Are those who push the proletariat work ethic degenerates?

[Seeker]

I don't give a damn about Trotsky's definition. The Marxist term referred to those who have to sell their labour to survive.

[Cornfed]

I don't give a damn about Trotsky's definition. The Marxist term referred to those who have to sell their labour to survive.

Trotsky was a prominent Marxist. Lots of Marxists call themselves Trotskyists. Lots of other Marxists at the time agreed with Trotsky. Your statement is extremely silly.

[Seeker]

So what? Trot didn't define it. Unless we agree upon a definition of the term which Marx already defined then there's no point in talking about it further.

[Lucas88]

Doesn't the OP mean PROTESTANT work ethic? The modern use of the word "proletariat" comes from Marx and was used to refer to the working class in the Marxist sense. I've never heard of the term proletariat work ethic.

No, the OP used the term "proletariat work ethic" to refer to the attitude of those working-class people who have imbibed modern industrial society's "work ethic" (i.e., love of relentless work) despite being lowly worker drones themselves, are enthusiastic about their own drudgery and shame anybody who doesn't show the same level of enthusiasm for work, often calling us "lazy" and portraying us as "immoral". They're often the kind of company shill who claims to be passionate about the company even though they work for minimum wage and will report other working-class employees for spending one minute too much on their break even though most people are only there for the paycheck. Pixel--Dude has to put up with those kinds of people at his workplace in real life. He and I humorously refer to them as "Stephens" from the villain Stephen from Django Unchained (see videos).

Proletariat isn't strictly a Marxist term although Marx did give it his own interpretation. The term actually goes back to the Latin terms Proletarius and Proles which in Roman society referred to the lowest class of laborers. Even today some non-Marxists refer to the working class and especially the less cultured and more lumpen specimens of that group as proletarian, often in a derogatory way.

I spent many years in graduate school, forgoing income, working, waiting, etc. Now I have a position that gives me a great deal of autonomy in my daily life. I may have to be at a certain place at a certain time 8 or 10 hours a week. I can do most of my work from home, etc.

But the complicated organizations where people operate as 'cogs in the machine' have enable some of the complicated innovations that you now enjoy. Would there be aircraft that could carry us around as we travel around the world? Before the development of the assembly line, automobiles were much lower quality inventions far out of the reach of the average man because of costs. Turning people into 'cogs' in the assembly line production system brought costs way down. Management taking responsibility for how work was to be performed to fit into a larger overall design made low cost production of automobiles possible.

if working as a 'cog' doesn't fit your skills and personality and you have something else productive to do to exchange for your food, shelter, etc., that's good for you. But we should appreciate that other people's labor, those who do work as cogs, enable us to enjoy some of the other products and services that we use. We are using Internet networks, smart phones, and computers to communicate. These were developed and are maintained by complicated organizations where many people work as 'cogs in the machine.'

Some work cultists like to make the argument that relentless industry is necessary for the development and upkeep of advanced technological civilization but they fail to understand that the question is a matter of degrees. Work cultists don't simply want people to be productive; they want work to be the center of everybody's lives, they want everybody to be subjected to long hours and strict work discipline, they want people to live to work! But the modern workweek is wholly unnatural. It is only driving droves of people to stress, depression, mental illness and despair. Human beings are simply not supposed to live like that! Fortunately in our high-tech 21st century human beings have no reason to work as much as they do. The workweek could and in my opinion should be reduced through the implementation of automation and labor-saving technologies. Unfortunately the corporate masters don't want to reduce the workweek and lessen the toiling worker drones' drudgery despite the possibility of automation. So many poor depressed souls continue to toil in meaningless jobs for a paycheck.

A NPC like you, @MrMan, might be satisfied with endless drudgery, your Jewish hoax slave religion and barbaric female genital mutilation ( ) but for those of us who actually have souls and inner spirituality modern society's insane work culture is nothing but a source of depression and frustration and many of us want nothing more than to get out of the rat race.

[jamesbond]

In Anglo countries it's "Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of a Paycheck."

[Seeker]

Most people don't like their jobs and only do them to survive. If you're fortunate you'll have a job you like which pays well. I'm currently fortunate enough to be in such a position. Most jobs throughout history were full of drudgery, hardship and low pay. What would you have been before the Industrial Revolution? Most likely a subsistence farmer on your family's small plot of land or an agricultural worker on someone else's. If you had the physical strength and fitness you might have been a soldier fighting some king's war. During the Industrial Revolution you would probably have been a factory worker doing gruelling, repetitive work for long hours 6 days a week in a hot and noisy factory for a pittance. It was only in the 20th century in capitalist countries where in some places as technology advanced and education, skill levels and capital investment increased that work became both easier and paid a decent living. We're currently going through another transition where as technology advances many jobs are becoming unnecessary and people are being thrown out of work and are having to retrain or take up temporary work. There are still good jobs out there but you have to be capable of it. A wisely regulated market economy works better than any other economic system in history.

