Listen, this user is a terminally online anarchist who complains about tankies and calls Stalin genocidal. But shes correct about this one. Mostly. I mean using the term "bedtime abolition" sounds dumb but Im pretty sure she only did that because its a common joke about anarchists. The core point is about how 9-5 work schedules dont work for everyone. As an ND person who struggles with culturally normal sleep schedules, I absolutely agree that society needs to accomodate these things. I absolutely agree that its literally normal talk everyone says that work schedules suck.
People saying "just go to bed on time" or "just pop a melatonin" have never been in the position of trying to do that and failing, just laying awake for hours until you finally fall asleep two hours before you need to be up.
https://nitter.net/moonlit_misfit/status/1743350718944121067
- Show
Also side note this interaction filled me with joy.
I'm trying to interpret the point of the order of the flags. I think it's kind of looped, so US/China are next to each other here, which leaves most of the rest as natural pairs. Israel/Palestine, Ukraine/Russia. But do Greece and Turkey have some beef I'm not familiar with? Because that one still confuses me.
Yeah, I think they have a bit of the "two cultures with a lot of intermingling who both claim they invented XYZ and used to fight about borders" thing going on.
They both claim sovereignty over the whole of Cyprus and both control a portion of it, IIRC.
But do Greece and Turkey have some beef I'm not familiar with?
Of course the Greeks and Turks hate each other. Some Greeks are still salty over the Ottoman Empire. You can tell this poster never listened to the soothing rants of Stavros "The Mind" Halkias.
Bedtime discourse is a waste of energy and bandwidth when 4 day work week is an actually viable improvement that could happen in our lifetimes. Dividing our attention between different time-based issues is a surefire way to reduce effectiveness at getting either of them achieved.
Anyway Flexi-Time is already a standard thing used by huge quantities of businesses, it's widely adopted in the UK even by government. It literally eliminates this issue.
Stop talking about bedtimes and start organising to drag your company into giving Flexitime as a concession to workers.
This kind of specific labor issue is best fought consciously through working class solidarity, such as labor unions or larger political movements. But the emphasis and perspective should always be on labor as a class, not on particular issues that are only a consequence of the capital-labor contradiction.
Well yes that's the solution, and I'm sure she'd agree. Highlighting particular ways in which capitalism crushes people's souls is a part of the discourse, going back to Marx and even further.
It really feels like everyone in this thread is reacting to the political aesthetic of this person and then putting in extra effort to find some sort of dunk on her.
It really feels like everyone in this thread is reacting to the political aesthetic of this person and then putting in extra effort to find some sort of dunk on her.
Seriously. We should be above twitter style dunk thirst here. We arent quote tweeting her with a charachter limited dunk for engagement farming lol
Seriously. We should be above twitter style dunk thirst here.
This place has never, ever been above that. I'd love it if it was though.
We should be above twitter style dunk thirst here
sir this is hexbear
The problem is that they bring up a real issue in a dumb way, and in so doing, actually harm the cause instead of helping it. Having a bedtime is not the root of people's problems so I personally find it valid to criticize their self-righteousness, because people tune out when online leftists complain that their brilliance is unrecognized.
To say nothing because the general vibe of their tweet is good is the sixth type of liberalism. Though, criticizing behind their back over here on Hexbear is the second type, so I guess I'm a lib too.
That said I basically agree with you about the importance of highlighting the particular flaws of capitalism in order to increase consciousness, and also that we shouldn't be hung up on aesthetic.
The problem is that they bring up a real issue in a dumb way, and in so doing, actually harm the cause instead of helping it.
I don't know that these tweets matter that much.
The internet is such a shitty place to organize because it draws people into these obtuse theoretical nitpickings. It all feels so bad faith. In person it's always much easier to forgive someone's botched phrasing when you know their heart and head are in the right place. /minirant
Then why are we talking about it all though? OP made it clear this is someone who generally makes bad points, and they did a bad job making this (potentially good) point. So what's the point of using them or their tweets to start this discussion?
The capitalist/industrialized sleep schedule is not natural. Humans evolved to sleep at different times to provide security to the community. Some rise early, some sleep late, some sleep in "shifts".
Your body will tell you when and how long to sleep, Fuck the bosses' schedules.
i actually only sleep for 4 hours so i can stop off on the way to my landlord's house every morning to leave them a tip (i can't afford a car so im walking)
a podcast told me somehow this is gonna get me pussy and make me a millionaire
Hey, if it was on the internet, it must be true, right? I think there is a rule that you can't lie online.
