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chaoticevilbean · 3 years

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Voltron Humans are Weird 6/?

The Paladins had once again won an intense battle. It had been on the planet Cygoth, which was home to a group of humanoids. The Cygi, as they were called, had skin in shades of pale pinks and purples and blues. Their heads were like those of bald humans, but with upside down ears and eyes like felines. Instead of five fingers and five toes, the Cygi had four fingers and six toes, to aid them in their strange environment, along with bug-like wings that hid under hard green and yellow shells.

Said environment was one with 'extreme weather conditions' and 'toxic' rain. The Cygi lived in caves that were on a large cliffside. Since the elements often got within the rocks and all the animals were terrestrial and highly territorial, the aliens would hang upside down and crawl across the ceilings like spiders. They also collected rare minerals that grew down to build their homes and helped them grow food in their strange way of living.

It was these minerals that the Galra wanted. Stronger than 98.97% of all other metals or rocks, they could be used to create impenetrable ships and armor. The Cygi had called Voltron to Cygoth to aid them in protecting their resources and freedom. After they had succeeded, and it became clear that the team only wanted to help, no reward necessary, the leader of the Cygi offered an alliance. New armor and some upgrades for the Paladins and Castle, an increased amount of trade for the aliens, and a plethora of allies for both because of their union.

The talks were boring, and the four younger Paladins found themselves quickly becoming inattentive. Lance got them excused and Pidge ran straight to the edge of the central cave, ignoring how the Cygi were suddenly watching them keenly. It was likely to avoid the Terrans getting attacked by the fauna or killed by the 'toxic' rain that was cascading down just outside. A device was pulled from the depths of the Green Paladin's armor to scan the substance pouring from the atmosphere, and they all peered over the girl's shoulder tensely.

The screen lit up in green.

"HECK YEAH!" Keith shouted, his voice echoing loudly against the stone walls. "Nontoxic!"

"C'mon, Paladudes!" Lance waved his hand at the others in a beckoning motion. "It's time to explore this world and turn Shiro's hair whiter than before!"

The kids dashed forward towards the more organic part of the planet's surface, but paused and turned at the sound of buzzing.

A large group of Cygi were heading straight for the humans, frantic expressions and furiously beating wings drawing the Paladins' attention. It seemed that the team's newest allies were more knowledgeable about their intentions, and were attempting to avoid what they assumed was a dangerous situation.

The teens were not about to let that happen.

"BREAK FOR IT!" Hunk screamed, and there was no way that Shiro and Allura didn't hear that. They only had a few minutes before they would be caught in their escape. The humans dashed for the entrance, and Keith was definitely gonna make it. Pidge wasn't, and Hunk was a coin toss, so Lance took action. The self-sacrificing idiot.

The Blue Paladin grabbed his smaller friend and threw her at his bro.

"CATCH!" The cook caught the child easily, still sprinting to freedom. But the action left Lance behind the herd and much closer to the Cygi. It became obvious how close when his feet left the ground.

"What the flippity floppity flapjack‽ WOAH!" The flying aliens were swift to bring the Terran over to the suspended platform where Shiro, Allura, and all the diplomats were staring down from. It was from there that the kids had originally climbed down the rungs of the strange ladder to get to the floor. "Ah, you lily-livered sons of witches! You snackers! Oh, tick-tack snick-snack frick-frack paddlywack! My father will hear about this, you barnacle-covered Caprisun knock-offs! I'll steal your kneecaps and eat your curtains! You moldy walnuts!" He continued spouting off insults as he was carried over to his leaders, smiling slightly at the look of exasperation on Shiro's face. His words stopped the moment his feet hit the mioxite platform, smile growing exponentially.

"Lance, what were you guys doing?" The older man didn't let Allura speak, taking over the conversation immediately.

"The rain isn't toxic for us, so we were gonna explore. I gotta join the others soon."

"No, you don't gotta."

"I do gotta."

"Why?"

"You want Keith and Pidge alone in unknown territory with just Hunk as their voice of reason?"

