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Looks can be deceptive. That's true for people and objects, but, sometimes, we can also apply that to certain jobs. A line of work might seem inviting and easy from the outside, but, when you listen to what the people who actually work there have to say about it, you thank your lucky stars you never accepted that job offer.
Recently, people took to Reddit to expose the industries that have some pretty questionable hidden practices. When one user asked, "What industry is a lot more dark and sinister than most people realise?", over 7k people came in ready to answer. Curious to know what industries made the list? Scroll down and check them out!
This post may include affiliate links.
#1
Church.
#2
Child modeling and talent shows.
General Anaesthesia 1 month ago
"I own the pageant so I'm allowed in the dressing room". - IQ45.
Nimitz 1 month ago
It's so much more than just toxic stage moms and agents or even the child exploitation. There's also the multi-level marketing aspect of it that's completely f****d up. Growing up, even in small towns, all my sisters were heavily marketed to by people encouraging them to take "modelling lessons". They squeezed my sisters and my mom for every penny they could on the lessons and photo shoots promising them it was an investment and that they'd earn it back and more. Got them to hold sleepovers/parties that were basically recruitment drives. All so one or two single old ladies, or super creepy old married couples, could come to town once a month and scoop up all that money from kids and single moms or girls with creepy dads. Every level of that industry is more toxic than you can imagine, even if you already think it's toxic AF.
Marilyn Holt 1 month ago
I've watched a few videos. So very sad....pushed and pushed and pushed by parents.
#3
Politics. However dark you think it is, it’s a LOT darker.
#4
Social media. They use the same strategies that casinos do to game human psychology.
#5
Baby food. The s**t nestle pulled in Africa is despicable.
#6
F*****g nursing homes.
I didn’t think the worst part of ems would be learning how most nursing homes in my area treat their patients.
But it is. By **far**.
Riley Quinn 1 month ago
Death is preferable to the lives that thousands of elderly people suffer in these for-profit hell holes.
#7
Healthcare, particularly big pharma. Look up the Merck scandal with Vioxx. Merck fabricated a journal to hide the side effects of Vioxx, which was actually responsible for causing tens of thousands of heart attacks.
Big pharma ultimately cares about money, not health.
RagDollLali 1 month ago
Don't even get me started on how they control insulin and EpiPen prices (here in the US), absolutely disgusting. My blood pressure skyrocketed just typing this now.
#8
Gambling
However sinister you think it is... it's more than that.
I_imagine_even_worse_w***s 1 month ago
This should be higher. I worked in an industry that regularly worked with large gambling companies and have friends in the industry. It's actually shocking. I'm not anti gambling in thr least but what some companies in the industry are allowed get away with is actually frightening.
#9
This will get buried but the Aquarium industry is awful. The amount of death and fish we just throw away would shock you. On top of that so many shops sell fish to people who are not setup properly to take care of the animal.
Riley Quinn 1 month ago
I haven't step foot in a pet store for over 50 years because they are a grotesque form of capitalism.
#10
The Art Industry. Paintings that look like a 5 year old made it that sell for $10 million are really just money laundering schemes, tax avoidance schemes and insurance scams.
Chich 1 month ago
Did security for a show once years ago. There were several carvers there who did birds. Most were beautiful and had wonderful detail. One booth had several loon carvings. Nice but nothing special compared to what else was on display. Got talking to the guy who also owned a small fishing lodge That largely catered to german clientele. Told me he sold these loons to German businessmen for $25 000. They would donate them to a school or sumsuch when they returned home as a tax write off.
#11
Surprised I’ve not seen charity sector. Funding fraud, mistreatment and underpayment of staff and focusing more on PR than actually doing anything of substance are commonplace.
#12
I thought working at a local flower shop would be rosy and idyllic until I was told to upsell grieving widows on already overpriced casket sprays.
Riley Quinn 1 month ago
There's nothing like taking advantage of people drowning in grief from the pressure to buy the expensive caskets, to flowers and catering. Human suffering = profits.
