The First of May is approaching, dear habrobvchane. Recently, I made it clear to myself how important it is to keep asking ourselves simple questions, even if it seems that we already know the answer.
So what are we celebrating?
For a correct understanding, we need to look at the history of the issue at least from a distance. Even for a superficial, but correct understanding, you need to find the source. I would not like to sound banal, but head-on queries about May 1 are not an effective way of knowing. The correct keywords would be "Riot in the Haymarket".
Briefly the essence. Chicago, May 1, 1886
The working day systematically lasts about 15 hours, wages are low, and there are no social guarantees.
Today, a worker, having become accustomed to modern working conditions as a given, can imagine himself in the place of workers of the 19th century. Such a thought experiment - evaluate the scale of the problem, approaching the personal, and in the presence of a family, the family tragedy of a person who, having freedom, does not have free time and material resources.
Of course, rallies and strikes began. I would not like to copy the text of an already well-written article, so I suggest that those interested follow the link "". There is enough there: a rally, the police, a provocateur, a bomb, shooting, slander and the death penalty for the innocent.
The American press attacked all leftists indiscriminately. Judges and juries were opposed to the defendants, no attempt was made to identify the person who threw the bomb, petitions to hold a trial of each accused separately were rejected. The prosecution line was based on the fact that since the defendants did not take measures to search for a terrorist in their ranks, it means that they were in cahoots with him.
...
Of the defendants, only Fielden and Parsons were ethnically English, all the rest were natives of Germany, of whom only Neebe was born in the United States, and the others were immigrants. This circumstance, as well as the fact that the rally itself and anarchist publications were addressed to German-speaking workers, led to the fact that the American public for the most part ignored what happened and reacted favorably to the ensuing executions, if somewhere there was a revival of the labor movement in support of the defendants, then abroad - in Europe.
In memory of this event, the first Paris Congress of the Second International in July 1889 decided to hold annual demonstrations on May 1. This day was declared an international holiday of all workers.
Sometimes there are opinions that in Russia this holiday was borrowed during the revolutionary period, they say, they themselves cannot come up with anything. I note that, firstly, the “Day of International Solidarity of Workers” cannot be borrowed, you can only join it, and secondly, May Day was celebrated for the first time in the Russian Empire in 1890 in Warsaw by holding a strike of 10 thousand workers.
According to some media estimates, for most Russian citizens this day is just an excuse for entertainment, an additional day off and the beginning of the gardening season. I think that the reason is mainly in insufficient enlightenment in the history of the issue. The social structure, the world has become better, the struggle against oppression has been given in countries around the world at different prices. Definitely, there is something to be grateful for, something to appreciate and cherish.
Commodity - Money - Commodity
"Sell yourself." Have you heard anything similar in an interview? Most likely you are lucky, IT specialists are more adequate in this matter, but when it comes to the vacancy of a sales manager or marketer, this happens. Yes, of course, you should understand the phrase in context: you came for an interview - you sell yourself as an employee, you sell your own labor on the labor market.
However, after the start of self-presentation, the potential employer stops immediately and quickly. No, it's not about self-presentation. The person looks at the reactions of the other person. For what? Take the phrase “sell yourself” out of the context of the interview and draw a conclusion about the compromise behavior of a person in relation to his honesty, morality?
Should we shift the paradigm?
What does "the worker sells himself" mean? Yes, the worker exchanges his labor for money. But exchange is a two-way business.
Does an employee buy an employer with their time? "Employer sell yourself?"
Money is not a universal equivalent. Money is the universal equivalent. This is an intermediate stage of the exchange.
- The employee does not sell himself, but exchanges time and effort FOR money.
- The employer exchanges money FOR the efforts and time of the employee.
They are equal in the process of exchange. The word sell is a variation of the word exchange, in which money is involved. A word coined to designate a particular case can be completely abolished. But it captured the consciousness and design of the thinking of a contemporary. Money did not appear immediately, but a very long time ago. Here are the money exchange formulas known far beyond the economic universities:
Goods/Services <-> Goods/Services = Exchange
Goods/services -> money -> Goods/services = Sale (Exchange through money)
Goods/services -> moneymanaged by an ethical person -> Goods/services = Sale' (Exchange with respect)
And why not shift the paradigm of venality, pleasing to the morally weak (he is not all like that) capital, towards an exchange with respect for the individual and the Man. No, this is absolutely not a call to give up money. Do not misunderstand me. I want workers to not be sold in the future, but to exchange their labor with respect.
If you ever undertake to “chew this semantic bun” for someone, keep the word “exchange” in your head. The concepts of buy/sell are so deep in the mind of a person that you yourself can get confused before the interlocutor understands it.
An interesting fact.
In business correspondence, the signature "Respectfully, Name" has become widespread. Yes, it is possible that partially forgotten truths leave imprints in the form of traditions or customs of conducting “business negotiations”. May 1 is a great occasion to think about their meaning.
With respect to you and your business, I congratulate Habr, readers and authors on May 1.
Source: habr.com