/r/antiwork: A tragedy of sanewashing and social gentrification • Hacker News Board

Re: /r/antiwork: A tragedy of sanewashing and social gentrification

#241

Post by TuringNYC » Mon, Feb 07, 2022, 4:52 PM UTC

gavinray wrote: post #182

JSavageOne wrote: post #156

I remember stumbling upon /r/antiwork a few years ago and being so happy I'd stumbled upon a thriving movement that so effectively criticized one of the core principles of society that everyone takes for granted - that everyone must effectively sell their labor to someone else (unless they're rich enough to opt out, or clever enough to create some business or invest their way out). To me anti-work is the recognition…

>Universal basic income I'm going to sound like I'm being snarky here, and I promise I'm not. How exactly is this supposed to work? The government prints money and gives it away for free, nobody has to work? I don't say this from a place of privilege. I grew up lower class trailer trash and have been homeless. Maybe I don't understand the concept fully but it seems a bit absurd and unfeasible

>> How exactly is this supposed to work? The government prints money and gives it away for free, nobody has to work?

I grew up around a lot of poor people. One issue in the US is healthcare. If you make The solution here is obvious to me -- if you provide some of the benefits without means-testing (i.e., the "U" in "UBI") then people are incentivized to work even bits without risking losting healthcare/foodstamps.

Another example was in college -- if you earned even a bit of money, your student aid often went down commensurately. At that point, why would you work? You were no better off unless you could make a LOT of money. I realize this has changed over the past 20yrs.

Also, as someone who's gone thru this -- this is a very delicate process. You do one thing wrong, and you're in bureaucratic hell for months without benefits. The "safe" thing to do is to earn nothing -- God forbid you earn a thousand here or there and lose medical care. The whole system of means-testing makes no sense. It seems to be more a way to create jobs for bureaucrats.

Re: /r/antiwork: A tragedy of sanewashing and social gentrification

#242

Post by zeepzeep » Mon, Feb 07, 2022, 4:52 PM UTC

gavinray wrote: post #182

JSavageOne wrote: post #156

I remember stumbling upon /r/antiwork a few years ago and being so happy I'd stumbled upon a thriving movement that so effectively criticized one of the core principles of society that everyone takes for granted - that everyone must effectively sell their labor to someone else (unless they're rich enough to opt out, or clever enough to create some business or invest their way out). To me anti-work is the recognition…

>Universal basic income I'm going to sound like I'm being snarky here, and I promise I'm not. How exactly is this supposed to work? The government prints money and gives it away for free, nobody has to work? I don't say this from a place of privilege. I grew up lower class trailer trash and have been homeless. Maybe I don't understand the concept fully but it seems a bit absurd and unfeasible

> How exactly is this supposed to work? The government prints money and gives it away for free, nobody has to work?

Nobody HAS to work, correct. If they only want to survive, they don't need to work. Everyone gets money for food, water, shelter and education; no questions asked.

If you want an iPhone or eat something nice, you should probably get some money though.

Universal basic income isn't much usually, it's enough to survive, enough for a livable life.

That's paid by taxes of the majority of people that will still work, because people usually want more than just to survive, so they'll work. They'll just not work at Starbucks for 10 years to pay their student loan, they'll find a job that they like, a job with meaning.

Re: /r/antiwork: A tragedy of sanewashing and social gentrification

#243

Post by shakes_mcjunkie » Mon, Feb 07, 2022, 4:53 PM UTC

> Every time, liberal progressives hop on these movements and attempt to sanewash them; every time, the radicals proudly push towards extremes. The trouble for these radical movements comes, often, when their vision meets reality. Mass protests fail to materialize. Workers of the world fail to unite. Autonomous zones collapse into violence and murder.

The problem here is liberals want to reshape movements without actually understanding them. Modern liberalism isn't really about understanding core issues and looking for solutions, it's about "sanewashing" as the article mentions which fundamentally runs counter to movement ideals. I think a lot of more radical people would be willing to work with liberals and vice versa if liberals (who IMO generally have more power) would listen more first.

Re: /r/antiwork: A tragedy of sanewashing and social gentrification

#244

Post by yk » Mon, Feb 07, 2022, 4:53 PM UTC

HideousKojima wrote: post #159

asojfdowgh wrote: post #71

> You’ve come across the gentrifiers before, I’m sure. They browse the front page of reddit and the trending tab of YouTube, buy Ruth Bader Ginsberg figurines and wear Che Guevara T-shirts. So, gentrifiers are generally made out of straw is the take-away? likewise, "no one wants to mine coal" me, I do, I wanna do that, I wanna work out the refining process, I want to lathe 1000 of the same thing. Not every personalit…

>likewise, "no one wants to mine coal" me, I do, I wanna do that, I wanna work out the refining process, I want to lathe 1000 of the same thing. Not every personality is what the author can come up with in his head, other kinds of people exist too You may want to, but the kind of people who talk in online discussions about "What will your job be after the revolution" overwhelmingly do not.

The radical position is, if nobody wants to mine coal, then we will need to either not use coal (great idea, saves a lot of Co2), or make the coal mining job better. Of course nobody wants the dirty, unhealthy and dangerous job that capitalism designed, but that does not imply that it is impossible to design a job that extracts coal and people genuinely enjoy.

Re: /r/antiwork: A tragedy of sanewashing and social gentrification

#245

Post by bleachedsleet » Mon, Feb 07, 2022, 4:53 PM UTC

jklinger410 wrote: post #126

BitwiseFool wrote: post #40

This reminds me of "Defund the Police", wherein supporters would try to convince others that the slogan did not literally mean what it says. Like AntiWork, It seems to have been started by those who genuinely wanted to abolish the police. But as time went on people joined who instead wanted to reform the police by dramatically cutting back what they were meant to respond to. But the slogan stayed, and was very mislea…

Actually defund the police means exactly what it says. The proposal is that police budgets get diverted to mental health and rehabilitation programs. The budget moved to mental health & rehab would be handled under a different agency than the police, which is something that is constantly argued over. Many opponents of defund the police agree with the overall budget reallocation, but they believe the budget should not…

> Actually defund the police means exactly what it says.

