
English: 
Hey y’all. AlkiHistoriker here. Today we
are going to take a break from relevant labor
history and talk about the experience of a
warehouseman, specifically me. For a brief
period of time in the winter of 2017, I used
to work in the food warehouse of an NBA and
needless to say it was one of the worst job
experiences I’ve ever had, so much so that
it was one of the biggest influences on me becoming
an anarchist. While I won’t mention which
team I worked for, I do want to talk about
my experiences there and the effect it had
on me.
Let me first explain: I hate working with
food. Mainly because of the sausage principle,
but also because working in a food warehouse
comes with a bunch of downsides as I’ll
explain in a moment.
But before that, let’s talk about the positives.
The biggest positive was watching basketball
players practice for upcoming games (ones
they usually lost), watching games at court
level even if it was from 50 feet away, and
often working close to celebrities. Most people
will never have Jay-Z walk past them at their
job or serve Cee-Lo Green drinks. More often
than not, I got to see the best player on

English: 
Hey y’all. AlkiHistoriker here. Today we
are going to take a break from relevant labor
history and talk about the experience of a
warehouseman, specifically me. For a brief
period of time in the winter of 2017, I used
to work in the food warehouse of an NBA and
needless to say it was one of the worst job
experiences I’ve ever had, so much so that
it one of the biggest influences on me becoming
an anarchist. While I won’t mention which
team I worked for, I do want to talk about
my experiences there and the effect it had
on me.
Let me first explain: I hate working with
food, mainly because of the sausage principle,
but also because working in a food warehouse
comes with a bunch of downsides as I’ll
explain in a moment.
But before that, let’s talk about the positives.
The biggest positive was watching basketball
players practice for upcoming games (ones
they usually lost), watching games at court
level even if it was from 50 feet away, and
often working close to celebrities. Most people
will never have Jay-Z walk past them at their
job or serve Cee-Lo Green drinks. More often
than not, I got to see the best player on

English: 
our team, who would actually give a lowly
peasant like me a nod. I’m glad he’s with
a better team now. Some other pros were getting
free lunch everyday, which usually was pretty
well made even if it was sometimes just hot
dogs. And that was about it.
The rest of the job varied from okay to downright
awful. Let me take you on a quick journey
of how we got the stadium food from the truck
to your mouth. First, the food was delivered
to us by a food distributor. Our main food
distributors was okay, thankfully not one
of the worst ones though occasionally we would
receive pallets that weren’t built correctly
and would fall over. Because we often had
multiple events a week, everyday we got about
2-3 deliveries. Putting away and rotating
frozen food was always among the worst tasks
for me, because I hate working in cold environments
and freezers mess with my eczema, to the point
where I needed to use a special cream to keep
my skin from getting irritated. Taking care
of alcohol deliveries was a pain, as it involved
a bunch of heavy lifting especially on the
occasion when we had to deal with kegs. Moving
several 160 lbs. Kegs on a cart and then lifting
them even just 6 inches into the freezer was
probably the hardest part of the job for me,

English: 
our team, who would actually give a lowly
peasant like me a nod. I’m glad he’s with
a better team now. Some other pros were getting
free lunch everyday, which usually was pretty
well made even if it was sometimes just hot
dogs. And that was about it.
The rest of the job varied from okay to downright
awful. Let me take you on a quick journey
of how we got the stadium food from the truck
to your mouth. First, the food was delivered
to us by a food distributor. Our main food
distributors was okay, thankfully not one
of the worst ones though occasionally we would
receive pallets that weren’t built correctly
and would fall over. Because we often had
multiple events a week, everyday we got about
2-3 deliveries. Putting away and rotating
frozen food was always among the worst tasks
for me because I hate working in cold environments
and freezers mess with my eczema, to the point
where I needed to use a special cream to keep
my skin from getting irritated. Taking care
of alcohol deliveries was a pain, as it involved
a bunch of heavy lifting especially on the
occasion when we had to deal with kegs. Moving
several 160 lbs. Kegs on a cart and then lifting
them even just 6 inches into the freezer was
probably the hardest part of the job for me,

