Memes @sopuli.xyz

1y ago

I don't dream of labor

100 comments

Nah the trick is to find something you can stand doing for 40 years to fund what you actually want to do with your time
- What I want to do with my time doesn't involve removed my best years out to some asshole I'll probably never even meet.
  
  So better to just sit and let someone removed his life so you can just be? Indeed a shallow way to look at existence.
  
  The post doesn't talk about working for someone else though, it talks about a job.
  You can have a job being self employed.

Sigh ... can you people tell me what is your "idea of life"? Like what do you think a persons' life should look like?
I mean for a moment lets imagine that you're the only one on earth, everyone just disapeared. Your life will be pretty hard do you realize that? It'll be a constant survival, gathering food, clean water, being warm, preparing for weather catastrophes, animal attacks, insects, diseases, etc. You'll be constantly on edge whether you survive to the next day, week, year. The reason you don't have to deal with shit like that is that we have sort of functioning society where everyone takes a part, everyone specializes at something and together we achieve more and make your life super easy.
So with this in mind, back to the original question - how do you imagine your existence? Sitting down on your ass? Travel? How? Having a family? How do you feed them? Do you want them to be in constant survival mode?
Or if you like this then go. Really. Go to the woods and enjoy your life.
Or is this somehow supposed to be criticism of 9-5 office job for some billionaire? If yes then this is laughably shallow view of jobs and a society as a whole. Whith shit like this you literally shit on eneryone who does our society a better place.
- 4 days of work, 3 days off would be a great start.
  
  I did 3 on 4 off. The 3rd 12hr shift was rough, but otherwise it was pretty great.
- Such a rigid view of life man
  Here's a crazy idea: decouple work from personal survival. People will work just as much, and live easier.
  
  But it isn't decoupled.
  There are people whose work directly enables your survival, and that of everyone else's around you, as well as their own.
  Food production, mining, logging, maintenance of infrastructure, just to stay basic.
  These people need to be compensated too, and they can't just opt out. Cause if enough of them do, or if the ones who don't are just not performing well enough, everyone is fucked.
  This fixation that we don't need to work to live is moronic, just because your job is not essential doesn't mean no job is.
  At its most basic level work is about portioning scarcity. You work to be assigned a smaller amount of the hardship pie on your society. Thankfully western society has a very small pie to dole out, comparatively.
- I love writing software. I write a fair amount of it, and upload it for free. And my experience is that the best way I've found of turning something you love into something you hate is to tie it to being something you have to do, and do by other people's rules. I only started liking writing code again when I moved into management and didn't have to write code for other people anymore. I was able to go back to doing it for pleasure.
  So, yeah. In an ideal world, I'd be free to write and publish software, on my time. When I burned myself out, I'd switch to something else; home projects, setting up selfhost servers, maybe build a table. You can't do that when you're doing it for a living. Fuck if I know how we make that happen; I'm not an economist. And I think it's probably another couple of generations away before we could possibly get to a post-scarcity society - even assuming that we don't extinct ourselves, and that the people who could make it happen actually let it rather than greedily using it to enrich themselves.
  Automation, clean energy; I think we're close to having the tech for post scarcity. I do believe this: if we freed people from defacto indentured servitude, they might turn into unproductive fat slobs like on Wall•E. Or they might become artists and artisans ushering in a new Renaissance. But I'm optimistic: we won't know until we try, and not trying because we have a low opinion of our fellow man is just callow.
  
  Thanks for sharing this! I'm at a point in my career where I could move up to management, or I could stay on a pure tech path and start to have limited opportunities for advancement. I've also been feeling less satisfaction for my technical work lately. I've thought about looking around at other jobs, but I've been coming to the conclusion that it would be the same anywhere, because it is ultimately for someone else and most of the time either the goal of the project or the method required to get there don't align with my own goals or interests. From the bottom looking up, there's a lot about management that doesn't excite me either, but I've been wondering if it would free me up a bit to keep hobby work fun.
  I'm glad to hear you were able to feel an increase in your passion about coding after moving to management and I'm hoping it can do the same for me. I'm a little weary of becoming just another cog in the system though. I'm just hoping that I can keep my current perspective in focus so I can use that to bring compassion for my reports and keep them from being burned out as long as I can.
  It'd be nice to just to screw off and make my own things, but I have bills to pay. None of my hobby project ideas are money producers and even if some of them could be, I don't know that I want to pervert them by making that a goal. I feel like that would suck out the fun of them for me and put me back in the same trap I'm already in.
- this reads like a capitalist propaganda leaflet that falls out of the sky for you to read in the 1940s. what if I told you that you can have a functioning society that isn't predicted on exploitation of labor and doesn't require you to live like a hermit in the forest. you should read some Adam Smith or some shit if you're going to talk about labour division and specialization as if it's a good thing. you can laud it all you want, but Smith is very clear this is a system of masters and labourers where society is built on your masters giving you just enough rent so you can afford to pay another (or even the same) master back while you and the other laborers compete against each other in a labor market while the masters watch. he even warns if you divide too much, you end up with a pile of shit. we're there now. we're a pile of shit. nobody wants to work their meaningless job that was sold to them on this capitalist American dream thought up by a bunch of anglos from 1790.
  
