7 ms·

There is, unfortunately, a common pathology amongst white-collar workers, and especially the "managerial class". Of which I am a member, so I get to see this fi

by donw 5y ago

There is, unfortunately, a common pathology amongst white-collar workers, and especially the "managerial class". Of which I am a member, so I get to see this first-hand quite often. It is incredibly common that my economic peers and betters treat blue-collar workers as filthy meat-robots, tolerated purely out of necessity. Because, after all, if they were worthwhile human beings, they'd have a college degree. I find this mindset abhorrent. Anybody that works a job well deserves respect, regardless of the job.

sandworm101 5y ago
>> Anybody that works a job well deserves respect Everyone deserves respect, even those who do not work "well". Being bad at one's job doesn't means anything in terms of access to basic services. Half the people in any job are below the average. Basic dignities must be provided to all, even those a day away from being fired. I've seen it so many times that the "underperformer" or new guy in the office ends up working through every lunch or pulling the bad shifts because "they deserve it". That isn't a healthy work environment.
- sokoloff 5y ago
  One way someone whom you label above as an “underperformer” can make themselves more valuable to the team us by taking work that others don’t want to do. One way they can close some of their performance gap is by working more. Both of those could easily be a perfectly rational and voluntary response to preserve their job.
  - birksherty 5y ago
    Society simply sucks as even to view someone as a human being, they have to be a valuable member (means work whole life). Not good enough, just work more. Basically be a cog in the economic system or die.
    - AlgorithmicTime 5y ago
      It's more basic than that. The universe itself, entropy, means you must "work or die," in the most basic sense. Complaining about that unavoidable reality of existence is pointless.
    - Chris2048 5y ago
      Consider that being "valuable" means contributing to the services that provide for human beings, be it bathroom facilities, medical care or pensions; If being treated as human means being provided these services, why shouldn't there be conditional contribution? And the people who virtue-signal "Well I think they should be treated humanely!" are rarely the people at low-paid services end, struggling to compete with the status quo.
    - FredPret 5y ago
      Well, it’s a little brutal to think about it. But it’s true. Because if the economic system stopped working, we would ALL die
      - birksherty 5y ago
        https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29041607 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29041607
        FredPret 5y ago
        Well, you got me. When I’m not making a dead easy million on stocks, I’m lazing about on my various yachts; unless, of course, the mood to crush a few peasants strikes. Your imagination must be an odd place indeed.
    - sokoloff 5y ago
      It's way better than hunting for food everyday or facing starvation or predation like most other animals face. We've advanced significantly over the inherently brutal and unforgiving initial conditions of life. We've built economic and social systems that allow most people to die of what we used to call "old age" and now name as specific diseases that typically manifest in old age [rather than starvation, expousure, or predation]. That people have to contribute in some way to enjoy the fruits of all that aggregate labor doesn't seem so unreasonable to me. All the people required to do all the back-breaking work of farming, transporting, building, cleaning, purifying, and cooking aren't going to do that labor while you enjoy life doing nothing constructive that helps them via some chain of events/transactions.
kjaftaedi 5y ago
Have you worked in logistics? Truck drivers are regularly exposed to the worst possible restroom conditions. It's not a surprise that they often don't flush the toilet when they come into the office. It's not an easy situation to deal with, and it has little to do with white-collar vs. blue collar. It's all about what level of restroom management is appropriate to keep people from dealing with 'surprises'
- jasode 5y ago
  >It's not an easy situation to deal with, and it has little to do with white-collar vs. blue collar. >It's all about what level of restroom management is appropriate to keep people from dealing with 'surprises' And the more fundamental reason is the very different social mechanisms of restroom use by transient drivers vs office workers. Psychology is very different: - transient user: The restroom belongs to someone else and I can leave a mess for others to deal with after I drive away. Therefore, there is no pride in keeping the toilet somewhat clean because I don't need to care who the next user is. This is what causes public restrooms to become disgusting. (Thankfully, some drivers are considerate but unfortunately, a few inconsiderate ones ruin it for every one else.) - office worker: The restroom belongs to us that we have to re-visit repeatedly. Usually, we don't embarrass ourselves by leaving disgusting presents for our co-workers. This pride keeps the office restroom relatively clean (compared to public restrooms) -- even without a janitor standing by 24/7.
  - greedo 5y ago
    This is really an idealized view of how office workers view restrooms. BFC I worked in a 5 story office building with 6 bathrooms per floor. Nobody felt ownership of the restrooms, nor treated them particularly well. Some stayed clean (largely because they were either relatively unused) and some were dirty. The idea that we wouldn't allow a vendor or repairman to use them (since in your view they didn't have ownership and would thus soil the restroom) would never enter our minds.
    - jasode 5y ago
      >This is really an idealized view of how office workers view restrooms. It's not idealized. I linked a video of a business owner and his office workers cleaning their own company bathrooms. The owner of that company includes himself in the rotation of employees to clean the bathrooms. I can't discount your anecdote about your particular coworkers because your personal experience is what it is. I'm describing population tendencies and not absolutes. In my experience, office workers who are not transients do tend to take better care of their shared bathrooms. The office employees may not be as fastidious as the workers in that Youtube video but they usually don't let it degrade to the level of nasty public restrooms on highways.
IG_Semmelweiss 5y ago
I agree wholeheartedly with you. In any organization , tone at the top matters. You talk about managers. I would say we need to look higher up in the chain of command. I would posit that when you have candidates running for higher office referring to that group as "deplorables" I would say the tone of the top has failed.
- analog31 5y ago
  I agree that Clinton's "deplorables" speech was a gaffe, but I also just re-read it. She's not talking about blue collar workers in general, but a particular strain of voters who are motivated by racism, sexism, etc. Naturally her opponent fought back, pretending that she was attacking the working class in general. Today, what she said is considered to be a basic fact of American politics. Part of what makes the Deplorables such a powerful force is that it has become politically incorrect to talk about them openly in plain terms, or to confront them with their own beliefs.
  - splitstud 5y ago
    Confront them with their own beliefs? You mean invalidate their policy preferences by just ascribing them to racism?
  - rendall 5y ago
    > ...but a particular strain of voters who are motivated by racism, sexism, etc It was received quite properly as an attack on any voter who would not vote for her: that is to say, anyone not voting for Clinton herself would by definition be deplorable: racist, sexist, etc. This was taken as a rather self-serving statement
    - krapp 5y ago
      It was received that way because Republican propaganda is very effective (see the way they reframed "fake news" as an example,) but no reasonable person reading the actual text of the statement would interpret it that way. And obviously it was self-serving. Hillary Clinton was giving a speech running for political office, not having a casual conversation. Every word coming out of Donald Trump's mouth was self-serving as well, for the same reason. Yet (again, due to the effectiveness of Republican propaganda) it's a sign of arrogance and elitism when a Democrat does it, but virtue and strength of character in a Republican.

