Mind-Boggling Ideas About Modern Work (Part 2)
8 more paradoxes and contradictions in our work life
Hello readers,
A couple of weeks ago we looked at 7 big contradictions and paradoxes that we encounter in our work culture. Going by the response, it seems like many readers could relate to it- having experienced it themselves or seen those trends play out in the world of work.
In continuation, here are 8 more mind-boggling ideas that will make you re-look at modern work and think about it in a very different light:
Orwell’s idea of BS jobs: If you’ve read Animal Farm or 1984, it’s clear that George Orwell had quite a sharp insight into the workings of society…and those who controlled it. He believed that the proliferation of so many (pointless) jobs was perhaps a way to keep the masses exceedingly busy so they’d never have the chance to band together and plot a rebellion. This is exactly what was done on slave ships and plantations- given a bit of free time, the indentured laborers could start planning something mischievous. The best way to nip those plans in the bud would be to never let them be free, even for a moment. Intriguing thesis, and while it has all the trappings of an unlikely, evil-genius plan, I suspect there might be a grain of truth to this.
Ignoring the caring classes: The great tragedy of our age is that we seem to have reduced jobs solely to what they produce. In doing so, we overlook the essential care element that a lot of them involve. This commodification of work may explain why we simply fail to take care of the caring classes: nurses, support staff, firefighters, teachers, elder-care workers, etc. We already saw how these people sacrificed their lives during the COVID-19 crisis and yet they barely get the respect, pay, and benefits they deserve for ensuring the society doesn’t collapse overnight. An interesting possibility for why this happens is that care work is usually carried out by the working classes (and mostly low-income women). The elites never have to engage in this and can simply delegate such work, which is why they never come to empathize with the service these people do and how they deserve much better. This allows such structural inequalities and undervaluation of care work to continue.
The First Question: When humans die, their graves mark the love they felt from their families & friends- marks of intense emotional attachment. Graves rarely mention designations from work. This probably offers a clue on how we sum up our lives and what they meant. But when we’re alive, the first question we ask others is about the work they do for a living, and not about our curiosities, values, and obsessions- the very things that make us human!
The Worship of Overwork: A big paradox about our work is that we derive a sense of meaning from struggling in the very jobs that we hate and can’t stand. The meaning-deriving part probably happens because, at some level, we all feel a sense of self-worth when we struggle against an ordeal and can come out of it (by practicing self-denial) successfully. But instead of being a side effect, this sadomasochistic feature has become our main source of validation, where suffering is a badge of economic citizenship, overwork is celebrated, and leisure (or non-over-work) is cast down as lazy and disrespectful.
One pic to sum up modern work The Artifical Divide: Since self-torture through overwork has become so important, we automatically conclude that the poor are lazy and didn’t really struggle or else they’d not be in such a situation. The finance class, thus, couldn’t have done a better job- make people work endlessly and create resentment against the working class while getting them to aspire to resemble the elite in their lifestyle and mannerisms so they can perpetuate a system that benefits them alone.
Value vs Values: We’re in a conflict between value and values- with the former taking over everything in its path. The thinkers of the past rarely wrote books on how to get wealthy and their chief concern usually was how one could be a loving, caring human and lead a good life- ultimate questions that matter more than anything. But there’s no room for value in a world solely focussed on (and deluded into?) extracting value from every pocket of the planet.
The Trade-Off: We didn’t get the 15-hour workweek Keynes promised because we traded consumerism for leisure. Our system of sadomasochism makes the pain of work the only way to justify the furtive pleasures we earn and squeeze into the few hours we get. That is why we can only get low-quality, compensatory pleasures, like a quick TV show episode or 30 mins of mind-numbing scrolling on social media, and have forgotten what genuine leisure- reading a book, going on long walks, spending hours with our kids without worrying about an email from the boss- really feel like.
UBI: Looking at the scourge of painful BS jobs that people hold on to purely out of economic considerations, it might be a good idea for governments to explore solutions like Universal Basic Income. Tying back to the point on BDSM explored in the previous article, UBI can provide workers with the safe word they’ve been looking for so they can finally end the debacle and tap out when their crappy jobs become too much to handle. This is the safe word theory of social liberation. Assure people a basic monthly income so that they can escape the torture of bullshit jobs and toxic bosses. With the advances in generative AI, I believe this conversation has become more urgent than ever- but we must be careful not to use UBI as a tool to draw attention away from the endless concentration of wealth that AI owners want to create.
Hope you enjoyed today’s piece. If you’re new here and found this interesting, here are a few other articles you may like:
- A World Without Work