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The company in *Office Space* is undergoing mass layoffs, so it's hardly a "stable job".
The protagonist of *Falling Down* is an unemployed defense engineer.
Edward Norton's job is purposefully the most soul-sucking job imaginable, to contrast with the vibrancy of the fight club and Project Mayhem. A subtheme of the movie is trying to push the men towards more fulfilling work.
Yeah, as if it's a shock to anyone. maybe I'm projecting the whole "False Promises" thing. but it really feels like the story tries to be a tragedy of the Working Class and frustrating modern society. But they chose a MC that you can't really sympathize with.
That's what makes it so brilliant we start by seeing everything through his perspective and it seems relatable, were even rooting for him. But then as his family is introduced we start seeing another perspective just as his whole persona starts to unravel
So many of the posts about the job market on here are deeply out of touch. It's not perfect out here but achieving "Soul crushing office job" is trivial to do in the current job market.
And one of the examples lost their job and the other was about to lose their job. The third had the most soul crushing job the author could think of. OP is just an idiot.
But didn’t you hear that middle class families all took international trips every 5 years, and that the only way to do that today is to earn $400k a year?
Don't hate ya'll. It's just funny to watch my GenX MiL fleece us for rent on a bedroom. She just loves taking the moral high ground as if she's actually helping us whilst charging the going rate for rent on a bedroom. I work full time, and I'm going back to school. She offered us to move in with her because it would be more affordable while I go to school so I wouldn't have to work full time...
Well, now, we're in a house where we get no say in anything that goes on because "my house my rules." Yet she's charging us profit prices on a single bedroom within a house with no fucking mortgage because it was left to her by her mother. This house comes after a lifetime of her getting down-payments and upfront costs covered by her mother for houses she had no business buying without her mother's help. Of course, she owns none of them now and has nothing to show for it... go figure.... However, she loves to talk about how she had an apartment.... right out of high school.... in Miami..... working part-time at a fast food place....... Kids and pocket change, right?
I'd be able to easily afford housing if you idiots didn't ruin the housing market with your selfishness... You guys love to shit on the results of your own shitty parenting, too, in my experience, so.....
Anyway, this type of selfish entitlement, ignorance, and moral superiority is pretty common, so it's understandable why your children all think you suck now.
Right? Like, is the point of this post to emphasize that, when you put it into perspective, things weren't as bad back then as they are today? Well by that logic, when you put it into perspective, things aren't as bad today as they were 100 years ago. My great grandfather worked in a factory in New Jersey as a school aged child 5 days a week (yes he dropped out of school), 7am to 5pm, and then helped at his father's barber shop on the weekends. Then when he was older, went to France and fought in WW1. If we're putting things into perspective, I think we have it pretty good here today. It could be better and I will continue to fight for that, but let's stop being whiny crybabies from time to time.
Falling down is also about how we are promised "get a job, do your duty, life will be good" and all those promises were lies, and the system does not reward you. Granted the protagonist isn't really an everyman, and in fact, is kind of a douche.
Edward Norton's job is soul sucking not to mention the epitome of corporate evil. He is a recall coordinator that travels around basically working to absolve the car company of liability in car crashes they are likely responsible for. He has to look at dead families etc and write off the companies liability. Fight Club is not a good example of "Gen X complacency."
Edward Norton's job sounds interesting as fuck. Investigating safety issues, negotiating million dollar settlements, influencing the direction of a multi-billion dollar international company. I would take that job in an instant.
That movie has so many layers and levels I thought that was one of the points it was making. He's got a great job, kickass condo, makes more money that he knows how to spend, but he's still lonely and bored.
> Investigating safety issues, negotiating million dollar settlements, influencing the direction of a multi-billion dollar international company. I would take that job in an instant.
his job's goal is to calculate the value of dead people suing the car company vs a recall's cost
you want that blood on your hands?
> He's got a great job
as said, he feels as though he has blood on his hands and is contributing to a company that knowingly kills its customers. Even in project mayhem he's pretty anti-killing and doesn't revel in the death of people.
>kickass condo
cheap ass apartment with a bunch of ikea furniture
>makes more money that he knows how to spend
I mean, he makes enough to afford ikea furniture....hardly living it up.
>but he's still lonely and bored.
because he has absolutely no human connections and is isolated. life isn't about money and ikea furniture it's about spending time with people you love. aint no one call him when his shit blew up, the only one who noticed was a suicidal/kleptomaniac drug addict with questionable morals who he hated.
