I work in a gas station kitchen rn. Every job I've ever has had deadlines, but now things are really starting to click for me. I work with no one else, I have to cook food, restock food, prep for the next day, clean, document production, food waste, and temperatures, unload items that come on truck, order new food, and probably other things I'm forgetting. I also vape and work eight hours, so good luck getting all that done and finding time to eat something, have a smoke, and socialize with coworkers and customers. Somedays I get it all done when I'm in my routine, but good mf luck when something unexpected happens.
I feel like I'm playing a fucked up video game like my life depends on it, which it does cuz I have to pay rent. If I clock out early cuz I'm tired or if I clock out on time but didnt get something done it fucks my poor coworkers and I feel bad. If I clock out late cuz I didnt get something done my boss chews me out for getting overtime pay... I only work 40 hours a week, I shouldn't feel this tired or stressed. I'd gladly take an extra hour or two a week, it would make me feel better and make me more money, but that's not an option and I hear from coworkers that our boss gets a bonus for keeping overtime down.
I know there was a time in human history that we didn't have to be this stressed. I'm not an agrarian or hunter-gatherer utopian tho, I just despise how little control I have over how it makes me feel. And this urgency, it fucks with your head, it conditions you to do everything faster, Faster, FASTER. We've created a new kind of human, homo capitalus and this human is a slave to efficiency and productivity for the sake of the profits of those at the top.
It feels like you don't even have time to dream, let alone realize those dreams into existence. It brings to mind the lyrics of the song Piazza Fontana by Yu Kung, which is about the mf YEARS OF LEAD.
Perché la banca chiude gli sportelli Dio, come tutto vola così in fretta Risparmi e gente, tutto così in fretta
I don't speak Italian, so maybe a good comrade could translate it better for us, but it roughly means:
"You have to do everything quickly, the bank is closing soon. God, why does everything go so fast? People and their savings - all so fast!"
Everytime I feel stressed at work, I think "God, why does everything go so fast?"
The chorus of the song continues:
bisogna piangere i sogni per capire che l'unica giustizia borghese si è spenta
Dreams have to be mourned to understand That the last bourgeois justice is dead
It's amazing to me how music bridges the gap in language and emotional understanding. How can a song in a language I don't speak make me cry? I know of course, because we are all human, we all have the same emotions in our hearts no matter when and where we are born. And I will never forget that anytime I meet someone different than me.
The song ends on a hopeful note at least. The final verse concludes:
ma non sentite il grido sulla barricata la classe operaia continua la sua lotta!
But can't you hear the shout at the barricade? The working class continues its fight!
Never surrender what is in your hearts comrades, what brought you to a place like this website. We will win. Thank you for taking the time to read all of this, no worries if you didn't have the time, everything goes so fast.
Now I need to walk my little furry companion, he's been so patient and I love him.
Oh, here's the link to Piazza Fontana, it's a beautiful song.
We have enough productive power to ensure an ample quality of life for every human being, several times over. It's the most devilish of paradoxes that expounds how as technology advances, returns get faster and faster, and yields get higher, we all just seem to be more immiserated.
If we were to cut out most of the meat industry, to design things to last so that we wouldn't need to replace all our clothing, electronics, appliances, and buildings all the time, and to live in a density where we could access everything within a short walk or bike ride from the nearest transit stop, it would take maybe one fifth of our present extraction and also one fifth of our present labor inputs to live well. Granted, rebuilding around density with durable and sustainable materials would be a massive endeavor.
95% of all this could be done with pre-transistor technology. A plurality of it might even be done with late-medieval technology. I don't think taking this stance makes one an agrarian or hunter-gatherer utopian.
Yeah, I don't think any of those ideas are utopian, its just going to be a massive collective struggle. Look what was made possible by socialist states in just the last hundred years. While the endeavor would be MASSIVE, it can be done. Fuck, if I'm being real I think it can be done without the need to sacrifice much human (or animal for that matter) life. I used to be a student of history, and while I'm not nearly as literate as I could be or even was before I dropped out to focus on work, it seems that to me most of the death and other hardships suffered in developing socialist states was because a perceived (dare I say a justified perception) that if sacrifices weren't made to "modernize" at breakneck speeds then the revolution would be crushed on the jackboot of the nations that were still capitalist. I argue this point when defending the excesses of the USSR or the PRC. Think of what could be accomplished if the revolution was a global one, one final victory over the forces of capital.