polygoniaJun 16, 2024
Spencer Beswick
Ursula Le Guin: “A child free from the guilt of ownership and the burden of economic competition will grow up with the will to do what needs doing and the capacity for joy in doing it. It is useless work that darkens the heart. The delight of the nursing mother, of the scholar, of the successful hunter, of the good cook, of the skilful maker, of anyone doing needed work and doing it well, - this durable joy is perhaps the deepest source of human affection and of sociality as a whole.”
Jun 16, 2024 at 2:36pmWeb
Show thread𝓼𝓮𝓻𝓪𝓹𝓪𝓽𝓱【ツ】☮(📍🇨🇦)Jun 16, 2024

@spencerbeswick

I feel reminded of David Graebers Book: Bullshit Jobs

Show threadPipfordJun 16, 2024
@serapath @spencerbeswick it's not a coincidence that Graeber was an anarchist and this quote is from the (fictional) words of an anarchist revolutionary in LeGuin's The Dispossessed.
Show threadEric LawtonJun 16, 2024

@anandamide

I'm halfway through rereading it.

@serapath @spencerbeswick

Show threadBytebro 🇬🇧 🇺🇦 🇬🇱Jun 16, 2024
@spencerbeswick Always loved her writing.
Show threadGuyroscopeJun 16, 2024
@spencerbeswick
Unfortunately most people limit their knowledge of UleG's writing to the Earthsea trilogy and it's additions. While these are a good introduction, for a younger reader, the depth and breath of her work is worth investigating.
Show threadVictor GijsbersJun 16, 2024
@Guy @spencerbeswick Having just reread Tehanu, it doesn't seem to me at all pitched towards younger readers? (Frankly, I think the original trilogy is a form of literature to which age categories don't really apply. But the fourth book would be a hard sell to younger readers, being completely about middle age and womanhood.)
Show threadGuyroscopeJun 16, 2024

@victorgijsbers

@spencerbeswick
I agree, they aren't "standard" kids fare but are punted at kids.

Show threadMr. CompletelyJun 16, 2024
@Guy @spencerbeswick I believe she's the single most important author in the development of SFF into a modern art form
Show threadGuyroscopeJun 16, 2024

@mrcompletely

@spencerbeswick

Left hand of darkness....
Spellbinding, bizarre, awesome....

Show threadK2Jun 16, 2024
@spencerbeswick I would add gardening to her list. It brings a connection from the smallest critters to the entire cosmos. Miracles all.
Show threadClimb of the VineJun 16, 2024

@spencerbeswick

William Morris pamphlet on this topic:

“Here, you see, are two kinds of work - one good, the other bad; one not far removed from a blessing, a lightening of life; the other a mere curse, a burden to life. What is the difference between them, then? This: one has hope in it, the other has not.”

(WM, ‘Useful Work vs Useless Toil’:
https://archive.org/details/gri_33125010841183)

Useful work versus useless toil : Morris, William, 1834-1896 : Free Download, Borrow, and Streaming : Internet Archive

Cover title

Internet Archive
Show thread✨buff dog himbo✨Jun 16, 2024
@spencerbeswick i love that research has now completely confirmed this & people still choose to believe that humans need jobs & will simply do nothing at all unless literally extorted under threat of starvation, illness, & total expulsion from society. 🙃
Show thread🌿Mouse-Friend🌿Jun 17, 2024
@itsmeholland @spencerbeswick Meanwhile, that "logic" only apparently applies to the working class. According to the same people making that claim, the only possible way to motivate rich people is by giving them even MORE money, with no strings attached.
Show threadSteve's PlaceJun 16, 2024

@spencerbeswick So, fund them, Ursula. We can provide a list of excellent starving musicians, for starters. Do they not count? The hunter, after all, has a blessed, glorious, more important than human life, gun. Perhaps if musicians all packed heat we'd make a buck after performing for 4 1/2 hours in some bar for drunks requesting the same song over & over, then barfing on our equipment.

Music is all cost, no income. Even artists on canvas do tremendously better, so why not start there?

Werdz.

Show threadJonathan Hartley's old accountJun 19, 2024
@steter @spencerbeswick if you are suggesting that society should provide a source of income to all these people, not necessarily lavish, it can be basic, and perhaps it should extend beyond just musicians and artists, to being universal, then I agree.
Show threadTim Ward ⭐🇪🇺🔶 #FBPEJun 16, 2024
@spencerbeswick Yeah. When I get called by a scammer I ask them "do you feel happy when you wake up in the morning knowing that you are going to have to spend your day trying to scam people?". I don't usually get to the end before they hang up, though.
Show threadCyJun 17, 2024
Huh, that's all delight that I have never felt nor ever shall feel.
Show threadSacha RavendaJun 17, 2024
@spencerbeswick I love Ursula K. Le Guin so much. I still need to read the Dispossessed. It’s been on my list for a while.
Show threadAviva GaryJun 17, 2024
@spencerbeswick truth
Show threadNonya Bidniss 🥥🌴Jun 17, 2024
@spencerbeswick I think @tinker would like this
Show threadTinker ☀️Jun 18, 2024
@Nonya_Bidniss @spencerbeswick - I would.