I am incrementally beginning to appreciate society’s need for reviews– it is in fact a very real need, and just one example of how we, the social and societal species, rely on language and conveyance for understanding. In fact, I remember how Andres Duany let on about how we don’t have time for the thousand-page novels, and the 3-hour movies (although some of those are well worth it– more on that later) and that apples-to-apples, a single Corinthian column expressing civic function takes a decisive victory over an entire Morphosis facade system (“neurotic” architecture, he calls it).
VS.
But all neuroses aside, Kathi Weeks presents a hypothesis worth entertaining. Particularly on Mayday.
Indeed, the history of the 40-hour workweek started with organization of labor in the industrial revolution. But there’s a big difference between the workers of then and the workers of now: collar color. 8 hours per day was the practical limit of physical exertion for blue-collar workers at the mills and factories a century and a half ago. They figured, when the majority of workers (at least in this country) swayed over to the white-collar service industry, that sitting in front of a screen and filling out papers and talking on the phone are not nearly as taxing and that maintaining a 40-hour week is beyond feasible. But as anyone who nods when seeing those 5-Hour Energy commercials knows, it isn’t. The workweek needs to thus be adjusted to meet the unique physiognomical demands of desk work.* Maybe not as extreme as Kathi Weeks’, but clearly changes need to be enacted.
And in the spirit of laziness, this post is one day tardy. Lazies of the world unite!
*Note: Time of writing: 3PM.
