this post was submitted on 01 Aug 2025
464 points (98.3% liked)
People Twitter
7827 readers
797 users here now
People tweeting stuff. We allow tweets from anyone.
RULES:
- Mark NSFW content.
- No doxxing people.
- Must be a pic of the tweet or similar. No direct links to the tweet.
- No bullying or international politcs
- Be excellent to each other.
- Provide an archived link to the tweet (or similar) being shown if it's a major figure or a politician.
founded 2 years ago
MODERATORS
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
view the rest of the comments
“What do you mean you work more hours than us for less in return? Doesn’t your king fear a revolt?”
We get less of a percentage of our work, but certainly get more absolute value.
The gains in efficiency over the last hundred years have been insane. Today's crumbs are better than the whole cookie back then.
No more dirt floors, indoor plumbing, electricity, books, etc.
No, we get more convenience
In exchange for indoor plumbing, we don't have the time to do our chores. In exchange for concrete foundations and plastic floors, the entire world is poisoned and we no longer have community bonds. In exchange for electricity, we lost nature
We work far more than we ever have, and for what? To destroy our bodies and live in anxiety of losing what we have?
What truly matters in life?
I'm not saying it's all bad, but there's a balance. We live in the most exciting times in history - it's so absurdly convenient, but it's also deeply horrible
You also don't have to cobble your own shoes or darn your only pair of socks.
It isn't a serious perspective to say that medieval peasants had it better than anyone in a first world country today.
Genuinely, I think your examples are negatives
I love the act of creation. I love molding the world around me. I would rather fix my shoes and repair my shirts than have shitty, unrepairable clothes made from plastic that just dissolve after a couple years
I think the connection between you and your personal things is good when it's a long relationship of maintenance and restoration. I think it's horrible when it's short and replaceable
Then why don't you? There is literally nothing stopping you from doing that.
Your clothing probably isn't made of plastic. It's probably made of cotton. If you're buying unrepairable clothing that's a choice you made, since I think all of my clothing is repairable and it wasn't purchased with that intention.
I know why I don't spend my time patching holes in my hand made underwear: it would be uncomfortable, and it would take more of my time than a 5 pack of underwear costs.
We didn't invent all this stuff because we're stupid. We invented it because owning one pair of pants for your adult life is just absolutely miserable.
I'm literally wearing a shirt from a decade ago right now. It is made of 100% cotton, and the underarms have ripped recently
Why? Because my more recent clothing dissolved we when I tugged at them gently. Just fucking fell apart, not even at the seams, just tore like paper
So I practice on the plastic bullshit so I can sew up the cotton when I need to
again, that’s a choice you made… you can make your own clothes out of linen and the tools to do it are more available to you because they’re not hand crafted, but you choose not to because you want to save time
heck, you can buy a shirt that’s 5x the price that will last but you choose the cheap shirt so you can have 5 of them
this is the same argument that we don’t build the coliseum any more and therefor we’re not as good at making concrete as ancient romans… modern society is built on engineering, and engineering doesn’t build things that lasts 2000 years that’s true, but that’s not what engineering is for
engineering isn’t about building bridges that don’t fall down: engineering is about building bridges that barely stand up so you can have more of them
the same goes with clothes… modern clothes aren’t made to last your entire life because they’d cost 5x more… people don’t actually want a shirt from their 20s when they’re 70 - people don’t even really want a shirt from their 20s when they’re 30! they want 5 shirts in their 20s and 5 more in their 30s, and they want to be unique and personal and they want to spend no time to acquire them
I actually don't believe you. Like I don't think your shirt fell apart like that, and I don't think you bought a plastic shirt.
Fabric lasting a long time isn't odd. I've got a synthetic fabric gym bag from 20 years ago that's fine. I've got a 10 year old synthetic blend shirt that's never had an issue. I've got cotton shirts in the same range.
Synthetic fibers tend to be more expensive, and are more durable for the fabric weight. It's why they use them for safety equipment.
You're acting like none of us are familiar with clothes. Where are you buying disintegrating shirts, and why ? I've never encountered that and I've been wearing clothing for quite a while. I've only had any type of clothing tear like that if it snags on something like a nail.
Then you can get that with technology. Because where computer stuff is concerned, we're still cobbling our own pi-holes and smart home setups.
I agree. I think personal mastery over your devices is a wonderful thing. Even when ephemeral - if you transfer a concept from device to device, I think that's beautiful