  It does seem like a much better way could exist. So, why doesn't it? Is nearly the whole world just constantly being outsmarted by a few super clever assholes?
- Humans are social creatures and people of all strokes in the anti work movement wish to return to a less structured, communal version of labor and survival. Starting on the premise of "you're the last person in earth" is a non-starter. It's coming from the perspective of this toxic individualism that denies people's innate desire for community and connection to others.
  I'm generalizing and opinions vary widely but I think this would be a fair summary. Most want to decouple labor from survival. It is inherently coercive to be denied food and shelter on the basis of being unwilling/unable to work. Most want to divide essential labor (farming, housing, transportation, sanitation, etc.) as evenly as possible among a given population to ensure everyone is fed, sheltered and healthy. I'd type more but I'm at work and don't have the time to go into further detail.
  Here's more of the "why". As for how, I don't have a handy resource right this second but I'd be happy to talk more when I can. For further reading I'd recommend that you look into degrowth, solar punk, anti-work, anarchism/ libertarian socialism, mutual aid, UBI, and social ecology. They're all pieces of the puzzle
  
  I'd type more but I'm at work and don't have the time to go into further detail.
  enough said
  
  Here is an alternative Piped link(s):
  Here's
  Piped is a privacy-respecting open-source alternative frontend to YouTube.
  I'm open-source; check me out at GitHub.
- That's why ancient civilcations had slaves and we have bots. Yes, we are only half there. But we need to find a way, so the other half has to eat and a place to live until then.
  Btw, if not for 2% possessing 90% of world wealth, average work week would be much shorter.
- Holy shit did you set some people off with this.
  
  Yeah, people generally don't like bullshit.

Nothing is fun 8 hours a day
- I'm a programmer and would happily spend 8 hours doing it in my free time haha
  It's nice to get paid to do something you enjoy. But it's still not as enjoyable as doing it for fun.
  
  Plus, when you get to a certain point in some careers, especially IT ones, you don't have to work a full 8 hours straight. I can pretty much keep whatever hours I want as long as the job gets done.
  Sometimes that includes overtime, but most of the time it doesn't.
  
  I am a systems architect. I love my job, and work is the only place I can do this stuff. I don't have a million $ for hardware here.
  Also, I'm paid well and the environment is great. For me, it is true, I don't "work", I do what I like. And as a german, I benefit from all the holidays, and general employee rights and protection.
  
  Good for you! I studied computer science and afterwards I had no joy in programming anymore. I'm a data manager right now, doing data stuff and little programming which is ok. Maybe I will do a full time programming job again one day.
  
  Yes programming is the way. Truly the closest thing to this dream
  
  Yeah I code in my free time anyways so idk I think there's at least a perfect job for me.
- You don't like sleeping? :o /j
- <' laughs in therapist '>

If your hobby can pay you a salary, then quickly you'll have to pervert it to continue to earn enough I stead of doing it "your way".
- Dunno, I've managed just fine 👀
  
  Of course there are exceptions. I also like doing what I do, both as a hobby and in my job. But the point is that this can be really dangerous as it can take the fun out of a hobby for a lot of people if you have to do it.
  Would I have been less ambitious I might have become a cook. I like cooking. But imagining that I would have to do it 8 hours a day, 40 a week for years and years, possibly with overtime, and – depending on where I am – in a hectic environment due to time pressure doesn't sound so appealing to me. Nah, the casual cooking at home where no one really expects a certain degree of quality / a certain product or where I can be as creative or as lazy as I want and can take all the time I need is much better.

