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submitted 1 day ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

Just got back from my latest surgery, it went fine. The staff were nice, ones I hadn't seen before. Although I got the dreaded question, "So what do you do?" And had to say "Nothing at the moment," and then justify it by explaining all my health issues, but these were some of the rare people who accepted I couldn't be expected to work in my condition instead of being judgmental about it. Although they did do the whole "You'll get better soon," thing, and imply that I can get back to work eventually. Why is our society like this? No matter how insurmountable your health issues society can never just accept that you're on the scrapheap, work-wise. There always has to be some undercurrent of "You should be working." Hence why even people with degenerative conditions get re-assessed for disability benefits again and again instead of being left in peace.

And don't even get me started on "So what do you do" being the standard conversation opener for everyone, everywhere, always. Always immediately judging and classifying someone by their job. Are we really so unimaginative that we can't think of another way to start a conversation with a stranger? How about "So what music do you like? Been anywhere nice lately? What's your favourite film?" I mean, literally anything that is about an individual's personal interests rather than how productive they are to capitalism and where they fit on the job-based social respect scale.

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[-] [email protected] 18 points 1 day ago

lemmy has shown me the other side of this type of asshattery:

i made a career change a few months ago because i realized that my work was helping maintain all the fuckery that we're dealing with in the west and it led to me to working 2 full time jobs at the same time for a while. during that time, the liberal lemmy users accused me of being unemployed because i was posting frequently to help alleviate the stress and they REALLY didn't like what i had to say.

it made me realize that the people who are trapped into this group-think were your value as a person is defined by how you answer the "so what do you do" question is so invasive that they believe that it's not possible for you to enjoy yourself with something other than work, while you're working.

it also made me realize that they defined themselves as a human being by their work; which led to a further understanding of why job interviews are so screwed up. my autism forces me to have a different take of interviews and, up until then, i wondered by they guarded the positions w so much fervor; now i think i understand that it's how they define themselves and they want to make sure that you're one of them.

[-] [email protected] 11 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago)

your value as a person is defined by how you answer the “so what do you do” question

I feel like this is a huge part of everything that is wrong with our societies. we are expected to be human doings rather than human beings.

[-] [email protected] 10 points 1 day ago

i suspect is a class thing; as in how much respect should they give you based on your perceived class based on the work you you.

it's a little bit like how they treat you based on how you're dressed.

[-] [email protected] 2 points 12 hours ago

Or based on your gender and ethnicity.

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this post was submitted on 08 Jul 2025
61 points (100.0% liked)

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