So now that I know what the Wakefield Doctrine is, what can I do with it?

Here’s what you do….

Following are descriptions of a number of everyday situations. Read each one carefully, imagine yourself in the situation. Following each of these ‘scenaria’ are three possible responses. Pick one. There are no right or wrong answers, just go for the one that ‘feels right’. Mark it down somewhere next to the number of the Question. Then check out the easy scoring guidelines!

1)  You’re in class one Friday afternoon in October. You’re in the middle of an exam and glad you’re glad you prepared for the test. You glance over and notice your best friend is looking at another person’s Answer Sheet. You immediately look away, but then notice your Teacher is about to catch your friend cheating. You immediately:

a) stand up and ask to be excused to go to the bathroom
b) start laughing in a very loud voice or
c) do nothing, you need an ‘A’ on this test or you won’t get into Medical School

2) You’re out on a double date with your best friend. While sitting at the table, waiting for the band to come on stage, you notice that, when they don’t think anyone is looking, your friend’s date is flirting with your date. Will you:

a) feel embarrassed for your friend and don’t do anything, except when you over-compensate, you’ll end up looking like you’re flirting with your friend’s date;
b) take your friend’s date aside and tell them that if they keep it up you will kick their ass
c) take your friend aside and tell them what you suspect and offer your support

3) (from Friend of the Doctrine, Christine): ( True story). Scenario: Sitting in a “restaurant” (Step above fast food. Order at counter, but some workers roaming the place asking if you want refills or more breadsticks.) alone, you notice some thug-looking teenagers taking turns stealing tips off of tables. What do you do?

a) tell the counter person that, while you might not be 100% certain, you’re pretty sure some of the people in the restaurant are stealing tips
b) stand up and tell them to put all the stolen money back or
c) call 911 on your cell phone (speed dial) and return to enjoying your meal

4)  (from DownSpring Lizzi... here is one of 4 that she was kind enough to send us and is “… heavily edited” ): You’re at home waiting for a telephone call. Your favourite relative, who you haven’t seen in years, is coming to visit and promised to call as soon as they got into town, for final directions to your house. The phone rings, so rather than let it go to the answering machine, you pick it up and say, “Hi’. The telemarketer seems delighted to hear an actual person’s voice and immediately launches into their pitch, “Hi! Am I speaking to the member of the household who makes the decisions about how happy your family will be?”
You…

a) Listen politely to the spiel until you have a moment to interject, at which time you explain that you don’t want to buy into their service and try to negotiate the conversation to a swift end.
b) Start swearing at them, notice that the telemarketer is still on the line and seems to be getting upset…stay on line asking personal questions about their family, savouring the outrage you sense when you suggest they engage in an anatomically impossible sex act…hang up, laughing;
c) Leave the phone off the hook, and walk away, coming back five minutes later to hang up if they’ve stopped talking by then…(at that point you) remember that you’re waiting for a call, get angry and, without picking it up, shout at the phone (“Can’t you see I’m waiting for someone?”).

5) You’re in a Supermarket checkout aisle. There’s one person ahead and two behind you in the line. It’s late on a weekday afternoon, people are all getting their mid-week grocery shopping done. While you are focused on the magazine rack opposite the checkout counter (One newspaper is stating, ‘Obama and Rhianna are siblings born on the Planet Osiris’), another shopper ‘cuts in line’ in front of you. You:

a) Look to see if anyone else in line noticed. Try to figure out why someone would be so rude and whether you should confront them or maybe tell the person behind you that the line will be delayed and aren’t people rude these days…
b) Establish eye contact and smile and shake your head in a ‘No. Don’t do that’ gesture. (if the person is an attractive member of the opposite gender, make them stand immediately ahead of you in line).
c) Tap the offending shopper on the shoulder, tell them (nicely) that there are people in line and ask them, do they understand the normal protocol of lines? You say this with a smile and a genuine sense of wanting to help the person understand how they should behave in a checkout line.

6) (courtesy of DownSpring Michelle) You’re out for dinner with your spouse and another couple. The restaurant is new and very popular, so popular that there is normally a 3 month wait for reservations. But you have a client who has connections and you were able to get in with very little delay, much to the impressed delight of your spouse and your friends. The dinner is all that you hoped it would be, outstanding cuisine and everything perfect and then as the server is pouring your coffee at desert they are jostled by a passing customer and spill coffee in your lap. You:

a) feel very embarrassed…feel like people are staring at you…apologize to the nearest person… hate yourself for ruining the server’s evening (optional)
b) scream loudly (if female)…shout loudly (if not), look around the table and the nearby tables and decide whether to play it for laughs or simply the fun of making the server cry (if female) get mad and storm off (if not)
c) apologize to the server while trying to determine who is to blame. Failing that, consider the possibility that either the server simply made a mistake or…has a flawed personality

