I don’t believe people should *have* to work themselves into tatters just to survive, although at the same time there’s really no cosmic guarantee that they won’t have to, it all depends on the harshness of our surroundings, over which we have some control but not total. Leisure is great, I’m a huge fan myself, but the restaurant/takeout complex doesn’t quite qualify as leisure to me, not on this scale, but rather fits into a much broader destructive tendency of outsourcing domestic life skills and neighborhood commercial and social patterns to both chain enterprises and their “small business” counterparts that effectively work the same way, with ruthless economizing and patronizing regard for a churning and novelty seeking customer base.
As for the way out: I don’t have one. Sure, some unionization would be useful, maybe you could cut down on some of the exploitative practices, some of the surveillance and wage suppression. But really I think you’d need to somehow set things up for generations of relative social, cultural and practical continuity, where skills, practices, and relationships actually stretch unbroken over decades, and not just hope that a constantly changing mass of disposable unskilled workers can slightly improve their circumstances with a little factory style solidarity. Getting paid a little more and not being constantly spied on is great, but after that, you’re still an Amazon warehouse worker or a line cook, and the question is, how did you end up like that, and that opens farther reaching questions
Sorry, I forgot to say - the end point of unionizing isn't to get an incremental pay increase, though of course nobody's against that.
No, the end goal of all unionizing efforts is to increase democracy in the workplace, which sounds absurd until you actually see it in operation. Then for example being a short-order cook or a food server isn't some despicable thing but a trade like any other, one that you might want to pass on to your kids as a family tradition.
Hi Caleb, an excellent analysis of -part of- the overriding problem of alienation in the contemporary developed world. I have only two reservations about your piece:
1) The emphasis on moral degradation at the core of this issue. Yet everyone deserves some time for relaxation and enjoyment, in company or individually. It's not morally reprehensible to want to hang out some. Overindulgence is distinct from leisure, IMO.
2) [Which relates to the former point] What's the way out of this situation? Given that you identify the twin impulsers of this as international commercial structures (aka global capitalism) and human weakness, and we're not gonna get a better human nature any day now, then the way ahead is to change the social system.
You know where I stand on this and I won't labor (ho ho) the point again, but for those interested, a recent article on how unionized workers fight back against their alienated condistions is here
And another which bundles up all these issues into a call for an actual change to the system through an analysis of the very phenomena Caleb so ably identifies above
I don’t believe people should *have* to work themselves into tatters just to survive, although at the same time there’s really no cosmic guarantee that they won’t have to, it all depends on the harshness of our surroundings, over which we have some control but not total. Leisure is great, I’m a huge fan myself, but the restaurant/takeout complex doesn’t quite qualify as leisure to me, not on this scale, but rather fits into a much broader destructive tendency of outsourcing domestic life skills and neighborhood commercial and social patterns to both chain enterprises and their “small business” counterparts that effectively work the same way, with ruthless economizing and patronizing regard for a churning and novelty seeking customer base.
As for the way out: I don’t have one. Sure, some unionization would be useful, maybe you could cut down on some of the exploitative practices, some of the surveillance and wage suppression. But really I think you’d need to somehow set things up for generations of relative social, cultural and practical continuity, where skills, practices, and relationships actually stretch unbroken over decades, and not just hope that a constantly changing mass of disposable unskilled workers can slightly improve their circumstances with a little factory style solidarity. Getting paid a little more and not being constantly spied on is great, but after that, you’re still an Amazon warehouse worker or a line cook, and the question is, how did you end up like that, and that opens farther reaching questions
Sorry, I forgot to say - the end point of unionizing isn't to get an incremental pay increase, though of course nobody's against that.
No, the end goal of all unionizing efforts is to increase democracy in the workplace, which sounds absurd until you actually see it in operation. Then for example being a short-order cook or a food server isn't some despicable thing but a trade like any other, one that you might want to pass on to your kids as a family tradition.
Thanks for that considered response CC, much to mull on as ever.
Hi Caleb, an excellent analysis of -part of- the overriding problem of alienation in the contemporary developed world. I have only two reservations about your piece:
1) The emphasis on moral degradation at the core of this issue. Yet everyone deserves some time for relaxation and enjoyment, in company or individually. It's not morally reprehensible to want to hang out some. Overindulgence is distinct from leisure, IMO.
2) [Which relates to the former point] What's the way out of this situation? Given that you identify the twin impulsers of this as international commercial structures (aka global capitalism) and human weakness, and we're not gonna get a better human nature any day now, then the way ahead is to change the social system.
You know where I stand on this and I won't labor (ho ho) the point again, but for those interested, a recent article on how unionized workers fight back against their alienated condistions is here
https://jacobin.com/2024/06/worker-surveillance-technology-emotions
And another which bundles up all these issues into a call for an actual change to the system through an analysis of the very phenomena Caleb so ably identifies above
https://jacobin.com/2021/05/covid-restaurant-service-workers-emergency-unemployment-relief
Nice one.
Brutal, nice read. Made me hungry for the new Thai place that opened up down the street.
Stop enjoying things!