“Tone deaf” is certainly an appropriate word to describe Ivanka Trump’s entire life, but this “Find Something New” campaign that she rolled out yesterday reaches Beethoven levels of deafness. Some rich asshole who’s never worked a day in her charmed life is gonna tell me to get a new career just because her piece of shit dad fucked up by pretending like this pandemic wasn’t real? How about you get a new career fucking off, Ivanka.

In all fairness, Ivanka isn’t the only tone deaf member of that family, but as the most attractive of the Trump kids (just ask her dad!), everything she does has bit more of a sinister edge than if Eric or Don Jr. were presenting the same ideas. When you see those two assholes, you expect a certain amount of chicanery.

On the surface, the idea is not without merit – learn a new skill, get a career in a field that pays relatively well, leave your low-paying job behind. But what happens when everyone who is currently laid off, or who is currently working a low-paying, “unskilled” job “finds something new” and leaves their low-paying, “unskilled” jobs behind?

Oh, you want a decaf pumpkin spice latte with skim milk? Too fucking bad asshole, all the laid-off baristas found something new, and are now repairing elevators. You wanna order the Cobb salad but you wanna sub cheddar for gorgonzola and you wanna sub steak for chicken and you wanna sub spinach for half the amount of lettuce? Sorry fuckwad, all the furloughed servers and cooks found something new, and they’re working as electricians and plumbers now.

Look here: I’ve been cooking professionally for more than half my life, and I’m fucking good at it. It’s not considered skilled labor, but I promise you it is, and I challenge anyone who disagrees with that statement to step into a busy kitchen in the middle of a Friday night dinner rush and prove me wrong. That shit is exhausting, both physically and mentally.

Unrelenting heat, flames and steam and smoke shooting out from all over the place, slip-and-fall hazards that can’t be dealt with right away, sharp knives moving everywhere, dehydration, never-ending noise coming from every imaginable direction, 7 tables order at the same time, and one of those is a 20-top who wants to modify every goddamn thing they order, food being sent back because a surprising number of people don’t seem to know what “medium rare” actually means, all while trying not to piss yourself because you haven’t been able to step off the line to go to the bathroom in over 4 hours. And when it’s all over, you get to start restocking and cleaning!

That’s not something any random person can do. The list of people I’ve worked with who found that out the hard way and moved on is much longer than the list of people I’ve worked with who are still in the industry.

But don’t just take my word for it. Watch the late, great Anthony Bourdain step back into his kitchen for the first time in years.

And I’m not saying my job is anywhere close to being the hardest job. Hell, I’ve worked harder jobs myself. I once spent the absolute worst three consecutive weeks of my life as a construction laborer, and I left there to go back to foodservice, because fuck every bit of being a construction laborer.

What I am saying is that it takes a certain set of skills to be good at working in the service industry, regardless of the specific job. Cooks, waiters/waitresses, bartenders, baristas, manicurists, hair stylists, estheticians, hotel workers, retail, bowling alleys, convenience stores – all of it. Shitty, unskilled employees exist in all areas of the service industry (as in every industry), but the ones who are good at it, and who can make a career of it, are skilled, and if you can’t see that, you’re big ol’ shit head.

But Ivanka Trump thinks I should use my time while I’m furloughed from my relatively well-paid job at a beloved locally owned restaurant that offers health insurance and PTO to pay for classes and training and “find something new”. Simple, right? No way a 43-year-old man would have any trouble getting a job in a new industry in the midst of a recession.

I know, I’ll just ask my dad for a small loan of one million dollars, and I’ll find a new career making guillotines!

Thanks for reading. And good luck finding something new.