The sad thing is that I DO want to work. I WANT to go study and become a biologist and hopefully teach it someday. But, because of this fucked up system, have to do what can afford to pay rent instead of what I have been dreaming of since I was a kid.
- That's the lie of capitalism: "you can be anything you want! Just as long as what you want can be easily monetized and turned into a product, otherwise you're welcome to die in a ditch you leech."
  
  Socialism requires production just as much as capitalism, and absolutely requires people to work to their ability.

Whther we use a monetary system, or live like or ancestor tribal groups. We need to work all our lives. The difference is that right now, most of us work longer and harder for less and lezs. The market forces argument need rebalancing

I agree with the old man. You clearly haven't truely done something you love.
- I've done jobs I loved. I've been harassed, degraded, and threatened by bosses at each such job such that I suffered psychologically and eventually had to leave each job.
  
  Bosses have gotten really bad for some reason. A manager used to mentor people and deal with communicating issues upwards. Now it seems to be entirely abusive supervision.
  
  I'm sorry to hear that. I guess I just need to remember to be thankful
- Doing the thing I love as a job, just destroyed my hobby for me
- Yeah was going to say.. if you equate what you do with slavery, you prrrooobably aren't doing something you love.
- Yeah, I was lucky to get the crazy ass unemployment during covid like week one. And I was applying to jobs but not hearing shit back. I had essentially four months of making more money than I had at that point. ($900 a week is pretty goddamn good) and wanted a job super bad lol. Like I was definitely picky but a good fulfilling job can't be beat. You can only do hobbies so long before you're doing them to fill time and they loose luster.
  Ended up learning programming in that time and started that as a career and am doing incredibly well. So I do love my job and know I'd rather do that than nothing

If you do something you love you'll have one less thing that you love.
- Sometimes this is referred to as "grad school."

Don’t you still have to work under communism?
- Yea but if you read into the fanfic you'll learn they all want to be cookie bakers and dogwalkers among other essential work

Shrug. I race cars, have a wonderful family, own a home. Could retire today. I choose not too because I do like my job AND I like money.
There is very much a way to not hate your job.
- Sounds like the way to not hate your job is to be rich?
  
  Little of column a, little of column b.

I have no problem doing work that directly benefits me like farming/hunting/building
I only have a problem doing work when it only benefits someone else who gives me a pittance of the outcome

I've found work that I love. Only problem being is it's freakin voluntary.

I dunno, most cops love beating the shit out of homeless and shooting black people… and they keep on doing it
- Sounds like a jolly old time out with the lads
  
  If you love what you do you never work a day in your life!

Grandpa never said he did what he loved.

I feel like I kinda hit the jackpot with my job rn. In the US, I work at my local community college (where I'm a student as well), and I don't think I could ever make myself work for a for-profit business. I'm paid well, treated well, and most importantly, my work is meaningful to me. I happened to land a job that in the language lab (as an interpreting major), and I know that I'm working to directly benefit my community-- not to exploit customers or to be exploited for my own labor. It's bliss.
Not disagreeing with this post whatsoever, and fuck capitalism. Just wanted to go on a happy lil rant because I'm lucky enough to have a job I love in spite of it (for the time being).
- Same. I help elderly with tech at a retirement community.
  Feel appreciated every day. Feel like I've made a meaningful impact by making people's days easier.
  Think the key is benefiting a community like you said. It's borderline impossible to change the world you live in, making it better for others is fulfilling if you are fortunate enough to have the opportunity.

if you don't learn to love a career, you'll also never learn to appreciate Las Vegas

Yeah if everyone decided to leave this wage slavery tommorow there would be much more tents in main cities . It would be like one huge ass camping trip.
- They would change the system overnight, if everyone left. Because without everyone, there is no system. There wouldn't need to be tents.
  
  Who would change the system though ?

If you find work that you love capitalism will drain the joy out of it until you hate the thing you used to love.

'ur'
Fuck I hate illiterate memers.
- @corsicanguppy their cool!
  @ThePicardManeuver
- Mind your memners

Kid, I need you to work hard and spend your money at Walmart and Amazon like a true patriot.

I mean, even if the laborers own the means of production, they still have to labor. So finding a "job" you love would still be a viable goal. Or am I missing something obvious here?

100 comments