In Japan, It’s a Riveting TV Plot: Can a Worker Go Home on Time? • Hacker News Board

Re: In Japan, It’s a Riveting TV Plot: Can a Worker Go Home on Time?

#91

Post by maxxxxx » Thu, Jun 20, 2019, 9:01 PM UTC

reroute1 wrote: post #90

maxxxxx wrote: post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Then don't call it "masculinity" and be more specific. Anything related to "masculinity" will be connected to males.

I think the problem is there is only a focus on toxic masculinity and men see it everywhere. It stands to reason there can be just as much toxic femininity, but you don't hear about that ever... or not much talk about positive masculinity but surely that exists also

Connecting bad traits with the same term as unchangeable traits makes no sense to. I am male and therefore have masculinity. Why connect demanding overtime to masculinity? It's super unspecific and not helpful. And no way you could ever use the word "toxic femininity" or "toxic blackness". People would go crazy,.

Re: In Japan, It’s a Riveting TV Plot: Can a Worker Go Home on Time?

#92

Post by otakucode » Thu, Jun 20, 2019, 9:04 PM UTC

I do not understand why in this article it is permitted to only be mentioned in passing that the creators of the TV show are completely and fundamentally changing the core message of the novel it is based upon. In the novel, the characters decision to overwork ruins her life. In the TV show, they're going to have it do the opposite. So while they toy with the idea of leaving on time, they're just going to feed more into the social disease of overwork.

I realize that the change from a manufacturing-oriented economy to a knowledge-work-oriented economy is going to take decades, and there are going to be a lot of bumps along the way and likely a good bit of bloodshed, but it doesn't make it any more pleasant to watch.

Re: In Japan, It’s a Riveting TV Plot: Can a Worker Go Home on Time?

#93

Post by GuiA » Thu, Jun 20, 2019, 9:05 PM UTC

rubber_duck wrote: post #89

GuiA wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That’s a very toxic attitude to have, especially as a manager. You don’t know that “nobody gets offended”. All you know is that “no one chose to express their discomfort”, a very different thing.

It's pretty easy to make sure nobody gets offended - you communicate (in a serious setting) that you value results over hours worked and you demonstrate this in practice. At that point irony and sarcasm is safe territory (appropriate or tasteful is another matter). Being afraid to joke about this because it could be missunderstood tells me you are failing at that which is far more important than worrying about what a…

It’s not being afraid to joke, it’s making sure that employees do not feel like they are receiving mixed signals (“he says results are what matters but he’s always joking about me leaving early when I’m leaving at a reasonable hour and getting my work done?”). This is particularly important when considering employees who might not have English as their first language, or come from a culture where joking is perceived differently.

Re: In Japan, It’s a Riveting TV Plot: Can a Worker Go Home on Time?

#94

Post by otakucode » Thu, Jun 20, 2019, 9:06 PM UTC

m463 wrote: post #53

komali2 wrote: post #7

>In addition to cultural attitudes about the value of hard work, she said, some employers reduce costs by relying on overtime, and employees work the longer hours for the extra pay and to please the boss — promotions often depend more on time spent at a desk than actual productivity. Agggh hits to home. Arrogant American me rolled into a Taiwanese job expecting to skyrocket up the ladder on results alone. Nope, becau…

> how do leaders convince people that change can be good? Showing the idea to a broad audience on tv is actually one way to do this. (although there are ways this can backfire)

This show is not seeking to do this. Note this part of the article which barely gets a mention:

"In the novel, the decision to work overtime leads to her downfall: She becomes addicted to work, ends up in the hospital and loses a new beau, who has a decidedly more relaxed attitude toward his own job. But on the TV show, which began airing in April, Ms. Higashiyama is destined for a happier fate, said the producers"

They're subverting the novel and using it as a tool to support the obsession with putting in more hours, not avoid it, apparently.

Re: In Japan, It’s a Riveting TV Plot: Can a Worker Go Home on Time?

#95

Post by fzeroracer » Thu, Jun 20, 2019, 9:09 PM UTC

maxxxxx wrote: post #91

reroute1 wrote: post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think the problem is there is only a focus on toxic masculinity and men see it everywhere. It stands to reason there can be just as much toxic femininity, but you don't hear about that ever... or not much talk about positive masculinity but surely that exists also

Connecting bad traits with the same term as unchangeable traits makes no sense to. I am male and therefore have masculinity. Why connect demanding overtime to masculinity? It's super unspecific and not helpful. And no way you could ever use the word "toxic femininity" or "toxic blackness". People would go crazy,.

Masculinity isn't an unchangeable trait though. You can dress, shave, act etc in different ways which affect how you express yourself which all results in how 'masculine' or 'feminine' your expression is.

Toxic masculinity is an attempt to define how a man should look. If you get mocked for having long hair, shaving your face/body or wearing certain colors, that's toxic masculinity. Because you're not acting in a way how a man is supposed to act.

Re: In Japan, It’s a Riveting TV Plot: Can a Worker Go Home on Time?

#96

Post by paulryanrogers » Thu, Jun 20, 2019, 9:09 PM UTC

jedmeyers wrote: post #19

komali2 wrote: post #7

>In addition to cultural attitudes about the value of hard work, she said, some employers reduce costs by relying on overtime, and employees work the longer hours for the extra pay and to please the boss — promotions often depend more on time spent at a desk than actual productivity. Agggh hits to home. Arrogant American me rolled into a Taiwanese job expecting to skyrocket up the ladder on results alone. Nope, becau…

> How do you implement change? Someone big and local has to step in, let the the workers leave on time yet kick everyone’s butt on the market. Then everyone will start copying the practices.

