Our Socialist Book Club Our Socialist Book Club

Support the Girls is a one-bad-day film following Lisa (Regina Hall), the manager of a sports breastaurant called Double Whammies. This movie explores the worker-manager-owner relationship, the intersections of race, class, and gender in the workplace, and the cathartic nature of friendship and solidarity.

We are joined by our friend and honored guest, Christee, an artist and worker in the food service industry. Thanks to Christee for recommending this film and for bringing her insight and experience to this episode! She puts it best: "Waiting tables in the United States is a performance art."

This episode was recorded May 2019.

This week, we read Bullshit Jobs by David Graeber, a book that dissects the social, historical, and cultural theories implicit in our acceptance of the bullshitization of labor! Truly one of the most elegant and accessible approaches to this topic out there. Thanks to our honored guest and friend Larry for suggesting this one!

Read it here on Anarchist Library: https://theanarchistlibrary.org/library/david-graeber-bullshit-jobs

Read his shorter article that preceded the book here:
https://strikemag.org/bullshit-jobs/

We structured this episode roughly around the five types of bullshit work defined by Graeber as:
11:00 duct tapers
12:25 flunkies
15:50 goons
23:45 box tickers
58:50 taskmasters

Other Topics:
40:55 the cultural consensus around projects and policies benefiting the ruling class
1:00:00 Universal Basic Income
1:09:05 Moral envy and the systemic under-compensation of the caring professions
1:13:00 Caring, coercion, and the status quo

Other Works Mentioned:

51:28 Theranos, Elizabeth Holmes, and the rituals around data visualizations and 'predictive' data under capitalism. We reference the HBO documentary "The Inventor: Out for Blood in Silicon Valley": https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wtDaP18OGfw

1:08:00 "baseball article" refers to this interview in Jacobin: https://jacobinmag.com/2019/03/minor-league-baseball-pay-labor

1:20:00 Loic Wacquant's article, "Territorial Stigmatization in the Age of Advanced Marginality"
https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/0725513607082003

1:21:15 Howard Zinn's "A People's History of the United States"
https://www.historyisaweapon.com/zinnapeopleshistory.html

1:22:40 "Freedom Is an Endless Meeting: Democracy in American Social Movements" by Francesca Polletta, who argues in favor of a practical and participatory democracy based in bottom-up decision making.