Bossnapping…Seriously?

Protesting workers at the Scapa factory in France. Photograph: Laurent Cipriana/AP

People are starting to take their boss revenge fantasies way too seriously. 

I read a story yesterday about a poll taken in France where 45% of people polled felt it was ok for workers facing layoffs to take their bosses hostage.  Aside from the obvious downside of having to spend even more time with the boss than normal, the whole illegality of the act, you would think, might be a major deterrent as well.  Not so much for some French workers it seems.  Apparently there’s been a recent rash of what’s now been termed “bossnapping,” in France.  One incident even involved a French billionaire trapped in a taxi for about an hour before riot police came to his rescue.

I’ve never entertained fantasies about kidnapping any of my bosses.  Besides the fact that I am very afraid of prison and try to avoid activities that will land me in one, kidnapping involves a degree of sinister planning and detail for which I have neither the time nor patience.  While I’ve never fantasized about kidnapping, I have had several fantasies that involved me interrupting any one of my bad bosses during one of their ridiculous tirades.  There were times during meetings that I’d get that dazed look in my eyes as any one of a number of asinine ideas erupted from my boss’ mouth. Looking around, I knew that everyone was thinking the same thing that I was, “Please… Shut up and sit-down.”  But of course, none of us ever said it.  Instead I daydreamed about slamming my hands down on the conference table, standing up Norma Rae style, and letting it rip.  My daydream smack-down would start off by me telling him, that we all, without exception, thought that he was the biggest ass going.  Encouraged by my colleagues who had now also risen to their feet, cheering and pumping their fists, I’d let him know that after every one of our meetings, we all got together and asked the same questions “Is he serious? Seriously? No…seriously?”  In my fantasy, by the end of my verbal smack-down, he’d be reduced to a whimpering mess on the floor, cowering in the corner and begging for mercy.  Harsh, I know, but well deserved.  Once he managed to scoop himself up off the floor, I would escort him from the building to the cheers and support of my fellow colleagues.  Even today I get tingly just thinking about it.

Another favorite fantasy involved an especially condescending manager who wore an enormous clip-on ponytail.  Besides calling her My Little Pony behind her back, I’d often imagine myself running up to her during one of her regularly scheduled ‘I’m the boss and don’t you forget it meetings’, snatching the tail off her head and dunking it into the ever present 64 oz. Big Gulp on her desk.  I did neither. And I never delivered on the verbal smack-down.  None of us really ever do.  Reality takes over and we remember that we need our jobs, we don’t want to burn bridges, and of course, we don’t like prison. 

But I guess that’s part of what makes fantasies so fantastic – we can give them any ending we want and they help us make it through another meeting, another day, and another really bad boss.  I hope the rash of bossnappings in France come to an end soon.  It’s one thing to fantasize about getting back at that really bad boss, but it’s another thing entirely to actually hurt or threaten one of them.  I’m a big proponent of making the most of a bad situation by learning as much as you can while you can.  I’d say learning what not to do from your really bad boss will get you much farther in life than a felony kidnapping charge ever will.

Share your really bad boss fantasies in the comment section.

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