So simple

Here is the rule:

A patron must have an I.D. of some kind, or a library card, to check items out.

Here is the incident:

Nervy Ms Grunewald, a unique and difficult patron who likes to challenge and contentiously engage with library policy, both when it affects her and when it does not, but also likes to get things to go her way, has not brought her I.D. or her library card. The clerk, who knows who Ms Grunewald is, won't check out to her without them. The manager backs up the clerk.

I found this incident very interesting. So I queried as many of my co-workers as I could. It was supposed to be an impartial survey, but within seconds, with each person, I was sharing my opinion, which just goes to show what a terrible reporter I'd make, unless I could be, like, one of those "New Journalists" a la Tom Wolfe or Hunter S. Thompson. As long as I am free to hallucinate giant lizards during my reporting then I suppose I can be an okay reporter.

Here is what I found out in my survey:


1. Roughly half of my co-workers would have checked items out to Ms Grunewald and roughly half of them would not have checked out items to her.


I would have.


2. Nearly everyone cited "trouble" in regards to their choice. The not checking out group said they feared Ms Grunewald would make some trouble for them if they broke the policy. The checking out half did not want the trouble in refusing the difficult and contentious Ms Grunewald. 
 

I agree with the second group here in the sense that Ms Grunewald never makes trouble over getting her way. I differ from both groups though in that trouble was no part of the basis for which I would freely check items out to Ms Grunewald.


3. Everyone was agreed that the policy dictated that they not check items out to Ms Grunewald, whether they actually decided to or not.


Except me! I consider our knowledge, in our brains, that Ms Grunewald is indeed Ms Grunewald, to be a fully adequate and acceptable form of I.D.  I believe I might have convinced a couple of my co-workers of the validity of this interpretation by posing the question "If your spouse, or co-worker came to you without a card would you need to see their I.D. to check items out to them?"


4. Finally, everyone was agreed that Ms Grunewald was awful and unlikeable.


Alas, I am alone again. Go Ms Grunewald!