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The Dangerous Fetishization of ‘Hustle Porn’

melmagazine.com

101–110 of 170 posts

Re: The Dangerous Fetishization of ‘Hustle Porn’

#101
I wanted to give my thoughts Gary Vaynerchuck since I read some comments about him here. Yeah, he's super extra and too much for a lot of people. That's just kind of the way he is, or maybe more accurately, the way he has become. He's a showman, but with credentials.

People kind of get the wrong image of him since they tend to hear only the 'hustle' stuff of working your ass off for a few years on some project. But he has a ton of other advice too, and much more "sensible" ones at that. Not too long ago he changed his eating habits, lost weight and promoted healthy living. I believe he's also put emphasis on getting enough sleep. He's said multiple times that he knows a lot of people who make 50k a year and are happier than many millionaires. I think he usually gives the "eat shit and work hard" type of advice to people who are asking him for a formula to success on their business. And it is true, you have to work hard to achieve something exceptional.

Talking about 'hustle', I think it really depends how you define it in the first place. You can do a bad, BS hustle by working to get Internet points and validation from strangers on social media. Or even worse, do something to con people out of their money. To me a positive hustle is putting in constant work, not being afraid to sell and market your stuff, and most importantly, starting before you are ready.

I'm not a zealot of the Vaynernation but I have found some of his messages helpful. One of his key principals is to document your journey. I love this idea and I've recently gotten over the fear of doing it myself, posting VLOGs and doing things more publicly using my real name (you can search this username and find out more). Another message is that "you could die tomorrow". Sure, this is a bit dramatic and cliche, but it did give me courage to push on with doing some things that I might have procrastinated on.

Overall, I find Gary's content useful for the most part, especially his insights on social media. If you just know him from 'hustle hustle' type of things, I suggest you try to dig a bit deeper to his videos and blogs. He does know his stuff.

Re: The Dangerous Fetishization of ‘Hustle Porn’

#102
post #68
post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Personally, I think I work pretty hard! I don't think I slack off, I just recognize that I'm going to get more out of doing weight training than I will spending another hour on the same code-base I've been hacking on for the last 8 hours. To be clear: I hate working out. HATE. IT. It is so boring!

I think this is exactly the same problem. If you don't like it why to push? Just do training of another kind of the sport? Maybe more active or team one.

This is exactly how I think. Gyms are possibly the most boring unimaginative ways of getting exercise as I see it. Personally I cycle to work and that gives me 45 minutes of decent exercise per day. When I get the chance to I like whitewater kayaking, mountain biking or skiing depending on the season. Climbing is another one that I used to do and want to start again.

Re: The Dangerous Fetishization of ‘Hustle Porn’

#103
post #83
post #53

I disagree with the article. I got nowhere fast in life by just sitting around waiting for things to happen. I had all sorts of excuses on why I wasn't succeeding, the article likes to supply plenty, and they are just poisonous thoughts. then i lit a fire under my butt. I wanted to be a principle engineer, so I did research by looking at profiles on linkedin and found a masters at a great school would make that path…

I agree with you for the most part, but there definitely is a toxic extreme of "hustle culture", in which people believe the sheer amount of "hard work" is the only coefficient.

All things in moderation.

There is an extreme amount of entitlement and apathy in the US today as well.

So while extreme "hustle culture" is bad, and working yourself to death is very bad, the idea that you might have to "work Saturdays" in your 20's to get ahead also should not be considered an "extreme" position.

But to many people working even 40 hours a week is considered "too much work", being away from facebook for more than 2 hours is a burden, etc.

Re: The Dangerous Fetishization of ‘Hustle Porn’

#104
post #70
post #64

Ecclesiastes 4:6 - "Better one handful with tranquillity than two handfuls with toil and (anxious) chasing after the wind." In fact, just read the whole book of Ecclesiastes if you want some sobering realities on the nature of the hustle, the grind, the striving for material things: https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Ecclesiastes+2&...

This is all well and good if the grind is about next level “material things”. A bigger house, another car, private schooling for the kids, that holiday etc. But there’s a huge proportion of humanity that has to grind just to keep their heads above water. One uninsured medical incident and it’s tickets for them.

But that's a problem of the system and cannot be overcome by 'working harder'.

Re: The Dangerous Fetishization of ‘Hustle Porn’

#105
post #6

The problem with hustle porn is really how little emphasis is put on luck. They show a grind that translates directly into results, not really talking about dealing with failure due to things outside of one's control. Yes hard work gets you primed for new opportunities, but luck still plays a role in which opportunities you come across.

The way I look at it, the more you work the more opportunities you have to have good luck. No guarantee of it. (Kind of like smoking doesn't guarantee you will die of lung cancer, just increases your chances).

There are probably smarter ways of increasing your luck though.

Re: The Dangerous Fetishization of ‘Hustle Porn’

#106
post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ultimately its peddling false hope with just enough of an inkling of truth to not be downright fraud. Like peddling health elixirs, magic diets, or the casino's w/l rate. It will get worse as income inequality (and desparation) grows.

Exactly. Wake me up when Gary does a video on unit economics. Or cohort analysis. Or CAC/LTV. Or literally anything to do with business other than the idea that regardless of how unfit you are, how unsuitable your idea is, or how damaging the attempt will be on your personal finances or health, hustle is all you need. The winds are increasing against him. It's going to be interesting to watch him flip and suddenly pr…

> more on the basis of his "authenticity". (And I wish I could use about fifteen more air-quotes around that word.)

He curses a lot, so you know he’s authentic.

Re: The Dangerous Fetishization of ‘Hustle Porn’

#107

Earlier quoted context omitted.

“Cargo cult” gets thrown a around a lot, and I enjoy comments like yours that bring it back to its roots.

Cargo cult means imitating something for the sake of it, not doing rain dances or other backwards stuff.

No, it doesn't mean "imitating something for the sake of it".

It means ritualistically imitating some advanced technology and thinking of it as magical way to get wealth and prosperity (based on primitive tribes building fake-airports and thinking that will bring the associated goods westerners coming to their land with airplanes had). And yes, it can involve all kinds of "rain dances or other backwards stuff" too.

"The name derives from the belief which began among Melanesians in the late 19th and early 20th century that various ritualistic acts such as the building of an airplane runway will result in the appearance of material wealth, particularly highly desirable Western goods (i.e., "cargo"), via Western airplanes."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cargo_cult

Re: The Dangerous Fetishization of ‘Hustle Porn’

#108

Earlier quoted context omitted.

“Cargo cult” gets thrown a around a lot, and I enjoy comments like yours that bring it back to its roots.

Cargo cult means imitating something for the sake of it, not doing rain dances or other backwards stuff.

It's more about misunderstanding cause and effect. Tribal people after WW2 started building runways on their islands because they thought that as long as they built the runways the airplanes would show up bringing their cargo.

They didn't imitate it "for the sake of it", they genuinely thought they would receive cargo by building runways.

So while it's not about rain dances and shakalaka sticks the previous commenter was on the money about the term cargo culting.

Re: The Dangerous Fetishization of ‘Hustle Porn’

#110

Earlier quoted context omitted.

“Cargo cult” gets thrown a around a lot, and I enjoy comments like yours that bring it back to its roots.

Cargo cult means imitating something for the sake of it, not doing rain dances or other backwards stuff.

No, "cargo cult" means imitating someone's activities that lead to a certain outcome, without understanding why did that work and why it might not work for someone else. In fact, to be precise, imitating the perceived activities: your coconut headphones might look like what that US army guy had on his head, but they don't have the whole technical and human infrastructure behind them; or, your Web search page might look exactly like Google's, but it won't produce similar results by itself.
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