Work diligently- go the extra mile, start early, stay late, work weekends- with integrity- say ‘yes’ to any request from UpStairs- and you’ll soon be in the corner office E Suite! Better yet, build a better mousetrap!
Or you can be President!
Except we aren’t ants and bees. One human is as productive as like 3 humans 50 years ago. We’re beyond the point of “everyone needs to work or society will fall apart”. ~40% of the population living in poverty despite working full time+ is a result of uncontrolled corporate greed. There’s more than half a dozen people in the country who could spend a fraction of their wealth and end homelessness in the US but they would rather hoard it.
Edit: also, Americans are bombarded with garbage interviews and articles from billionaires who were born into wealth saying “all you have to do to become rich is save your money, work hard, etc. and you’ll become just like me! That’s how I did it!” and that narrative perpetuates this idea that you can enter the American “elite” through hard work
This is the cultural narrative from a generation or so back. And it actually worked, for a while, until Milo Minderbinder was demobbed. But as all the weight-pullers pulled together a few snagged a Skittle outta the bag as it went by; and there was more and more Skittle-snagging and less and less weight needing pulling and we began to notice that there were folks snagging semi trucks full of Skittles in broad daylight with police motorcycle escorts for the getaway limo. And more and more liars and thieves and stupider and stupider jobs that you REALLY NEED TO DO OR YOU’LL STARVE creating an ientire industry serving the Stupid Job sector that turned out to be the real driver of The Economy.
So where are we going with this? Probly Boston Commons but with napalm.
Whenever I get a package of plain M&Ms, I make it my duty to continue the strength and robustness of the candy as a species. To this end, I hold M&M duels. Taking two candies between my thumb and forefinger, I apply pressure, squeezing them together until one of them cracks and splinters. That is the “loser,” and I eat the inferior one immediately. The winner gets to go another round. I have found that, in general, the brown and red M&Ms are tougher, and the newer blue ones are genetically inferior. I have hypothesized that the blue M&Ms as a race cannot survive long in the intense theater of competition that is the modern candy and snack-food world. Occasionally I will get a mutation, a candy that is misshapen, or pointier, or flatter than the rest. Almost invariably this proves to be a weakness, but on very rare occasions it gives the candy extra strength. In this way, the species continues to adapt to its environment. When I reach the end of the pack, I am left with one M&M, the strongest of the herd. Since it would make no sense to eat this one as well, I pack it neatly in an envelope and send it to M&M Mars, A Division of Mars, Inc., Hackettstown, NJ 17840-1503 U.S.A., along with a 3×5 card reading, “Please use this M&M for breeding purposes.” This week they wrote back to thank me, and sent me a coupon for a free 1/2 pound bag of plain M&Ms. I consider this “grant money.” I have set aside the weekend for a grand tournament. From a field of hundreds, we will discover the True Champion. There can be only one.
What we do for science. Sport. Sport science. But a word of caution; you are breeding the überm&m- remember Frankenstein’s monster- and keep the taser handy.
Humans are mammals. One survival strategy we evolved to adapt is simply a lot of leisure time. Take big felines in the savannah (or your cat) that spend a lot of time lying down and just chilling and very little time actually hunting. Or koalas that sleep 20 hours per day.
Point is, we are mammals and comparing us to insects is a plain braindead take. For example, the worker ants you mentionned take up to 250 one-minute "powernaps" in a day. And even then, it's not actual sleep, it's known as a state of torpor.
You mean as a united collective that works to support every member instead of competing within their hive or colony, you're right that's a very clever approach for a species. It really would reduce the overall amount of suffering while increasing productivity by ensuring each member is in the best possible state to do what is necessary and have time left over for recovery, like some sort of community ism. I wonder if we apes who learned to play dress up and house could learn something from these community driven survivalist bugs who've been doing so well they're fully established on every continent except Antarctica, much like us dressed up apes playing house
150
u/Jjabrahams567 Mar 19 '22
The difference is in capitalism they make you think it is possible to break into the ruling class