this post was submitted on 12 Jan 2024
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A Boring Dystopia
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People offended just by looking at this picture out of context should really try explaining their preferred authoritarian social policy to a teenager who wants a part-time job but for whom some people would forbid them by penalty of the law.
Spoiler: They won't understand why you should have any authority over their body and time.
I don't understand why you should have that authority either. I mean, where does it end?
What are your criteria for exceptions? Shouldn't it be between the kid and their parents, and not you?
Are you imagining there is a parental figure with a bull whip for this kid in the back office and you want to outlaw physical abuse? There are already separate laws for that!
Children should not be working. We have piles of dead children that died in the past for the profits of capitalists, and it took millions of maimed children marching to DC led by Mother Jones for anything to be done about child labor. I highly doubt that there's anyone, let alone children, that want to be in the coercive environment we call work. If you want to say protecting children from the dangers of a capitalist workplace is authoritarian, then so be it. I don't want to see children in a workplace where they will be exploited by everyone above them.
I started working at age 13 back in 1980 because I wanted money to buy GI Joes, and comic books. So I started going to construction jobs with my shithead father on Saturdays and helped him put up sheetrock. My first legitimate job was the summer I turned 15, I was big for my age so I started doing deliveries for a furniture store, worked there for two summers until I was fired after a workplace injury. The guy I worked with was a racist Italian from Whitestone New York, and I was a smart slightly autistic black kid. His delivery truck only had one seat so I stood in the open door on the right side holding on for dear life. One day we were moving a heavy office desk upstairs and I was bringing up the rear, he lost control which resulted in the desk sliding downstairs and slamming me into a wall. My ribs were badly bruised so after I got home the store panicked and fired me, they probably thought we were going to sue. Anyway I went into a deep depression and couldn't leave my room for a month. One of my therapists later told me that it was the first appearance of my bipolar disorder.
I was legally employable, and of age but still got hurt on the job. I just had shithead employers.
If the business commits a crime like killing a kid, there are laws for that - just like there are laws for when businesses kill adults.
You are not providing a reason to bar the kid from working, you are providing a reason to outlaw murder(which is already illegal).
You doubt there are people under 18 who want to work? Should everyone just take your doubt for evidence of the absence of those people? I think not.
I do agree, if you stand by your beliefs on this issue, you are officially a self-proclaimed authoritarian on this issue.
It's cute that you think I'm talking about murder. Triangle Shirtwaist fire. Children in mines and mills. Children in factories. Children on farms. Children in retail. These are all areas of labor that have killed, maimed, and injured children. These kids were never murdered, they were hurt and killed in accidents that occurred because they were too young to handle the conditions of labor that was demanded of them. Fuck you for advocating for children to return to that type of labor.
Kids routinely get hurt (and sometimes killed) just playing. As long as they're not getting more seriously hurt more often at a job than regular activities, I don't see what the issue is, at all.
Why tf should a kid want to work? Why would you want a society to normalize a 14-year-old hustling and working after school? It's not authoritarian to protect children from parasitic businesses. Child-labor is illegal because at that stage a person has less emotional intelligence and rationality, they can more easily be taken advantage of and overworked, and won't understand their rights as a worker as well. You can't even sign a contract at 14 without a parent or guardian and you want them to be able to act at the whim of fast food managers?
Your argument is hardly one step away from the argument I see people trot out when defending child marriage.
It's already normal and kids want to buy things as much as anyone else. This is incredibly easy to understand.
I don't presume to know why anyone else wants anything for themselves, why do you?
To make it clear that I am answering your question: I do not know.
Can you answer my question? Why do you presume to know what the kid wants?
Like I said, there are separate laws for child abuse. Physical abuse, mental/emotional abuse too. The bases are covered.