This may sound a bit weird, but it’s a random thought I’ve had, does anyone ever feel like memes like this almost make us leftists come off a bit too idealistic and romantic?
Lemme clarify where I’m coming from here. As I get older, I’m in mg 30s now, I’ve come to the realization a lot of people don’t want the life of a bohemian artist who’s traveling constantly and does six different types of creative hobby. A lot of people want a kinda boring stable life with a house, a job that’s rewarding but not too physically or mentally taxing, enough time off to take a nice vacation once or twice a year, and the resources to keep them and their family comfortable. I guess I say this cuz this is increasingly how I feel as I get older. Add this to the fact that I don’t think FALGSC is coming anytime soon, if Mecha Lenin pulled off the perfect revolution today we’d still probably have a few generation of people needing to pull 9-5s before we got to the point we could all be space traveling poets like in Star Trek so maybe don’t oversell what we can deliver to people alive now? Focus on shit an actual socialist government could achieve in our lifetimes, like public housing, more vacation time, free healthcare?
I’m coming into my 30s now sort of going the opposite direction you are. From my perspective I’m realizing that I missed out on creative expression until now because I subconsciously realized it wasn’t a “practical option” that I couldn’t afford, so I’m waking up to the fact that I’ve lived my life up to this point as a STEM bro type missing out on a huge spectrum of experiences, and it makes me feel robbed.
I want to live in a fucking treehouse for a month, with a rope ladder, and a Zipline.
Just having the freedom for literally anything. I have a stable, boring job that sucks, but it keeps a roof over my head (barely) while also leaving little time for anything else. I’m nearing 40 now and I definitely wish I’d gone back in my 20s and taken a lot more risk before I had responsibilities. Even then, I don’t want to be a wandering hippy, but a 30 hr work week with 3 weeks mandatory vacation? Sign me the fuck up.
Yes. When I’ve read excerpts about life in the Soviet Union from workers perspectives, their lives are quite similar to ours with differences being that they didn’t have the same economic worries we do in addition to having plenty of time to take off work with the bonus of having access to state-subsidized vacation facilities across many locations.
I’m not saying we’re just going to abolish work, but we absolutely could be working far less if we structured our society differently. We’ve had an explosion of automation since the industrial revolution, yet people still work just as much as they ever did. A lot of the jobs we have are just make work jobs. There’s a whole book on the subject even.
Also, the way we do things under capitalism is dreadfully inefficient. Nearly half of the food produced is just thrown out, lots of new goods are sent directly to landfills to keep pries up, there’s shit like planned obsolescence. All to keep the consumerist society going so that a handful of oligarchs can keep raking it in. Not only does this create shitty living conditions for the majority, it’s also fundamentally unsustainable and what’s driving the current climate crisis.
The focus of a socialist government should be to ensure that the purpose of work is to produce things that we need collectively such as infrastructure, food, housing, healthcare, and so on. Producing things should be seen as a cost to society, and we should focus on making things that last and can be repaired. Consumerism needs to be abolished.
No need to go all the way to beatnik wandering artist. I feel like the creative urge can strike any person at any time, and the problem with this is that as things are currently organized, that spark will be smothered. Part of demonstrating to people why they should want things to change is appealing to those who have felt that happen to them. I don’t think a person ever forgets the pain of it, and it can happen to anyone.
thats why UBI would be a better thing in my opinion. you get enough money to survive normally as a prerequisite but then you can also go to work if you want to save up for more luxury stuff, traveling or whatever you want to do
some people dont realize that a lot of us would still work, just with way less stress and as a bonus, not a basic necessity
UBI without some sort of partner program to de-commodity the things humans need to live (food, shelter, healthcare) and eventually things we need to live a decent life (education, recreation) would likely lead to a situation like in The Expanse where the “basic income” is truly basic, just enough to live off ramen noodle and rent a crap studio. What jobs there were would be hotly competed over since everyone wants more to life than microwaved noodles and playing the first Halo on a 20 year old Xbox.
yes but as the other person said…thats already an improvement over how some live right now. its a very low bar to set but one that has to be. and theres people who would gladly live a life like that. gotta say tho…im not one of those as i would like to travel
Yup, and, aside from the fact that humans were never made to do or be anything by anyone, but just evolved by chance, I still can’t recall a moment in our shared collective history when most people alive were bohemian artists, traveling all the time and having lots of creative hobbies and aspirations.
Afaik we went from barely surviving on what we could hunt and gather to barely surviving in the farms of the nobles, to barely surviving in the factories of the masters, to at least having some level of food security (at least in the developed world). I don’t remember a time when we were better off than now, with more free time and more security.
Not even in Stalin’s Russia or Castro’s Cuba were most people living the idyllic bohemian life everyone here seems to be clamoring for.
This may sound a bit weird, but it’s a random thought I’ve had, does anyone ever feel like memes like this almost make us leftists come off a bit too idealistic and romantic?
