Worker Comes Into The Office For Her Last Day At Her Job Of 5 Years And No One Else Shows Up — ‘They Really Just Didn’t Care’
It could point to a lack of empathy in the country.
fizkes / Shutterstock Most people mark the last day at their job as a big occasion. Many recognize it in a celebratory sort of way, like with a party thrown by co-workers.
One woman didn’t have any of that when she spent her final day on the job.
A woman was completely alone in the office on her last day.
A TikToker named Lex Jacoby posted a video with her experience at her last day on the job. It was an awfully quiet one.
“I have worked here for five years,” Jacoby explained. “Today is my last day at my nine-to-five.”
After working somewhere for five years, you would expect a fairly big send-off. After all, that’s plenty of time to get to know everybody well. It certainly seems like the perfect time for a celebration of some sort. However, that’s not what happened to Jacoby at all.
“Not a soul is here,” she said.
Jacoby at first wondered if perhaps her co-workers were playing a good-natured joke on her. “At first, I thought it was a prank,” she said. She quickly realized that was not the case.
“They really just didn’t care,” Jacoby said.
This heartbreaking revelation resonated with others on TikTok.
TikTok users who commented on Jacoby’s video understood what she was going through all too well.
“People don’t care about people anymore. It’s the world now,” one commenter said.
“When they show you who they are, believe them,” someone else said.
A third person said, “That happened to me after ten years.”
While many people commiserated with Jacoby, others pointed out that she was expecting too much in the first place.
“Co-workers are co-workers, not family or true friends,” one person pointed out.
“You cannot ever rely on a co-worker for anything except to stab you in the back,” another said.
“I see my co-workers more than my family, but I wouldn’t care if they quit, moved on, whatever,” a third commenter stated. “Our relationship stops [as] soon as that clock does.”
As this experience exemplifies, Americans are less empathetic than they once were.
Jacoby going into the office on her last day to find no one there to greet her is indicative of attitude changes in the U.S. right now. This was discussed on an episode of the American Psychological Association’s podcast, Speaking of Psychology.
The podcast, hosted by Kaitlin Luna, explored the ins and outs of empathy in America. Luna stated, “There’s scientific research to back up the notion that Americans are caring less and less for others.”
Luna’s guest, Dr. Sara Konrath, was co-author of a study that “found a steep decline in empathy among young people from 1979 to 2009.”
When asked how to “cultivate empathy,” Konrath had an interesting answer. “Just imagining,” she said. “Taking a moment to imagine what other people are feeling and thinking; what the world is like from their perspective. There’s many, many, many ways to increase empathy.”
If there is an empathy problem in America, it could explain why no one felt the need to show up for Jacoby’s last day. If everyone feels no sense of empathy toward their co-workers, they would see no reason to support someone on their last day.
Overall, the world is just a different place than it used to be. Not only are people less empathetic, but they also treat connections more casually. Few people see supporting others as important as they once did.
Experiences like Jacoby’s show that this may be making some lives easier while it is hurting others.
Mary-Faith Martinez is a writer for YourTango who covers entertainment, news and human interest topics.