Don't Be A Tool

Are you a tool or just being used as a tool by another?  What is the definition of tool?  There are so many definitions and usage for the word because it is a slang term.  Here are a few:

- an offensive comment, mainly aimed towards the male of the species, when one is being particularly nasty, stupid, or facetious.
- A tool is a dick, both in the literal sense (genitalia) and in describing someone who's unpleasant or full of themselves.
 - ...being a tool means being pompous or infatuated with oneself, whereas the urban dictionary and wiktionary write that it means one is being used without knowing it.
- When someone is called a tool, it indicates that they lack personal convictions, and generally go along with what they believe is expected of them without bothering to question the higher purpose. 
- One who lacks the mental capacity to know he is being used. A fool. A cretin. Characterized by low intelligence and/or self-esteem. 


A few hypothetical situations that might involve being a tool:

-  Perhaps someone like a public official, lets call them Person A, wants to smear another person.  They can't do that publicly without making themselves look bad, petty, so they enlist the help of another person, lets call them Person B.  So Person A and Person B devise a plan where A will make a brief reference to something that was said but doesn't follow through on it any further in their remarks.  Then Person B reacts to that slight reference by asking for a little more information and then they plan on requesting something like maybe a copy of a letter or email that may contain the information or remarks or whatever that was "briefly" referenced by A.  Now the plan is that B will then try to enlist another person, lets call them Person C, to use as an accomplice to help A and B publicly smear another person.  The plan is for C to share the "information" on something like a public forum.
So in this hypothetical situation, Persons A and B are "the tools" and Person C is the one being used as the tool.  But if Person C wises up and gets tired of being used as a tool by others just to achieve their dirty little deeds, then the plan fails and Person C is no longer a tool.

- Person A comes in contact with Person B in some kind of situation and sees that B is in a desperate state and needs some help.  This provides an opportunity for A to offer assistance to B and thus they ingratiate themselves to B.  And maybe there is even a Person C.  In both cases A will ingratiate themselves with only a goal of self enrichment in the end.  Maybe their goal is financial enrichment through a crime like insurance fraud, or maybe even theft from one of the desperate persons needing help.
So in this hypothetical situation, Person A is "the tool" and persons B and C are the unwitting tools being used by A.

So are you "The Tool" or are you the one being used as the "Tool".  My advice is to open your eyes and wise up, don't be used as the tool.  Once you wake up and quit being used as a tool by others, they will turn on you.  So anyone who joins in and helps the user, don't cry when they turn on you too.  That is what users do.  And if you are a willing participant in the dirty deeds of a user, you deserve what happens.