Sorry to bust your rant, but as a security geek, I can tell you that security guard did exactly the right thing.

The guard's job is not to make sure they know everyone who enters the building, it's their job to help prevent unauthorized (not un-authenticated) access. She had no way of knowing for sure that you still work there.

There are plenty of stories of guards who did the "nice thing" and let someone in, only to discover later that person had been terminated and had come back to mess with hardware or cause other damage. I've even had to clean up after some of those messes.

Instead of snubbing her, you should be thanking her for doing her job.

Ha! Spoken like a true engineer. You'll see in my OP I did not fault her for doing her job, I am faulting her for doing her job like a robot. She is doing exactly the right thing. Since she is so predictable, I can probably write a Perl script that emulates her to a T.

There is more context than I have inclination to provide, including the fact that my work is not all that sensitive, that the area in general is not that secure, and that my capacity to do damage is governed by my access to company servers and network, not physical access to the office building. All items that a human being can take into account, and a list of rules cannot.

I think in general it bothers me because I see this fascination in America with rules, process and automation, to the detriment of human relations and using your brain. People jump at the opportunity to shirk responsibility and decision-making.

• "Sir, your nail scissors are prohibited by TSA regulations. You'll have to surrender them."
• "I cannot sell this bottle of medicinal liquor to you without identification showing you're over 21."
• "I have to call the phone number of the company that employed you previously." -- "I was self-employed." -- "I still have to call."
• "These are your tech design standards. They're for ABAP, and you write Java, but they're standards so you have to follow them."
</soapbox>

I'd have to agree with brother radiantmatrix here -- the security guard's job is to guard. She did her job, so I'm guessing it's more like a customer service issue.

You didn't say what happened after that, but I would hope she followed up with "Did you forget your pass?" and start the procedure to get someone authorized to vouch for you and let you in, and/or set you up with a temporary pass after confirming that you are authorized to enter this secure area.

Or you could have smiled and said, "You know what -- I'll just go back to my car and get my pass." She might even have let you in at that point. Or not.