#13
Academia.
Abuse. Exploiting young ambitious people. Nepotism. inefficient allocation of resources.
Cindy Tucker 1 month ago
Add in the outrageous costs for books, housing, and food, plus incidentals and it's yet another rip-off. More teenagers are looking at trade schools and that's a good, economical idea. How much would you pay for a plumber in order to have water or sewers fixed? Whatever they ask for! Same with mechanics, hair dressers, and more. It's already showing in college admissions going down, too!
#15
CPS/Foster Care Systems.
#16
Health insurance. The moment you use them they are no longer profiting. Stay healthy or die. Nothing in-between.
#17
MLM’s. Toxic industry disguised as “career independence” that preys on vulnerable people.
#18
Higher Education. It's become all about the dollars.
Colleges took a major financial hit over the COVID years. To make up deficits, they're doing some very shady s**t to get enrollment and retention back up to fill seats and collect money.
They're doing things like:
1. Recruiting standards have fallen through the floor, attracting students who have no business in college in the first place.
2. Institute a 'No academic dismissal' policy. You can carry a 0.0 through the fall semester and be welcome back in the spring.
3. Ruin housing. They enroll more students than they had rooms for, resulting in triples instead of doubles, converted lounges to barracks style rooms, and even put students up in local motels until they could find rooms for them. Parents are not made aware of this until move-in day.
4. Refuse to expel students guilty of criminal behavior, at least until after the deadline where students would be eligible for refunds
5. Cut the resources of their campus police and security departments so their ability to actually investigate criminal behavior is limited.
6. Actively hampered criminal investigations so that word doesn't get around that there are safety concerns associated with overcrowding and s**t enrollment standards.
7. Fire experienced department heads who can properly serve students and replace them with people they can pay lower salaries to
8. Cut support services budgets and freeze employment lines, resulting in manpower shortages in the departments meant to support students
....and more. Everything college administrations are doing is designed to pull a dollar through the door and keep it there....even at the expense of the security and well-being of the students they bring in.
goldenwood_cottage 1 month ago
Include use and overuse poorly paid adjunct staff to teach classes. I was offered $1200.00 to take over a class 4 weeks into a semester. That's less than $15 an hour including in class and out of class time. Nope.
#20
The beauty industry. You think it’s all glam and glowing skin? Nah, it’s basically a battlefield where innocent pores are tortured by overpriced serums, and your self-esteem is held hostage by Photoshop and airbrushing. They sell us a fantasy, and we’re out here spending half our paychecks chasing it. And don’t even get me started on those “miracle” products—they're just expensive lies in cute packaging!
#21
Casinos. They setup the facade that everybody is having a great time. But they are experts in psychological manipulation and are taking advantage of every move you make. Reality is fundamentally manipulated at every turn. Truly dark and sinister.
#22
I'd say Sales, such as call centers and cold calling. Nothing worse than being told to hit KPIs and targets just to sell people s**t they don't want, sometimes forcefully, under the threat of loosing your job.
Been there, never doing it again, no matter how desperate. Such an unethical practice when you think about it.
#23
Fast fashion.
Alexa Saltz 1 month ago
Clothes are not even fabricated correctly. No darts (well endowed women miss this feature). Check out hems on dresses, skirts, and pants - there are none! The material is simply cut, left unfinished without sewn hems!
#24
Non-profits. They like to talk all rainbows and unicorns, but they are some of the most toxic, backstabbing, nepotistic workplaces I've ever been in.
Kira Okah 1 month ago (edited)
Did some voluntary work at a disability non-profit long time ago. In order to look good they hired many disabled people, who were absolutely belittled, bullied, and abused. Including me. Most of them sad that they had no choice in not leaving - either people didn't believe what was happening due to the façade the charity upheld, they would lose some or all of their assistance without a job, and that the abuse had convinced most of them that they were so broken and useless that they would never get another job so they should just put up with the daily abuse. Yes I left, yes I reported it, no nothing happened.
