You’ve heard of “going postal,” a euphemism for “going crazy” that was coined when several disgruntled postal employees all started firing off weapons at work. Well, now there’s a newer, sadder phenomenon happening. Within the last 18 months, 23 employees of France Telecom, a telecommunications company, have committed suicide. While there’s no other known link between the different employees other than their jobs (France Telecom is a nationwide company, and the employees who killed themselves were not all in the same offices). The Times Online has a fascinating in-depth article with possible theories about what led these civil cervants to take their own lives:
Le travail is the cornerstone of modern France in other ways, too, Baudelot says. “In Italy and Spain, people rely on the family for solidarity. In the UK, there is both a cult of individualism where you are taught to get by on your own and a sort of primal neighbourhood solidarity — in the pub, for instance. France is different. People are taught to get by in groups and it is in the workplace where they seek the solidarity they need. The workplace is the cement of our society.”
The cement, however, is cracking as unemployment and globalisation impose a competitive edge to the world of work. “The violence of the modern economy is the same everywhere. But it is felt much more keenly in France,” says Baudelot. “People sense that social bonds are unravelling and they are disorientated by that.”
The rest is here.
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