EFFORT POST
Fuuuuuuuuuck. Am I being too “all or nothing” about this?
After holding my third corporate job (for going on 6 months now), it’s all the fucking same. And it’s going to be damn hard to convince me otherwise. Always a fucking business started by some CEO whose parents are rich, and they say there’s an opportunity to make your way up the ladder and other opportunities for career growth (devoting your entire existence to capital in this squid game esque way is truly draconian but I digress), though funny how they don’t mention all the nepotistic hierarchies in between which are akin to high school cliques. Seems like such a brazenly obvious (and extremely normalized) pyramid scheme. But hey, you get nearly a six figure salary for producing 0 value to any humans whatsoever in the computer touching factory because someone is in the position to shuffle around capital. But don’t you talk about a raise unless it’s the year end! You have to know that you’re paid based on the very real idea of “market value.”
Then you have service workers, care takers, social workers and the like. Since those careers are not contributing to the L I N E in any meaningful way (though it’s becoming more common with the plague on humanity that is private equity), they pay a lot less. I don’t know if there is enough evidence to say that it’s a “punishment” by capitalists or whatever, but I’m starting to think that it really doesn’t matter.
You reframe it in both contexts though, and it’s exactly that. If you pay a computer-toucher significantly more than someone caring for humans in the world, the value judgment could not be more clear. I don’t know why I’m acting surprised, I lived through Covid and saw these people (who undeniably showed their importance) being shat on relentlessly. There’s stuff I’ve been trying to unsee for years and I just fucking can’t anymore. Talk about man-made horrors beyond your comprehension
I need to bite the bullet and get the fuck out but how the hell do you enter the biggest phase of change in your life when you follow the same patterns each and every day?
i’m one of those computer touchers and i do it for the high salary.
the corporate world is likewise horrendous for me (like it is for almost all neuro-diverse people) but i do it because the money i save after working there for 2 or 3 years affords me the freedom to leave when those patterns start to make me hate life.
i think i’m done doing it from now on because not only are we producing zero value, but i think we’re actively hurting humanity and i’ve learned that my colleagues don’t care so long as they can afford the mortgages on their houses (yes plural) and put their children into the best schools.
i find that as i keep progressing career wise the work gets more evil and my colleagues have even more shitty, privileged takes due to the disgustingly high salaries; so i searched and found another job that’s as far away for corporate-hood as possible and hope to stay there for as long as i can. the pay is relatively shit like it is for the service workers (i’ll be one of them), but i’ll think i’ll actually be helping humanity while getting to use almost the same skillset.
our system admires and rewards psychopaths, so it’s unfortunately up to you to find ways of coping with it. in my case: i use talk therapy to help me identify the self-defeating patterns that cause me to feel like life is hopeless or stupid and redirect that angst/anger into something that helps me or at least minimizes the impact of those negative feelings; my career change is an action i’m taking to this end.