It seems as though we struggle with admitting when we’ve done something wrong. Have you ever heard the phrase: “Throwing someone under the bus?” This phase has it’s roots in the sports arena and has crossed into business and other fields where colleagues who failed to pull a project together eventually end up playing the blame game. This is not your ordinary finger pointing session, this is when someone deliberately uses truths or untruths against you. By definition the phrase means to sacrifice another person (often a friend or ally), who is usually not deserving of such treatment, out of malice or for personal gain.
Imagine working on a project and when asked by the supervisor why deadlines were not met, one of your colleagues says, “well so and so was late to our planning meetings!” Now, who was late or on time to the meeting is irrelevant to why a deadline was not met. Some present-oriented thinking people would argue that it does, but I beg to differ. You have to examine with of all the facts to bring up, why was one person’s tardiness so high up on the list?
In another scenario, one delivery guy is subbing for his colleague when he gets to a client who has a complaint. The complaint is that the normal driver is slow and not too friendly. Instead of supporting his teammate and reassuring the customer that the information will be passed on to the proper people, this driver decides to join in on the criticism. He says things like “I’m not surprised!” or “we’ve had other reports of this from other customers.” Another one bites the dust. Hung out to dry by a fellow employee …but why?
The worse situation to be in is when you find yourself selling out a friend for personal gain. Or can you image allowing your words to crucify someone else because you don’t like them? Either way if you are this type of person, you don’t deserve to have friends. The Psalmist wrote in the 55 division, verses 11-14: “11 Destructive forces are at work in the city; threats and lies never leave its streets. 12 If an enemy were insulting me, I could endure it; if a foe were raising himself against me, I could hide from him. 13 But it is you, a man like myself, my companion, my close friend, 14 with whom I once enjoyed sweet fellowship as we walked with the throng at the house of God (NIV).
This proves there is nothing new under the sun, but the person who would perpetrate a friendship only to violate that bond by throwing you under the bus is in a sad state of affairs. Don’t allow them to bring you down. Forgive them and move on! Your character is not in question, it is theirs. Misery loves company, so don’t join them!
My favorite incident of someone being thrown under the bus was when Kobe Bryant was caught cheating on his wife and in an interview said something to the affect of, “you guys are coming down on me, but Shaq is cheating on his wife too!”
ClydeStyle 