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I've definitely seen some bad takes on /r/antiwork, and my general opinion is that the community on any large subreddit (political or otherwise) gets pretty tox
by heyitsguay 5y ago
I've definitely seen some bad takes on /r/antiwork, and my general opinion is that the community on any large subreddit (political or otherwise) gets pretty toxic pretty quickly if not heavily moderated, but it's hard to deny that the rise in popularity of the anti-work movement is a reaction to really bad labor conditions in the USA that have only been further strained during COVID. Lots of people are suffering and they're expressing that, even if some of them are not diagnosing the root problem correctly.
- GhettoComputers 5y agoWhat are these really bad labor conditions? Are they all working at restaurants? Rather than going”anti work” they could find another job, it’s painfully obvious.
- Boltgolt 5y ago"just find another job" like it's that easy for everyone
- GhettoComputers 5y agoIts much easier to stay at an unfulfilling job you hate, have it crush your soul, post memes on Reddit, and resent it, but is that really a good choice? They are on a path they don’t like, do you think it’s a good idea to change trajectory?
- smus 5y agoOur service economy that we live in is structured around there being a poorly paid and poorly treated underclass. Sure some in that class could leave but there aren't enough good jobs for everyone. We're talking about a structural problem, which can't be solved by individual action. I understand that can be hard to conceptualize for some.
- GhettoComputers 5y agoIt isn’t hard to conceptualize because it doesn’t exist as you imagine,there are great service jobs, and calling them all bad is prejudice and shows a lack of experience with any good ones. I know college graduates that work as servers and hosts/hostesses, they love the social life, the tips they make are more than their college required job, and they made a rational decision. The service industry isn’t a monolithic evil.
- hkt 5y ago> The service industry isn’t a monolithic evil. It does somewhat seem that people don't like working in it. From reading the antiwork subreddit, the general feeling appears to be that they want to improve the conditions (by rejecting bad jobs, or unionising) which suggests there is something to be desired.
- GhettoComputers 5y agoAntiwork people don’t like their service job so it’s universally hated? Seems biased to me. Photography is a service job but I don’t see anything but negativity of that kind, it doesn’t mean that all photography jobs suck.
- sosborn 5y agoWhy is the onus on employees to "find another job," instead on their managers to improve the labor conditions? Some of the stories on that sub are an incredible indictment on how wage workers are treated. I don't care what decisions that person made to end up in a minimum wage job, but I do care that they get treated with some respect and dignity.
- GhettoComputers 5y agoThe same reason why people move. Relying on others to do everything to benefit you is wishful but deluded. If you care, what are you doing to improve their conditions? Would you like to be that manager or are you currently doing that? It isn’t bad to be that way, but who is willing to put in that work?
- sosborn 5y ago> Relying on others to do everything to benefit you is wishful but deluded. Isn't that exactly what these companies and managers are doing when they exploit workers?
- GhettoComputers 5y agoIs it working?
- sosborn 5y agoFor whom?
- bpfrh 5y agoWe rely on the restaurant not serving bad food because of regulation. We rely on good safety standards in a workplace, so that people working in chemical factories do not die from breathing in toxic fumes. So to be clear, we rely on other people and other people doing things for us all the time, so the discussion is not about relying on other people, but in this case what are work conditions which are acceptable. I think that fire at will for example is a bad idea, but I don't live in the USA, so my view comes from a different perspective.
- rahidz 5y agoTo me the advice of "If your current job has bad labor conditions, find a better one" has an implicit meaning of "Certain jobs have bad labor conditions, and this is fine". People are realizing this shouldn't be, and between protesting and quitting, are making themselves heard.
- GhettoComputers 5y agoYou might not have a better choice, and choose it. You might not appreciate the flexible hours of McDonald’s, but that is no reason to force your choice upon the world as your experiences are the correct one. If I don’t like programming should all programming jobs be banned? I don’t like cooking, is that reason no cooking jobs should exist?
- malermeister 5y ago"If I don't like to be exploited, shouldn't others still be able to?" No. No, they shouldn't. Some working conditions are straight up bad and exploitative and nobody should be forced to put up with them.
- GhettoComputers 5y agoWho is forced? Those jobs interviews weren’t held at gunpoint. If (You personally don’t like a job) { Ban anyone from doing it even if they like it. }
- malermeister 5y agoPeople that have no other means of supporting their family are forced though economic means. Do you really think anybody works the night shift at a fast food joint because they enjoy spending their time that way? No, but they do it because otherwise their kid starves. Exploitative capitalism doesn't often need to resort to guns. Usually the threat of starvation or dying from preventable disease is coercive enough.
- walleeee 5y agoalso that despite centuries of purportedly labor-saving invention, all but the most privileged experience not a corresponding increase in leisure but an explosion of more or less amusing diversions from this condition
- gruez 5y agoOr maybe thats just lifestyle creep? I'm sure you can live with much more leisure if you're willing to accept medieval living standards.
- kkjjkgjjgg 5y agoI don't understand why those people don't simply start their own companies that treat their employees better. Afaik the r/antiwork subreddit also publicly proclaims that they are socialists. Haven't looked it up now, though.
- heyitsguay 5y agoYes it's like i always say, if poor people don't like being poor, why don't they simply buy more money?
- GhettoComputers 5y agoThat comment aged poorly because that’s what early Bitcoin adopters did.
- lovich 5y agoWhich early bitcoin adopters? The tech people who worked on the protocols and had the ability to save up enough money to go work on a startup? Or do you mean the people who bought bitcoin early which was literally gambling that happened to pay off. Did the comment age poorly because lottery winners are well off now?
- GhettoComputers 5y agoAll of them, unless your point is that Bitcoin was never accessible to anyone except tech people since the beginning. MtGox was originally an MTG card trading exchange. People also mined it on their crappy computer. > Or do you mean the people who bought bitcoin early which was literally gambling that happened to pay off. Life is a gamble.
- lovich 5y agoThat’s not buying more money. They didn’t build anything or purchase money. They purchased a commodity with no real expectation of growth beyond a pipe dream that happened to work out, and even with those winners the bitcoin millionaires were exceptional enough from the norm to get into the news. If you think people gambling on a brand new asset class becoming valuable is equivalent to things like getting low interest loans against your stock holdings that you aren’t forced to liquidate when it comes to buying more money, than we just have incompatible world views