[Seeker]

No of course none of the current systems are perfect, though some capitalist systems seem to work better than others in providing prosperity for all. We don't make the system though, we just have to do the best we can in it. If you can't change the system to a better one, and nobody has ever devised a better one yet, I would focus your thoughts on what YOU want and how you can get it. Why should others produce for you (I don't mean 'you' personally) if you provide nothing in return? Lastly, enteprenuers take a lot of risk by starting a company, and they create employment and opportunities for others while providing a service or a product that others want. I'm going through that process right now and it's much harder than it might seem on the outside. It seems that you're pushing for some kind of socialism or common ownership, how did that play out over the last century?

[Seeker]

If most jobs could really be automated don't you think companies would do it? Who wants to deal those pesky workers who might not even show up on time when you could just have a machine do it instead. We don't even have a decent android house servant yet! Speaking as a business man, (it feels strange to call myself that), I would rather automate some jobs than have to hire people. The problem is machines aren't nearly capable enough to do most jobs to an acceptable level that would justify the cost. I wouldn't bother hiring if I didn't have to. Technology isn't advanced enough for the techno-utopia you are pushing for.

[MrMan]

Some work cultists like to make the argument that relentless industry is necessary for the development and upkeep of advanced technological civilization but they fail to understand that the question is a matter of degrees. Work cultists don't simply want people to be productive; they want work to be the center of everybody's lives, they want everybody to be subjected to long hours and strict work discipline, they want people to live to work!

Who are 'they?' What expert promotes this idea? Is there a book that promotes it?

The idea that management should control production processes is an old one, and it goes back at least to Frederick Taylor, but the objective is not focused on filling the lives of workers with drudgery. It's focused on making the production process efficient. There are HR experts who focus on topics such as workplace motivation, engagement and 'work-life balance.' No doubt they have a different philosophy about work than you do, but even if they start with different assumption about the role of worn in the individual's life, the focus is not to oppress people by making work the center of their lives.

I do see diligence as a noble characteristic and laziness as a sinful characteristic. That doesn't mean that I think ones employer has to be the focus of all their work effort or that they have to hate their work for it to be real work. One can get a job with decent hours and use other times for work he enjoys or that breaks up his life with different kinds of activities.

But the modern workweek is wholly unnatural. It is only driving droves of people to stress, depression, mental illness and despair.

No one say around counting statistics on how many people are stressed, depressed, or mentally ill until the development of modern work culture with all its microspecializations. Psychologists measure these things. Clinical psychologists have disproportionately high suicide rates, I hear.

Human beings are simply not supposed to live like that! Fortunately in our high-tech 21st century human beings have no reason to work as much as they do. The workweek could and in my opinion should be reduced through the implementation of automation and labor-saving technologies.

Without some kind of communist revolution or major shift toward socialism, how is this going to work? Who is going to make the robots that make the hamburgers at McDonald's and that clean the motel rooms? The large corporations would do it. And who would make the money from selling these services? The owners of the robots or the robotic technology. These proletariate workers you want to free are unlikely to own the technologies. The money from the would go to the companies you despise, not the workers you want to work fewer hours.

A NPC like you, @MrMan, might be satisfied with endless drudgery, your Jewish hoax slave religion and barbaric female genital mutilation ( )

I never heard of female genital mutilation being part of Judaism. NPC? I think you've been playing too many video games. I have a job that ranks very high on low stress jobs, best jobs for creative people, etc. I have to be at a certain place at a certain time maybe 8 to 10 hours a week for 9 months out of the year, and the pay is good.

I've worked in the corporate world where you get to work at 7 something and it is pretty typical for colleagues not to leave their desks until about 7

but for those of us who actually have souls and inner spirituality modern society's insane work culture is nothing but a source of depression and frustration and many of us want nothing more than to get out of the rat race.

Do you think lazy people are more likely to be spiritual and have souls than diligent people?

The way I think of getting out of 'the rate race' typically involves disciple and hard work. Either you work hard at something that benefits others that doesn't give you the best house and car, but fulfills a greater purpose, or you can stop working for a pre-packaged job from a company and build your own businesses.

[Lucas88]

Some work cultists like to make the argument that relentless industry is necessary for the development and upkeep of advanced technological civilization but they fail to understand that the question is a matter of degrees. Work cultists don't simply want people to be productive; they want work to be the center of everybody's lives, they want everybody to be subjected to long hours and strict work discipline, they want people to live to work!