"You definitely gotta."

"Shiro, Lance, what is going on?" Allura finally managed to interject. The humans turned towards the Altean, both confused. Lance had just said that he and the others were going to explore Cygoth.

"What d'you mean, princess?"

"What code was Lance speaking?"

"Code? What co- oh." The Black Paladin's face lit up in realization. "She meant the curses. Lance, explain."

"I was cussing without swear words."

"What?"

"I was spouting profanities without ever using actual words that are considered profane. For instance." The boy faced his fellow Terran once more. "Let me strawberries and cream go before I rocky road your face, you useless paperclip."

"Where's that from?"

"Ice cream flavors with the classic inanimate objects with no function. From Tumblr."

"What is ice cream? Is it more... omnivore things?" Allura seemed to be scared she might have to hear more about the meat-eating habits of humans.

"Nah, don't worry, princess," Lance assured her. "Ice cream is a chilled treat back home. We found out that there's many animals we can safely farm for their milk. When done correctly, it doesn't harm the animals, and we can process the milk for consumption. Process the milk properly, and then you can get ice cream. It comes in many flavors."

"Such as?"

"Strawberries and cream, and rocky road, to name some."

"Are any of those poisonous?"

"I think lactose might be, which is in a good portion of milk, and some nuts are, and definitely chocolate. So, to animals, yeah, most ice cream is toxic, but not always enough to do more than a stomachache."

"Princess, I can take over explaining, but Lance has to go make sure none of the others get into trouble."

The Blue Paladin took that as his cue to leave, climbing down the ladder once more and bolting back to the entrance. In moments, he had disappeared from view, joining his fellow humans outside the caves. Shiro watched him go, internally wishing he could join them.

But they had once again caused a situation that needed explaining, and Lance was needed to prevent an actual disaster from happening, so Shiro had to do damage control solo this time. That's what he got for letting four teenagers kidnap him back into space.

If a human seems to be speaking in code, yet other humans seem to understand them, even on a basic level, ask if they are speaking in 'slang'. This is a Terran term that encompasses many variations of speaking. Much like the difference in linguistics between Blue and Green Zithians, humans will likely have very different slang depending on where they spent their time. A place called Tumbler often fosters a more complex version, whereas Insta Gram has a simpler code.

Humans might invent their own slang in order to packbond properly with one another. Two groups of Terrans hailing from the same locations may have entirely different lexicons due to the change that each team may make. Some individuals may even know more than two versions of slang, in order to establish better relations with their fellow humans. There is very little evidence of what requirements are needed to include learning more than one variation of slang. An example of this would best be shown by the following interaction:

Terran Blue, addressing Terran Yellow: Then he just yeeted it at me, as though I was gonna sit there like a soggy popsicle.

Terran Yellow, responding: That doesn't explain why you turned him into an ice cube.

Terran Green, addressing Terran Blue: "Blue", what was the 411 on those rocket launchers?

Terran Blue, responding: The main man blew a gasket. Didn't make it far, but managed to nab a couple of the suckers.

Terran Yellow, addressing Terran Green: You throw a glitter bomb down the chutes and I'll cop all the cookies.

Terran Green, responding: Do it and you'll lose your kneecaps.

In the above interaction, it was explained that Terran Blue and Terran Yellow were discussing an instance where an object was hurled towards Terran Blue's head. He dodged the object and used a weapon to freeze his opponent in a section of ice. Terran Green was inquiring about a mission and the weapons that were supposed to be gained if it succeeded. Terran Blue informed of the partial success they achieved, after which Terran Yellow warned Terran Green to not perform certain playful acts. Terran Green responded with a more intimidating warning.

However, as seen, there were many different instances of slang usage. All three of the humans used at least two versions, yet they all hold very different positions. Terran Green is a scientist, Terran Yellow is (assumed to be) a chef, and Terran Blue is (assumed to be) a diplomat. Their needs for their positions are greatly varied, leading to confusion as to the education of humans.