English: 
as it always left my muscles stinging.
After all deliveries were handled, I spent
the rest of the time filling orders for the
various stands within the stadium. A supervisor
would build these orders on a cart, often
stacking product six feet high, then I would
have to push one cart and pull another to
their stands and unload them. If you have
ever been to a basketball stadium, then you
are familiar with how big they are. Now imagine
pushing one cart and pulling another, each
weighing nearly a couple of hundred pounds
throughout the entire complex. More often
than not, my supervisors would throw the carts
together improperly and on more than one occasion,
I dropped large jars of pickles on the floor.
In fact, you can actually still see the pickle
stains at the stadium today as of 2020. The
stands handled everything else on event days,
though if they ran out of food or a keg needed
to be changed, I would have to make deliveries
snaking my way through thousands of drunk
buzzing fans with a small rickety cart. By
the way, as most of you know, never buy food
or drinks at a sporting event because they
are ripping you off. Thing is, you probably
don’t realize how bad they are ripping you

English: 
as it always left my muscles stinging.
After all deliveries were handled, I spent
the rest of the time filling orders for the
various stands within the stadium. A supervisor
would build these orders on a cart, often
stacking product six feet high, then I would
have to push one cart and pull another to
their stands and unload them. If you have
ever been to a basketball stadium, then you
are familiar with how big they are. Now imagine
pushing one cart and pulling another, each
weighing nearly a couple of hundred pounds,
throughout the entire complex. More often
than not, my supervisors would throw the carts
together improperly and on more than one occasion,
I dropped large jars of pickles on the floor.
In fact, you can actually still see the pickle
stains at the stadium today as of 2020. The
stands handled everything else on event days,
though if they ran out of food or a keg needed
to be changed, I would have to make deliveries
snaking my way through thousands of drunk
buzzing fans with a small rickety cart. By
the way, as most of you know, never buy food
or drinks at a sporting event because they
are ripping you off. Thing is, you probably
don’t realize how bad they are ripping you

English: 
off. A burger there cost $10.75, the price
being conveniently left off the website so
you don't eat before hand. This doesn’t
include fries or a drink mind you, just the
burger itself. McDonald’s only charges you
$5 and some change for a burger, fries, and
drink which tastes better than the bland mushy
stadium burger. Alcoholic beverages are even
worse. You’ll pay $15 for a 25 oz. can of
beer that costs maybe $2.00 at a convenience
store, that costs us less than $1.00. Considering
that food prices were the biggest complaint
we received, perhaps one day sports fans and
gamers alike will understand how capitalism
ruins their favorite past time. Anyway, despite
how physically difficult the job was, that
wasn’t really what made me hate the job.
Compared to the positives, these negatives
weren’t too bad for me and often I could
finish the job rather quickly and got to go
home early so I could beat rush hour traffic.
No, the two things that made me hate the job
were the awful pay and management.
The Pay was not great. I made $10 an hour there, which was
more than my state’s minimum wage and about

English: 
off. A burger there cost $10.75, the price
being conveniently left off the website so
you don't eat before hand. This doesn’t
include fries or a drink mind you, just the
burger itself. McDonald’s only charges you
$5 and some change for a burger, fries, and
drink which tastes better than the bland mushy
stadium burger. Alcoholic beverages are even
worse. You’ll pay $15 for a 25 oz. can of
beer that costs maybe $2.00 at a convenience
store, that costs us less than $1.00. Considering
that food prices were the biggest complaint
we received, perhaps one day sports fans and
gamers alike will understand how capitalism
ruins their favorite past time. Anyway, despite
how physically difficult the job was, that
wasn’t really what made me hate the job.
Compared to the positives, these negatives
weren’t too bad for me and often I could
finish the job rather quickly and got to go
home early so I could beat rush hour traffic.
No, the two things that made me hate the job
were the awful pay and management.
The Pay. I made $10 an hour there, which was
more than my state’s minimum wage and about