Who are 'they?' What expert promotes this idea? Is there a book that promotes it?

The "work cultists" who I refer to are a subset of the population who praise the workaholic lifestyle and shame others who don't have the same enthusiasm about work. They are not experts but simply regular folks who have imbibed the old Protestant Work Ethic a bit too much and like to bang on about how hardworking they are and how everybody else is lazy. The OP and I know people like this in real life. We have contempt for those people and believe that their workaholism and desire to equate it with moral superiority are due to them being empty on the inside and having no other interests or virtues in life. You do realize that the OP posted this as a rant, don't you?

As for experts, I doubt that many subscribe to the idea of relentless industry being necessary for the advancement or upkeep of technological civilization anymore. From what I've seen there seems to be more talk about advanced robotics and automation making more and more forms of human labor redundant and concerns about the future of employment.

I do see diligence as a noble characteristic and laziness as a sinful characteristic. That doesn't mean that I think ones employer has to be the focus of all their work effort or that they have to hate their work for it to be real work. One can get a job with decent hours and use other times for work he enjoys or that breaks up his life with different kinds of activities.

You see work as noble because you (presumably) subscribe to the Protestant Work Ethic. I myself on the other hand subscribe to the classical view which holds that common drudgery is nothing more than a necessary evil which should be reduced to the absolute minimum and is certainly nothing to glorify. The classical view which is aristocratic in nature sees a lifestyle of common drudgery as the condition of slaves and therefore incompatible with eudaimonia. We have very different ideas of what is good and noble because we subscribe to vastly divergent worldviews. You are a Christian (presumably Protestant) man (actually a MrMan) and I am a Pagan soul who looks to the classical world for my values and inspiration.

But the modern workweek is wholly unnatural. It is only driving droves of people to stress, depression, mental illness and despair.

No one say around counting statistics on how many people are stressed, depressed, or mentally ill until the development of modern work culture with all its microspecializations. Psychologists measure these things. Clinical psychologists have disproportionately high suicide rates, I hear.

For me what clinical psychologists have to say on this issue is superfluous because I can already see with my own eyes that many people are stressed and miserable and sick of working. You'd be surprised how many people talk openly about this nowadays. Increasingly more people are tired of modern work culture. Many say that they wish they could work less.

Human beings are simply not supposed to live like that! Fortunately in our high-tech 21st century human beings have no reason to work as much as they do. The workweek could and in my opinion should be reduced through the implementation of automation and labor-saving technologies.

Without some kind of communist revolution or major shift toward socialism, how is this going to work? Who is going to make the robots that make the hamburgers at McDonald's and that clean the motel rooms? The large corporations would do it. And who would make the money from selling these services? The owners of the robots or the robotic technology. These proletariate workers you want to free are unlikely to own the technologies. The money from the would go to the companies you despise, not the workers you want to work fewer hours.

While I'm certainly not in favor of the Bolshevik-style Jew socialism of the previous century and don't claim to have all the answers with regard to the best direction for civilization's evolution, I do believe that some kind of more cooperative socialistic system will inevitably come about in light of technological advancements making the present capitalist arrangement obsolete (assuming that some unforeseen catastrophe doesn't disrupt technological development before). Automation and AI will eventually become so advanced that most of today's forms of employment will become superfluous. Depletion of natural resources and environmental concerns will force us as a civilization to reconsider our current lifestyle of consumerism and conspicuous consumption. Various factors will push us towards some form of post-capitalist economy. What sort of system we adopt will depend on us and I hope we take a positive path which integrates new technological changes in an intelligent manner and preserves human freedom.

The current global elite seems to want to take us into an extremely negative form of socialism with their envisioned "Great Reset". I am opposed to this vision. It strikes me as too totalitarian and dystopian. I predict that the global elite's agenda will end in chaos though due to mass resistance.

@Pixel--Dude has stronger views on this point than I do. He believes that capitalism (which is now just corporatism) has run its course and has now become an obstacle to progress rather than a driver of it.

I never heard of female genital mutilation being part of Judaism.

You obviously have a short memory if you cannot remember your little discussion with @WilliamSmith. I bet he still thinks that you're a good creative writer, by the way!

but for those of us who actually have souls and inner spirituality modern society's insane work culture is nothing but a source of depression and frustration and many of us want nothing more than to get out of the rat race.

Do you think lazy people are more likely to be spiritual and have souls than diligent people?

