Human Resources - the lowest form of human life ?

Luckily I haven't worked for a multi-national in over 10 years but when I was there constantly at odds with whatever automaton worked in human resources.

Shirt not ironed, tie not straight, no tie or no shirt was their full contribution to the productivity of the company.
Being 5 minutes late caused a feeding frenzy amongst the HR pool who couldn't wait to admonish you in public, especially if you were on their naughty list.
Luckily I worked my way up in the design R & D part of the company to a point where we granted freedom over our hours, dress code & budgets so it cut our dealings with HR down to virtually zero.

I escaped that working environment but I see my wife currently having to suffer daily at their whims.
It's berating your staff over petty things which drives moral down where you wonder if the company would be better served without a HR dept.
In my wife's case she's just biding her time before jumping ship, a company she loved, a job she loved made completely redundant cause of one over officious department.

I realise someone has to do head office's bidding, I just wish their typical employee understood human emotion & had empathy for individual cases.
Now girls, pick up the slack cause Mary's out on stress leave, don't park in the spaces near the entrance cause they're for execs, didn't you wear that tired outfit yesterday, if I could see your shoes needed a shine under the partition then everyone could, where's the doctors cert for the half-day you took off, your mug shouldn't be kept at your desk now should it . . . .

Would anyone else be in favour of putting them all on an Island then nuking the thing from orbit or is it just me ?