Marx Schmarx
My church friend (or should I add, NEWLY-MARRIED CHURCH FRIEND WHOO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!) drove me home after a meeting, and for some reason our conversations during the car ride were very intense, even with the occasional attacks we made out of jest.
We talked a lot about jobs and the meanings behind it. The usual “question” came up (refer to blog posts a few posts back) and I mentioned that I was particularly interested in a certain topic in Sociology, but that there’s no place for me in the workforce where I can apply this because the system is fundamentally warped. On the way back we talked about it again and I admitted, “Singapore is not made for people like me. People who love the arts and humanities.” And he agreed.
In one of my lectures, the lecturer asked us if any of us are studying because we like what we study and we simply want to study because we like studying. Not for jobs, not for a better future, etc etc. We went through more theories regarding this and it was then I realised how warped everything is. First the genetic approach when it comes to education, and now about how education and in particular the Singapore education is just a gateway to a mindless job.
I mean that’s what we have equated our lives to guys. Everything boils down to this path of jobs. Just typing this out is overly irksome. And ludicrous. What did my mother go through such pain (overnight in Gleneagles don’t play play) to simply have another human slave to capitalism? I mean isn’t that just some sick sick consequence of Marx who wrote about this and in the end I’m looking at this like some self-fulfiling prophecy?
I mean what if I say I don’t want to work. I refuse to work. I refuse to choose something that I can do but something I’m not particularly interested in, and join the workforce of mechanized, lifeless, cogs. Cogs of the system.
Because this is it guys. If you’re working now, you’ve sold yourself to 40-50 years of slavery to ensuring that rice bowl is darn well provided at the table with a pair of chopsticks and spoon. It boils down to earning dollar bills that can buy you wonders, desires, and almost anything you like. But remember, and burn this in your heart, that if you don’t find your dream job, a job that you’re passionate about and you find meaning in, that there’s no other time in your life to do so. Because its 40-50 years, and after that you’re probably having cancer, handicapped by stroke, or just too tired to move around backpacking, helping kids overseas, etc.
And look at that number. Forty to fifty years is a HELLA long time of your life. If we don’t do something that you enjoy for such a prolonged period, I think it’s better if we simply …. die and corrode. Unless you’re earning for a family.
