YOU ARE NOT ALONE - A companion online community discussion board for The Mental Illness Happy Hour podcast with Paul Gilmartin

I'm really feeling this article:

http://www.salon.com/2013/07/31/living_ ... y_partner/

Tw points stand out:

A June 2013 Gallup poll revealed that 70% of Americans hate their jobs or have “checked out” of them.

-I sure did before I got laid off.

For many of us, society has become increasingly alienating, isolating and insane, and earning a buck means more degrees, compliance, ass-kissing, shit-eating, and inauthenticity.

-Really seeing that in my job hunt.

Society is alieniating. Not only in the USA.

Everything is so delimited.

That is true. I think there are a lot of people unhappy in their jobs, and also in their marriages.

In my last job, I liked doing the job, but I hated the culture that was created from the top by the CEO. It was the petty politics and unreasonableness that pervaded from the top that made life horrible for us that reported to the executive team. We had to shield our employee's from the madness so that our teams would be happy and productive for us. Any dissension by us, or hint that we didn't think they at the top were competent, and it was off with our heads (It wasn't with a guillotine either, but with a slow, rusty butter knife over a period of time--psychological abuse). I was put in no-win situations, which even to my surprise (because I did a great job for them for almost 15 years) resulted in me being terminated.

I wasn't the first, nor will I be the last. I saw many, many VP's, Directors, and Managers leave or get fired over the past 9 years when the new guy came on board. They guy has a horrible reputation in the industry. He's the only one that doesn't know it. The emperor has no clothes was an often quoted phrase by us who had to serve him and his minions.

But the good side is I am free from all that bullshit. Free to create my own life from here on out. I loved my job. I learned a lot. I worked on lots of cool projects, and with some great people. I know this will be a good thing for me, but I still have some anger about the way things went down. I wish I could expunge it more quickly. It's been 6 months now, and I still have some anger.

Oh man, I know I'm quite late to this topic, but I have a lot to say on it.


It comes as no surprise that modernity is more stressful to exist in than it ever has been before; and I would say that the general reason why is because while the conditions for achieving a comfortable life are getting tougher (with the economy being relatively worse than a couple generations ago), the expectations are growing higher- so not only is the finish line being pushed ahead further, but the starting line is being pushed back as well. I hope we can unanimously agree on the fact that today, IT'S WAY TOUGHER TO GET A GOOD JOB THAN IT EVER HAS BEEN. Workforces in almost all vocations are shrinking; whether it be due to downsizing or outsourcing, the game isn't the same "Land of Opportunity" as some people still love to call it. This is also the reason why getting a higher education is such a stressful and draining endeavor for people. The whole idea behind higher education was that if you were to spend this large sum of money for this substantial extension of education, it would be an investment that would pay off in the long run, due to the nice, well-paying job you would most likely get from it. The problem now is that people still recite this logic when it simply isn't true. An article in The Atlantic a year ago stated that over half of recent college graduates are either unemployed or are working at a job that does not require a Bachelor's degree. And of course, the worst part in a situation like that (a situation that many face) is that they're left with having to pay off tens of thousands of dollars in student loan debt (which on average is at an all-time high today). And for the people who do have jobs, the pressure is always on them- whether it be that they have to keep making money in order to pay off the debts they acquired, or knowing that if they lose this job, it may be a really long time before they find another one- so it's no fucking surprise that most people would feel generally miserable in their work life.


What I find most interesting (in a sick and twisted way) is how the ethos of productivity in civilization came to this, because it didn't used to be this stressful. The traditional outlook on labor was simply a necessary evil; people weren't concerned with being as productive as humanly possible, they were just doing what was needed to live a comfortable life. But within the past few centuries, that ethos has drastically changed to being as productive as you could possibly be, dismissing any desires for comfort or satisfaction. One of the most interesting reports I had ever written when I was in community college was on Max Weber's "The Protestant Ethic and The Spirit of Capitalism." Weber and his fellow sociologist colleagues wanted to answer the question: How did the culture of modern capitalism come to be? Some said it was the globalization of commerce, others said it was an evolution of greed, some said it was human evolution, and somebody even tried blaming the Jews (OF COURSE there would be somebody dense enough to suggest that). But Weber believed the answer was something that was monumentally influential to society: Religion. Particularly, the Protestant Reformation and the new wave of Puritan sects of Christianity. The most influential at the time was Calvinism, named after founder John Calvin. Calvinism was the first belief system to introduce "predestination": the idea that God had already determined who would be saved and who wouldn't be, regardless of what you did. Clearly, it was impossible to know if someone was chosen to be saved, but according to Calvin's teachings, the only way to be sure they were elected was to work. Calvinism also taught the idea of having a "vocational calling," and it was fundamentally important to realize what job you were to have for the rest of your life (sound familiar?) because man's purpose in this world was to work "for the greater glory of God." Those who were working were confident that they were pleasing God, and those who weren't working were considered one of the damned. People were being pressured to work by threat of the most fearful thing possible at the time: the fear of not achieving salvation. While Calvinism was the strictest form of new Christianity, there were many other sects that pushed similar outlooks on labor, such as Pietism, Methodism, and baptizing sects like Mennonites and Quakers.


While the fear of not achieving salvation isn't what fuels people to be as productive as possible anymore, the Protestant Ethic in modern capitalism still lives on. Weber claims that Benjamin Franklin successfully rebranded it with his teachings of business and rationality, so while God was now taken out of the equation, these strict guidelines on productivity were still the right way to live. Regression in productivity was untoward, and there was no "enough"- no matter how hard you worked, or how much wealth you accumulated, you could always do more, and you SHOULD do more. Just like Paul F. Tompkins said in his episode of MIHH, "the ladder never ends because you're always building the fucking ladder." We're conditioned to be dissatisfied with what we earn and what we accomplish because we're told that if we can do more, we HAVE to do more. If you stop and enjoy the life you've made for yourself, you'll stop working. And we're told that not working- even for a moment- is a filthy thing. Weber also talks about how because the people began to push the expectations of productivity to higher levels from generation to generation, the economic system began to speed up. The overarching problem with this is that the system is incapable of slowing down, so when it reaches a new speed, that speed now becomes the norm, regardless of if the people inside are able to keep up- basically, the perpetual increase of productivity is now just a self-fulfilling prophecy. And boy, is it. Our new fears to work as hard as we can are now about keeping jobs, paying off the multiple debts we may have weighing us down, and while the majority of us probably aren't worried that we'll go to hell if we don't work as hard as possible, many people still chastise those who are unemployed or those who aren't actively trying to move up in their career or make a better life for themselves, and deem them as "lazy losers." The system that we kicked into high gear with our productivity is now the thing we work for in fear.



*takes a deep breath* So yeah, I can agree that society is driving us crazy.

I have two degrees and I'm definitely not earning a buck....I made more money working for Wal-Mart than I do teaching. Wal-Mart.....ruined my faith in the general public, let's just say.

I asked my coworkers how they dealt with it, and the majority of responses were:

1) Booze
2) Separating themselves. As in....yes, they "checked out" when they came to work, did their job, kept quiet, and then explored their own lives and identities when they left.