My view on this is pretty much the same as @Winston's. I believe that spiritual people are more likely to be of a Bohemian disposition, to prefer to pursue their own creative and artistic pursuits regardless of how profitable they are, to desire much free time for spiritual practice (i.e., Yoga, meditation, etc.) for the evolution of the soul, and to work as little as absolutely necessary in order to have an abundance of free time. I also don't think that such a Bohemian is really lazy either because he is often focused on his own worthy creative and artistic pursuits (they just don't fall under the narrowly utilitarian modern view of diligence).

I also think that only a soulless unspiritual person could happily subject themselves to hours of monotonous drudgery without becoming depressed or going crazy. I actually believe that most people are soulless and have no higher spiritual faculties and that truly spiritual people (i.e., souled humans) are a small minority.

I also believe that Christianity isn't even remotely spiritual in any way. It consists of little more than theological readings, prayer to an external entity and a bizarre ritual celebrating blood sacrifice and imitating cannibalism and vampirism. The same Jewish cult doesn't include any actual spiritual practice for the evolution of the soul or real concept of soul evolution. It seems to me like a cheap pseudo-spirituality which mostly soulless people find spiritual.

[jamesbond]

The "work cultists" who I refer to are a subset of the population who praise the workaholic lifestyle and shame others who don't have the same enthusiasm about work. They are not experts but simply regular folks who have imbibed the old Protestant Work Ethic a bit too much and like to bang on about how hardworking they are and how everybody else is lazy. The OP and I know people like this in real life. We have contempt for those people and believe that their workaholism and desire to equate it with moral superiority are due to them being empty on the inside and having no other interests or virtues in life. You do realize that the OP posted this as a rant, don't you?

As for experts, I doubt that many subscribe to the idea of relentless industry being necessary for the advancement or upkeep of technological civilization anymore. From what I've seen there seems to be more talk about advanced robotics and automation making more and more forms of human labor redundant and concerns about the future of employment.

I do see diligence as a noble characteristic and laziness as a sinful characteristic. That doesn't mean that I think ones employer has to be the focus of all their work effort or that they have to hate their work for it to be real work. One can get a job with decent hours and use other times for work he enjoys or that breaks up his life with different kinds of activities.

You see work as noble because you (presumably) subscribe to the Protestant Work Ethic. I myself on the other hand subscribe to the classical view which holds that common drudgery is nothing more than a necessary evil which should be reduced to the absolute minimum and is certainly nothing to glorify. The classical view which is aristocratic in nature sees a lifestyle of common drudgery as the condition of slaves and therefore incompatible with eudaimonia. We have very different ideas of what is good and noble because we subscribe to vastly divergent worldviews. You are a Christian (presumably Protestant) man (actually a MrMan) and I am a Pagan soul who looks to the classical world for my values and inspiration.

But the modern workweek is wholly unnatural. It is only driving droves of people to stress, depression, mental illness and despair.

No one say around counting statistics on how many people are stressed, depressed, or mentally ill until the development of modern work culture with all its microspecializations. Psychologists measure these things. Clinical psychologists have disproportionately high suicide rates, I hear.

For me what clinical psychologists have to say on this issue is superfluous because I can already see with my own eyes that many people are stressed and miserable and sick of working. You'd be surprised how many people talk openly about this nowadays. Increasingly more people are tired of modern work culture. Many say that they wish they could work less.

The current global elite seems to want to take us into an extremely negative form of socialism with their envisioned "Great Reset". I am opposed to this vision. It strikes me as too totalitarian and dystopian. I predict that the global elite's agenda will end in chaos though due to mass resistance.

@Pixel--Dude has stronger views on this point than I do. He believes that capitalism (which is now just corporatism) has run its course and has now become an obstacle to progress rather than a driver of it.

I never heard of female genital mutilation being part of Judaism.

You obviously have a short memory if you cannot remember your little discussion with @WilliamSmith. I bet he still thinks that you're a good creative writer, by the way!

but for those of us who actually have souls and inner spirituality modern society's insane work culture is nothing but a source of depression and frustration and many of us want nothing more than to get out of the rat race.

Do you think lazy people are more likely to be spiritual and have souls than diligent people?

My view on this is pretty much the same as @Winston's. I believe that spiritual people are more likely to be of a Bohemian disposition, to prefer to pursue their own creative and artistic pursuits regardless of how profitable they are, to desire much free time for spiritual practice (i.e., Yoga, meditation, etc.) for the evolution of the soul, and to work as little as absolutely necessary in order to have an abundance of free time. I also don't think that such a Bohemian is really lazy either because he is often focused on his own worthy creative and artistic pursuits (they just don't fall under the narrowly utilitarian modern view of diligence).

