Oy veh!

[Gary Freedman]

I used to work at a law firm in DC. An employee, who worked in a cubicle next to me, talked about her July telephone bill one day. She kept saying: "Ju-ly. Ju-ly." I complained to the firm's managers that it was an instance of anti-Semitism: that the employee's statement could be interpreted as "Jew lie, Jew lie." I added that around that time the same employee had been saying, "liar, liar, pants on fire" and that she had entered a room saying, "oy veh." (The employee was African American). The firm concluded that my interpretation was a sign of severe mental illness ("ideas of reference"), and fired me. I applied for Social Security Disability benefits on the basis of the firm's determination that I was mentally ill because I looked for hidden meanings in coworkers' statements.

Looking for hidden meanings in people's statements, looking for meanings beyond the manifest meaning, can get you certified insane. Oy veh!

So now I live on $20,000 per year of government benefits. It's all tax free, so it's equivalent to a $30,000 per year job. That's not bad for doing nothing all day. I've been getting benefits since 1991. It's a case of your tax dollars at work. Thank you America! And it's all because I interpreted the word "July" as "Jew lie."