7) You’re alone in your car, driving home late at night and you notice an SUV in the woods by the side of the road. Its emergency flashers are on, steam is billowing from under the hood; clearly it has run off the road. You immediately:

a) Slow down and watch your rearview mirror until you see someone else pulling over, then speed up so that you can get to where your cell phone reception is strongest so you can call for ‘back-up’
b) Pull over, get out of your car (hopefully remembering to put your transmission in ‘Park’) and run towards the SUV shouting “Hey! Is everyone alright in there!”
c) Look to see if you recognize the vehicle, when you see that it has out-of-state plates, look at your watch, then pull over and get out of your car, but stay where you are parked so that you can wave down the passing cars, ignore the screams for help and try to decide if the Good Samaritan laws apply to engineers

8) (Considerer for the next three…) You are at the Wildlife Park (a local family attraction), you notice a small boy kicking up a fuss, he appears lost and is clearly getting increasingly distressed. All at once, he begins screaming for his Dad and looking around frantically. Do you:

a) Watch him from a distance, pleased as other people step in to try to help the little chap.
b) Walk up to him, put your hand on his shoulder, look him in the eye and reassure him that you’ll help him find his father, simultaneously scoping the area for a member of staff to tell that there’s a lost child.
c) Join in with the crowd of other people saying nice (but largely ineffective) things as he zig-zags past you all.

9) You’re out on a second date when he/she starts talking in depth about a highly technical game they like to play. You don’t understand a word of what they’re saying. You…

a) Listen attentively and tell them you’re glad they have something in their life that they’re so passionate about, which brings them such pleasure. You either try to genuinely follow what they’re saying, or at least look like you do.
b) Tell them outright that it’s not something you understand, in such a way that (you hope) doesn’t lead to a more in-depth explanation from them.
c) Listen carefully for an opportunity to re-route the conversation onto topics about which you’re more knowledgeable. If they’re being particularly boring, re-route the topic of conversation into an area where you can show off your own technical expertise, and use lots of long words to prove the point.

10) You’ve been there for 3 hours, there were two rows of waiting patients when you arrived, that was reduced to half the number (of waiting patients) but now you (still sitting there) detect a noticeable increase in the number of people coming into the waiting room. You:

a) sigh… and say
b) scream… and shout
c) pout…and whine

11) It is breakfast time and your oldest child is having their first meltdown of the day over not wanting to finish their breakfast. What do you do?

a) mutter: “God help me, it is only 9 am and she is already crying over something” and walk away.
b) Try to reason with her and make a deal that if she eats 2 more spoonfuls, “we will go to the park!!”
c) Whine and cry that you don’t like breakfast either.

12) Your spouse tells you that they were online and happened upon a ‘total deal’ on lumber and building materials, enough to build the deck that you and the family have been talking about for years. The materials are being delivered on Friday and when (your spouse) returns from their business trip on Saturday, maybe the whole family could discuss what to try to build. You:

a) get on the computer look up plans for decks…go to the site for ‘This Old House’, “Hometime’ and ‘Deck Beautiful’… take a break and, while watching TV, notice a deck in a commercial that has a tree growing out the middle…go back to the computer…look up the commercial then look up the tree in the horticulture sites, identify the species…run out to the back yard decide that you don’t have the proper trees, go back to the computer find a site that has 3D Deck building apps that promise to let you design your own deck ( … 3 hours later) go outside…layout enough of the lumber to outline the shape of the deck… take a picture, go back to the computer
b) stand in the yard when the lumber is being delivered, get into a conversation with the guys putting the stuff on your lawn…get them to take it all into the back yard… ask them if they’re hungry, bring out some beer/lemonade/hamburgers and ask them what kind of deck they think would look good… pick up a hammer…tell one of them, before they go, just to hold one board…
c) go to the basement, find the folder marked ‘Deck Plans’, go outside and spend an hour cutting the grass, when finished, cut up enough lumber to construct what amounts to a free-standing drafting table (4 posts supporting a 4 x 3 sheet of plywood… with a piece of molding running horizontally along the bottom edge to hold the (sharpened) pencils, sharpies, rulers and T-squares), neaten up the pile of lumber, take photos…go back inside

13) (From Beth) You’re at the airport and an employee announces the baggage will be arriving late. A fellow passenger commences with ugly, disrespectful, downright bratty behavior towards the employee (as if it’s even his fault). How do you react to this?

a) Step in front of the complaining passenger and ask the airport employee a question that you believe will yield an answer of a positive nature, make faces mocking the complainer, but only at an angle that does not allow them to see you making fun
b) Tell the complaining passenger to, ‘Shut the fuck up.’
c) Walk over to where this passenger is acting out, smile and watch for an opportunity to contribute to the brow-beating, otherwise simply enjoy.