I also think that only a soulless unspiritual person could happily subject themselves to hours of monotonous drudgery without becoming depressed or going crazy. I actually believe that most people are soulless and have no higher spiritual faculties and that truly spiritual people (i.e., souled humans) are a small minority.

I also believe that Christianity isn't even remotely spiritual in any way. It consists of little more than theological readings, prayer to an external entity and a bizarre ritual celebrating blood sacrifice and imitating cannibalism and vampirism. The same Jewish cult doesn't include any actual spiritual practice for the evolution of the soul or real concept of soul evolution. It seems to me like a cheap pseudo-spirituality which mostly soulless people find spiritual.

This was very well written Lucas88 and I agree with your ideas about work and how society views work. In Anglo countries we have the protestant work ethic on steroids. Some employers will even make you feel guilty for taking vacation time (or even family members might run a guilt trip on you for taking a vacation). It's ridiculous really how things have gotten to this point, where your job is supposed to be the center piece of your life.

[WanderingProtagonist]

Some work cultists like to make the argument that relentless industry is necessary for the development and upkeep of advanced technological civilization but they fail to understand that the question is a matter of degrees. Work cultists don't simply want people to be productive; they want work to be the center of everybody's lives, they want everybody to be subjected to long hours and strict work discipline, they want people to live to work!

Who are 'they?' What expert promotes this idea? Is there a book that promotes it?

The "work cultists" who I refer to are a subset of the population who praise the workaholic lifestyle and shame others who don't have the same enthusiasm about work. They are not experts but simply regular folks who have imbibed the old Protestant Work Ethic a bit too much and like to bang on about how hardworking they are and how everybody else is lazy.


I hear that everytime someone brings up immigrants "Oh Mexicans are so hardworking, Americans are lazy. Mexican Immigrants will do this and do that. Americans won't do this and wont do that." Goddamn ass kissers. And I'm thinking if these people are so damn hardworking, why do they need to move into the U.S.? Why aren't they being hardworking in their own countries? Seriously they throw that hardworking junk around in your face like somehow that makes specific people superior. It reminded me of that dumb Hispanic guy who said "I love paying taxes" I couldn't help but laugh at him when he said that. He said it just to be a suck up. Who the hell loves paying taxes? I don't know anyone who likes working their asses off only to get half of their money taken away from them so the Government can keep funding dogshit with it without your consent. That's one of the reasons why wealthy people try to avoid it if possible, they hate paying taxes. People work endless hours for nothing, some people work hard and still end up homeless anyway. I once heard my cousin say that "I love work" he said even when he can afford to retire he will still continue to work. I just kept quiet because I didn't know what to say.

[Lucas88]

I hear that everytime someone brings up immigrants "Oh Mexicans are so hardworking, Americans are lazy. Mexican Immigrants will do this and do that. Americans won't do this and wont do that." Goddamn ass kissers. And I'm thinking if these people are so damn hardworking, why do they need to move into the U.S.? Why aren't they being hardworking in their own countries? Seriously they throw that hardworking junk around in your face like somehow that makes specific people superior. It reminded me of that dumb Hispanic guy who said "I love paying taxes" I couldn't help but laugh at him when he said that. He said it just to be a suck up. Who the hell loves paying taxes? I don't know anyone who likes working their asses off only to get half of their money taken away from them so the Government can keep funding dogshit with it without your consent. That's one of the reasons why wealthy people try to avoid it if possible, they hate paying taxes. People work endless hours for nothing, some people work hard and still end up homeless anyway. I once heard my cousin say that "I love work" he said even when he can afford to retire he will still continue to work. I just kept quiet because I didn't know what to say.

I've lived in Mexico and know that Mexicans have a much more "Mediterranean" (i.e., relaxed) sense of work ethic than an Anglo-Saxon one. They view work as simply a source of income and don't turn it into a moral issue like Americans do. But still in Mexico companies typically make their employees work long hours and give them shit pay. They know that because of the relative poverty which pervades the lower strata of Mexican society they can take advantage of the desperation of a significant subset of the population and get them to accept a poor deal. I've spoken with my Mexican ex-girlfriend about the work culture in Mexico. She explained to me that companies there have adopted what she calls the US model of employment in which they simply exploit their workers for all that they can get out of them. She also expressed admiration for German work culture which is known for treating workers much better and believes that Mexico would be a better country if it imitated Germany rather than the US.

Because it doesn't pay to work in Mexico, many somewhat more well-off young Mexicans will often refuse to take a job because the low pay just isn't worth it. They'd rather neet it up for a few months rather than waste their time with a dud. This is even socially acceptable since Mexico isn't pervaded by the toxic Protestant Work Ethic and the related moralism of the Anglosphere. Mexicans usually view work as simply a means to an end and give much importance to other aspects of life such as family, friendships, relationships and relaxation. As a result of this they are generally more mentally balanced than Americans.