In all events of slang use, please proceed with great caution. A greater percentage of this subject is unknown than the previous logs. Refrain from attempting the replication of slang unless the code has been explained to you by a Terran. Humans have not shown much aggression yet, but they may do so if provoked on an emotional level.

#voltron #vld #lance #keith #shiro #pidge #hunk #allura #oneshots #voltron oneshots

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kalico-to-the-letter · 5 years

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REVIEW // RWBY | 6.11 | “THE LADY IN THE SHOE”

AKA my Naruto: Shippūden experience revisited.

Welcome in to my review of Volume 6, Chapter 11, entitled, “The Lady in the Shoe”.

In this episode: Atlesian pride is at sea. A shared demon is faced.

The hands, though … the hands.

HOW SHŌNEN OF YOU.

We’re officially in a weird spot with this, the sixth and current season of RWBY.

I have – as have most of us, I’m sure – known for a long time now that the 26th of January would be the airdate of the season finale. Despite that knowledge, it was never something that had never rung any alarm bells in my viewing experience of the season – until now.

With only two (!) episodes left for this season, we remain hanging on the cliff of an uneven storyline’s hastily-escalated climax. (Remembering of course that the finales have tended to be at least double-length episodes.)

The whole thing was very entertaining, and at times, edge-of-the-seat action material. As a singular package, this episode is very good. And if there were, say, five more episodes left, instead of just two, I wouldn’t have any issues at all.

But therein lies the issue. Naruto and Dragon Ball can pull off storytelling like this – RWBY has struggled with it forever, yet the show can’t seem to stay away from it or find the formula to make it work within its own limitations.

I’ve criticised this show in the past for its tendency to act like it has more time and more room to manoeuvre than it actually does. This is also not the first time I’ve identified shōnen storytelling characteristics in the show. But it seems to remain an ongoing issue directly affecting the pacing of seasons. As up-and-down as last season’s overall quality was, it was one of the better-paced runs in the show’s history. And when this season opened with a good episode, then an ok episode, then four great episodes in a row, and we were getting these great set ups with the antagonists and Team RWBY’s internal issues, I thought that the lock had been picked after all – that the show could stay consistent in quality and pace at the same time.

Call it a wandering focus, or a loosening of the grip – the unique, tight direction of this season was lost with the arrival in Argus. The early stories of the primary antagonists were pushed to the sideline, as was the Ozpin story. Any problems still within Team RWBY were instead transformed into Qrow’s issues with life itself, and even though Yang and Blake are fighting Adam now and will probably smack his ass around next week, they have had far less to do with each other than one might have expected, given their obvious issues.

Of the main storylines for this season, the only one that has been consistently featured and worked on is the story of Ruby’s personal growth, which is still fantastic as far as the positives go, and this episode continues to build on that by giving her some fun moments, with Weiss in particular.

I struggle with the grade for this episode, too. Perhaps more than any other episode I’ve assigned a grade value; this could well be the best episode I’ve not given at least an “A-“, and it’s solely down to the season’s recent pacing woes. Ultimately, it was all very well done. In fact, I would go as far as to say that the execution of Blake’s plot was flawless in this episode, and I must spotlight it.

It was staged and crafted in all the right ways, from fighting and flying around in the trees to being forced into the open above a waterfall. The swordplay choreography hit its beats without making the fight look like a dance, which maintained the sense of danger. It created some telling images, such as Blake catching one of Adam’s swords in the sheath of her own weapon, or Blake losing that sheath to the water, or Blake’s own sword being shattered to pieces. She’s had this weapon forever, and now it’s gone – you can’t say that’s not a big deal. For a second, I thought she had been stabbed again, and the afterimage clone was used to counter that strong parallel of the first fight with Adam, years back. The scene held its drama throughout, and built even higher as the fight progressed onto the bridge and brought Yang into the situation.

