4 ms·

Maintenance is either the one thing everyone forgets in these conversations, or it’s the one thing everyone says no one will want to do. If there were a return

by thrav 7y ago

Maintenance is either the one thing everyone forgets in these conversations, or it’s the one thing everyone says no one will want to do. If there were a return to pride in and appreciation of a job well done, there would be no shortage of people willing to do the work, in my mind. The reason most people are so unwilling to do these things is because they feel like it is beneath them, and that doing them is a demonstration of their low status.

tkbtkbtkb 7y ago
I assume many people view menial tasks as below them, and it also seems to differ in degree culturally. I'm from the US, and on a recent trip to Japan I noticed a stark difference in the pride and responsibility the average citizen showed in taking good care of even small spaces. It appeared to be an appreciation for the aesthetics of life, no matter the scale. This isn't valued in the same way in America, where anything that isn't the top feels like it's not worth one's time.
- thrav 7y ago
  Yep. I felt the same way in Japan. There appeared to be dignity in certain kinds of work in a way that there is not in the United States, and in most cases this yielded superior results of that work. They do so many foods better than the people who invented them.
jeena 7y ago
I'm not convinced, I think not doing the dishes, not taking out the trash, not sweeping the floor is a demonstration of a low status. That is if you can't afford to pay someone and you still don't do it. People with a clean home have a higher status.
- coldtea 7y ago
  That's beside the point though. You might be considered very low status if you "can't afford to pay someone and you still don't do it", and slightly less low status if you do them yourself. One is lowly and dirty-ass, the other is lowly-and-clean. But not lofty and successful as "I'm all about creating, I have staff to do those things, can't be bothered as my time is precious". To the more well off/elites etc, someone who "can't afford to pay someone" and does those things themselves is still low status. They are not going to get impressed with someone cleaning the house themselves...
  - IggleSniggle 7y ago
    There are many social hierarchies. To the plurality of my own, those that pay someone else to clean up after them and to feed them are of lower moral character and thus lower status. You can be high status and poor, or high status and rich, but the former is easier to achieve. This probably stems from a “it is easier to thread a camel through a needle than for a rich man to find grace” kind of mentality, but also relates to values of self-sufficiency. Nevermind that everyone goes to the grocery and only maintains small vegetable gardens. As someone who likes to make money, I am in a subculture of my immediate social network.
TeMPOraL 7y ago
> The reason most people are so unwilling to do these things is because they feel like it is beneath them, and that doing them is a demonstration of their low status. Maybe some people. Not others. N=1. I absolutely don't think maintenance is "low status". I just consider it a waste of human time and resources that interferes with deriving utility and enjoyment from things, but is strictly necessary. It's something to be minimized, both in terms of doing no more than strictly necessary and finding technological solutions to reduce maintenance burdens of products/systems. But when it has to be done it has to be done, I have no problems with it. It has nothing to do with status. Most maintenance work isn't done in front of people, and not doing it at all signals much lower status than doing it. Rich people may do less of it themselves because they can afford to pay someone else to do maintenance tasks.
- coldtea 7y ago
  >The reason most people are so unwilling to do these things is because they feel like it is beneath them, and that doing them is a demonstration of their low status. >Maybe some people. Not others.* Well, parent already said "most people", not all. (But even if they haven't said "most", one should assume they allow for exceptions in any general statement in a casual conversation. Unless of course they used the universal quantifier and insisted on "absolutely everybody, no exceptions whatsoever". But I digress). >It has nothing to do with status. Most maintenance work isn't done in front of people It doesn't have to be to be associated with low status though. It's merely enough that it's considered as stopping one from doing the things they think would raise their status (what they "should be doing" that's not beneath them).
  - TeMPOraL 7y ago
    > Well, parent already said "most people", not all. What I meant is, while I can't read minds, "most people" disagrees with the ad-hoc statistical sample of "people I know". What I perceive is people differing in the amount of resistance they have towards doing unwanted things that still need to be done, but I maybe once saw it being considered a status issue. > It's merely enough that it's considered as stopping one from doing the things they think would raise their status (what they "should be doing" that's not beneath them). Do people really think this way? "This task is beneath me", "that other task is not beneath me"? I consider chores to be stopping me from doing things "I should be doing", but it has nothing to do with status; it's just about having better things to do with the time. I hate chores as much now as I hated them in the days I had trouble making ends meet; the only difference is that nowadays I can afford reducing some of them (e.g. I have a dishwasher now, and I can afford a little bit extra to buy something that's easier to clean than the cheapest option). Rich people are able to outsource more. Maybe the picture is backwards? Outsourcing chores is a status signal in the sense that your ability to reduce maintenance burden is correlated to your wealth. That doesn't mean people hate maintenance because of status - what makes this a good status signal in the first place is that chores are a waste of life.
coldtea 7y ago
>If there were a return to pride in and appreciation of a job well done, there would be no shortage of people willing to do the work, in my mind. The reason most people are so unwilling to do these things is because they feel like it is beneath them, and that doing them is a demonstration of their low status. The whole modern economy is based on having them feel low status... People content with their jobs and lives don't consume as much. The whole 1.2 trillion dollar advertising industry (plus tons of non-measured counterparts, e.g. lifestyle articles in magazines, movies etc) is based on promoting unattainable lifestyles as exciting to sell products they associate with them.
koonsolo 7y ago
The problem with maintenance is that you are trying to keep the status quo, and not really improving things permanently. That is the main reason for me that I don't enjoy that work as much, because next week all your effort will be gone again.
- biohax2015 7y ago
  On a long enough timespan, all of our work will be gone anyway.
- johnisgood 7y ago
  All your effort put into, say, eating healthily is not really gone though, is it?
  - koonsolo 7y ago
    True. But if you have kids, all your effort cleaning the kitchen will be gone in a few hours.