by donw 5y ago

sandworm101 5y ago

>> Anybody that works a job well deserves respect Everyone deserves respect, even those who do not work "well". Being bad at one's job doesn't means anything in terms of access to basic services. Half the people in any job are below the average. Basic dignities must be provided to all, even those a day away from being fired. I've seen it so many times that the "underperformer" or new guy in the office ends up working through every lunch or pulling the bad shifts because "they deserve it". That isn't a healthy work environment.

sokoloff 5y ago
One way someone whom you label above as an “underperformer” can make themselves more valuable to the team us by taking work that others don’t want to do. One way they can close some of their performance gap is by working more. Both of those could easily be a perfectly rational and voluntary response to preserve their job.
- birksherty 5y ago
  Society simply sucks as even to view someone as a human being, they have to be a valuable member (means work whole life). Not good enough, just work more. Basically be a cog in the economic system or die.
  - AlgorithmicTime 5y ago
    It's more basic than that. The universe itself, entropy, means you must "work or die," in the most basic sense. Complaining about that unavoidable reality of existence is pointless.
  - Chris2048 5y ago
    Consider that being "valuable" means contributing to the services that provide for human beings, be it bathroom facilities, medical care or pensions; If being treated as human means being provided these services, why shouldn't there be conditional contribution? And the people who virtue-signal "Well I think they should be treated humanely!" are rarely the people at low-paid services end, struggling to compete with the status quo.
  - FredPret 5y ago
    Well, it’s a little brutal to think about it. But it’s true. Because if the economic system stopped working, we would ALL die
    - birksherty 5y ago
      https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29041607 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29041607
      - FredPret 5y ago
        Well, you got me. When I’m not making a dead easy million on stocks, I’m lazing about on my various yachts; unless, of course, the mood to crush a few peasants strikes. Your imagination must be an odd place indeed.
  - sokoloff 5y ago
    It's way better than hunting for food everyday or facing starvation or predation like most other animals face. We've advanced significantly over the inherently brutal and unforgiving initial conditions of life. We've built economic and social systems that allow most people to die of what we used to call "old age" and now name as specific diseases that typically manifest in old age [rather than starvation, expousure, or predation]. That people have to contribute in some way to enjoy the fruits of all that aggregate labor doesn't seem so unreasonable to me. All the people required to do all the back-breaking work of farming, transporting, building, cleaning, purifying, and cooking aren't going to do that labor while you enjoy life doing nothing constructive that helps them via some chain of events/transactions.

