droid
(From "android", SF terminology for a humanoid robot of essentially biological (as opposed to
mechanical or electronic) construction). A person (especially
a low-level bureaucrat or service-business employee)
exhibiting most of the following characteristics: (a) naive
trust in the wisdom of the parent organisation or "the
system"; (b) a blind-faith propensity to believe obvious
nonsense emitted by authority figures (or computers!); (c) a
rule-governed mentality, one unwilling or unable to look
beyond the "letter of the law" in exceptional situations; (d)
a paralysing fear of official reprimand or worse if Procedures
are not followed No Matter What; and (e) no interest in doing
anything above or beyond the call of a very
narrowly-interpreted duty, or in particular in fixing that
which is broken; an "It's not my job, man" attitude.
Typical droid positions include supermarket checkout assistant
and bank clerk; the syndrome is also endemic in low-level
government employees. The implication is that the rules and
official procedures constitute {software} that the droid is
executing; problems arise when the software has not been
properly debugged. The term "droid mentality" is also used to
describe the mind-set behind this behaviour.
Compare {suit}, {marketroid}.
[{Jargon File}]
(1995-09-27)