A sign of the times

I've just been looking through a website that collects passive aggressive notes: http://www.passiveaggressivenotes.com/. I don't find any of them funny (although some people seem to acknowledge that the situation is petty, and use humour to express themselves), but instead sad indictments of the frustrations that arise when we share space. Offices and student dorms are classic examples since we have little choice over who we share space with. The latter in particular can thrust people from vastly different backgrounds together. In the picture on the right below, is that last part a joke? 

 

Offices in particular propagate a missive culture (where instructions are given in text rather than verbally), making passive aggressive notes an inevitability. I recently met the former CEO of a French company who pretty much outlawed note taking - he wanted someone's word to be binding, and a culture of personal (i.e. face to face) communication.

Contrast these conflict resolution techniques with how we behave to our families/partners. I suspect that very few people leave notes of this sort (exceptions might be parent's leaving notes to teenage children, or new relationships and/or alternative sleeping patterns examples of both below), so hierarchy (or the struggle for hierarchy) seems to be an important influence. My intuition is that note leavers are high-group (in Mary Douglas' system), encompassing both hierarchical (corporations) and egalitarian (dorms) cultures. But should we leave notes to our spouses? For those of us who've survived long distance relationships, there's something special about *the letter*. With emails, SMS text messages and cheaper phone calls the art of crafting love letters is a dying form, one supposes. But there's clearly power and clarity that come from putting thoughts onto the page. It's also fascinating when these informal notes develop into memes (such as signs that read: "unnattended children will be given an espresso and a free puppy"

Are these missives an integral part of human coexistence; a window into embattled souls desperate to be heard, unsure of how to be heard, and thus willing to risk public humiliation by exposing those frustrations in written form? To the extent that the unfolding story, and sequence of repeated notes, becomes quite distressing? Is it a sign of the times, or am I assuming a perennial search for autonomy upon others?

click on photos to enlarge

Comments

[Andrew Mellor]

Alumni of 47 Greenbank Road will remember one particular occasion when I left a note for the returning, drunken masses, and it caused a genuine stir. I'm not surprised; I probably wasn't then, either. But I think note-leaving is a particularly English thing - isn't it representative of repressed anger, repressed self-expression, and, indeed, repressed sexuality?

Many make no bones about the fact that they don't find it easy to have 'emotional' and 'confrontational' conversations with people about problem areas. I'm one. One good aspect of email is that you can approach something like a genuine conversation, taking asides here and there to clear up any potential misunderstandings along the way.

And whilst I'm here - Anthony, I think you owe me a packet of pork scratchings. And next time we meet, could you make sure you're on time? Thnks, A x

[aje]

not only will I be on time, but i could bring along the aforementioned note...

[JRWB]

Andrew, he has files of incriminating documents on all of us. I swear he's waiting for the right moment to start leaking these to the press.

[Brain Howard]

laudableness mileage trout hemichorda gasify adobe domesticity cosymmedian
United Kingdom
http://www.finalbuilder.com/

[ma570zda]

c95t

[ma558zda]

c658t