English: 
average considering that most of the food
warehouse jobs I saw at the time paid that
much. However, when you take into account
that parking was roughly $10 a day, you technically
don’t earn anything for your first hour
of work. The first hour there you basically
worked for free. Also, on average I worked
34-37 hours a week 6-7 days a week, meaning
that $60-70 of my income went towards parking
every week. Often, my supervisors, who made
$14.00 an hour wanted to complete the job
as quickly as possible, in roughly about 5
hours. I always tried to take my as much as
possible because working so few hours would
have made it impossible for me to afford anything.
In fact, I didn’t make enough money there
to really afford rent. The insultingly low
wages for the physically demanding workload
showed just how little respect anyone above
me had for the rank and file worker and this
leads me to the worst part of the job. I'm an
anarchist, so naturally we gotta talk about hierarchy.
The management was by far the worst. When
it came to the stadium’s hierarchical structure,

English: 
average considering that most of the food
warehouse jobs I saw at the time paid that
much. However, when you take into account
that parking was roughly $10 a day, you technically
don’t earn anything for your first hour
of work. The first hour there you basically
worked for free. Also, on average I worked
34-37 hours a week 6-7 days a week, meaning
that $60-70 of my income went towards parking
every week. Often, my supervisors, who made
$14.00 an hour wanted to complete the job
as quickly as possible, in roughly about 5
hours. I always tried to take my as much as
possible because working so few hours would
have made it impossible for me to afford anything.
In fact, I didn’t make enough money there
to really afford rent. The insultingly low
wages for the physically demanding workload
showed just how little respect anyone above
me had for the rank and file worker and this
leads me to the worst part of the job.
The management was the worst, by far. When
it came to the stadium’s hierarchical structure,

English: 
at the top you naturally had the executives
within the team itself. These were the people
who you were to never approach, unless they
spoke to you first. Most of them avoided all
contact with anyone who wasn’t an executive
or an executive assistant. This went as far
as avoiding eye contact with us and purposely
taking inconvenient routes to avoid having
to walk near us, even on the days where the
public weren't present. Many would in fact
walk an extra 80 feet just to not have to
use the same elevator as us and would have
their assistants bring them lunch from the
kitchen. As a result, I didn’t see them
much and honestly their jobs are still a mystery
to me.
Below the executives were the handful of people
whose job it was to uphold the team’s image
and by extension, make sure that the rank
in file workers of the food catering company,
the cleaning company, etc. were doing their
jobs professionally and making the team look
good. typically called them the “Demagogues”.
They were basically a third boss, but they
had more authority than your manager or even
the Director of Operations within my company.
What did they do with authority you ask? Well,
they mainly just walked the halls inspecting

English: 
at the top you naturally had the executives
within the team itself. These were the people
who you were to never approach, unless they
spoke to you first. Most of them avoided all
contact with anyone who wasn’t an executive
or an executive assistant. This went as far
as avoiding eye contact with us and purposely
taking inconvenient routes to avoid having
to walk near us, even on the days when the
public weren't present. Many would in fact
walk an extra 80 feet just to not have to
use the same elevator as us and would have
their assistants bring them lunch from the
kitchen. As a result, I didn’t see them
much and honestly their jobs are still a mystery
to me.
Below the executives were the handful of people
whose job it was to uphold the team’s image
and by extension, make sure that the rank
in file workers of the food catering company,
the cleaning company, etc. were doing their
jobs professionally and making the team look
good. Typically called them the “Demagogues”.
They were basically a third boss, but they
had more authority than my manager or even
the Director of Operations within my company.
What did they do with authority you ask? Well,
they mainly just walked the halls inspecting