#25
Chiquita Banana and any of the banana republic companies. These are companies that essentially bought entire countries in central America. Bought, paid for, and own all of the local utility companies, and they control the government. They're all behind a lot of assassinations to control these countries and keep them company owned.
#26
Advertising.
If publishers wanted to, they could easily identify any and all users, all of their interests, darkest secrets, and vulnerabilities. If you share location data, they know where you live, and they know exactly where you go.
Sure, it seems benign when they want to sell you a cool new brand of underwear, but that amount of data being available is the most insane vulnerability we have in the modern era.
michael Chock 1 month ago
Marketing is the ongoing colonial era wars. It's no longer flags on wooden ships, its logos on boxes. Just an ongoing war to hoard resources while the earth burns.
#27
I'm going to say Finance but not for the reason most people think. I work in trading, and my colleagues are some of the smartest people on the planet. Former chemists, physicists, virologists, aerospace engineers, statisticians, materials scientists, and etc. They all get burnt out barely able to keep their research going and being for grant money, then they get recruited into financial firms to do the same kind of work they enjoy but get paid 10x or even 100x. They don't have to deal with customers, and they see direct indicators of the quality of their work.
Finance takes people who could be changing the world for the better, and once they cross the event horizon there's no going back. The other half of the problem is how difficult it is to get funding for research to improve the world, but finance is the black hole from which there is no escape.
Šimon Špaček 1 month ago
I might get a lot of hate for this, but it is our choice. Why movie stars and athletes get paid absolutely crazy money and scientists of any kind get peanuts? Some guy gets 50 millions for one movie, it is normal and nobody cares. Another guy, who spent 10 years in school and another 20 years in lab has to hope and pray that his research with 10% chance of some profit will get funding so he can pay for next month rent. When you see that, you will understand why Phil Mason thanked his Patreons in one of his research papers, they paid for it. And this thing that would never get funding was on cover of Science or Nature (I'm not sure which one). But we are more interested in movies and guys kicking ball on field, than in science.
#29
The Tomato industry. I went to a lecture for extra credit in college on the history of the tomato. I was expecting to hear how people used it and where people started growing them and what not. What I got was essentially a full season of the sopranos. Extortion, m*rder, blackmail, vandalism, you name it...the tomato industry was rife with the worst s**t.
#30
Childcare.
I work with people who are straight dumb, some who are mean, and the well meaning get burnt out.
And your child isn't always safe from other children because there's really nothing we can do about bad behavior. They might get bit, and like there's nothing I can do about it but write up a report and scold the kid. And they'll get bit again.
Low pay, low support, lack of adequate training for any kids who fall into neurodivergency, lack of supplies, no time/space/room for one-on-one care, high turnover.
School up the street is in the middle of a police investigation. Detectives are involved. Research the center HARD before placing your kid there.
Solidhog 1 month ago
This is basically primary schools in the UK. There are a number of exceptional staff who really do care. But now they are fighting against "Trusts" who only care about the money coming in and their image. They pretend they care about your child's education and the welfare of the staff but in reality staff now are burnt out, have no respect for management and are losing the love for the job they had. Add to that the ever decreasing behavior of children due to bad parenting.
#31
Real Modeling (not being influencer lol).
XanthippeⓐWulf🇨🇦️️🇬🇧 1 month ago (edited)
As vicious as you think you can possibly imagine this industry could be, you'd be wrong because you'd miss the absolutely insane racism that is just shrugged off & accepted to placate the head of some design house.
#32
Cruise Lines. Man overboard tech exists that would drastically reduce the number of lives lost at sea but it comes at a cost. The large cruise line I worked at wouldn't even consider it unless a competitor did it first. It will never be implemented.
#33
Dog shelters.
There’s a lot of people that breed dogs without knowing what they’re doing, and just doing it to make money.