14) (from zoe):  You call a friend to go out with some other friends and she can’t because her husband is going out for a guys night. While you and the others are out, you notice across the room the husband of your friend (that couldn’t make it) and he is obviously not with the guys, but with another woman to whom he is paying more attention than a married man ought. Its obvious what’s going on… what do you do?

a) Nothing. Hope that the errant husband doesn’t notice you there at the time. It would be awkward and uncomfortable and you prefer to have your options un-impaired. (None of your options include confronting the husband immediately).
b) Get up. Walk over to the husband and smile and say, “Hey! I didn’t know you had such an attractive sister!”
c) Tell your friends exactly what appears (to you) to be going on, make a point of telling them that they are not to breathe a word of this to anyone, least of all the wife, because, “it will totally devastate her and you’re her best friend and that’s why you should be the one”.

15) (from jean): You are at a meeting but are not running it. The person conducting the meeting makes a mistake and only you appear to realize it. It is a mistake which will affect someone who is not you. What do you do and how?

a) Raise your hand and ask the chairperson to repeat his assertion (the mistaken one), after they do as you request, offer that you are aware, from your experience that the better answer is the following. As you repeat this ‘better answer’ you make constant reference to how you understand how easily the person could make the mistake, not that you’re suggesting they did…make a mistake.
b) If possible, get the chair person aside on a break and ask them about the ‘mistake’, gently suggest that there might be another view of the matter and, while be sure to say that you could be wrong, present 5 possible alternative answers (being certain that the correct answer is among them).
c) Raise your hand and tell the Speaker to, ‘Shut the fuck up!’

16) (also from jean): You want Italian Food, and the rest of the family–3 people,.. want Chinese food. what happens next?

a) Call in your order to a local restaurant and then inform everyone else that, seeing how the order for food (enough for everyone) has already gone in and there are no cancellations allowed and how it would be wasteful to throw away all that
food, not to mention the expense, that for tonight it needs to be Italian.
b) 等待中的谈话平静，并说，你真的想意大利和他们都可以“闭嘴”
c) Give in and tell yourself that the family comes first and you can eat what you want anytime once everyone has left the house.

17) (…from jean): Your husband cheats on you. Not your friend’s husband. YOUR husband. You find out when he TELLS YOU. what do you do?

a) Suggest that if that’s what he felt was necessary, you are willing to go to counseling and try to work out the differences that drove him to such an extreme act
b) You tell the doctor at the emergency room a fantastic story about how your poor, poor hubby fell off a chair and broke his nose on the counter, beat himself two black eyes, lost some teeth, … And once the bleeding has stopped, you hand him his bag and send him off to the other lady to nurse him back to health and beauty (thanks to Friend of the Doctrine, Stephanie for this response)
c) Refuse to listen and when he stops talking, continue your life as if nothing has happened, you have put too much effort into creating the perfect home to have something like this get in the way.

18) You are sitting in a movie theatre with your date. Your date really, really wanted to see this movie and you really, really didn’t like what you heard the movie was going to be about. But, (and this is critical), this is your 3rd Date! Your date was very excited and happy with how thoughtful you were to suggest going to this movie and… it is abundantly clear that your date will be very… grateful! Fine. You and your date are sitting there and it is the middle of the movie and three people (coming in late) seat themselves 2 rows behind you, and it starts. The giggling and the laughing and the running commentary… finally one of them gets a call on their cell phone! Throughout this, your date is being stoic and has made it clear they don’t like the idea of making a scene, but for you, the ‘perfect third date’ is being ruined!!  You:

a) call the movie theatre on your own cell phone and ask to speak to the Head Usher and proceed to complain in a quiet voice
b) jump up on your seat, turning towards the three ‘noise makers’ and say in a loud, clear voice, “Shut the fuck up right now or I will kill all three of you”
c) suggest to your date that you wouldn’t mind leaving and coming back another time, when maybe there won’t be such annoying audience members

19) You are being told, by the doctors at the very exclusive veterinary hospital, that your 10 year old dog (that you’ve had since she was a puppy), has a terminal illness. They tell you there is nothing to be done and (gently) hint at euthanasia…right there and then. You:

a) in a calm and upbeat manner, thank the doctors and decide to take your dog home. While checking out of the animal hospital, you ask for some high potency dog food, ignoring the looks from the people behind the counter (who are totally aware of the prognosis for your dog) and insist that 6 cans will do (this you are clearly saying for the benefit of your dog, who in turn, has a look of patient tolerance on her face, as if indulging you in your antics)
b) cry and create a scene loudly enough to cause the people in the waiting room sitting with their pets, to avert their collective gazes
c) immediately accede to the doctors suggestion that the merciful thing to do is to put your dog to sleep and ask if they would take care of everything