by thrav 7y ago

tkbtkbtkb 7y ago

I assume many people view menial tasks as below them, and it also seems to differ in degree culturally. I'm from the US, and on a recent trip to Japan I noticed a stark difference in the pride and responsibility the average citizen showed in taking good care of even small spaces. It appeared to be an appreciation for the aesthetics of life, no matter the scale. This isn't valued in the same way in America, where anything that isn't the top feels like it's not worth one's time.

thrav 7y ago
Yep. I felt the same way in Japan. There appeared to be dignity in certain kinds of work in a way that there is not in the United States, and in most cases this yielded superior results of that work. They do so many foods better than the people who invented them.

jeena 7y ago

I'm not convinced, I think not doing the dishes, not taking out the trash, not sweeping the floor is a demonstration of a low status. That is if you can't afford to pay someone and you still don't do it. People with a clean home have a higher status.

coldtea 7y ago
That's beside the point though. You might be considered very low status if you "can't afford to pay someone and you still don't do it", and slightly less low status if you do them yourself. One is lowly and dirty-ass, the other is lowly-and-clean. But not lofty and successful as "I'm all about creating, I have staff to do those things, can't be bothered as my time is precious". To the more well off/elites etc, someone who "can't afford to pay someone" and does those things themselves is still low status. They are not going to get impressed with someone cleaning the house themselves...
- IggleSniggle 7y ago
  There are many social hierarchies. To the plurality of my own, those that pay someone else to clean up after them and to feed them are of lower moral character and thus lower status. You can be high status and poor, or high status and rich, but the former is easier to achieve. This probably stems from a “it is easier to thread a camel through a needle than for a rich man to find grace” kind of mentality, but also relates to values of self-sufficiency. Nevermind that everyone goes to the grocery and only maintains small vegetable gardens. As someone who likes to make money, I am in a subculture of my immediate social network.

TeMPOraL 7y ago

> The reason most people are so unwilling to do these things is because they feel like it is beneath them, and that doing them is a demonstration of their low status. Maybe some people. Not others. N=1. I absolutely don't think maintenance is "low status". I just consider it a waste of human time and resources that interferes with deriving utility and enjoyment from things, but is strictly necessary. It's something to be minimized, both in terms of doing no more than strictly necessary and finding technological solutions to reduce maintenance burdens of products/systems. But when it has to be done it has to be done, I have no problems with it. It has nothing to do with status. Most maintenance work isn't done in front of people, and not doing it at all signals much lower status than doing it. Rich people may do less of it themselves because they can afford to pay someone else to do maintenance tasks.

coldtea 7y ago
>The reason most people are so unwilling to do these things is because they feel like it is beneath them, and that doing them is a demonstration of their low status. >Maybe some people. Not others.* Well, parent already said "most people", not all. (But even if they haven't said "most", one should assume they allow for exceptions in any general statement in a casual conversation. Unless of course they used the universal quantifier and insisted on "absolutely everybody, no exceptions whatsoever". But I digress). >It has nothing to do with status. Most maintenance work isn't done in front of people It doesn't have to be to be associated with low status though. It's merely enough that it's considered as stopping one from doing the things they think would raise their status (what they "should be doing" that's not beneath them).
- TeMPOraL 7y ago
  > Well, parent already said "most people", not all. What I meant is, while I can't read minds, "most people" disagrees with the ad-hoc statistical sample of "people I know". What I perceive is people differing in the amount of resistance they have towards doing unwanted things that still need to be done, but I maybe once saw it being considered a status issue. > It's merely enough that it's considered as stopping one from doing the things they think would raise their status (what they "should be doing" that's not beneath them). Do people really think this way? "This task is beneath me", "that other task is not beneath me"? I consider chores to be stopping me from doing things "I should be doing", but it has nothing to do with status; it's just about having better things to do with the time. I hate chores as much now as I hated them in the days I had trouble making ends meet; the only difference is that nowadays I can afford reducing some of them (e.g. I have a dishwasher now, and I can afford a little bit extra to buy something that's easier to clean than the cheapest option). Rich people are able to outsource more. Maybe the picture is backwards? Outsourcing chores is a status signal in the sense that your ability to reduce maintenance burden is correlated to your wealth. That doesn't mean people hate maintenance because of status - what makes this a good status signal in the first place is that chores are a waste of life.

coldtea 7y ago

>If there were a return to pride in and appreciation of a job well done, there would be no shortage of people willing to do the work, in my mind. The reason most people are so unwilling to do these things is because they feel like it is beneath them, and that doing them is a demonstration of their low status. The whole modern economy is based on having them feel low status... People content with their jobs and lives don't consume as much. The whole 1.2 trillion dollar advertising industry (plus tons of non-measured counterparts, e.g. lifestyle articles in magazines, movies etc) is based on promoting unattainable lifestyles as exciting to sell products they associate with them.

koonsolo 7y ago

The problem with maintenance is that you are trying to keep the status quo, and not really improving things permanently. That is the main reason for me that I don't enjoy that work as much, because next week all your effort will be gone again.

biohax2015 7y ago
On a long enough timespan, all of our work will be gone anyway.
johnisgood 7y ago
All your effort put into, say, eating healthily is not really gone though, is it?
- koonsolo 7y ago
  True. But if you have kids, all your effort cleaning the kitchen will be gone in a few hours.