The pandemic has changed many things. Among them, not only the work space due to the rise of teleworking, it seems that also the feelings of many employees.
The possibility of experiencing greater flexibility and the excess workload that the pandemic has brought in some sectors has led to several surveys indicating that more and more workers are willing to change jobs, that they even renounce them or that now they would not put the salary as the main aspect to value.
All of this has had an impact on 2021 characterized by high-impact strikes, as we have experienced in the transport sector, unprecedented job abandonment rates in some economies such as the US or the Chinese movement of “vigilance in revenge” carried out by young people in China in front of their marathon day of 9 -6-6 (which assumed that you had to work from 9 in the morning to 9 at night, 6 days a week).
What do the anti-work agents propose?
For this reason, anyone who begins to question the role of work in their life or if they give themselves too much in it has been able to see themselves reflected in the ‘antiworks’ or ‘anti-work’, a trend that has had a special journey in forums such as Reddit in the United States. Unidos, a real national hotbed that this year also has spawned phenomena such as GameStop meme actions.
In total, on his subreddit, there are 1.4 million users who are willing to break the dictates of the culture of hustle and bustle and the total dedication to working life.
The pandemic has had a lot to do with its growth “because people for the first time could not go to work and realized how much the world kept turning without the amount of work we had,” according to one of the forum moderators. , a West Virginia-based engineer who goes by the Reddit username rockcellist, and who has spoken to the outlet Quartz.
The group has been in the news in recent months for coordinating efforts in all kinds of activities, from the Black Friday boycott to overwhelming the employment website of the mythical cerales company Kellogg’s with false applications to make it difficult for the company to replace workers in strike. In another sign of the influence of the Reddit community, Goldman Sachs cited ‘antiwork’ in recent research on how the anti-work movement broader could lead to a decline in labor force participation in the long term.
The most common issues members raise on the forum, says rockcellist, are “the stagnation of wages, overwork, and that a worker is always expected to be on guard attentive to calls”. In general, he says, “We see a lot of people who are just frustrated with the hierarchical structures at work and the treatment they receive.”
But, What does it really mean to be anti-work? The responses are as varied as the group members.
“There is no concrete political ideology that we follow,” says Rockcellist. Forum posts are windows to “how each individual views their work, their contributions to society, and how they are compensated.”
They say they have no ideology: they are united by the exhaustion of hierarchical structures in their jobs
In a way, the anti-work community could be seen as a successor to Occupy Wall Street: a broad and dispersed movement with no clear leaders or demands, but wanting major change at the societal level. “Much of the anti-work ideology goes hand in hand with a change in the social structure of society, so that it is known that the situation of housing, food and general well-being are not linked to work,” says Rockcellist.
Although the forum lets users define what it means to them to be against work, there are some general principles that most members can support, and that can be food for thought for the many people who are reexamining social expectations around work.
These are some of them:
No need to go do more than what is required of us: An important tenet of the anti-labor movement, says Rockcellist, is resisting pressure to go beyond job duties.
“My father was a great advocate for [la idea de que] you have to do more than they ask, “he says.” And then his company fired him. So he put in hours of effort and extra work. In the end, that did not mean anything, “says the forero.
Goodbye to the 8-hour day: The history of the eight-hour workday dates back to the industrial revolution, when it was introduced as a way to protect factory workers from the burnout and stress of extra long shifts. The anti-work movement opposes the idea that workers have to be at their jobs for a full eight hours if they can fulfill their responsibilities in a shorter time.
Being ‘anti-work’ does not mean not wanting to work: Anti-work is not anti-labor One of the most common objections raised by posters in the Reddit sub-forum on anti-work is the argument that if everyone stops working, society will collapse. But being anti-work doesn’t mean getting rid of teachers, doctors, postal workers, and garbage collectors.
Rather, says Rockcellist, “our view is that the current way work is viewed in society and the current way work supports the upper class in society is not fairly distributed.”
Facebook
Twitter
Linkedin