Everyone in Montana Should Work This Job at Least Once

I keep hearing some sad stories around Billings about people being ruthlessly cruel to fast-food employees.  

A lot of the time the fast-food workers are young teenagers who are working a job to afford their car insurance every month. Sometimes they’re fully grown adults. Maybe they’re helping their parents with rent because times are tough.  Maybe they're in crippling debt and needed a second job. 

The reality is that we never really know what people are going through, right?

We don’t know if someone’s mom just passed away, or if they are battling cancer- whatever the life problem is, we never know what’s going on in peoples’ lives. This means living kindly should be a given. But it’s not.  

Many people are so quick to anger when it comes to food service employees. 

 Just the other day a woman posted on a Billings Facebook group about her teenage daughter being screamed at, “F**K YOU!” The person was upset that the food took a bit longer in the drive-thru and sped off after cussing her out.  

Here’s the deal, I believe everyone should work in a restaurant setting. This could mean bartenders, food servers, hosts, anyone who works for tips/ lower wages. We keep seeing "HELP WANTED" all over town at fast food places, but people don't want to work in this setting.

Anyone in a fast-food setting knows it’s not a glamourous job, but working in this setting truly builds character. You learn to talk to people, you learn how to multi-task, you learn to be kind to hungry people, and you learn to try your best every day. I was a server for 7 years; it's hard work. 

It should be a requirement for any job later in life to have a food setting on the resume.  

Please don’t be a butthead to these people working. Just because someone has a bad day doesn’t mean they get to take it out on employees. Ever. This goes for any job in the world. A little compassion goes a long way.