The fine art of complain • 1ng

Complaining works as a kind of soothing balm to frazzled nen,es I: absorbs our wor Des, our woes, our anxieties and the thousand natural shocks that Aesh is heir to.

And what better way to complain than the feedback forms that organisations use to assess customer satisfaction.

These assessment sheets bomba rd the hapless consamer at every nun. From shopping centres to video stores, lecture halls and used car shows, we are finally being asked what we th.ink. Questionnaires have suddenly become a necessity for corporations who have suddenly clued on co the fact that listening to and addressing customer concerns can actually improve profits.

1 for one am a b ig fan of these assessment sheets and fill them out with a meticulous zeal and solemn gravity, weighing each response carefully like a guru issuing prophetic wisdoms

These forms pander to the selfimportance that exists in all of us. It is a nan1ral law of the universe that as soon as any regular Joe is asked for their opinion, they become a self -proclaimed expert swaggering forth with all sorts of gems.

For example recently m y local supermarket revan1ped its lairout w ith flashy colours and rearranged aisles.

No doubt some ingenious marketing hack in accounting bad bloodlessly deduced (a fter careful study of the ps ychological make-up of us 'conswners ') iliat somehow swapping cat food in Aisle 3 and bread in A.isle 2 and drowning the store in a horrid blood red colour would somehow cough up more pennies for the corporate coffers.

Tb.is method of seducing us to buy more only succeeded however in rormenting th.is customer, forcing me to navigate frightening new terrain after having just figured out where tl1e stationary and hosiery were after the last revamp.

Needless to say I was incensed, and vented m y frustration on ilie assessment form with gusto that no doubt some poor sod in a customer service centre somewhere is still deciphering. Ir went something along the lines of 'Bright colours are infantile and abrasive,' 'Ais le 3 pad<aged goods inconvenient and clumsy,' 'Fruit ais les too big and ove1whelming causing customer co ponder on the boundless and amorphous nan1re of existence, prm7oking existential angst and general despair causing said customer to lash ouc at shiny tomatoes'

1 must say thm1gh, venting has a brilliantly cleansing feeling, like purgatory or confession.

And tlrns to the heart of my diatribe l'v[y personal homage to tb.is brilliant shock absorber - tl1e assessment form. l say, thanl< you m y friend, for being there to chart the discontent of our lives From faulty plumbing, shopping centre revamps, annoying cOJnmercials, wu.nspiring fads, banal celebrities and the hazard s and perils of public transport. You were tbere through it all.

Sure you came from humble beginnings. A grumb le there, a note here. But gradually you rose. Steadily gaining speed on the backs of whingers and complainers everywhere. You spoke to that deep visceral need in everyone - to have 01u complaints acknowledged, appreciated, accepted.

You took the place of the sympatl1eric friend, the halfliste11.i.ng partner. You did not judge or condemn, you me re ly listened.

Yes, you bring out the little old granny .in all of us. That dark, complaining, annoying side wh ich sees disturbance and righteous indignation at every possibl e bwnan error and irritation.

But tl1ankfully you allowed us to purge d1ese dark and ab ysmal thoughts. To g ive a fonun from which our co!Jective consciousness could rid itself of the hundred shocks and injusrices of modern life. You made complaining fun, necessar)~ compulsor y almost.

Rising from the ashes of irre levance, a certain cachet began to be attached co you. Sudd enly customer satisfaction became all the rage. Hotlines and focus groups popped up everY'vhere.

Yo u gave complaining a competitive edge, made it an art to be striven for. A cerr.'lin g lamour infected the age-o ld tradition. Now not only was content important - a certain style was required. There was a race to be the most terrib ly inj ured, outraged and insulted. To be the most gri eved, in t he most Flagrantly woe -is -me, helpless romanticheroine style manner.

You created hierarchies i n tl1e complainants' code of conduct. The bitter edge that was the raison d'etre of every true b lue complainant started to disappear. Instead posers started coming in, imposters with the flair and style, but lad,ing in that essential venom count.

Instead of baleful treatises on the ti.1tility of life and the humru1 condition in gene ral, d1eirs was only semi-wistful nostalgic tracts artfully requesting or gently seeking a re-evaluation of th ings as they were - more politeness please, more civili ty in public Ii fe, let's a!J be good citizens and live harmo niousl y toge t her so all our problems miraculously disappear. othin g or no one is sacred a n d immune from our scr utinising glare - full of evaluatio n and judgment.

The power of the complaint began to be diluted. Political correctness began to infi l trate tl1e complainer's words wateri n g down d1e pointed whinge to a pitiful whimper.

The true complainan t never pleads, never compronuses, never asks ohh so gently for things to change We are not revolutionaries, in fact we are counter-revolutionar ies. Our purpose is to remain in constant opposition. We truly !mow tbat life is a never-ending str uggle against tbe 'blows an d arrows of o utrageous fornme'. W/e shall continue to fight, to complain, to whinge lf we lived in a veritabl e uropia, we should find a flaw, a tragi c error in the perfection of thin gs.

We work against silence, our style i s bombastic, lacking in subtlety and full of contradiction s.

We ar e tbe complainers.

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