Lemme clarify where I’m coming from here. As I get older, I’m in mg 30s now, I’ve come to the realization a lot of people don’t want the life of a bohemian artist who’s traveling constantly and does six different types of creative hobby. A lot of people want a kinda boring stable life with a house, a job that’s rewarding but not too physically or mentally taxing, enough time off to take a nice vacation once or twice a year, and the resources to keep them and their family comfortable. I guess I say this cuz this is increasingly how I feel as I get older. Add this to the fact that I don’t think FALGSC is coming anytime soon, if Mecha Lenin pulled off the perfect revolution today we’d still probably have a few generation of people needing to pull 9-5s before we got to the point we could all be space traveling poets like in Star Trek so maybe don’t oversell what we can deliver to people alive now? Focus on shit an actual socialist government could achieve in our lifetimes, like public housing, more vacation time, free healthcare?
People are doing that, but it would make a boring meme.
I’m coming into my 30s now sort of going the opposite direction you are. From my perspective I’m realizing that I missed out on creative expression until now because I subconsciously realized it wasn’t a “practical option” that I couldn’t afford, so I’m waking up to the fact that I’ve lived my life up to this point as a STEM bro type missing out on a huge spectrum of experiences, and it makes me feel robbed.
I want to live in a fucking treehouse for a month, with a rope ladder, and a Zipline.
Just having the freedom for literally anything. I have a stable, boring job that sucks, but it keeps a roof over my head (barely) while also leaving little time for anything else. I’m nearing 40 now and I definitely wish I’d gone back in my 20s and taken a lot more risk before I had responsibilities. Even then, I don’t want to be a wandering hippy, but a 30 hr work week with 3 weeks mandatory vacation? Sign me the fuck up.
Yes. When I’ve read excerpts about life in the Soviet Union from workers perspectives, their lives are quite similar to ours with differences being that they didn’t have the same economic worries we do in addition to having plenty of time to take off work with the bonus of having access to state-subsidized vacation facilities across many locations.
I’m not saying we’re just going to abolish work, but we absolutely could be working far less if we structured our society differently. We’ve had an explosion of automation since the industrial revolution, yet people still work just as much as they ever did. A lot of the jobs we have are just make work jobs. There’s a whole book on the subject even.
Also, the way we do things under capitalism is dreadfully inefficient. Nearly half of the food produced is just thrown out, lots of new goods are sent directly to landfills to keep pries up, there’s shit like planned obsolescence. All to keep the consumerist society going so that a handful of oligarchs can keep raking it in. Not only does this create shitty living conditions for the majority, it’s also fundamentally unsustainable and what’s driving the current climate crisis.
The focus of a socialist government should be to ensure that the purpose of work is to produce things that we need collectively such as infrastructure, food, housing, healthcare, and so on. Producing things should be seen as a cost to society, and we should focus on making things that last and can be repaired. Consumerism needs to be abolished.
No need to go all the way to beatnik wandering artist. I feel like the creative urge can strike any person at any time, and the problem with this is that as things are currently organized, that spark will be smothered. Part of demonstrating to people why they should want things to change is appealing to those who have felt that happen to them. I don’t think a person ever forgets the pain of it, and it can happen to anyone.
yes. having the same thoughts now
thats why UBI would be a better thing in my opinion. you get enough money to survive normally as a prerequisite but then you can also go to work if you want to save up for more luxury stuff, traveling or whatever you want to do
some people dont realize that a lot of us would still work, just with way less stress and as a bonus, not a basic necessity
UBI without some sort of partner program to de-commodity the things humans need to live (food, shelter, healthcare) and eventually things we need to live a decent life (education, recreation) would likely lead to a situation like in The Expanse where the “basic income” is truly basic, just enough to live off ramen noodle and rent a crap studio. What jobs there were would be hotly competed over since everyone wants more to life than microwaved noodles and playing the first Halo on a 20 year old Xbox.
Living off ramen and playing video games all day would be an upgrade for me since I already kinda do that but I also have a job
yes but as the other person said…thats already an improvement over how some live right now. its a very low bar to set but one that has to be. and theres people who would gladly live a life like that. gotta say tho…im not one of those as i would like to travel
Yup, and, aside from the fact that humans were never made to do or be anything by anyone, but just evolved by chance, I still can’t recall a moment in our shared collective history when most people alive were bohemian artists, traveling all the time and having lots of creative hobbies and aspirations.
Afaik we went from barely surviving on what we could hunt and gather to barely surviving in the farms of the nobles, to barely surviving in the factories of the masters, to at least having some level of food security (at least in the developed world). I don’t remember a time when we were better off than now, with more free time and more security.
Not even in Stalin’s Russia or Castro’s Cuba were most people living the idyllic bohemian life everyone here seems to be clamoring for.