Some Mexicans emigrate to the US due to poverty at the lower end of society and poor pay. They think that they can achieve a better standard of living working in America and decide to take a chance. Many Mexican immigrants in the US work a lot and do shitty jobs that few Americans would like to do but that isn't because their culture promotes a hardworking disposition but rather they work the way they do out of desperation. Few people really want to live a US-style workaholic lifestyle. Most of the time people simply have no choice due to economic pressures and companies take advantage of that. They capitalize on people's desperation. But if you mention this you're a "Marxist"! You will be called a "commie" and portrayed as a villain just for defending your own interests! In America people are seen as little more than units of economic productivity and exist just to serve the companies of the wealthy. I'm not a Marxist but neither am I a proponent of predatory American Ayn Rand-style Jew capitalism.

[MrMan]

You see work as noble because you (presumably) subscribe to the Protestant Work Ethic. I myself on the other hand subscribe to the classical view which holds that common drudgery is nothing more than a necessary evil which should be reduced to the absolute minimum and is certainly nothing to glorify. The classical view which is aristocratic in nature sees a lifestyle of common drudgery as the condition of slaves and therefore incompatible with eudaimonia. We have very different ideas of what is good and noble because we subscribe to vastly divergent worldviews. You are a Christian (presumably Protestant) man (actually a MrMan) and I am a Pagan soul who looks to the classical world for my values and inspiration.

The idea that work results (eventually, generally) in success and that laziness is a bad trait predates protestantism. It shows up in the Proverbs in the Bible. In the Classical period, Jews might have been hard workers. The ten commandments say, 'Six days shalt thou work....'

But the idea that hard work is inconsistent with a 'classical' worldview doesn't seem right, either. I don't know of any early Greek philosopher that applied the Golden Mean to work. I haven't seen that on any of the lists. I would expect 'diligence' to have been on the middle if one did that. But Roman culture is 'Classical' and one of the Cato's worse regrets, he said, was that he spent a whole day doing nothing at all. I take that as a hint that Romans valued diligence. That, combined with their idea that dominating other was virtuous may have contributed to their conquering their corner of the world.

But the modern workweek is wholly unnatural. It is only driving droves of people to stress, depression, mental illness and despair.

No one say around counting statistics on how many people are stressed, depressed, or mentally ill until the development of modern work culture with all its microspecializations. Psychologists measure these things. Clinical psychologists have disproportionately high suicide rates, I hear.

For me what clinical psychologists have to say on this issue is superfluous because I can already see with my own eyes that many people are stressed and miserable and sick of working. You'd be surprised how many people talk openly about this nowadays. Increasingly more people are tired of modern work culture. Many say that they wish they could work less.

One could dislike modern work culture and still subscribe to the Protestant work ethic. That 'ethic' was prominent when people were farmers and small business owners running family businesses. We shouldn't conflate it with the idea of the majority of the population being hired servants. If you run your own cobbler shop you can close up and take a few days off for your daughter's wedding without asking permission. Farmers could go a few days without weeding anything.

The current global elite seems to want to take us into an extremely negative form of socialism with their envisioned "Great Reset". I am opposed to this vision. It strikes me as too totalitarian and dystopian. I predict that the global elite's agenda will end in chaos though due to mass resistance.

And the whole plan could never get off the ground, or something like that could happen way off int eh future. It sounds pretty bad to me, too. I've got a friend whose listening to really conservative Q type videos who believes some new currency is on the way to come out, but it sounds almost like the same thing.

I never heard of female genital mutilation being part of Judaism.

You obviously have a short memory if you cannot remember your little discussion with @WilliamSmith. I bet he still thinks that you're a good creative writer, by the way!

I don't know what you are talking about. Are you thinking of Muslim cultures rather than Jewish?

Do you think lazy people are more likely to be spiritual and have souls than diligent people?

My view on this is pretty much the same as @Winston's. I believe that spiritual people are more likely to be of a Bohemian disposition, to prefer to pursue their own creative and artistic pursuits regardless of how profitable they are, to desire much free time for spiritual practice (i.e., Yoga, meditation, etc.) for the evolution of the soul, and to work as little as absolutely necessary in order to have an abundance of free time. I also don't think that such a Bohemian is really lazy either because he is often focused on his own worthy creative and artistic pursuits (they just don't fall under the narrowly utilitarian modern view of diligence).[/quote]

That sounds like another variation of the carnal/nonspiritual type to me.

