At first it was all about presenting data in an original looking way. In the end it was about pushing political ideas in your throat using a plain bar graph. It was not about sharing something interesting you found but about taking advantage of a captive audience.
r/antiwork before say 2020 and even worse after the Fox thing, a lot of trolls came in once it got big and where before it was fun discussions on anarchist antiwork theory that coined the name, with some venting and support or discussing how a different society might look like.
Then it became the usual political battleground like many big subs, all about who to vote for in the US and a repost place for latestagecapitalism, then all the text quitting or firing screenshots and tipping battles for some reason, which I‘d also not seen before then. Oh and all the nationalist humble bragging which seemed condescending to me as EU person towards the US people and at the same time dismissive of issues in the EU too. I guess it could be summed up with: it felt more hostile to me.
Always liked r/workreform better. Even the name sounds less like “we are lazy shits” and more like the actual point of thoes subs.
Ok cool, I liked antiwork better, because in the beginning it wasn‘t about “lets just reform it a little bit”, that is just what it turned into cause I guess most people can‘t see anything between being forced to labor and not moving at all aka lazy shits.
Abolition of work is an interesting text which imagines something else entirely, a world in which the absence of money and hierarchy could lead to replacing all work with a voluntary and playful version of it, where people may still choose to spend their time doing various activities mainly for the community and the results of their labor vs just getting someone or themselves more money. Similar to how most firefighting places and other charitable organisations or open source projects are already run, despite all capitalist logic saying we shouldn‘t give our labor for free.
That‘s what it was about before it got snuffed out and turned into a harmless “lets change nothing on the hierarchy but maybe unionise to get more money and vote for little bit better” movement anyway. It‘s not like I think I can convince you or anyone anymore, so have your work reform and your politicians and fight the good fight for workers, you‘re certainly not alone with it, most everyone seems to enjoy all these conflicts to get wrapped up in just fine. I even support it to an extent, I‘m in the union too out of practicality.
I just enjoyed having a space where I could talk about this theory and the hypothetical world I would enjoy instead and am lamenting it‘s loss, that‘s all.
Not attacking that or anything but I guess I struggle to undertstand how a world without “work” would work?
It‘s ok, I struggle with that too, for some things people ask me when I bring this up I have an answer, for others I don‘t. I guess it‘s as if you asked a tribal hunter/gatherer person to imagine a world where all of the food is delivered to them in a store, they couldn‘t imagine it and if they try they‘d get a lot of it wrong.
I do think as automation gets rid of more and more production labor and the majority are pushed into service labor or bullshit jobs, it becomes more important that people at the losing side of that equation try to imagine it differently though, cause I don‘t think those at the top will and otherwise… well my username says it, I feel like I‘m caught in a storm of massive proportions trying to tell it to please stop, slow down, and look at what we could all do if we changed this or that. I keep coming back to the open source though, cause it‘s what I work on sometimes in my free time and has shown me what people can accomplish even in absence of a profit motive.
So roughly I imagine it like this: voluntary organisations replacing involuntary ones and a shared purpose to get rid of unpleasant and unnecessary work and for the results to be shared with their community. I think luxuries would be less abundant, but we could manage to make what we need and perhaps we‘d value more the things someone does make for us voluntarily.
Now that you bring up Automation, I definitely think that once AI and such are capable of running the world without need for human effort there will be some sort of restructure of how things work. Thanks for replying!
What happened to antiwork was fantastic. It was created by someone who was lazy and did not wanted to work. Then it got co-opted by people who wanted to work. Finally he was kicked as a mod for sticking to the name and spirit of his sub. He had his cosy sub and he was invaded by workers.
How can you seriously claim to be pro-work but follow the banner of someone who claimed long ago to be antiwork? Why were they all shocked? Just read the sign, antiwork, it’s the name!! Don’t you listen to the people you chose to follow?
watches the TV –> “Ho no, our leader is antiwork!”
Just create your own thing.
I already elaborated enough on this from my own perspective, so instead I‘ll use this next laziness dig to conform to this view of me and lazily quote something random I like:
Peace.
I am supremely glad you’re on the Fediverse talking about these things in such an honest and eloquent way. Thank you, and followed.
Oh wow nobody ever followed me before, I’m not sure if that will be a great experience for you, cause I sometimes post kinda random or darker thoughts and then get embarrassed and delete it after a few minutes.
Anyway if you liked those comments specifically, I get a lot of it from reading various texts on here: https://theanarchistlibrary.org/special/index
There is a LOT though, but sorting by popular or choosing certain tags that appeal gives some good stuff to read.