this post was submitted on 04 Aug 2024
447 points (85.5% liked)
Antiwork
483 readers
8 users here now
For the abolition of work. Yes really, abolish work! Not "reform work" but the destruction of work as a separate field of human activity.
To save the world, we're going to have to stop working! — David Graeber
A strange delusion possesses the working classes of the nations where capitalist civilization holds its sway. ...the love of work... Instead of opposing this mental aberration, the priests, the economists, and the moralists have cast a sacred halo over work. — Paul Lafargue
In communist society, where nobody has one exclusive sphere of activity but each can become accomplished in any branch he wishes, society regulates the general production and thus makes it possible for me to do one thing today and another tomorrow, to hunt in the morning, fish in the afternoon, rear cattle in the evening, criticise after dinner, just as I have a mind, without ever becoming hunter, fisherman, herdsman or critic. — Karl Marx
In the glorification of 'work', in the unwearied talk of the 'blessing of work', I see the same covert idea as in the praise of useful impersonal actions: that of fear of everything individual. — Friedrich Nietzsche
If hard work were such a wonderful thing, surely the rich would have kept it all to themselves. — Lane Kirkland
The bottom line is simple: all of us deserve to make the most of our potential as we see fit, to be the masters of our own destinies. Being forced to sell these things away to survive is tragic and humiliating. We don’t have to live like this. ― CrimethInc
founded 1 year ago
MODERATORS
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
view the rest of the comments
This is the entire problem I pointed out with my first comment. The entire joke hinges on “some jobs are not legitimate,” and if any of us bring up any potential examples you can simply say “well I can picture it so no it’s fine.” It’s a convenient on/off switch that makes the claim invincible because the target can be moved at any time to any location.
At the end of the day the problem is simple: we should generally not look down on people just trying to pay their bills. Yes we can hand wave it away with [insert super moray dubious job] but that’s not what this post is pointing to.
The question isn't whether someone in the comments section can imagine the job, it's whether the same 'you' who does the job can imagine the job being done by a pig in a children's book.
Also, if you're complaining about it being unfalsibiable, don't give more examples for them to judge, ask the people defending the joke for counterexamples. That's just logical (in the literal mathematical sense). That is to say, jobs that can't be pictured as something done by pigs in children's books.
There I would say hedge fund managers, health insurance coverage evaluators, and telemarketers.
As for looking down on people for just trying to pay their bills, how do you come to that conclusion? Unemployed people and chronically disabled people don't have real jobs either. Do you look down on them? If not, why assume people are looking down on people who do fake jobs to pay the bills?
Why do you think this post isn't pointing to super morally dubious jobs?
I think you’re giving a very generous interpretation to this post in an attempt to win an internet argument.
It’s a flawed joke. The ambiguity lends itself to the interpretation that certain work is more legitimate than others without giving a real definition, meaning people will likely insert their own prejudices. Especially because of the moving target aspect.
Basically this feels like another flavor of boomer humor.