“How Dumb Can You Be?”: 45 Times People Got Fired And Had No One But Their Stupid Selves To Blame

Two co-workers were out one night and one of them hurt his hand and had to go hospital. He still came into work on time the next morning. The other one phoned in saying he was still stuck at the hospital with the friend so couldn't make it in. 🙄😂.

In the back of the grocery store I worked at was something called a cardboard baler. You’d toss your broken down boxes into this machine and press a button, then it would smush all the cardboard down until it was full enough that you would bail it with wire and put it on a pallet jack and take it out back.

Well, a couple knuckle heads figured out that the press only goes down to about 18” of the bottom; just low enough to frighten the bejesus out of a new hire. And so they took a new guy to the back to “show them how to work the baler”, and tossed the guy, slammed the door, and hit start. The guy is screaming up a storm with fear that he’s about to be squished to death when the safety feature kicked in and these two ding dongs go “JK LOL”.

Fired.

Dude got fired for forgetting to mute himself during a zoom call where he spent 10 minutes explaining to his cat why our boss "has the leadership skills of wet cardboard".

I worked at a university. A guy got hired with the maintenance crew. Later that day, a woman's bike was stolen from the bike rack outside the maintenance office. The next day, it reappeared on the bike rack with a new lock. She called campus police and as they were taking a report at the bike rack, the new maintenance guy came out to go home on his "new" bike he stole from her. He was fired.

Day one in orientation with about 20 other people. Cute gal in a professional skirt and blouse steps up on the stage and starts to introduce herself.

A guy from one table over whistled, basically cat calling the woman. The presentation stopped immediately, and the dude was escorted out.

We all got a lesson on unwanted sexual advances instead.

I own my own company, came back from holidays and there were a few new hires I hadn’t met. Came into the canteen to grab a tea wearing casual wear and a guy was loading up a large back pack with a few hundred euros of snacks. It was mid morning so the place was empty as people were working.

I casually asked what he was doing and he explained the snacks were free and there was no limit on how many you could take, he suggested I should steal some too handing me a box of 48 kitkat chunky bars. I declined, saying If I took them then there wouldn’t be enough for everyone else.

I’d image, based on his face, he died a little inside at the company all hands meeting when he realised who I was.

His manager fired him that afternoon and said he wouldn’t be arrested if he emptied his bag and returned all the snacks stolen on previous days. Which in fairness he did.. 3 suitcases!! were needed to return his boxes of snacks. He was there 1 week.

A lunch teacher at my elementary school would hover over kids yelling at them to stop talking and eat their food. She got fired because a kid complained to the principal that we can't talk during class or lunch so when are we supposed to socialize??

She showed up to her 2nd shift, stumbling and stinking of liquor, while making jokes about the fact there was a bar across the street.

She was a delivery driver.

Yeah, bye.

Uncle of ex husband (who worked at the same place) told his boss his wife died. The boss came to the house with flowers and said sorry for your loss. Wife heard him, walked in and said who died. Doofus wanted a day off and got a permanent one.

Former airline worker here. Head flight attendant thought it would be funny to enter the cockpit wearing a plastic bag over their head, pretending they had been hijacked. Needless to say, they were stood down swiftly.

Guy tried to call off saying his ride got into an accident during the winter rain-snow mix and put their truck into a ditch. He texts the boss an unprompted picture of the truck in the ditch. She shows me the pic saying, "look who called off again". I look at the picture and something looks weird to me. There were pine trees in it. We don't have many of those around here. "I google "truck in ditch winter" and it's the very first picture that pops up. She isn't even that mad and we laugh about it more than anything. She wasn't even going to plan on any write-ups or anything. I later find out that when she showed him the picture on google after he kept bringing up the accident", he became irrationally angry and threatening so she sh**canned him.

Dude was a police officer for over a decade and got fired for running multiple women’s license plates through the system to get their #s and hit on them. They complained and utilizing the system for a non-LE purpose is a crime in itself. You can see where this becomes a huge problem for the agency.

Bro had wife and kids at home too.

I used to work as a bartender for a big, well known hotel chain. One day, another bartender decides to steal a case of beer. To accomplish this, he took it to the loading dock (which, as you'd expect, had security cameras on it), placed it right in the middle of the well-lit loading area and covered it with a cloth.