English: 
our work, like our supervisors were already
doing, but these people hold you to a much
higher standard. However for them, appearance
was more important than function. As long
as the operation looked good, it wasn’t
a big deal if something was inefficient. These
people paid so much attention to outward appearance
that they tried to ban us from wearing jackets
because they did not have the team’s logo
on them. We often worked in freezers for extended
periods of time and outside in 30 degree weather,
and they actually tried to ban us from using
jackets. Eventually they “compromised”
with us by forcing us to buy jackets with
logos on them. I was supposed to return these
things according to the rules, but since I
paid for them, I decided to keep them. They
were also our “spirit leaders” or in non-corporate
speak, it was their job to inspire us to do
our jobs to the best of our ability. The main
way they did that was by talking about how
the team’s majority owner was a well-respected
celebrity and that it was a privilege to work
for him. They encouraged us to work in a way
that would impress this person, despite the
fact that this person doesn’t actually attend

English: 
our work, like our supervisors were already
doing, but these people would hold us to a much
higher standard. However for them, appearance
was more important than function. As long
as the operation looked good, it wasn’t
a big deal if something was inefficient. These
people paid so much attention to outward appearance
that they tried to ban us from wearing jackets
because they did not have the team’s logo
on them. We often worked in freezers for extended
periods of time and outside in 30 degree weather,
and they actually tried to ban us from using
jackets. Eventually they “compromised”
with us by forcing us to buy jackets with
logos on them. I was supposed to return these
jackets according to the rules, but since I
paid for them, I decided to keep them. They
were also our “spirit leaders” or in non-corporate
speak, it was their job to inspire us to do
our jobs to the best of our ability. The main
way they did that was by talking about how
the team’s majority owner was a well-respected
celebrity and that it was a privilege to work
for him. They encouraged us to work in a way
that would impress this person, despite the
fact that this person doesn’t actually attended

English: 
the games.
Below them was security and HR, who naturally
enforced the rules of the stadium and patrolled
the halls to ensure that no one was in any
of the restricted areas. Security, however,
took this a step further than their job description
by often “checking up” on workers, stopping
us and asking what we were doing and why we
were entering certain parts of the stadium,
even to people who had been there for several
years. I got these little “check ups”
for weeks until I started giving some of the
security officers free drinks, after which
point they started leaving me alone. NBA refs
also had their own security and one of their
security officials once actually told me not
to walk past the refs because it was “rude”,
but I just ignored her kept on walking. By
that point, I didn’t really care if I kicked
the hive. Funnily enough, I never got into
any trouble for that despite that disrespecting
NBA officials was a major offense. HR, while
necessary to maintaining a healthy workplace,
did not enforce the rules equally across the
entire stadium. Complaints against workers

English: 
 games.
Below them was security and HR, who naturally
enforced the rules of the stadium and patrolled
the halls to ensure that no one was in any
of the restricted areas. Security, however,
took this a step further than their job description
by often “checking up” on workers: stopping
us and asking what we were doing and why we
were entering certain parts of the stadium,
even to people who had been there for several
years. I got these little “check ups”
for weeks until I started giving some of the
security officers free drinks, after which
point they started leaving me alone. NBA refs
also had their own security and one of their
security officials once actually told me not
to walk past the refs because it was “rude”,
but I just ignored her kept on walking. By
that point, I didn’t really care if I kicked
the hive. Funnily enough, I never got into
any trouble for that despite that disrespecting
NBA officials was a major offense. HR, while
necessary to maintaining a healthy workplace,
did not enforce the rules equally across the
entire stadium. Complaints against workers

English: 
and supervisors almost always resulted with
write ups while complaints against management
and chefs never seem to stuck. One chef had
so many harassment complaints dismissed, several
workers threatened to take the company to
court but as far as I know, he was never reprimanded.
Despite all that, if there was a problem I
was encouraged to rely on these people for
help, but typically I just took things into
my own hands.
Finally, there was the management directly
above me: my supervisors and my managers.
The lack of respect I got from these people
was the last straw for me. The day I quit,
my boss was snapping at us like dogs attempting
to get us to complete last minute tasks that
had been thought up early that morning. But
that was far from the only time something
like that happened. It was often the case
that my manager and his boss would throw something
together last minute and have us figure out
how we were going to get the task done on
time. I often complained that we needed sufficient
time to properly implement new ideas, but
these complaints fell on deaf ears. I mean,
why would he listen to someone who made less
than a fifth of his salary. And speaking of,
why did he need to make that much more than
me? Sure, he took care of the orders and paperwork
that got the food there in the first place,