Dogs are born with illnesses and disabilities so get ditched and left behind, ending up in a dog shelter.
Here it’s filled with dogs still “too healthy” to pass away but “too weak” to live. If we wouldn’t take care of them they wouldn’t survive for a day.
If you ever want to get a dog, please get one from a GOOD shelter. Know what you’re getting, but please don’t go find a cheep breeder.
WindySwede 1 month ago (edited)
Don't the[y] need a license, or is that just paperwork and an fee? Animals deserve better.
#34
Medical devices. You think your cataract surgeon thinks it's unsafe to do both cataracts in the same day? Yea right, they just can't bill as much if they do them both same day. You think that iStent will help your glaucoma?? B******t, it does almost nothing, but the surgeon gets to bill your insurance a lot of money for that procedure - so we're doing it. Oh, you have astigmatism?? How about laser assisted cataract surgery? It's great for eyes like yours. Forget that the complication rate is much higher, and that it's not covered by insurance because the outcomes are so bad. It's PERFECT for you.
I mentioned a few ophthalmic procedures, but the list goes on for every specialty. Your medicine is likely influenced by the highest bidder. I hate to say it, but you can't trust any medical provider in the US.
#35
Temp agencies who provide housing.
Nimitz 1 month ago (edited)
Or the Temporary Foreign Worker Program here in Canada. I remember being a kitchen manager in my 20s. We had a stack of resumes and plenty of available employees, but the owner's sun ran the numbers. A chain of 4 restaurants brought in 27 Filipino workers and rented them a six bedroom house to share. By doing so they saved about $2/hr per worker. Our labour costs were usually around 9-12% max. With a 15-17% food cost. Just one location made about $60k/month in pure profit. But daddy's boy wanted a bonus so f**k all the local college kids who wanted a job, right?
#36
Real estate
I'm a copywriter for a US real estate corporation and cant wait to get the f**k away from them. Disgusting industry. But right now i need to pay my bills.
Tim Gearing 1 month ago
Bottom feeders. In fact anyone in an industry that gets paid a commission is only interested in one person …Themselves.
#37
I am going to go with Jewelry. A fair number of people are aware of "blood diamonds" and some people are aware of the s**t that DeBeers has pulled and therefore avoid diamonds altogether, but it is much deeper. You will be hard pressed to find a gemstone mine that isn't exploitive of its labor force, and even harder pressed to find one that isn't exploitive of the environment. It is an industry ripe with money laundering, ties to organized crime, and human trafficking. Industry standard terms are very careful to make it sound like they are protecting consumers (so governments don't step in) but actually protecting the industry. For example, a diamond that is manufactured from pure carbon to create a true diamond lattice with a hardness 10 etc. *must* be prominently labeled as "lab created" or "synthetic" in marketing. Meanwhile a low-grade diamond that has a coating on it to completely change it's color can be called "natural" and the fact that it is "treated" can be in the small print. And you can get a piece of white quartz, and sell it as a "natural diamond simulant" without problem. A "cultured" pearl will usually have less than a mm of pearl around a bead of shell or even plastic. And *all* commercial pearls are cultured.
#38
In my country: window cleaners and roof builders.
They are run like mob organisations. If anyone would be stupid enough to start a window cleaning or roofing business, they can count on actual bombs, arson, intimidation and violence. The businesses that run the show have their own terfs and tresspassing will result in getting a bomb in your mailbox.
It's not even a joke.
#39
Probably all of them. Every industry I ever came across tries to do the minimum required (effort/social/sustainability) to make the most (money) for themselves.
Food industry: race to the bottom for least amount of proper ingredients in their products. Pharmaceutical industry: maximize profits to the point a part of the customers go into bankruptcy. Tech industry: longevity of products just a little longer than warranty. I can go on and on.
edit: typo.
Toothless Feline 1 month ago
This. Every industry is darker than outsiders think it is. The fact is that a significant number of people can’t (or won’t) overcome their natural tendency to be greedy, selfish, and controlling, and other people tend to ascribe leadership qualities to this behavior. So big decisions usually end up being made by people who should be nowhere near that authority.