The making fun of the western 13 year old "anarkiddie" trying to abolish bedtimes is in no way the same argument as someone actively taking about how workers are forced to work unpleasant or unreasonable hours. These are completely unrelated topics. The latter is something I've heard plenty of anarchists actually discuss, as they actually care about worker's rights. The former is just a kid mad at their parents.
Yeah, "abolish bedtimes" is used for folks whose knowledge of anarchism begins and ends at "rules bad." It's derisive shorthand for saying someone is calling themselves an anarchist but hasn't engaged with anarchist literature (on topics like when hierarchy or rules can be justified, for example).
This is kind of how I always thought about it too. Like it’s a jokey epithet for people with an immature, unsophisticated, lifestylist sort of vaguely “anarchist” politics. Was very confused to come in here and see serious political discussion about bedtimes.
this is a largely imaginary figure that you nevertheless find useful to avoid meeting anarchist ideas on their own terms. just like anti-communists who don't oppose more rights for workers, they just don't agree with those crazy tankies who want everyone to get the same haircut.
Flexible schedules should be considered a worker's right. Obviously the degree to which your schedule can be flexible depends heavily on what you do but I think there are more jobs than people think where you could make the schedule "show up any time, as long as the work gets done some time today" and it would work fine.
a 9-5 schedule drains my energy
No shit, that's half the point. All you should have energy left for in the evening is to consume a bit of distilled pop culture and some of your vice of choice
The problem is not just the 9-5 society (or more like 7-3 if you're working in construction or similar). These received schedules doesn't work for everyone and that is a problem. But the problem is also that there is simply not enough time for sleep in most people's daily schedules, no matter at what time of the day you put it.
If you have a full time job and a commute and you have housework and other chores that needs to be done for things to function and you also want to have the luxury of feeling like a person with some kind of agency to decide what you want to use your time on, even if it is just for a little while, then you rarely have the time to also get eight hours of uninterrupted sleep. This gets even worse if you have children.
The only way the ruling liberal-conservative ideology can engage with the problem is to turn it into a question of individual moral shortcomings and shame people for taking a little leisure time for themselves at the end of the day. "Why are you complaining about being sleep deprived, you ungrateful peasant? Just do nothing but work and sleep."
Much agreed. Though I'm sure timing of sleep matters to some, for me the reality is that I feel tired no matter when I go to bed, because most days I don't feel capable of sparing the 8 hours of sleep I need. It takes me a long time to chill out from the anxiety that work and financial chores stir up in me so I rarely really reach the point of genuinely 'relaxing' after work.
Revenge bedtime procrastination is also a big part. I deserve to enjoy some of my life dangit >:(
or more like 7-3 if you're working in construction or similar
Believe me it’s still 7-5 and it’s fucking bullshit.
Scrolling on my phone all night, natural and good, but the boss wants me to go to work in the morning, unnatural and bad.
The 28-hour day is the coolest idea I have ever heard of and I wish I lived in space so I could do it.
I wish I had a 28 hour day but somehow it was secret to the rest of society so they couldn't invent more bullshit to put in there for me to have to do.
just stay inside all day with blackout curtains, no one can tell you the 28-hour-day is wrong lol
molemen stay winning with the subterranean 28-hour day
She's right about what she's saying but I don't really see how it relates to "bedtime abolition." Like I feel completely the same about sleep schedules. I dropped out of high school primarily because I could not fucking handle being on a consistent daytime schedule every day, week after week. I got third shift / overnight jobs and I'm much, much healthier now. I get actual sleep now. Some people just aren't built for the 9-5.
But what the fuck does that have to do with parents making their kids get to sleep at a reasonable time relative to their responsibilities lol
"Some people aren't built for the 9-5" I wish people would understand this.
Hyper capitalist societies aren't intended to recognize these differences. Only people who can think outside the bubble will even think it... as simple as that is.
When all necessities of life (taking the US as the worst example of first world capitalism) are commodities and not guaranteed, one is forced to work. This is step 0 that every single liberal and conservative stumbles over. Ask a conservative and they'll say "no one makes you work! you choose to work where you want and are compensated based on ability!" and other such dog vomit. Obviously the choice to work is a non choice if the alternative is death. Liberals will say "maybe they can learn new skills? like coding? and also we have programs like WIC and SNAP and Medicaid!" of course it costs money (leaving aside time) to learn skills because they have to be properly creditialed ie a degree or certification of some sort. And neoliberals have spent like 50 years dismantling all of the programs (the few that existed) that were around to help people out who couldn't work at all or worked less or whatever the case may be. Good fucking luck qualifying for SNAP benefits if you work basically at all. Or Medicaid.