And even though it left on another cliffhanger, it was not the irritating sort like the fight against the mecha suit. It was more in keeping with better shōnen cliffhangers, an ending which still had deeply satisfying components despite choosing not to resolve the overall storyline. Yang’s arrival was momentous on its own, tossing her beloved bike into the water, and then squaring off with Adam. In another acknowledgement of the parallels, the fight was back-and-forth rather than Yang’s original headlong charge into defeat.

Consider the complexity at play here. Despite being the fresh fighter and going toe-to-toe with an old tormentor, Yang knows that she cannot defeat Adam on her own – only “hold him off”. When her hand shakes again. of course Adam is quick to call her out for her supposed lack of nerve. And of course, Blake is there to take it and reinforce their bond. “She’s not protecting me, Adam. And I’m not protecting her. We’re protecting each other.”

They both had turns fighting him solo in the Volume 3 finale. They both lost spectacularly, and Adam has haunted the both of them ever since. Blake wounded his pride at the end of Volume 5, but that wasn’t a real fight. Here, they will, at last, fight him together, and exorcise the demon they both share – the demon that tore them apart in the first place.

An ending like that to this story – and this whole scene, really – is almost enough to make up for potential storytelling malpractice. So, let’s bring it home, Volume 6: I can’t say I’m not intrigued about what happens next.

OBSERVATIONS:

What’s more impressive? Sniping a missile out of a sky from the ground, or catching a missile with a giant mecha suit and throwing it at a moving airship? Open the polls.

I see Weiss and Ruby riding on a giant bumblebee … Nothing.

I feel like Nora’s trying to get something from Ren … I’m stupid.

The fight against Cordovin was something straight out of an JRPG – plenty of making the sword-wielding heroes look tiny against a giant boss enemy. Not quite Final Fantasy or Nier, but in the ballpark.

The reveal of Adam’s scar is pretty gnarly. No one tell Weiss about the SDC brand right on his freaking eye.

Blake didn’t just lose her weapon – she lost her coat. Oh my goodness. Let’s just … whew.

I got chills when Yang blocked the charged strike and just frowned at Adam.

Of course, I would have preferred both stories to wrap up in this episode, but given how both it played out, I feel instinctively that one of these two storylines should have ended with this episode.

The Gang vs Cordovin isn’t the most compelling fight on paper, and it isn’t helped by some heavy-handed emotional manipulation, but hits all the points it needs to. That cliffhanger was genuinely annoying and unnecessary, though.

Cordovin isn’t a great antagonist, is she? Like, we were literally introduced to her four episodes ago, and here she is having a fight stretched over three episodes. Remember Neo and Cinder? And Salem’s crew? I’d care more about a fight with any of those jokers than I do about this fight with Cordovin. It’s still cool to see Ruby and Weiss killing it, and Qrow seems to have stopped his moping.

The main disappointment with the realisation that the finale is so close also comes from the promising set ups from the early parts of the season, such as Cinder’s involvement with Neo, or Emerald’s return to the villain crew – or even more recently, with Saphron and Terra’s issues with the Atlesian camp kind of fizzling into nothing. A lot of ideas which started strong but seem to have since been shelved for either the finale or Volume 7, which doesn’t really feel necessary. With Atlas almost promising to be a battleground, the next season pretty much writes itself, and skipping through these random Volume 6 subplots feels like a bit of a waste.

GRADE: B+

Against the time pressure of a rapidly winding-down season, “The Lady in the Shoe” puts RWBY in a strange place. On the one hand, it is another example of the show’s historically misguided tendency to dig itself into the "shōnen" hole and demand more of itself than it can deliver, and leaves the trajectory of the remaining two episodes in a murky state. On the other hand, it is an episode buoyed by strong execution and compelling character beats. Blake vs Adam, in particular, is a scene which goes down as one of the strongest and most complete of the entire series, in terms of fight psychology, staging, and dramatic involvement. At the very least, it all keeps one guessing. – KALLIE

#rwby spoilers #rwby reviews #rwby6 #rwby volume 6 #rwby

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colorguardian10 · 7 years

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Response to Mike Rose’s “Blue-Collar Brilliance”

I said I wouldn’t share this if another post didn’t show enough interest, but @yoursinfulsister asked to see it and I didn’t really need a strong excuse anyway.