#40
The towing / tow truck industry, at least here in Toronto where it is very territorial and well connected.
#41
Call center. Training automatic communication on the clock f***s you up.
Met people who were in the industry for some years and who had complete private conversations without remembering one word the person said. Not in the sense of forgetting but in the sense of just not listening.
Apatheist Account2 1 month ago
Just to change the mood...the other day my wife said to me "You haven't been listening to a word I said!". I thought, what a strange way to start a conversation...
#42
The video game industry. All you see as a consumer is a fun game, some big publishers and perhaps a few interviews with devs telling you how proud they are of element xy or the game in general.
Reality is that most those projects live off constant pressure on the devs, and a lot of it. The publisher sets a date, there are millions of dollars going into it including investments by stakeholders who want to be satisfied. Most of the times those release dates are unrealistic to say the least. This leads to a ton of pressure on the devs, working way over time and still not being able to really put out the work that would have to be done in order to put out a complete game in the end.
Thats also one of the reasons why so many games nowadays release unfinished or full of bugs. Theyre pushing the game out before its finished due to unrealistic release dates set to satisfy investors. If the game is still a success, devs go right back to work with new contracts. If it flops the work on that game gets dropped and you only had to pay like half of the work done by the devs because you released the game halfbaked.
StrangeOne 1 month ago
I heard so much about this through LucidPixl. He's worked with Disney, Activision, Blizzard. He recalled a time he was working on the project all day, into the evening. When 2am rolled around he realized he was still at work, hadn't eaten supper nor had a break in many, many hours. As he was getting his stuff in order his boss asks him "Adam, where do you think you're going?" Adam replied "Home. It's 2am. I am going home and having dinner." His boss threatened him his job if he left. So he walked out for good.
#44
Hospitality(Hotels/Resorts).
Some issues: Money laundering, gentrification, and human trafficking. Not to mention waste, destroying natural habitats, limiting local access to resort areas, and over tourism.
Gary Geracci 2 weeks ago
Like B and Bs! Stupidest idea and most riddled with unethical players
#45
The Art World, by which I mean the high-end institutional gallery art world. Gagosian, Mary Boone, etc.
I grew up in that world, and the amount of s****y exploitation that exists at every level would astonish you. I could write a book.
My advice to any young artist would be to make art for yourself first, and to not chase mainstream success. It’s not worth it.
#46
Rehab for d***s and alcohol. .
Aballi 1 month ago
I work for an amazing non-profit recovery agency in Santa Cruz, Ca. Yeah there are the bad apples, but the majority of my coworkers provide trauma informed, client centered care. I've learned how to set strong boundaries and uphold them in a firm and compassionate way, We're constantly growing and holding more staff trainings based on the latest scientific advancements in SUD recovery. No potential client is turned away; if we're full, we'll still assign them a case manager and help them find somewhere else to go. Coolest part about it for me, I graduated as a client 8 years ago; it's pretty rewarding to be on the other side.
#47
Shipping industry, along with many different commodities. Oh you got a vessel to take your purchased cargo from some third world s**thole? Gotta bribe the port staff or your vessel gets delayed indefinitely. Or the port staff simply siphons your bunker fuel while docked and sells it back to you lmao.
You sold a cargo basis certain specifications with a lab doing independent testing upon discharge to determine the exact specs for payment settlement? Guess who’s bribing that lab?
For the US market, there are many addictives that are prohibited from being added to gasoline to improve its octane rating as they are deemed too polluting to the environment. But many US gasoline blenders buy large volumes of them anyway. Why? For selling into the Latin American market.
Pittsburgh rare 1 month ago
Stevedores are a well stablished family business here. Children basically inherit their parents' position. The pay isn't bad, but turning a blind eye can make you rich. Any attempt to change their work conditions or introduce examinations or qualifications is quickly shut down with a threat of strike and stopping all cargo trade.