kjaftaedi 5y ago

Have you worked in logistics? Truck drivers are regularly exposed to the worst possible restroom conditions. It's not a surprise that they often don't flush the toilet when they come into the office. It's not an easy situation to deal with, and it has little to do with white-collar vs. blue collar. It's all about what level of restroom management is appropriate to keep people from dealing with 'surprises'

jasode 5y ago
>It's not an easy situation to deal with, and it has little to do with white-collar vs. blue collar. >It's all about what level of restroom management is appropriate to keep people from dealing with 'surprises' And the more fundamental reason is the very different social mechanisms of restroom use by transient drivers vs office workers. Psychology is very different: - transient user: The restroom belongs to someone else and I can leave a mess for others to deal with after I drive away. Therefore, there is no pride in keeping the toilet somewhat clean because I don't need to care who the next user is. This is what causes public restrooms to become disgusting. (Thankfully, some drivers are considerate but unfortunately, a few inconsiderate ones ruin it for every one else.) - office worker: The restroom belongs to us that we have to re-visit repeatedly. Usually, we don't embarrass ourselves by leaving disgusting presents for our co-workers. This pride keeps the office restroom relatively clean (compared to public restrooms) -- even without a janitor standing by 24/7.
- greedo 5y ago
  This is really an idealized view of how office workers view restrooms. BFC I worked in a 5 story office building with 6 bathrooms per floor. Nobody felt ownership of the restrooms, nor treated them particularly well. Some stayed clean (largely because they were either relatively unused) and some were dirty. The idea that we wouldn't allow a vendor or repairman to use them (since in your view they didn't have ownership and would thus soil the restroom) would never enter our minds.
  - jasode 5y ago
    >This is really an idealized view of how office workers view restrooms. It's not idealized. I linked a video of a business owner and his office workers cleaning their own company bathrooms. The owner of that company includes himself in the rotation of employees to clean the bathrooms. I can't discount your anecdote about your particular coworkers because your personal experience is what it is. I'm describing population tendencies and not absolutes. In my experience, office workers who are not transients do tend to take better care of their shared bathrooms. The office employees may not be as fastidious as the workers in that Youtube video but they usually don't let it degrade to the level of nasty public restrooms on highways.

IG_Semmelweiss 5y ago

I agree wholeheartedly with you. In any organization , tone at the top matters. You talk about managers. I would say we need to look higher up in the chain of command. I would posit that when you have candidates running for higher office referring to that group as "deplorables" I would say the tone of the top has failed.

analog31 5y ago
I agree that Clinton's "deplorables" speech was a gaffe, but I also just re-read it. She's not talking about blue collar workers in general, but a particular strain of voters who are motivated by racism, sexism, etc. Naturally her opponent fought back, pretending that she was attacking the working class in general. Today, what she said is considered to be a basic fact of American politics. Part of what makes the Deplorables such a powerful force is that it has become politically incorrect to talk about them openly in plain terms, or to confront them with their own beliefs.
- splitstud 5y ago
  Confront them with their own beliefs? You mean invalidate their policy preferences by just ascribing them to racism?
- rendall 5y ago
  > ...but a particular strain of voters who are motivated by racism, sexism, etc It was received quite properly as an attack on any voter who would not vote for her: that is to say, anyone not voting for Clinton herself would by definition be deplorable: racist, sexist, etc. This was taken as a rather self-serving statement
  - krapp 5y ago
    It was received that way because Republican propaganda is very effective (see the way they reframed "fake news" as an example,) but no reasonable person reading the actual text of the statement would interpret it that way. And obviously it was self-serving. Hillary Clinton was giving a speech running for political office, not having a casual conversation. Every word coming out of Donald Trump's mouth was self-serving as well, for the same reason. Yet (again, due to the effectiveness of Republican propaganda) it's a sign of arrogance and elitism when a Democrat does it, but virtue and strength of character in a Republican.