Moral dilemmas are inevitable in life. Your inner compass might show a clear direction, but certain circumstances can make it difficult to follow. Then it seems like there’s no right way to go about the situation.

Redditor u/maybeisuck276 told the AITA community about the moral conflict he faced at work. His co-worker in retail constantly went on breaks. Eventually, she was caught by the boss and he had to choose whether to tell the truth and bear the consequences, or to lie about it and hold on to the resentment.

Moral dilemmas can arise even under the most mundane circumstances, such as being at work, for instance

Image credits: Blake Wisz (not the actual photo)

Guy had enough of his co-worker constantly going on breaks, and faced a dilemma about whether to cover for her to their boss

Image credits: Tim Mossholder (not the actual photo)

Image credits: Andrea Piacquadio (not the actual photo)

Image credits: maybeisuck276

Choosing the right way to go in a sticky situation might result in someone being unhappy either way

Sometimes it might be difficult to make a decision because of intersecting moral values and social norms. If the two don’t go hand in hand, it might feel like both options have negative outcomes. And they often do, which is why at some point, the person has to choose the lesser of two evils.

In the OP’s situation, he had to choose between lying to his boss or snitching on his co-worker. The first option likely felt morally wrong (no one wants to be a liar), while the second one meant going against what might be expected from society (no one likes a snitch). Since he couldn’t honor both sets of beliefs, he chose to be honest with the boss. The fact that the colleague had been misbehaving repeatedly and with no consequences likely didn’t make him want to sympathize with her more either.

Image credits: Towfiqu barbhuiya (not the actual photo)

Even though he did what he felt was right, the decision had some negative outcomes nevertheless. The co-worker got angry, and he started wondering if he was the jerk in the situation. People in the comments nearly unanimously decided that he’s not. Not only that, they shamed the co-worker for her actions—some of them have likely had a similar colleague at some point in their careers.

As with any other job, there are rules to taking breaks in retail, yet some people seem to care for them more than others

As a matter of fact, as much as 90% of Americans have had an annoying co-worker, and nearly 60% have thought of quitting because of them. Considering that the retail industry employs roughly 32 million people in the US, there ought to be a few bad apples there.

Most retail employees are hourly workers, who usually get 15 to 30 minutes of break time during their shift; also, usually only after some time of their shift has passed already. In the OP’s story, the girl was taking breaks constantly, even after only spending an hour at work, and paid no attention to her co-worker’s needs, to make matters worse.

Image credits: Chait Goli (not the actual photo)

She was using her breaks to take care of personal matters, which is not that uncommon. HR Daily Advisor pointed out that nearly one third of employed people in the US use their lunch breaks to run errands. It also revealed that employees have been spending this time surfing the internet and responding to emails way more than they used to. In addition to that, nearly 30% of them chose to work during their lunch breaks nowadays.

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Whether it’s retail or any other job, employees have a right to take breaks. But with rights come responsibilities, which is why you shouldn’t expect someone to cover for you when you disregard them. And that’s exactly why the OP didn’t.

People in the comments unanimously decided that the OP was not a jerk and discussed their opinions and experiences

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