This essay was really valuable for me in thinking about why people do this:

The Need to Punish: The Political Consequences of Identifying with the Aggressor https://arno-gruen.online-library.net/p/the-need-to-punish.html

yeah I'm picking up what you wrote down

I'm still really upset about this interaction, so hopefully you don't mind me wordvomiting an anecdote that I'm still processing and trying to integrate.

Background: My partner and I are privileged enough to have workfromhome jobs that almost never require we physically be on site. We're both excellent at our jobs. Also relevant is that my parents insist on only talking to me on the phone. Setting up a video call is something they've resisted at every suggestion. I got them to agree to it once: the audio quality was way better and we could hear and see eachother. I got to see their dog and it was dope. That was in September. Every other conversation I've had with them has been textual or by voice call.

Okay. So we're talking about our weeks and somehow the topic of work-from-home-zoom meetings came up. In discussing this, I mention that I only very rarely turn my camera on and as part of my work managed to teach an online class entirely without it. I was informed that "this wouldn't fly" at their workplaces, one of which has an explicitly communicated rule that all employees attending meetings must turn their cameras on if their manager requests it, and that my mother almost always does. They also have rules about dress code in work-from-home meetings and wearing a nametag that's visible in the frame. For some meetings, her supervisors also insist on this. I explained that I think this is unnecessarily oppressive. It's qualifying enough that work is now an inescapable activity that I do in the physical space of my small bedroom every day (and something I get to be constantly reminded about because I live in a house that's small enough I don't have room for a separate desk where I could trick my brain into psychologically distinguishing work places from other activities' places), but to demand that I also show that space (which is also my partner's living space, though they often work at our kitchen table) to my colleagues is excessively so. I tried to explain that a just way to handle this is to allow people to determine for themselves whether they are comfortable turning on their camera for work meetings. I tried to explain why some neurodivergent people who begin work-from-home-zoom meetings with their cameras off might be more than a little uncomfortable with turning their camera on depending on what's going on in their home lives or their minds.

They took this opportunity to condescendingly explain that it's much easier it is to connect with the people on the call when you can see them and that this makes the interactions "more meaningful and pleasant" [for them]. I told them that for some (my partner and I, for example) that's the fucking point. That's what makes it extra uncomfortable.

This is the best (read: worst) part: I was told that sometimes, my father notices people have their cameras turned off in meetings and just for kicks tells them, "hey it sure would be nice if we could see your face" and has great success in pressuring people to turn on their camera (no shit; who wouldn't worry about being fired for not having their camera on in a meeting when their boss or even a colleague points out that they're not "connecting as deeply" (his words) the same way ).

The irony that they insist on not videocalling their own progeny completely escaped them. That wasn't really why I responded, that was just the thing that pissed me off enough that I'm still talking about this hours later instead of doing my homework. I responded because neither of them sees as punishment the act of forcing someone lower on their hierarchy to share intimate photographic detail about their life regardless of their discomfort with that level of intimacy or work performance when that's literally all it is.

It felt exactly like the motivation of people who oppose m4a or debt forgiveness only because they "earned" their health insurance or they've already paid off their student loans. Weirdly, my parents are better than most libs on these issues, and at thanksgiving in 2019, my mother explained to her mother why opposing m4a just because she had medicare and good health insurance benefits through her husband's work her whole life is just punishing people who don't have those privileges is only punishing them.

Thanks for reading my rant. I know that overall my parents aren't bad people and that they do love me, but GODDAMNIT WHY THE FUCK CAN'T THEY LISTEN.

Also, I agree with your notion that this seems all encompassing. It feels intuitive to me that this is a side effect of capitalism projecting every kind of interaction into the closest possible fit to a zero-sum game, but idk if that's even a well formed idea.

Possibly extremely tangengial, but also possibly the answer to your question. Sorry for just posting a link at you, but it's early hours and I'm not yet fully lucid.

I think this will change by necessity. I don't remember every dumb thing I said for shock value as a teenager, but most of it was over AIM/4Chan so it isn't going to haunt me. Now that people are born into social media, however, it's only a matter of time before we begin to realize that everyone has some embarrassing shit that they've said or done in their past, including the people we respect most. My hope is that this will make it easier to forgive one another.

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