For my Writing Seminar course, we were supposed to write a five-page response to this article. He wrote about how a lot of workers in low-class jobs are considered to not have intelligence, and about how it’s a gross misconception. I recommend reading it for the full context of this paper. Here was my response to his article:

Mike Rose speaks on the concept of most jobs fitting into one of two categories: the intellectual or “white-collar”, and the physical or “blue-collar”. Hearing these groups, examples come to mind: accountants, lawyers, teachers propped up against steelworkers, construction workers, or plumbers. We immediately categorize work differently in order to treat it differently. I’m not sure my first job could have been a more fitting example of this divide.

While I was in high school, my school district decided to try something new. Every student is given a laptop assigned to them to help with schoolwork and develop technology literacy skills, and every summer, they hire a few professionals to deal with the hundreds and hundreds of computers needing maintenance over the break. This year, they planned to hire a handful of mildly tech-savvy, and cheap, students instead. They also knew that they were short on janitors for cleaning each building while the students were out.

So, in the main library, applications were put out: you simply checked which of the two positions you were applying for, why you wanted to work there, and how many hours you would be available.

This turned out to be a grave mistake on their part. For starters, through some form of miscommunication, 12 “technology interns” were hired for the five open slots. For another, not a single person applied to be a janitor. Having relied on a boost of students to fill out their gaps, they were now even more short-staffed than before.

A solution was reached: the interns would rotate between the job they had applied for, and being janitors, to help even out the balance in each. Anyone unwilling to accept this could leave. (One quit, one threatened to sue for the position, and an additional two were later fired for committing crimes at work.) As much as I wasn’t happy with the arrangement, I knew that the administration was doing its best in an unusual situation, and certainly preferred it to not having a job at all. I stayed.

Working as an intern was repetitive, but concerningly easy. Our first task was to update the software on every laptop in the school and set up the school’s network (a process called “imaging”), which required first wiping them of personal data as a matter of policy. We simply had to memorize a series of hotkeys and administrator passwords and wash, rinse, repeat. All the interns of the day did for weeks was sit at a desk with two or three laptops in front of them:

ctrl + alt + D / ctrl + alt + D / ctrl + alt + D

Are you sure you want to reset to factory defaults? If so, provide credentials and press enter:

qu@k3r / qu@k3r / qu@k3r

Do you wish to download the latest software?

yes / yes / yes

You are using a private network. Please log in as a network administrator to continue:

qu@k3r# / qu@k3r# / qu@k3r#

Put them back in the computer carts, pick up three more from the “unimaged” cart. Repeat.

Certainly, it required basic computer skills, but it was pretty obvious why they didn’t bother to ask for previous experience on the form. Later, we were tasked with fixing broken hardware, which at least required the ability to unscrew the casing, identify and replace sensitive parts, and put the casing back on in one piece.

On the other hand, being a janitor was exhausting. Every summer, the entirety of every single building is cleaned from top to bottom: every desk, every chair, ceilings, walls, and cabinets alike. Furniture has to be removed so that all floors can get a new layer of wax. Outside maintenance is done, too. I was spared by only having to fill cracks in the tennis court with wet asphalt in the summer sun for just a few days. I was “accidentally” placed in the rotation for twice as much time as any other intern, though, so maybe not. I became very familiar with Laura, my immediate supervisor in this department.

I said it was exhausting. This was in part due to the fact that they were still short-staffed, and a quarter filled with unwilling teenagers to boot. I never got to stop. We had our 30-minute lunch break and two exactly-fifteen-minute breaks. The other eight hours were nonstop, moving, scrubbing, mixing solutions, lifting desks and slate tables, carefully picking up lamps, and putting everything back exactly how the teachers left it - they might complain about having to shift the desks again, I was told. Third floor to bottom floor, stripping the wax floors and re-waxing every room and hallway as we went. I could barely even interact with my family when I got back home from how mind-numbing it was on top of barely being able to move. I was given the “easy” jobs because I was young, and a student, and the other workers didn’t want me to “break something”. Laura had been working at my school longer than either of my parents have been alive. Despite this, I had never even heard of her.

