write as many of these opinion pieces as you want, I'm never going back to working in-person
The Lonely Office Is Bad for America
31–40 of 72 posts
Re: The Lonely Office Is Bad for America
#32> My mind goes first to the young. People starting out need offices to learn a profession, to make friends, meet colleagues This is what I think remote work advocates miss -- pure remote makes work 100% work, 0% percent anything else. This is probably fine if you work at a horrible finance firm where this was the case anyway, but for people in creative/tech professions where fun stuff / offsites / happy hours were th…
I miss the simple things, like finding a new restaurant and trying it with coworkers. It sounds cliche, but I liked "getting out of the house" and having more of a work-life separation. I have kinda accepted that that era is gone and is not coming back. The last time I worked out of an office was March, 2020.
I miss a lot about in office life. The parent talking about the newcomers i think really nails it the most/worst, not just because work is now 100% work, but because most people are totally isolated, heads down on their tickets, and dont see so much of whats going on. There's no serendipitous learning: few random exchanges, little chance to see someome beaming & hear them brag/explain, rarely chance to see someone struggling & have somone step in.
Anyhow. On food in specific, for the last decades I've dreamed of trying to get people trying & exploring new things. But wow, it felt like folks were absurdly attached to their staples.
That said, in my 20's, I was crazy dollar-conscious. I still ate out for lunch a lot, but the thought of paying $2 or $4 more than any of the abundant quality high-value local shops for something more upscale or just more elaborate was super hard to swallow. $13 buffet at Majer House Kabob was like the pinnacle of richness. So I get some of it. But also, it was still disappointing feeling unable to rally for a good exploration.
Re: The Lonely Office Is Bad for America
#33I work for money. Money. Money. Not to make friends, not to build culture. Considering how offended everyone is now, work isn't the place to socialize.
> Considering how offended everyone is now, work isn't the place to socialize. Remote work is a safeguard. There is a record of every Slack interaction, and with minimal equipment, you can keep your own record of every video chat conversation, too. If someone chooses to take offense at something you've said, then seek vengeance by way of the HR department, you can go back to the record to exonerate yourself.
Recording audio/video without all-party consent is legally perilous in the US. I recommend not doing that subtly.
It's at the very least illegal if any of the parties are in California or several other states.
Re: The Lonely Office Is Bad for America
#34Earlier quoted context omitted.
have you considered finding a new restaurant and trying it without coworkers
Have you considered that not everyone finds their coworkers insufferable, actually finds the camaraderie enjoyable, and do make friends at the office?
Actually no, I'm highly skeptical that happens outside of sitcoms
Re: The Lonely Office Is Bad for America
#35Peggy Noonan has failed to justify the continued existence of "office culture" and "national culture". As somebody else mentioned, I work for a living. I am not there to make friends. I am there to make money. I am not there to build community. I am there to build software that makes rich assholes even richer, in exchange for pennies on every dollar of value I create.
Peggy Noonan has failed to be relevant for decades and is now a total waste of space. She was recently on Meet the Press where she said Republicans could use their “victory” as an opportunity to go after women voters by changing their tune. She should retire already.
What a ghoul.
Re: The Lonely Office Is Bad for America
#36Earlier quoted context omitted.
Have you considered that not everyone finds their coworkers insufferable, actually finds the camaraderie enjoyable, and do make friends at the office?
Actually no, I'm highly skeptical that happens outside of sitcoms
You've seriously never had a fun time out to lunch or drinks with a coworker? I suppose it is possible!
Re: The Lonely Office Is Bad for America
#37Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Considering how offended everyone is now, work isn't the place to socialize. Remote work is a safeguard. There is a record of every Slack interaction, and with minimal equipment, you can keep your own record of every video chat conversation, too. If someone chooses to take offense at something you've said, then seek vengeance by way of the HR department, you can go back to the record to exonerate yourself.
Recording audio/video without all-party consent is legally perilous in the US. I recommend not doing that subtly. It's at the very least illegal if any of the parties are in California or several other states.
Not Canada. Only one party to the conversation needs to be aware. IANAL.
Re: The Lonely Office Is Bad for America
#38The reality of my personal situation - and I'm sure others are at the same point - is that remote work offers the biggest chance we have to fight (in my opinion) two of the most important issues of our time - cost of housing and climate change.
First - housing. The cost of housing is hugely tied to location and being remote offers a chance to fight back against that. There's not more land in San Francisco and New York and building has become politically untenable. This has and will have tremendous consequences for my financial future. Being remote offers a way to fight against that both because workers can expand their horizons for other locations that are building housing but also because in the future we potentially have an opportunity to re-zone commercial real estate into residential, higher-density real-estate. Rather than needing to provide an individual with two places (house, office), in the future a lot of jobs would only require an individual to have one place (house).
Second - climate change. The environment cost of commuting everyday is high since many cities functionally require a car. Traffic and pollution wreck real, tangible havoc on our habitat. Reducing the need to commute coupled with another opportunity to redesign urban landscapes into greener landscapes offers at least some pushback against climate change.
In my opinion, both of these concerns massively outweigh any intangible benefits such as workplace community.
Re: The Lonely Office Is Bad for America
#39IMO I think we need to create new ways to meet people.
I definitely understand and feel firsthand the lack of social interaction from our post-pandemic society. A lot of stuff are online now, like grocery shopping, college classes, and of course work. This is a lot more convenient but it leaves out social interaction.
That being said, the social interaction you get from shopping college and work, mandatory interaction with random people, is less than ideal. If we replace it with something like meetups and clubs, where you a) meet with people who actually share common interests and b) are able to not interact with people you don't like, that would be much better.
Re: The Lonely Office Is Bad for America
#40During the pandemic, I’ve been able to see my kids and neighbors more while working just as much, by eliminating my commute. There’s no reason to have these white collar workers go downtown every day (and concomitantly no reason to have all the service workers that support them go downtown every day). We can leave that thinking in the Reagan era where it belongs.