English: 
and supervisors almost always resulted with
write ups while complaints against management
and chefs never seem to stuck. One chef had
so many harassment complaints dismissed, several
workers threatened to take the company to
court but as far as I know, he was never reprimanded.
Despite all that, if there was a problem I
was encouraged to rely on these people for
help.
Finally, there was the management directly
above me: my supervisors and my managers.
The lack of respect I got from these people
was the last straw for me. The day I quit,
my boss was snapping at us like dogs attempting
to get us to complete last minute tasks that
had been thought up early that morning. But
that was far from the only time something
like that happened. It was often the case
that my manager and his boss would throw something
together last minute and have us figure out
how we were going to get the task done on
time. I often complained that we needed sufficient
time to properly implement new ideas, but
these complaints fell on deaf ears. I mean,
why would he listen to someone who made less
than a fifth of his salary. And speaking of,
why did he need to make that much more than
me? Sure, he took care of the orders and paperwork
that got the food there in the first place,

English: 
but I moved the food to the places where it
could be cooked and sold. I made sure that
kegs were changed promptly and delivered liquor
to bars, yet somehow my boss was doing five
times the amount of work I was to justify
his salary? The honest answer to this question
was no. This was also the case for supervisors.
Almost daily, supervisors would pass on tasks
to me that they simply did not want to do,
all while sitting at their desk and listening
to the radio.
And naturally at the bottom was the rank in
file worker who did some of the hardest yet
most important jobs for the lowest wages.
Even worse, most made so little that they
had to work another job. It wouldn’t be
until well after I left that I realised that
the social structure within the stadium wasn’t
too different from that of our current capitalist
society. However, this job did give me my
first clear memorable experience of seeing
capitalism for what it truly is.
This eye opening moment, the moment that I
truly started to critically question capitalism
was on one average Thursday. I was moving
two heavy carts to a service elevator when
one of the executives walked past me and headed
towards the parking lot, presumably to get

English: 
but I moved the food to the places where it
could be cooked and sold. I made sure that
kegs were changed promptly and delivered liquor
to bars, yet apparently my boss was doing five
times the amount of work I was doing.
In reality, he really wasn't.
This was also the case for supervisors.
Almost daily, supervisors would pass on tasks
to me that they simply did not want to do,
all while sitting at their desk and listening
to the radio.
And naturally at the bottom was the rank in
file worker who did some of the hardest yet
most important jobs for the lowest wages.
Even worse, most made so little that they
had to work another job. It wouldn’t be
until well after I left that I realised that
the social structure within the stadium wasn’t
too different from that of our current capitalist
society. However, this job did give me my
first clear memorable experience of seeing
capitalism for what it truly is.
This eye opening moment, the moment that I
truly started to critically question capitalism
was on one average Thursday. I was moving
two heavy carts to a service elevator when
one of the executives walked past me and headed
towards the parking lot, presumably to get

English: 
in his Mercedes SL 65 AMG Black. Based on
what I overheard from another executive, that
man made nearly $20 million a year not counting
bonuses. And in that moment, it hit me: This
person did not deserve to make $20 million
a year while many of us didn’t even make
$20,000 a year. He didn’t contribute that
much more to the stadium than us to deserve
a very comfortable lifestyle while others
could not even afford to put their children
through school.
Fulfilling the requests of people who
make several times my meager wages is one
thing, but spending everyday seeing and walking
by the executives of my company who made several
times my yearly income was just simply demeaning.
Seeing executives get in their Mercedes-Benz
they bought with my stolen surplus value while
I could barely afford to pay bills and buy
food. It was dehumanizing. It makes you question
your worth as a person. Question what you
did wrong to end up there rather than the
system that allows and encourages your exploitation.
I couldn’t take it. I quit that job as soon
as I found a better one, but I always think
back to those who, for various reasons, are
stuck employed there. And I’m not free.