#48
I'm older,(66) and remember a time when gambling was thought of as a moral failing.
Libstak 1 month ago
Investing in anything in the hope of a profit is gambling, the stock market is absolutely gambling. That being said, casino and slot gambling is targeted to the desperate and financially insecure and being the profiteer aka. Gambling organisation in this scenario is where the moral failing lies, the victims are just scared and seeking whatever dubious means seem available to them to survive, at least in their minds, from the outside looking in its easy to see the fallacy but for the addict, that view is lost.
#49
Film and TV production.
- Grueling 16 hour days / 6 days a week are normalized
- Going months without working, 25 year veterans on unemployment
- Hollywood egos and abuse towards production assistants and personal assistants
- Injuries / Deaths on film sets due to unsafe workplace
- The list goes on and on, with tons of examples in the news
But people still view hollywood as glamourous and aspirational.
What do you think ?
Tele Avision 1 month ago (edited)
People are a main source of profit in most revenue streams. Corruption is people and the institution is where they hide.
Load More Replies... Tyranamar Suess 1 month ago
Was it supposed to be uplifting? I missed that part.
Load More Replies...
Fabulous chocolate cookie 1 month ago
So turns out the biggest problem here are people and corporate greed for money. The more money the better. No matter how messed up it is.
michael Chock 1 month ago
Exploitation culture is why I am starting my own non-profit (The Aquifer Project). I am going to build a collaborative sub society or die trying.
Omi bub 1 month ago
This is why social enterprise is the way forward. A for profit business but the money goes back into the business or a community benefit. Like a charity but not
Load More Replies...
Donna Peluda 1 month ago
I lnia guy who works in the elevator 🛗 business. It has it's ups and downs.
Apatheist Account2 1 month ago
*its. Anyway, the problems in that business go all the way to the top.
Load More Replies...
LazyKitten 3 weeks ago
People have been covering up imperfection for years- hide the dark sides behind the pretty facade. Flawless Girls by Anne Marie McLemore is a great example of this. Also I Feed Her to the Beast and the Beast is Me by Jamison Shea, very "giving everything up for something that treats you terribly".
Charles Kormos 1 month ago
Everything listed here is system built into every society solely to enable the rich to get richer.
Auntriarch 1 month ago (edited)
Not really. I'd say about 9 of them are US specific. The rest are universal to one degree or another. Except the tomato thing.
Load More Replies...
Tele Avision 1 month ago (edited)
People are a main source of profit in most revenue streams. Corruption is people and the institution is where they hide.
Load More Replies... Tyranamar Suess 1 month ago
Was it supposed to be uplifting? I missed that part.
Load More Replies... Fabulous chocolate cookie 1 month ago
So turns out the biggest problem here are people and corporate greed for money. The more money the better. No matter how messed up it is.
michael Chock 1 month ago
Exploitation culture is why I am starting my own non-profit (The Aquifer Project). I am going to build a collaborative sub society or die trying.
Omi bub 1 month ago
This is why social enterprise is the way forward. A for profit business but the money goes back into the business or a community benefit. Like a charity but not
Load More Replies... Donna Peluda 1 month ago
I lnia guy who works in the elevator 🛗 business. It has it's ups and downs.
Apatheist Account2 1 month ago
*its. Anyway, the problems in that business go all the way to the top.
Load More Replies... LazyKitten 3 weeks ago
People have been covering up imperfection for years- hide the dark sides behind the pretty facade. Flawless Girls by Anne Marie McLemore is a great example of this. Also I Feed Her to the Beast and the Beast is Me by Jamison Shea, very "giving everything up for something that treats you terribly".
Charles Kormos 1 month ago
Everything listed here is system built into every society solely to enable the rich to get richer.
Auntriarch 1 month ago (edited)
Not really. I'd say about 9 of them are US specific. The rest are universal to one degree or another. Except the tomato thing.
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