“The Hedonism Handbook – Mastering
the Lost Arts of Leisure and Pleasure,” by Michael Flocker, (2004)
The author’s name reminds me of a
movie. “Hey, Flocker!”
At any rate, the reason I read this
book is to answer the question, is this the new “Right to Be Lazy” that was written by Paul Lafargue, Marx’s
son-in-law so long ago? Or the new
manifesto from the Situationist Internationale? Or just some middle-class
comedic fantasy? Lafargue’s book was
written in 1883. It addressed workers as
to the benefits of a ‘slow-down’ in the work process and for them to turn to
socialism. Even in the 1800s, labor was
constantly under the whip of long, long hours, hammering assembly lines, child
labor and tyrannical bosses. This was
the period of the ‘Protestant’ work ethic utilized by capital, which meant that
the only good worker was an exhausted worker.
 |
| The Middle or Upper Class Version |
Today, as the U.S. has become
the most workaholic society on the globe, the issue remains the same. Short or no vacations, high-intensity labor,
consistent short-staffing, digital connectivity 16 hours a day, the need to
work overtime to make more money, or the need to work 2-3 jobs – it all adds up
to a tiring shit-storm. Many white
collar workers are slaves to software and hardware, which controls their work pace. Then there is the possibly long, ugly commute
home. And if you go home and take care
of children? The second unpaid shift
starts. No time, as they say. No time at
all.
Hedonism Handbook
Flocker is the New York-based author
of the “Metrosexual Guide to Style,” and
at one time did red-carpet events and celebrity interviews - all of which should
produce suspicion. But he’s a funny tongue-in-cheek
writer, making whoopee out of our over-worked society in clever and insouciant
ways. He’s sort of a junior Tom Wolfe,
though he aspires to be Gore Vidal. The succinct description of this book is ‘Ape
the rich, but not too much!” You
see, he’s a ‘Great Gatsby’ kind of
guy. He uses Aveda hair control
paste, if you must know.
As he doesn’t know, different classes
have to ‘relax’ in different ways. He
does have a section on the working stiffs in cubes and workplaces, advocating
doing the essential and not everything. But I suspect this section is mostly aimed at
harried managers. He is especially an
opponent of perfectionism – the idea that you have to be perfectly good, which
is perfectly stupid. Behind this is the
dim understanding that your work is not your life – it’s a job, you are being
used, so stop trusting the outfit you work for. Do what you need to get the job done. The
impact of the book goes beyond setting up one room in your house as an
‘Oriental’ opium boudoir smacking of French Colonial rule, which he suggests –
perhaps with his tongue stuck right through his cheek. Reading the book might get a regular ol’ wage worker
to back-off and jack-down the hurry and laugh instead.
 |
| The Original Thing |
RIGHT TO BE LAZY
Lafargue on the other hand wasn’t
advising the tired corporate manager, factory owner, businessman or land lord to sleep
past noon, drink more champagne, visit his mistress or contemplate the natural
marvels of his suburban McMansion, as Flocker does for the modern ‘lords.’ Lafargue wrote
his essay against the ‘right to work’ idea pushed on wage workers, which was a dialectical
corrective to the worship of work pushed by the capitalists of the time and
even by some leftists. Lafargue spoke
against the ‘dogma of work’ which made humans into ‘machine slaves.’
Lafargue enjoined workers to
‘enjoy,’ not to suffer like the Christian parsons encouraged. Work was supposedly a cure for sin and vices
according the capitalists and the church. Hunger was even embraced by a priest of the
Anglican Church as a boon to work. Holidays were suppressed. Ultimately this love of suffering led to
drained human beings and physical damage.
Lafargue opposed bourgeois moralism and set against it the Cooperative
Commonwealth, where “human passions will have free play.”
Flocker also notices the repressive
and hectoring spirit of religion, especially the role of Christianity in the U.S., still a promoter
of workaholism. But he does not name the
sprite behind it all, capital. After
all, the enthusiastic pats on the back might stop if he took that tack. At this point in developed capitalist societies there is so much food, possible luxury, commodities, entertainment, booze and drugs that 'hedonism' has become the subtext of the whole consumer culture.
The overwhelming misery of factory
and associated work in Lafargue’s time was christened ‘progress.’ And indeed it was – for some. So while Marx and Engels understood
that labor actually created human beings, Lafargue added that too much labor
results in destruction. The point of
communism shared by them all was to abolish overwork and to use the technology
and science developed by capital to reduce working hours to a rational minimum.
Lafargue figured about 3 hours a day,
with the rest reserved for ‘leisure and feasting’ instead of the ‘religion of
abstinence.’
Of course, not every class was
working that much. As Lafargue
notes:
“The women of fashion live a life of martyrdom, in
trying on and showing off the fairy-like toilets which the seamstresses die in
making.”
And:
“To fulfill his double social function of
non-producer and over-consumer, the capitalist was not only obliged to violate
his modest taste, to lose his laborious habits of two centuries ago and to give
himself up to unbounded luxury, spicy indigestibles and syphilitic debauches,
but also to withdraw from productive labor an enormous mass of men in order to
enlist them as his assistants.”
Things have not changed that much. But his point is that we should not let the
upper classes ‘own’ time.
As can be seen in the U.S., capitalist
automation, artificial intelligence, cybernetics and computerization result in overwork
for the employed. For displaced wage
workers they now have to get 2-3 jobs, hipsterly called ‘gigs’ or ‘side hustles.’
(Oooh!
How cool!) This is an obvious
contradiction that is worrying the policy wonks of capital even now, so they
have come up with the warehousing placebo, the Universal Basic Income (UBI).
The working class has little
alternative but to work in order to survive.
However, we should raise our heads above the grindstone and see who created
this situation and why it shouldn’t continue.
Other reviews on this topic: ‘In Letters of Fire and Blood,’ ‘Shop Class
as Soulcraft,’ ‘Time Wars,’ ‘Marxism and the Oppression of Women,’ ‘The
Precariat,’ ‘Modern De Facto Slavery,’ ‘Marxism is Abolitionism,’ ‘Factory Days
/ Office Lights,’ ‘New Dark Age.’ Use
blog search box, upper left.
And I got it at the library!
The Kulture Kommissar
February 12, 2019
No comments:
Post a Comment