My personal experience would support the notion that jobs come either physically taxing or mentally taxing (or perhaps physically or not at all). I might even have argued against Rose’s claims that they’re not so divided, but I have the sense to see that my examples are pretty far on either end of the spectrum, and that one came with very different pressures than the other. I know that the majority of “physical” jobs, such as a waitress like Rose’s mother, do require mental effort as well as physical.

Mike Rose mentions the complexities of something as externally simple as taking orders, one of many basic skills of a waitress - “Waiting on seven to nine tables, each with two to six customers, Rosie devised memory strategies so that she could remember who ordered what. And because she knew the average time it took to prepare different dishes, she could monitor an order that was taking too long at the service station.” (47) He goes on at length about the massive cleverness needed to keep your head on straight in the restaurant business.

Even being a janitor, which I’ve already stressed the physical effort of, came with its tips and tricks: solution #20 for the desks and the walls, #8 for the windows, but dab some #16 on first for stickers. Zizz-O® gets off permanent marker and mop in that white gunk to strip the floors – but if you actually touch it head straight for the chemical shower. And by the way, pour in some extra #20 in your bucket, here’s a bottle we popped with a screwdriver - the mixing machine dilutes it too much.

You might take Rose’s statements and counter that, obviously, waitressing must be a strange exception that really requires knowledge rather than endurance. He prefaces these remarks by describing her additional efforts simply navigating the restaurant, describing her as walking “full tilt through the room with plates stretching up her left arm and two cups of coffee somehow cradled in her right hand” and “weaving in and out around the room” when not holding dishes as a constant part of her work, “flopping” into a booth to take a break with him (Rose 46).

However, while I do solidly agree with Rose’s argument that the perceived division of jobs is untrue, I do not agree with the way he makes it. He states that physical jobs include a mental aspect as a way of giving them value. I believe they should deserve it regardless. Certainly my experience would suggest giving even more respect to physical work.

I do not agree with the notion of intelligence garnering respect, and the corresponding notion that roles not requiring it are not worth respect. To again apply it to Rose’s thinking, I agree that jobs are often divided into mental and physical, but I believe that this is an applied devaluing of jobs in the latter rather than a quirky misconception with side effects. Work not requiring a formal education is frequently devalued based on not requiring “intelligence”. Rose applies this to waitresses and argues that they deserve respect by showing that they need smarts to do their job well. I believe that he is trying to rise something up with an idea used to bring it down, and accepting his argument completely, to me, simply leads to the same problem he is addressing - just for other people.

The superintendent told us we might be getting paid less while janitors - for the same qualifications, for the same hours, technically even for the same job title! Why? Because it was “unskilled work”. So what kind of “skills” are we really talking about when considering pay scales? Rarity of required skills, and compensation of effort in gaining said skills, may be one factor, but who decided that removing an LCD screen was harder than removing an entire classroom? While certainly some work is worth more than others, efforts to funnel money out of working people’s hands has only been hitting those least able to get it back, resulting in a drastically unfair imbalance. Instead of trying to help each other, our society climbs over each other to get at the precious “fair” work left, and people who can’t compete with one-dimensional standards get work that’s even less valued. It’s not about “skills” or “effort” at all. It’s about your rung on the ladder.

Rose does make good points. He clearly shows through his examples that stereotyped categories of work (he also includes “pink-collar” or creative/empathetic work in his comparisons) are defective and out of touch. He gives examples of foremen and waitresses having aspects that obviously contradict the social divide. He even admits that intelligence doesn’t necessarily have anything to do with formal education – and then says that many jobs require intelligence even if they don’t require formal education. Even Rose can’t seem to separate himself from the root problem enough to denounce it. Most likely he is not conscious of this – few people knowingly perpetuate issues – but that doesn’t mean that I can suddenly agree with the underlying notion.