…to you. Not everyone agrees and the simple fact that this discussion is taking place and you are defending this slogan would seem to render this purported clarity moot.

Re: /r/antiwork: A tragedy of sanewashing and social gentrification

#246

Post by asow92 » Mon, Feb 07, 2022, 4:53 PM UTC

dymk wrote: post #194

gavinray wrote: post #182

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Universal basic income I'm going to sound like I'm being snarky here, and I promise I'm not. How exactly is this supposed to work? The government prints money and gives it away for free, nobody has to work? I don't say this from a place of privilege. I grew up lower class trailer trash and have been homeless. Maybe I don't understand the concept fully but it seems a bit absurd and unfeasible

You tax a couple dozen ultra rich billionaires and a couple dozen ultra profitable companies. There's plenty of money. We don't need to print more. And each doesn't need the spare $20B anyways.

Even if we zero out every US billionaire (imagine that for a second; take 100% of their wealth and leave them with exactly $0) it would not even cover 1/5 of the US national debt.

We can't see taking their money as a viable long term solution to UBI. Our debt is out of control and our day of reckoning will come eventually. Nothing is free; markets will correct for UBI and people will become just as poor as they were over time. Existing UBI studies cannot take into account for the _universal_ aspect of UBI because they are controlled studies — there will be unintended consequences.

https://www.econlib.org/library/Enc/UnintendedConsequences.h...

https://www.politifact.com/factchecks/2021/nov/02/viral-imag....

https://www.nytimes.com/2022/02/01/us/politics/national-debt...

Re: /r/antiwork: A tragedy of sanewashing and social gentrification

#247

Post by seanmcdirmid » Mon, Feb 07, 2022, 4:53 PM UTC

whatshisface wrote: post #9

I think this post may be, in its parlance, "sanewashing" workaholism. For example, let's take this post from the subreddit: https://old.reddit.com/r/antiwork/comments/lo6wov/my_dads_a_... > "My dads a “working class hero” I wanna punch him in the face, we wanted to visit this weekend, we haven’t seen him in 2 months due to covid, we have three kids and so does he (6, 8 and 9) his wife passed away 2 years ago, and he’…

I can't even grock the writing to get a feeling from it. They have 3 kids and his dad has 3 kids also? Or are their 3 kids the dad's grandchildren and the author of the comment has 2 siblings? And the dad's wife passed away, I assume is not their mother? But why would that be relevant? And since he is a boomer, he is at retirement age probably? His kids must be fully grown right?

Re: /r/antiwork: A tragedy of sanewashing and social gentrification

#248

Post by goodpoint » Mon, Feb 07, 2022, 4:53 PM UTC

iso1210 wrote: post #92

wsb_mod2 wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The site itself leans left, I wouldn't call that manipulation, simply people voting on content they like. However, you are onto something. Almost every single post on r/MurderedByAOC is made by u/LrlOurPresident, and those posts hit the front page on a nearly daily basis.

The world itself leans left - at least compared with the US Left/Right divide, and younger people (who are more likely to be on reddit) lean left. Obviously the site itself leans left.

> The world itself leans left

No, by definition, it does not lean in any direction on the political compass.

> at least compared with the US Left/Right divide

More precisely, the overton window of the US goes from center to the far right.

Re: /r/antiwork: A tragedy of sanewashing and social gentrification

#249

Post by s1artibartfast » Mon, Feb 07, 2022, 4:53 PM UTC

diogenesjunior wrote: post #171

UnpossibleJim wrote: post #116

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Once you eat the cake, you can no longer possess it EDIT: Let me make it more clear, as English may not be your first language, if you're asking this question in truth (I sometimes miss sarcasm online, sorry). Cakes can be beautiful things which people (of a certain time period, especially) wanted to show off as a sign of their wealth, as refined sugar was expensive. Once it was eaten, you could no longer display suc…

i hate how americans always assume we are from there and understand everything they say

It is actually an idiom originating in England in the 1500's.

Re: /r/antiwork: A tragedy of sanewashing and social gentrification

#250

Post by JSavageOne » Mon, Feb 07, 2022, 4:53 PM UTC

monkeynotes wrote: post #191

JSavageOne wrote: post #156

I remember stumbling upon /r/antiwork a few years ago and being so happy I'd stumbled upon a thriving movement that so effectively criticized one of the core principles of society that everyone takes for granted - that everyone must effectively sell their labor to someone else (unless they're rich enough to opt out, or clever enough to create some business or invest their way out). To me anti-work is the recognition…

> We could already have this reality today if we just implemented a universal basic income This is at best naieve. How can you possibly reduce all of the complexities of a nation's multiple economic wants and needs to that conclusion? This is the problem with the movement, myopic and idealistic notions of being free from work. Universal income basically drives up inflation, if you give everyone a free $10 everything…

There are already many countries with generous welfare states where one does not have to work and could theoretically live off the government, yet they manage just fine.

Even if universal basic income was a pipe dream (which I vehemently disagree with, and again point to the examples above as evidence that not needing to work does not lead to societal collapse), I don't see why enabling everyone the freedom to work on whatever they want should not be a goal.

If it were up to me, taxes would be funded via land value tax (commonly referred to as the fairest and most efficient tax since there's no deadweight loss), and the proceeds would be distributed uniformly to the population as a citizen's dividend.