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> By contrast, Jimbo the night-shift line cook at Waffle House has significantly less margin for error. If he doesn't show up to work, he at best doesn't get pa
by ornornor 5y ago
> By contrast, Jimbo the night-shift line cook at Waffle House has significantly less margin for error. If he doesn't show up to work, he at best doesn't get paid and at worst gets fired. If he gets fired, he's now behind on his rent, plus he has to fix his car with money he doesn't have. He might need to take out a payday loan, or sell something important, or borrow money from family who is just as poor as he is.
This is in large parts because of the cruel society the US chose to build even though the economy is developed enough to support a less exploitative model. I’m not saying poverty and hard lives don’t exist outside the US, but being fired from your minimum wage job because you called in sick once which kickstarts a series of events which has a very real chance of making you become homeless and without health insurance is a uniquely US-specific thing.
- Gravityloss 5y agoor Jimbo is tempted to steal a catalyzer to avoid getting into a high interest debt spiral that ends in homelessness?
- throwaway2331 5y agoPerhaps that makes "standing" one's "ground" towards thieves catharsis-by-proxy? ;) There is much less recourse for having one's surplus labor "stolen," as it's normalized. Legally-sanctioned shootings could be the U.S. society's relief valve.
- dragonwriter 5y ago> Legally-sanctioned shootings could be the U.S. society's relief valve. No, legally sanctioned shootings aren't a relief valve, they ratchet up social tension rather than relieving it.
- throwaway2331 5y agoOn a grand scale, yes. But on an individual scale, the tension is released for the individual. In exchange for releasing the emotional pressure of one person, another dies, and many more are imbued with negative emotions. Very fitting parallel for the greater whole: zero sum.
- dragonwriter 5y agoEven on an individual scale, I suspect it is only a short term amelioration that exacerbates the underlying problem in the long term. The grand scale ratcheting-up effect is a result of processes that, while not narrowly focussed, most acutely apply to those associated with shootings. > Very fitting parallel for the greater whole: zero sum Its not zero-sum (if it were, the grand-scale effect would be neutral.)
- throwaway2331 5y agoYes. It seems like there's a baseline tension in the U.S. from socioeconomic circumstances that doesn't allow for a long-term approach. It's like constantly being in survival mode, one happenstance from ruin (real or imagined). As if the lower one's income, the closer one is to the heaping mass of natural inevitability: decay and death -- its gravity crushing. > Its not zero-sum (if it were, the grand-scale effect would be neutral.) I think I was referring to emotionally. There are so few great sources of positive emotion to tap into, that the zeitgeist is simply "take as much as you can for yourself, before it runs dry." That in order to escape from "loss," you must create negative externalities and emotions -- no matter how small. It feels cultural. There is no great basin of tradition and culture here; the positive emotions built off the backs of forefathers that sacrificed and endured negative emotion for the hope of a better tomorrow: missing.
- no_time 5y agoMarxist fighting words like "stolen surpulus labour" have barely anything to do with the problem. Protecting your property is an innate human tendency. I'm pretty sure even in a marxist utopia, I wouldn't shed a tear for home invaders getting shot.
- SyzygistSix 5y agoAnd this is also contributes to people deciding to steal catalytic converters to get by or get their fix.