I disagree. I think people are breaking down because of how much we're dealing with. We're perhaps working shorter hours but gains in efficiency (computers in particular) mean that we do more work faster. I don't believe any figure in the last century or century previous took a week off and came back to one and a half thousand pieces of correspondence that they had to deal with at the same time as doing their normal job. And I'm not talking about the president or the head of some multinational. I'm talking about someone close to the bottom of the chain. Like the man who maintains the mills for a cotton factory.
I know that they took a week off. In my part of the world it was called "Wake's Week" and they all descended on seaside towns like Blackpool. The mills and factories simply closed for the whole week. On reopening, production restarted as normal with no backlog.
I know it seems churlish to say it but work can arrive for me on a Sunday, while I'm asleep, on a week off, on Christmas Day even. Although I don't need to do it right then and there, I do still have to do it. I am never truly off duty.
I have to manage it myself and at any one time have upwards of a hundred jobs that need constant reassessment and reprioritising based on a complication matrix of interrelated (and opposing) criteria.
While I'd feel wasted if I was just beating horseshoes all day, it would be significantly less complicated.
Those correspondences just sum UP if you're gone. But they still come in regardless of wether you do regular work, too.
So yeah, the intensity of the workload is quite a bit higher than that of pre-industrialization. Note that i refer to the intensity, not to the "hardships" of hard physical labor.
There's many more things wanting our attention and most of us have to do a lot of mental and social work, too, not merely pure physical labor(which has the advantage of not being a part of your life any longer at the end of your shift).
I know where you're coming from, but you fail to see that there's also a lot more "expectations" today than back then.
There's a pressure on us to shave our legs, wear SOME makeup, have hair that looks "nice" and clean, clothes that combine with each other and are perfectly clean, etc. etc.
If you go wash yourself once a week in the creek, and take your clothes with you every other week, and not care about body hair since you're only nude when it's dark, you will be seen rather...reserved by modern people. Back then: Normal, little time and it had to be distributed in an efficient way. Yeah, today, we have more "free time" but still a LOT of chores, work, or expectations permeating it and eating up huge chunks of it.
People back then still had time to go to church, play instruments, tell stories, celebrate, carve things, read books, travel, ...
It's not like they had OUR kind of freedom in deciding what to do WHEN, but yeah, we are almost as busy on the whole picture as they were.
Also, since you referred to washing and cooking: Back then, traditionally woman's chores...which were not to "work" in mans jobs. Most women were full-time-wifes and cared about the household. So yeah, you are mixing up stuff there.
I have to work a regular job AND care about my household, and there's no mum or grandmother or children to do chores while i'm off earning the rent.
Are you busy??
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I disagree. I think people are breaking down because of how much we're dealing with. We're perhaps working shorter hours but gains in efficiency (computers in particular) mean that we do more work faster. I don't believe any figure in the last century or century previous took a week off and came back to one and a half thousand pieces of correspondence that they had to deal with at the same time as doing their normal job. And I'm not talking about the president or the head of some multinational. I'm talking about someone close to the bottom of the chain. Like the man who maintains the mills for a cotton factory.
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Anonymous Post Author
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I doubt they took a week off, period.
Did you really just answer this post with an example centered on a week's vacation? lol....
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dalmationUntoyourSoul
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dappled
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TerryVie
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i take a week off for my period. every month.
I know that they took a week off. In my part of the world it was called "Wake's Week" and they all descended on seaside towns like Blackpool. The mills and factories simply closed for the whole week. On reopening, production restarted as normal with no backlog.
I know it seems churlish to say it but work can arrive for me on a Sunday, while I'm asleep, on a week off, on Christmas Day even. Although I don't need to do it right then and there, I do still have to do it. I am never truly off duty.
I have to manage it myself and at any one time have upwards of a hundred jobs that need constant reassessment and reprioritising based on a complication matrix of interrelated (and opposing) criteria.
While I'd feel wasted if I was just beating horseshoes all day, it would be significantly less complicated.
no, i'd assume you simply missed the point.
Those correspondences just sum UP if you're gone. But they still come in regardless of wether you do regular work, too.
So yeah, the intensity of the workload is quite a bit higher than that of pre-industrialization. Note that i refer to the intensity, not to the "hardships" of hard physical labor.
There's many more things wanting our attention and most of us have to do a lot of mental and social work, too, not merely pure physical labor(which has the advantage of not being a part of your life any longer at the end of your shift).
I know where you're coming from, but you fail to see that there's also a lot more "expectations" today than back then.
There's a pressure on us to shave our legs, wear SOME makeup, have hair that looks "nice" and clean, clothes that combine with each other and are perfectly clean, etc. etc.
If you go wash yourself once a week in the creek, and take your clothes with you every other week, and not care about body hair since you're only nude when it's dark, you will be seen rather...reserved by modern people. Back then: Normal, little time and it had to be distributed in an efficient way. Yeah, today, we have more "free time" but still a LOT of chores, work, or expectations permeating it and eating up huge chunks of it.
People back then still had time to go to church, play instruments, tell stories, celebrate, carve things, read books, travel, ...
It's not like they had OUR kind of freedom in deciding what to do WHEN, but yeah, we are almost as busy on the whole picture as they were.
Also, since you referred to washing and cooking: Back then, traditionally woman's chores...which were not to "work" in mans jobs. Most women were full-time-wifes and cared about the household. So yeah, you are mixing up stuff there.
I have to work a regular job AND care about my household, and there's no mum or grandmother or children to do chores while i'm off earning the rent.