I also think that only a soulless unspiritual person could happily subject themselves to hours of monotonous drudgery without becoming depressed or going crazy. I actually believe that most people are soulless and have no higher spiritual faculties and that truly spiritual people (i.e., souled humans) are a small minority.

So do you think 'spiritual' people are more prone to mental illness?

What do you think about the ethical issue of freeloaders who think they are 'spiritual' not producing anything but gobbling up the resources. Imagine you are stranded on an island with 20 people. Would you rather be there with tough people who can endure a bit of monotonous drudgery, working on building a structure, making fire, catching fish, digging up edible roots, etc., or a bunch of 'spiritual' artists who lay around all day talking about how spiritual they are, smoking up the last of their weed, and not working? Is it right to gobble up what little food they get together if you aren't helping with the building, fishing, etc.?

If you are in a career you consider to be monotonous and full of drudgery, work hard to get some training to find another job you enjoy more.

This was very well written Lucas88 and I agree with your ideas about work and how society views work. In Anglo countries we have the protestant work ethic on steroids. Some employers will even make you feel guilty for taking vacation time (or even family members might run a guilt trip on you for taking a vacation). It's ridiculous really how things have gotten to this point, where your job is supposed to be the center piece of your life.

I've never experienced a corporation guilt tripping people for taking a vacation. Some people feel that sense of responsibility for their work and wonder how they can leave it, but big corporations sometimes have rules requiring the vacation, and HR types insist on it. But I suppose every company is different. I'm glad I'm not working in the corporate arena. I don't think I'd want to again unless I was a director, or maybe a CEO, but I think I'd prefer to outsource that if I owned a big company.

[Lucas88]

But the idea that hard work is inconsistent with a 'classical' worldview doesn't seem right, either. I don't know of any early Greek philosopher that applied the Golden Mean to work. I haven't seen that on any of the lists. I would expect 'diligence' to have been on the middle if one did that. But Roman culture is 'Classical' and one of the Cato's worse regrets, he said, was that he spent a whole day doing nothing at all. I take that as a hint that Romans valued diligence. That, combined with their idea that dominating other was virtuous may have contributed to their conquering their corner of the world.

The classical worldview emphasized the cultivation of wisdom and other virtues which are conducive to eudaimonia but, from what I have read, within classical though there was a tendency to view common drudgery as a lowly condition belonging to slaves and to regard it as a source of indignity. Make no mistake about it. The classical worldview was profoundly aristocratic. There was little glorification of the humble or the lot of the proles. Classical men of wisdom advocated the pursuit of personal excellence and therefore diligence but that was more along the lines of philosophy and learning, physical fitness, military virtue and knowledge of the arts and high culture and certainly not along the lines of servile drudgery or the modern concept of work. I'm sure that classical thinkers would view the modern concept of work as absolutely degrading and contemptible. The aristocracies of antiquity started off as military classes of free men who fought into order to avoid being enslaved, hence their obsession with military virtue and physical fitness. But once their societies became more stable and peaceful the same aristocracies evolved also into a class of high culture, philosophy and the arts. Common drudgery wasn't something that they admired. Classical man's attitude towards work couldn't be any further from that of the sickly and slavish Protestants of the time of Calvin and ilk.

One could dislike modern work culture and still subscribe to the Protestant work ethic. That 'ethic' was prominent when people were farmers and small business owners running family businesses. We shouldn't conflate it with the idea of the majority of the population being hired servants. If you run your own cobbler shop you can close up and take a few days off for your daughter's wedding without asking permission. Farmers could go a few days without weeding anything.

Technically you could, and I'm happy for people who set up their own small business and succeed, but the truth is that the Protestant work ethic has been used to justify the majority of the population's hired servitude and long work hours. In fact I remember reading that in England during the industrial revolution even some church hymns lauded drudgery and encouraged the faithful to put up with it in order to receive better blessings in heaven. Talk about indoctrination! Moreover, the Protestant work ethic crowd have always been the ones who moralize work the most and shame those who they consider not hardworking enough (maybe with the exception of Marxists who are just as bad when it comes to this). They're the ones who typically glorify the morbid US workaholic lifestyle and about whom this thread is primarily about. In fact I've lived in Mediterranean and Latin countries where the Protestant work ethic is nowhere to be found and I've found that they have a much more relaxed attitude towards work and a much healthier conception of life than any historically Protestant nation. Protestantism and its moralistic attitude towards life are part of the problem. I could never trust a Protestant.

And the whole plan could never get off the ground, or something like that could happen way off int eh future. It sounds pretty bad to me, too. I've got a friend whose listening to really conservative Q type videos who believes some new currency is on the way to come out, but it sounds almost like the same thing.

