Scott Stratten - The Jackass Whisperer

Copyright 2019 by Scott Stratten and Alison Stratten

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted, in any form or by any means, without the prior written consent of the publisher or a licence from The Canadian Copyright Licensing Agency (Access Copyright). For a copyright licence, visit www.accesscopyright.ca or call toll free to 1-800-893-5777.

Cataloguing in publication information is available from Library and Archives Canada.
ISBN 978-1-989025-73-4 (paperback)
ISBN 978-1-989603-11-6 (ebook)

Page Two
www.pagetwo.com

Edited by Amanda Lewis
Cover and interior design by Peter Cocking
Illustrations by Chris Farias, Unicorn Rebellion,
www.theunicornrebellion.com
Printed and bound in Canada by Friesens
Distributed in Canada by Raincoast Books
Distributed in the US and internationally by Publishers Group West, a division of Ingram

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eBook by Bright Wing Books

As you read, we encourage you to keep track of your own Jackassery on paper or on your device. For each example, youll find two possible reactions: the Jackass Reaction ( JR ) that pays the awfulness forward, and the Whisperer Reaction ( WR ) that stops the spread. Each Jackass move youve done (be honest here) gets you 1 point. For each Whisperer Reaction, give yourself -1 point. At the end, check out the last section of the book to see how you did. Share your score with the hashtag #JackassWhisperer. No judgement, of course.

It all began back in 2009. Scott was on the train home after giving a keynote speech in Toronto, and checking Twitter (as one did back in 09) when he read this tweet. To protect the identity of the guilty, well call him Patient Zero.

I deserve a cookie. I just watched five minutes of a video of Scott Stratten speaking and didnt shoot myself in the face.

After reading it a few times, Scott replied: Why the hate?

To which Patient Zero said: Its not hate, just fact. Deal with it.

Heres the thing: With a platform like Twitter, this interaction didnt just happen, it happened with an audience. A ton of other people chimed in, both in public and private messages, telling Scott not to block or ignore the feedback. Kill him with kindness, they advised.

No, said Scott. Im not the Jackass Whisperer. Its not my job to rehabilitate jerks online.

The Jackass Whisperer message became a rallying cry for everyone tired of keyboard commandos and people who use speakerphones in open-plan offices. It has been quoted with credit (amen and hallelujah), misquoted with credit (seriously, what is a Jackbutt Whisperer?), stolen (ugh), printed on socks and mugs, and even included in Bren Browns book Daring Greatly.

At this rate, its going on our tombstones: They died as they lived, surrounded by Jackasses.

So, youre probably asking yourself, what exactly is a Jackass? The original tweet was meant for online trolls and haters, but we realized very quickly it applied to a ton of real-life situations as well. Jackasses are those people who make our lives needlessly harder. They provide unsolicited feedback and begin sentences with phrases like, Just to be brutally honest here... They drive slowly in the fast lane and too quickly in the slow lane, reply all, heat up fish in the microwave at work and share way too much information about their cleanse on Facebook. They live in our homes, work in our offices and shop at our stores.

Jackasses are among us, and we have some bad news for you: if you cant spot the Jackass at the (literally any place on the planet), then the Jackass is you.

And sometimes its us. We realized in writing this book that the person who is constantly complaining about Jackassery may be the Jackass. That was quite the rabbit hole of self-discovery to fall into.

Ten years later, after extensive research, weve come up with a few conclusions. First, there are two sides to just about every Jackasswhat someone does (or doesnt do), and our reaction. Jackassery is like a virusits contagious. And when were wronged, we tend to react with equal irritation. Then we take that frustration and pass it along to the next person we meet. Like the new employee at the drive-thru who messes up our order and spills our coffee while apologizing for being in training.

Second, in the face of inevitable Jackasses, preparation is our ally. Is the lineup always super long at the airport? Maybe show up a bit earlier. Is the waiter at your favorite restaurant always rude to you? Complain. Not online, but to the actual human manager, or find a new favorite restaurant. Most of us are irritated by occurrences that are common to us, so pay attention to what gets you ranting and see if you can prevent, or at least ease, the situation.

Third, we are all the Jackass. Weve all done these things, and weve had almost all of them done to us and reacted badly. No one started it, no matter how many times that excuse got your little brother out of trouble. Own your treatment of others, own your reaction when meeting a Jackass and own the way you carry the experience forward.

Look, we know the person who cut you off isnt leading a fascist regime. We know they arent murderers or racists. We know that in writing this book, we arent solving world hunger or bringing down the patriarchy. So, before you tweet or post about how petty we are, remember this: if we could all just get along better and stop spreading the Jackassery around, wed have a whole lot more time and energy to solve the big problems.

Writing this book has been a kind of therapy, and its taught us an important lesson: we were the Jackass Whisperers after all. So, grab your cape and unitard, because we superheroes have a lot of work to do.

It had all the makings of a perfect night: Bob Dylan, third-row seats at the historic Beacon Theatre in New York City, and us.

In rare friendly form, Alison was chatting politely to the couple beside her, as a woman made her way to the seat on Scotts left. Well call her Arugula, so as not to publicly shame her and because we didnt exactly want to exchange names and keep in touch after the show, as youll soon see.

Also, because when Scott speaks of her, he makes the same face as when Alison tries to get him to eat Arugula (the green).

Before sitting down, Arugula (the person) threw her coat over the seatback of the person in front of her. When that seat was then taken by another concertgoer, Arugula began to mumble complaints to Scott, about how he was wrinkling her coat and how damn tall he was and why would anyone sit so close to the stage when theyre that tall and so on. Now, he was probably about five foot nine, and how she expected him not to wrinkle a coat that was on the back of his own seat, we will never understand. She punctuated the grumbles with can you believe this guy? looks until she announced she was off to find an employee with a booster seat, without even the slightest regard for the crapalanche of Jackassery shed be creating behind her. When she returned, she was even angrier because the venue, for adults, in the evening, wasnt providing boosters to adults.

Arugula was a gum chewer and chomped loudly throughout. With her mouth open.

After a few more complaints, she tossed the gum onto the floor and proceeded to whip out a room-temperature cheese string from her purse, a snack for toddlers that smelled so bad we hoped it wouldnt distract Dylan from his performance.