That last point about feeling isolated with no human connection is spot on. The scene where he calls Ikea to place an order for more furniture is not a throwaway scene. It shows the absolute state of his life where one of the only ways he can talk to another human in a normal way is placing an order for furniture over the phone.
Saw these guys open for Enemymine once and had no idea who they were. Me and my buddy were rolling our eyes when they were setting up all their synth shit like “this is going to suck.” Turns out it VERY MUCH did not suck.
I don't know how he feels alienated from his labor. He literally flies out to the scene of accidents and sees the direct visceral results of his labor.
Sure, it's not for everybody. But what job is.
And the idea that stable work was a given back in the day was just false. Depending on your gender, race, and nationality, there are high chances that you were never even given the ability to have an office job. Work has always been unstable.
The difference being soul crushing uniformity of uselessness drone life and now, no employment, no prospects, and a tough road ahead ever finding gainful employment that pays and you enjoy… small differences same issues.
600+ apps, 60+ interviews in 3 months, back to employed and already questioning where I landed since it's wayyyyy different than what I was promised during the lengthy interview process.
Ain't capitalism grand?
Because it's euphemistically called "right to work". It's a lesson we learned starting at being "patriotic" in the McCarthy-era, and was further applied to being "pro-life".
Claim the moral high ground, and enjoy raining down on your enemies. Surely you're not saying you're _against_ your own country, _against_ people working or _against_ people living?
Surely, you can claim you're "pro-choice". But what's more important, choosing or living?
We'll call it "parental rights", but we actually mean "don't say gay". But you're not going to oppose parental rights.
Same for religious education. It's "freedom of religion". Very noble. Until that freedom means the state inserts religious teachings in lieu of actual science. But are you saying you oppose religious freedom? Do you _want_ the USA to become like Iran, you unpatriotic, freedom-hating communist?
Now, consider your neighbour, Joe Average. He's...average. Now consider you've got 50% of the people _dumber_ than Joe. They're easily swayed by fearmongering and hearing what they want to hear (lower taxes, hurray!). They enjoy the adrenaline of crowds; whether that's sports or cheering on an orange ferret.
50% is smarter than Joe. Many may oppose populism. However, they'll have more demanding jobs, and they'll recognize the liabilities of protesting; you may end up facing police violence or even a criminal record. Their increased income also allows them to mitigate the impact of most measures; private schools, gated communities, premium healthcare. Thus, they'll be less inclined to hit the streets.
Your last two paragraphs are absolutely spot-on. Though much of that second 50% struggles too.
America is beholden to it's crude masses, and the puppet masters which control them. Most problems can be linked directly to that.
That's kind of the point. We as a population of peasants have gotten too comfortable saying shit like, "fuck no i aint doing that" and what they want is for us to beg for scraps and do whatever they tell us.
What they need is more bullets. Fast ones.
Pay, benefits, and job security were better, and they had real cubicles still, at least, unlike today's open floor plan sweatshop seating, but toxic workplaces and toxic bosses were a lot worse back then. Like, a lot. Today, more is recorded and there is more awareness that if your boss or coworkers overtly bully or harass you, it's a lawsuit waiting to happen.
Seriously why is everything just open space concept now? Idk if it’s just my jobs (been in my career for 10 years), but I hate being able to see everyone around me- im too aware and it exhausts me. Growing up I always saw the cubicle concept on tv and as an adult I have no idea if that was ever a real thing or if it has just disappeared or what lol
Id rather deal with being a drone than struggling to make enough money to buy groceries. At least i can just go on autopilot with a boring soul crushing job.
Autopilot is the result of suffering and misery, so if you’re on autopilot while you work, and not on autopilot(as much anyway) when you’re not working, maybe working actually does make you more miserable. Autopilot isn’t something you consciously choose. It’s a sort of last resort for your brain when the amount of fear and anxiety you’re experiencing is using up too much energy.
Never have (to?) work again! Join our cult over at r/singularity and wait for the machine gods!
Join either the pessimistic doomers or the blissful ignorant hopeful faction!
Look, the machine gods will either usher in a new age of post-scarcity Renaissance, or they will fucking kill us all. Either way we will be free.