English: 
in his Mercedes SL 65 AMG Black. Based on
what I overheard from another executive, that
man made nearly $20 million a year not counting
bonuses. And in that moment, it hit me: This
person did not deserve to make $20 million
a year while many of us didn’t even make
$20,000 a year. He didn’t contribute that
much more to the stadium than us to deserve
a very comfortable lifestyle while others
could not even afford to put their children
through school.
I mean fulfilling the requests of people who
make several times my meager wages is one
thing, but spending everyday seeing and walking
by the executives of my company who made several
times my yearly income was just simply demeaning.
Seeing executives get in their Mercedes-Benz
they bought with my stolen surplus value while
I could barely afford to pay bills and buy
food. It was dehumanizing. It makes you question
your worth as a person. Question what you
did wrong to end up there rather than the
system that allows and encourages your exploitation.
I couldn’t take it. I quit that job as soon
as I found a better one, but I always think
back to those who, for various reasons, are
stuck employed there. And I’m not free.

English: 
I’m still stuck in the same capitalist society,
the difference is that my current job is decent
and I don’t work near multi-millionaires
anymore. I want things to be better, but I
don’t want to move up in the pyramid. I
don’t want to exploit workers or assist
in exploiting workers. I want to destroy the
pyramid. I want to supplant capitalism. And
at the end of the day, I’m glad that I worked
that shitty NBA job.
Thanks for watching this video. I got the
idea to make this video from Hardcore Lime
and you should watch his video on why the
left should care about sports because there
is more to the interesection of sports and
politics than many leftists give credit. Rather
than plug other content creators, I want to
encourage other content creators to make videos

English: 
I’m still stuck in the same capitalist society,
the difference is that my current job is decent
and I don’t work near multi-millionaires
anymore. I want things to be better, but I
don’t want to move up in the pyramid. I
don’t want to exploit workers or help others
exploiting workers. I want to destroy the
pyramid. I want to supplant capitalism. And
at the end of the day, I’m glad that I worked
that shitty NBA job. Because I would have never
seen capitalism for what it is.
Thanks for watching this video. I got the
idea to make this video from Hardcore Lime
and you should watch his video on why the
left should care about sports because there
is more to the interesection of sports and
politics than many leftists give credit. Rather
than plug other content creators, I want to
encourage other leftist youtubers to make videos

English: 
about their awful past work experiences. Thought
Slime has made a couple of videos like these
already and I think that these videos resonate
with people because most of the people who
watch our content are working people and understand
the struggle. Youtubers like Fantavision do
similar things on their channels and often
unintentionally come close to showing how
capitalism negatively affects the workplace,
but never quite get there. If we want more
people to see how capitalism allows a select
few to prosper while exploiting the working
class, sharing our own experiences let’s
others know they are not alone in their struggle
and most importantly: there is a way out.
Anyway, the next labor history video is on
it’s way and this time we’re talking about
a major pre-Civil War strike. Catch y’all
then.

English: 
about their awful past work experiences. Thought
Slime has made a couple of videos like these
already and I think that these videos resonate
with people because most of the people who
watch our content are working people and understand
the struggle. Youtubers like Fantavision do
similar things on their channels and often
unintentionally come close to showing how
capitalism negatively affects the workplace,
but never quite get there. If we want more
people to see how capitalism allows a select
few to prosper while exploiting the working
class, sharing our own experiences let’s
others know they are not alone in their struggle
and most importantly: there is a way out.
Anyway, the next labor history video is on
it’s way and this time we’re talking about
a major pre-Civil War strike. Catch y’all
then.
