Just Plain Wrong

Ok, so up until now I have been attempting a light-hearted tone because really, in the grand scheme of things, all of the key item pushing, mystery shopping, etc. is just silly and there is no need to get truly upset about it. What is upsetting, is when "customer service" (as all of the silliness is called) gets put before employee well-being. For example:
Employee X is working the register when nature calls and she needs to take a bathroom break. Employee Y is "greeting" customers at the door and there are two more employees reshelving books and any one of them could easily run over to the registers while Employee X runs to the bathroom, but the service manager says "wait". 45 minutes later, Employee X still has not been allowed to leave the registers.

Or take another example:
As in our first example, Employee Y is "greeting" customers at the door. Now this position at the door is viewed as very important for the company because it ensures that everyone is getting acknowledged and offered help within seconds of entering the store. This person is also supposed to recommend key items to everyone that comes in. Super important. However, most people who walk in the door walk past the greeter as fast as their little legs can carry them because they just want to browse for a bit and then ask for help if and when they really need it. If the greeter is helping another customer, or not at the front for some reason, those people who do want help right away, can walk up to the registers and someone can call for customer service, or they could ask one of the people working on reshelving within the store, or the greeter can do a loop around the store and check to see how everyone is doing now and then. In other words, it is not the end of the world if that greeter is not in their spot for a few minutes. However, when Employee Y's stomach starts rumbling and she gets to feeling a bit light-headed because she didn't have quite enough for breakfast (not to mention the fact that breakfast was 5 hours ago) and she asks to take a two minute break to run to the office and grab a snack she is denied. And this even at a moment when there was already another person at the front who could have easily taken over for those two minutes. This isn't even the end of it. Employee Y resigns herself to a rumbling stomach for a while longer after her first request was denied and then is relieved when another employee comes to take over for her. As it turns out though, he was coming to take over so that Employee Y can go to the registers because there are three people in line and god forbid we make them wait for the one cashier who is there already (who by the way is Employee X who still has to pee).
There is no excuse for this shit. I quit.