Relying on cargo culting is probably not sustainable long term. Education and collective action are better tools IMO.

Re: In Japan, It’s a Riveting TV Plot: Can a Worker Go Home on Time?

#97

Post by derefr » Thu, Jun 20, 2019, 9:10 PM UTC

6gvONxR4sf7o wrote: post #81

derefr wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"A huge chunk of the world" and "literally every human being throughout history" are very different things. Like I said, a problem is potentially solvable politically if you have at least one constructive proof of people not doing that. If you don't, though, then it's likely one of these: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cultural_universal . If, for some reason, you thought that—to use a random example from the list— pe…

Yes, cultural universals exist, but in the interest of staying on topic, you'll notice a distinct difference between e.g. people having names, and things on zanny's list or cultures that work overtime too much.

I don't know, both bigotry and "[culture] exceptionalism" map pretty well to the cultural universals of "Collective identities" + "Binary cognitive distinctions".

Which is, again, why I think zanny was being downvoted: wishing people could get over wanting to work overtime, and wishing human brains would stop categorizing things and then assigning the categories themselves moral worth, are very different kinds of wish, that don't really feel like they should be in the same kind of list. The latter kind of thing can't be described with "a problem with American culture", because that's not the level it exists at.

Re: In Japan, It’s a Riveting TV Plot: Can a Worker Go Home on Time?

#98

Post by otakucode » Thu, Jun 20, 2019, 9:10 PM UTC

derefr wrote: post #43

komali2 wrote: post #7

>In addition to cultural attitudes about the value of hard work, she said, some employers reduce costs by relying on overtime, and employees work the longer hours for the extra pay and to please the boss — promotions often depend more on time spent at a desk than actual productivity. Agggh hits to home. Arrogant American me rolled into a Taiwanese job expecting to skyrocket up the ladder on results alone. Nope, becau…

Is there any way you could just make it physiologically untenable for anyone to stay in your office past 5PM? Right around 6PM at my apartment, the downstairs tenants light up with the most awful, stanky skunk-weed. You literally cannot keep the windows open; and yet, in the middle of summer and no central AC, you can't afford to be there with them closed, either. So, in effect, my neighbour forces me to ensure I'm n…

I don't imagine we will actually see this change in the way expected. Rather than companies making it so employees can leave on time and still feel secure in their job, I imagine companies will eventually find themselves destroyed by competition that are smart enough to forego having an office at all. Offices are a massive expense, and while they were crucial and profitable in the era of difficult communications, they're now nothing but a source for value destruction, amplified even greater by the tremendously negative impact on cognitive productivity interruptions have. The exact things that made offices valuable in the past, physical proximity of coworkers, are their greatest weakness now.

Re: In Japan, It’s a Riveting TV Plot: Can a Worker Go Home on Time?

#99

Post by dijit27 » Thu, Jun 20, 2019, 9:23 PM UTC

fzeroracer wrote: post #88

maxxxxx wrote: post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Then don't call it "masculinity" and be more specific. Anything related to "masculinity" will be connected to males.

Yes, that's the point? It's a well defined term. Toxic masculinity is connected to the masculine roles society forces on men and women. I'm not sure what else you'd call it, because the entire point is that it has everything to do with masculinity. Hence, toxic masculinity. But again, anyone can perpetuate it.

I think the point is the definition of toxic masculinity that you are using differs from that of some of the other posters.

As I understand your definition toxic masculinity is the pressure society puts on people to conform to negative masculine roles.

My personal definition would be people expressing there masculinity in a way that is hurtful and belittling of others.

They both are part of the same problem where society creates and perpetuates and pushes people to toxic expressions of masculinity and that in turn hurts the public in general. Which looks something like:

Society -> Masculine Roles -> The Public

I'd call the negative expression of that chain Toxic Societal Norms and the second part would be Toxic Masculinity. In both cases it's the noun, societal norms or masculinity, that is the source of the toxicity.

Re: In Japan, It’s a Riveting TV Plot: Can a Worker Go Home on Time?

#100

Post by ACow_Adonis » Thu, Jun 20, 2019, 9:25 PM UTC

reymus wrote: post #63

justaguyhere wrote: post #29

In a place I worked, if someone left at 5:30 pm, the CTO used to joke "half day today?", even though the person came in at 9 am. In many places I worked in the US, it is somewhat of a badge of honor to spend long hours at work (how many of those are actually productive, is a different story). And these aren't even startups. This can't continue - an entire generation of people have been brainwashed that hard work = go…

> In a place I worked, if someone left at 5:30 pm, the CTO used to joke "half day today?", even though the person came in at 9 am. In both the places I've worked, it's a common joke anyone says when somebody leaves. everybody laughs and nobody gets offended. It doesn't mean anything.

interesting, in that from my perspective it's a joke that only works if you're reinforcing a cultural attitude that they're breaking a norm. I.e. it wouldn't exist or even thought to be said unless there was an inherent expectation/value in working long hours.

Also, I'd probably worry that such frequent jokes walk a very fine line towards passive aggressive behavior (again, such jokes just won't exist where there is no expectation).

obviously I don't know your workplace, so there's a good possibility no one gets offended, but just pointing out there's different interpretations of such actions, and just because no one's saying anything doesn't mean it's not happening...

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