissed off when it just wasn't working.

She claimed I was trying to circumvent rules designed to protect me (what two forms of ID not good enough?) She got through serving three more people as I waited patiently.

After serving the third, she turned to me, this time calmly, and said, "Gimme your card then!". I refused and replied, "Sorry I don't want to give you my card, I would just like to speak to your manager!" No way was I letting this bitch off.

By then her colleague had shown up, totally oblivious to the situation. He asked me if I needed some assistance. I asked if he was the manager. On this, she turned straight to him and told him that I was being abusive to post office staff and not to serve me!

Still I kept my cool, I waited and when she got done chewing me out, I turned to the guy and said, "All I would like at this point is to speak to whoever is in charge! Apparently he is on lunch, so I will just wait!" Cue more noises from post office lady, the guy looking a little bewildered.

Finally, some guy shows up and claims he's her supervisor. I show him my parcel card, I show him my Govt. ID which contains my photograph and the household bill which, I didn't notice, was two days over her under three months old deadline. I asked him directly why the parcel card doesn't state that it requires a household bill under three months old as opposed to "some form of Identification!"

As it turns out, my suspicions were correct. This landwhale had decided that she would make up some rules and implement them immediately... because... hamsters? In fact, I have picked up plenty packages simply showing my name printed on my credit card! Apparently this was perfectly acceptable standard operating procedure.

My conversation with manager man was beautifully eclipsed by her yelling over in our direction that my behavior was "unacceptable" at some point. Anytime she would shout, I would just stop speaking, wait for her to finish and then carry on explaining to the guy what I was here to do today and what problems I apparently had with my paperwork.

At this point, she walks over, face covered in tears and yells at me, "You don't come in to a Government Office and start harassing people. That's abuse and it's not acceptable!"... She's escorted out back by bewildered guy, leaving two customers in a line, staring straight at me like I'm a piece of shit. Obviously, I must have been an asshole!

Sadly, manager man has to side with his staff, right? His response was that he was sorry, but it appears an employee had possibly misinterpreted rules, but he cannot accept any hostility towards members of staff and I would have to leave.

I calmly stated that I had done nothing that entire time which was either intimidating or harrassment. Surely the fact that she was inventing and implementing rules on the spot, making me drive back and forth for something I didn't even need, was tantamount to abuse of her position?

Of course, I couldn't prove this. The only people around were me, landwhale and the people going in and out with their parcels who, well, were gone!

In the end I just said, "Well I guess you'll just have to send the parcels back since I'm not getting them today!" I left empty handed. I knew the manager guy was just trying to keep the peace and really didn't need this today and I also knew the tears meant I'd already lost!

Another great lesson on feminism: If you're losing, start crying. Everybody sides with you!

On the drive back, I got to thinking about every female manager I'd ever had. Over the years, I've had I would guess a 70/30 split female to male manager ratio. Some of those roles, I was a team member, a lot of those roles I was either a team leader or manager myself, looking after a team of people and then reporting to someone higher up.

I cannot think of any female manager who wasn't so completely wound up and paranoid, nor could I recall any situation where every single one of those female managers decided to implement some bullshit policy or invent some new idea which, despite being absolutely bullshit, was nothing more than an exercise in showing power.

For example, I looked after a first line service desk for a while. Because I was excellent at reforming the first contact process, as well as improving image across the customer base, I was also given the second line team to manage on top. Enter psycho dragon career lady who seemed to undermine every single process or system I ever tried to implement, simply so she could have her rubber stamp on it. She even went as far to change my simple helpdesk telephone greeting to something so overly complicated and mundane, every single agent would have to repeat it, several times, before the customer on the end of the phone could even understand it!

By contrast, all but one of my male superiors have been an absolute joy to work with. They either see what you're doing is right and leave you the fuck alone, or the few times I've had to be talked to and told to do something differently, the delivery has been cogent, succinct, to the point and usually correct - or if not, reasons listened to and considered properly!

In fact, a lot of those male supervisors were good fun people despite the corporate image, but were useful allies for almost any situation. The women? Not even close. Every single one would automatically engage the bitch shield, like it was a privilege that you got to work along side them every day!

I'm trying not to be labelled the woman-hater here... but fuck... women... just... really should never ever be in charge of anything!

The worst part is, I don't entirely blame women for this. Women are constantly told by society at large that they are "struggling" and "it's a man's world" and "women who get to the top have to fight to get there"... If you tell some cross section of people that shit enough times, they will believe it. And any little avenue of sadism they can enjoy, they will go for it hammer and tongs!

TL/DR: Landwhale tried to implement her own rules at the post office. When explaining she was a dumbass to her manager, she started up the tears and won the day.