Labor: Menial vs. Noble

Gar Lipow lipowg at sprintmail.com
Sun Dec 17 10:20:58 PST 2000


The "Menial" vs "intellectual" is indeed a false distintion. But what is NOT a false distinction is that some work is pleasant and empowering, and other unpleasant, and disempowering. (And yes, I include both paid and upaid work in this.)

What is not fair is that some people should monopolize the pleasant and empowering work, while others do all the shitwork. And any future socialist society that seek elementary fairness will have to find some way of dividing both kinds of tasks fairly evenly -- so that no one is stuck doing nothing but hardest type of labor, and no one has a job that consists of nothing but the most most stimulating and pleasant of tasks. (Exceptions would be the disabled who have a more limited choice of possible work, and thus might indeed be allowed jobs that consists entirely of pleasant and empowering tasks.)



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