By the time he came back with his car, a security guard was there waiting for him, and said "if you're going to insult our intelligence this much, you deserve to be fired."

Oh, man. My fake brother. Like, unofficially adopted.

I was working at this warehouse for high end shoes and they treated us all so d**n good. Literally threw a million dollar new year's party every year. They were making 12b a year and we got catered lunch daily and our insurance was 100% coverage. Not exaggerating. I had NO MEDICAL BILLS while working there. This s**t is unheard of, I know. I used to tell the front desk "I promise I don't owe you a co-pay" and they'd roll their eyes, charge me anyway, and HR would run a check to me for the $20 2 days later. They were so used to it. Because companies CAN afford to treat you well, but all of them seem to choose to do the least legally required by law instead. Capitalism!

Anyway, I got my friend/brother to apply. He interviewed well. Got the job. Went to orientation. On the safety tour, they tell everyone what the Emergency Stop does. And then say, "Do not hit this button if it isn't an emergency." And he f*****g immediately hits the button and shuts down the entire converyor belt for the building. They just look at him and walk him to the door. Never even got assigned a department. I am still flabbergasted by it to this day. He was like, "I don't know why, man. I just couldn't resist." Ahahah.

Tried covertly switching a customer's bank deposit into their own account. Yeah, not too bright that one. Bank found out like, the next day. Ironic part? She was in operations and was one of our auditors.

New starter was fired 10 days after starting.

I was working at the time for a self storage company in the uk, new guy turned out to be a massive racist (calling Black customers the N word after they left, calling Polish people "pieces of sh*t" etc)

He was defenestrated by the area manager who heard new guy say that he had his "p*ki bashing boots" in his car (while laughing).

The area manager (who was Pakistani) told him in no uncertain terms to "get the f**k out, and dont bother coming back"

That was a the last we saw of new guy.

F**k that sh**bag.

We hired this guy because he was the son of an employee's friend. Not the worst guy on the planet. A little dim and unsure of himself, but he was kind of a steady Eddie type.

Well, imagine my surprise right after lunch when my bookkeeper comes into my office holding a revolver by the grip, pinched between two fingers.

She discovered it when she needed a PostIt note and thought, "Well, maybe Chuck has some in his desk." Opened the lap drawer and there it was.

I know how to shoot, but I don't own a gun. So I emptied the revolver of bullets and shoved it in a drawer. She's freaking out, I'm freaking out, but we don't want the entire office freaking out.

About ten minutes later, Chuck comes back from lunch. My bookkeeper could hear him frantically searching through his desk, then around his office. Then he started wandering up and down the halls with a worried look, presumably in search of his pistol. Meanwhile, I'm wondering exactly how to handle matters.

He passed my office on his next circuit. I called him into my office, held up the pistol and asked, 'Are you looking for this?'

After his eyes finished bugging out, he asked if he could have his pistol back. I said that I would return it to him the next day, but that he needed to go home for the afternoon while we decided what to do.

He left and I immediately called the landlord to notify security to never, ever allow that guy in the building again and to cancel his key fob. Meanwhile, my bookkeeper had a locksmith over pronto and issued everyone new keys.

The next morning, I fired Chuck over the phone and gave him a month's worth of severance and the promise of a good recommendation letter--mainly as a way to keep him from shooting me in the parking deck sometime in the near future. His mom called me an hour later all pissed off that I fired her son (He was 25ish and his mom was calling on his behalf. That should give you a clue), and all I said was, "Well, do you want to come buy and pick up Chuck's gun?"

There was several seconds of silence on the other end. And finally, the woman shouted at someone in the other room, "Did you give Chuck a pistol?" And then hung up. Last I ever heard from those guys.

Worked security, at a government department. Dude on night shift was walking around doing his checks one night in the building. Saw a PC on, and noone around. He started looking up p**n on it. The PC was on because the person was remoted in from home working.

He had a disciplinary meeting, and took his mum along as support person. His mum tried to say her son doesn't look at p**n, etc. boss provided proof of everything he was looking at, times, all of it. Fired.

Hired a guy to be a welder. Kept asking where the spools of copper were kept. By lunch he'd stolen a forklift and tried ramming the storage bay the copper was kept in. Only manager key cards could open them.

Called in sick to work, then posted photos on Facebook of her partying while she was supposedly out sick.

Many of her coworkers were Facebook friends with her, including some of the managers.