The World Economic Forum are openly talking about this on their website and they call it the "Great Reset". From what I've heard they aim to implement it within the next 10 years. Many people are saying that the scamdemic, the war with Russia and the economic crisis are manufactured events in order to hasten its arrival. The Great Reset might get off the ground if a large percentage of the population are convinced to support it (I think this is why the corporate media have been aggressively pushing leftist ideas in recent decades). Its implementation is a possibility just like how the Jewish Bolsheviks implemented communism in Russia in less than a decade. But fortunately I have faith that in today's age of the internet and skepticism of government and corporate agendas sufficient people will see what is going on and resist it.

Now, I as somebody with classical values am definitely in favor of progressive automation and elimination of all unnecessary drudgery, but not in the way that the NWO elite's World Economic Forum wants to do things. The kind of society that they wish to establish is just too dystopian for my liking.

I don't know what you are talking about. Are you thinking of Muslim cultures rather than Jewish?

You obviously don't remember your little tiff with WilliamSmith then!

That sounds like another variation of the carnal/nonspiritual type to me.

Spiritual people like Winston require a lot of free time for exploration and self-development and the pursuit of certain experiences since that is what our souls ask of us and what we perceive as necessary for our soul growth. Modern work culture with its long hours of drudgery often gets in the way of this and so many of us instinctively realize that we have to minimize work or "get out of the rat race" as some people put it. This sentiment seems to be shared by a lot of people on this forum. Many here are sick and tired of America's insane workaholic lifestyle.

But let's cut the crap. There's nothing truly spiritual about the New Age hippie types who sit around smoking pot and getting high on acid as they discuss Eastern metaphysics just as there's nothing spiritual about going to church and listening to preacher prattle about theology or participating in rituals of mock blood sacrifice. The only true form of spiritual practice is Yoga and meditation for the opening of the chakras and the nadis, the ascension of the Kundalini and the development of the Siddhis, all for the evolution of the soul towards its own power and godhood. Everything else is just nonsense pseudo-spirituality designed to distract spiritual seekers and trap them in inertia. Truly practicing spiritual people don't take drugs or alcohol because such harmful practices are an obstacle to true spiritual evolution. Only confused immature spiritual people think that those vices are compatible with spirituality. You can't be a serious Yogi or meditator and at the same time get shitfaced on booze and pot each weekend. True spirituality requires peak physical condition.

I think that only a deranged Protestant brought up on Calvinist claptrap could find anything spiritual about drudgery.

So do you think 'spiritual' people are more prone to mental illness?

No, I think that people who live in a toxic environment are more prone to mental illness. And modern workaholic societies like America have some of the highest rates of mental illness in the world so modern work culture must be toxic and detrimental to mental health.

What do you think about the ethical issue of freeloaders who think they are 'spiritual' not producing anything but gobbling up the resources. Imagine you are stranded on an island with 20 people. Would you rather be there with tough people who can endure a bit of monotonous drudgery, working on building a structure, making fire, catching fish, digging up edible roots, etc., or a bunch of 'spiritual' artists who lay around all day talking about how spiritual they are, smoking up the last of their weed, and not working? Is it right to gobble up what little food they get together if you aren't helping with the building, fishing, etc.?

On a desert island I'd rather be with rough warlike people (I'm kinda a bit wild and warlike myself) who can hunt and survive in the wild. I'd certainly not like to be stranded with a slavish Protestant work ethicist who endlessly preaches about the beatitudes of hard work though. His "virtues" would most likely be superfluous anyway outside of modern industrial society and moralists like that just bore me.

But we are not on a desert island or in any primitive world. We live in an advanced technological civilization with automation already on our doorstep. In light of this I think that we as a society should be working less and enjoying more leisure time and having more time to develop our intellectual and artistic faculties among other things. I'm in favor of using technology intelligently in order to make a society more conducive to human flourishing (I and many others perceive a 40 hour workweek of drudgery as a hindrance to that). I really couldn't care less about old moral ideologies that aren't even relevant today.

If you are in a career you consider to be monotonous and full of drudgery, work hard to get some training to find another job you enjoy more.

Everybody including the anti-work people does what they can to get by in this system because we have no other choice. Some people find jobs that are more bearable than others. But those of us who support the use of automation for the reduction of drudgery and oppose the toxic modern work culture for the misery that it is causing for so many helpless people are not going to stand by idly (pun intended ) just because we found something that we find mildly enjoyable. We wish to live in a worthier world in which humans are free from constant drudgery and servility, free to flourish on their own terms. So we spread our anti-work and automationist ideas online and attempt to influence others in order for our desired future to have a chance at manifesting in the world in the future.