The entire system is set up in a way to pit workers against each other. People will literally say, with no sarcasm, that if you do not work or can't work then you are your family's responsibility. And if you have no family? They don't care. You should just die. Which is, holy fuck I get tired of typing this over the years, a literal Nazi talking point. "worthless eaters" they called disabled people. Whether that was elderly, mentally, physically, whatever was going on, if you couldn't do "fair work" or whatever then you're not contributing and thus worthless. The exact opposite of the Communist mantra of course which holds that someone able to work should work, and one unable to work should also receive the basic necessities of life. Worth remembering when dipshits try to cry that the USSR was the same 🤦♂️
So if you set up society to hold a gun to people's heads and force them to work to survive, and over the decades their compensation for work goes down and down (as it goes up and up for the owners) so they go from maybe being able to prop up a cousin, or uncle, or whatever because everyone has plenty. And now they have just enough. But some people still can't work the jobs corporations force them to choose from. Those people, who should be supported by the state, are tossed aside. But first they're ridiculed. Maybe someone has a degenerative disease such as MS and begins their work career able to work "normally" but over time their ability to work goes down and down and eventually they're forced, at a young age, to stop going altogether. "Well, can't you do something" is probably the unspoken question from their family. But it doesn't need to be spoken. Society, capitalism, has made this person, already suffering tremendously due to medical conditions obviously outside their or anyone's control, a burden on their family. In absolute terms anyway. Their family has to work more or seek out higher paying positions, whatever, if they value their family member not dying. In this situation it's purely a rational thought to have "this person is weighing me down!" Now, sure, empathetic and educated people will understand it isn't their fault and instead it's the fault of Capitalists/the government they control. But that doesn't change the immediate reality. And so the thought or maybe spoken words come "why can't you just work a normal job?" A question the person who has become a burden, I'm sure, asks themselves every day. And things can get rather bleak from there.
So in the end, the well-meaning liberal or callous conservative arrive at the same thought "they should just work! this isn't my problem!" and when the decision for that person's life to be the "problem" of society at large has already been made for them, and it has chosen "not our problem either!" the end result is always a circle of "just be normal. just go to work. everyone else does it. just do it." around and around.
This applies to someone who can work, but for whatever legitimate reasons, has trouble with the 9-5 grind. the total hours or the time range. if you work less, someone else will see you as eating from their pie.
This system sucks so fucking bad, and yet so many people have gobbled up propaganda and become totally wedded to the absurd idea that this is how it always was and must always be. It's dissolving the bonds between people, families, all in the pursuit of more profit for a capitalist somewhere. All this suffering so that somebody born into privilege (usually) can continue their privileged life.
I think she uses the term "bedtime abolition" because its a joke used at anarchist expense. Like ive actually seen the post this was triggered by which would probably have been helpful context.
To me it seems that standardized business hours arise from cooperation in the work place, which increased exponentially with the industrial revolution. Capitalist, socialist, whatever, if you have people cooperating in factories (e.g.) then they have to be there at the same time. So "bedtime abolition" seems utopian because it is the practical consequence of a cooperative productive process, and it can't be abolished without abolishing the actual basis, cooperative labor, or more specifically the necessity of simultaneous work. Our production would have to change such that work is parceled out in time-independent units, which is possible for a lot of industries, but by a structural change and not by decree. Software development is cooperative but does not typically require that developers cooperate in real time, for example.
And of course, the above is made all the more severe by the actual duration of the working day. If people only had to work 4 hours per day, then it would be far easier to handle standard business hours of 10a-2p for example, even if they technically are not flexible hours.
That's literally a On Authority passage
Though I totally think that a futuristic communist mode of production would allow for ultra flexible work schedules taking advantage of low workloads, but that's unfortunately not something we will live to see
The primary thing that annoys me about this person's point is the term "bedtime abolition." She doesn't want bedtime abolition at all; no one does (everyone wants to go to bed at some point, after all). What she wants is wakeup-time abolition. And I agree with that. Calling it bedtime abolition has the dual effect of incorrectly expressing the issue, and making the person saying it sound like a whiny child.
she's saying that that phrase is a an example of how real anarchist arguments are misrepresented as childish whining
Except she uses the term "bedtime abolition discourse" without a hint of irony, as best I can tell; not even a set of scare quotes on it.
i mean if you lack the context and haven't been reading posts on the internet continuously for the last 5 years and also don't read past the first sentence, sure i can see how it could come off that way.
same, I have a job in a restaurant so it's actually fine for me, best year of sleep i've had working where I do now
Same, but it also means I've been a cook for 13 years. I need a sit job that I can start at 3pm.
Yeah bartending was the best job I've ever had partly because of that.
I gotta say, I was meant for a second shift schedule. Going to bed at maybe 1 am, waking up at 9? That's the stuff.