I believe that we should hold ourselves accountable when we notice ourselves keeping harmful ideas alive, at the most basic levels we can. That means, yes, don’t belittle work based on the perceived intelligence needed, but it also means don’t belittle work based on the actual intelligence needed. The original purpose of jobs and specialized work is so that everyone can provide for the needs of the populace. Roles are needed because no one can be their own doctor, and banker, and cook, and technician, and janitor. People simply can’t independently fulfill their own needs in modern society. We work to help each other. If someone is working in a position socially lower than you, then they are doing you a service. Respect them.

“Respect them.” What does that even mean? I know what I think that looks like, but I grew up in a rich neighborhood. I have more concrete examples of what respect for workers doesn’t mean. Do you remember Laura? I never even knew she existed until I had met her. When people are giving their time and effort for the sole purpose of making your life easier, we should appreciate that. Instead, we say these roles are “insignificant” or “low-level” and push them under the rug.

Have you ever had to wait in line at a fast-food restaurant because the service is slow? Think about this instead: the people behind that wall are working even harder than normal. Service isn’t being slow, demand is simply too high to keep up with. You have to stand still for a few minutes. They can’t stand still until everyone in there is gone, and probably haven’t for a while. I know far too many people who take a situation like this and complain, or leave pitiful tips. After all, you had to wait a long time to receive food you normally don’t have to wait for. To me, it always seemed that it meant the people serving you are doing an even better job working to fulfill your needs.

Part of recognizing that all roles aren’t divided into definite categories, as Rose and I argue against, is recognizing that work also can’t be categorized into quantifiable worth. The person making your Starbucks, the person making your sandwich, and the person wiping your floors are all working at least as hard as you are, and to your direct benefit. Treat them as such.

You may disagree with my earlier ideas, that work exists to help others. Isn’t everyone just working to provide for themselves? That’s how American society at least frames it. Rose shows his mother acting very differently. He says that many customers came in with a desire for human contact, and describes how she changed her behavior to suit that. Though he also says it was all to get a higher tip, this is an outlook we disagreed on from the beginning. One of the founding principles of a capitalistic society is that everyone has to compete to “earn” their right to live freely. And so, payment is phrased as points in some great unwinnable game and not as acknowledgement for doing your part. This is where the faults lie. We can’t ever be compensated properly when our compensation doesn’t treat our work as work. Beyond that fact, not everyone can “compete”. Certainly not everyone can compete in a system where your worth is measured by a singular quality. Waitresses have intelligence? Great. Why weren’t they respectable without it?

Again, I wish to state that Rose made a valid argument. I saw his article as halfway to getting at the true problem, but for many his view may be the first time they’ve seen it that way. I can think of a couple people back in my rich neighborhood who could have used the worker’s perspective. Maybe the girl who rented a stadium for her birthday, or my mother, who thinks that most of the janitors made minimum wage because they’re too lazy to get a degree. She can carry the accursed solid slate chem room tables for decades - then she can tell me what “lazy” is.

My experiences may be extreme, and my views radical. But I said above that it is necessary to prevent ourselves from perpetuating harmful ideals. That includes calling these ideas out when we see them. I know that the teenagers typing in passwords were placed at a higher worth than the full-grown adults working themselves to death. I saw Mike Rose’s criticism of a system that put those two forms of work on different pedestals, and I wanted to express what I meant by saying that this divide is unfair. Seeing so-called “white-collar” and “blue-collar” workers in different lenses is something we should recognize, and we should also recognize why we made that divide. Rose argued how inaccurate this difference is, and I argue that the difference shouldn’t even exist.

#this is phrased kind of like it was a learning experience but I was already aware of this kind of shit I just hadn't strongly experienced it #it was hard to keep myself from going on a full communist rant for a while there #also I tried to avoid pointing out the fact that I had my first job at 18 lol #mine #paper #I highkey suspect that the administration was taking advantage of me being the only one being nice about it #'my views may be radical' I can't believe I let myself write that sentence lol #yoursinfulsister

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