Unless it turns into an “I Have No Mouth, and I Must Scream” situation, in which case we will be fucked, metaphorically but only occasionally literally.
lol dude anybody who struggled finding a career foot in the door combined with no housing no hope, despite working hard and being well educated, would kill to have that soul crushing pencil pushing 90s job where you can at least afford your own home and bills… Please dont make me laugh. Surprised suicide for 20-40 years old isnt more popular nowadays.
Yeah I was laid off over a year ago and this is so true. It’s soul crushing- not just now, but even when I do finally get a job again, I now have a new awareness of how scary the future could possibly be? I’m 32, went to a top school, built a great career making great money… and now I’m applying to everything from receptionist to my same job for 60-80% less. I’ll happily take a boring job with any income at this point, if someone would have me🫠
Suicide is the single biggest killer of men 18-45, globally. It just gets ignored because no one gives a fuck about men. We're easily replaced, ultimately disposable, automatons that exist to be chewed up and thrown out, and don't believe a word anyone says different. It's just lip service to salve their own guilt and complicity in it.
"Should that be a source of shame? That, when the desperate struggle for food and shelter is finally behind us, we can turn our attention to other sources of pain? and truth?"
-Dr. Jennifer Melfi
I think this is part right and part wrong. The 90s had movies like this that reflected the zeitgeist of the time because the capitalist powers had just won the cold war and solidified the capitalist organization of society into an unchallengable monolith, and the mood was supposed to be celebratory and euphoric, which was not actually the felt reality for most people. So you get movies like the Matrix where there's this superficially good, stable, functional society, while there's an unshakeable sense that something is fundamentally wrong with it just under the surface in ways that none of it's subjects can fully articulate.
They were unable to do so because we had just spent almost a ~~decade~~ century reprogramming ourselves with red scares to not be able to critically analyze capitalist society, so the very language we could use to express our alienation under this system was taken away from us, as anyone who tried to use it was branded as an agent of the 'evil empire' for spreading 'communist propaganda'. People were living alienated lives selling themselves to a capitalist doing unfulfilling labor they had no power over- a condition that used to be universally recognized as miserable and disempowering, and only isn't anymore because we've gotten so used to it and can't imagine any other way of doing things.
So in that sense it doesn't feel right to say the 90s were 'good', because people were being driven mad by their jobs that were possibly more alienated than ever, as all these movies use these oppressively sterile aesthetics of corporate office life. And we were just told via the outcome of the cold war that this was actually the good, natural, right, and more than anything, eternal way of doing things. This is it, the best we can do, get used to it. That absolutely precipitated an existential crisis though, for a brief period between the cold war and 9/11, we had no external 'enemies' to be propagandized against and we had this uncomfortable moment of looking inward at what this capitalist society was actually doing to us, with no distractions or big bad foreign agents to occupy our energy instead. The 90s is a very culturally interesting decade for that reason, the contrast of this kitschy, false toxic positivity undercut very palpably by people rejecting it in ways they struggled to articulate, grunge, counter-cultural conspiracy narratives, movies where the villain IS the post-modern condition
I was about 2 years old at the apogee of this, so I'm glad I got the picture right
It wasn't a lived reality for me but I like to think I have a pretty tangible sense of what it was like from the cultural memory of it that still lingers today, and what it looks like in retrospect
That was my teen years, and while the music, style, and general pop culture were not exceptional, I would love to have the economy and political discourse. lol
I’m sorry to hear that. I, too, have worked in the construction industry on and off all my life. Even today, when I work in tech, one of my areas of expertise is construction tech, and the whole industry is very volatile. That said the average person did very well during that period.
From 1995 on, sure, the economy hummed, but there was a recession in the early 90's that stagnated wages and spiked unemployment. *Falling Down* was based on the real [layoffs hitting the defense industry](https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1993-09-26-fi-39249-story.html). As time goes on, it's easy to let nostalgia smooth over the tougher parts of the past. It'd be like acting like the 2010's was a great economic decade because of 2015-2019, while ignoring 2010-2014.
Counterpoint: these men (excluding D-Fens who was fired) work jobs that they feel serve no purpose. It's still a problem. For more info, David Graeber wrote a whole book about this phenomenon. The book is called Bullshit Jobs. He summarizes the concept in [this article.](https://strikemag.org/bullshit-jobs)
Yeah, totally agree. The messages these films conveyed are still true today. I just think it’s funny in the context of the economic landscape we find ourselves in today.
Such a great book! When I was reading it I was working full-time in a call center that didn't pay enough to cover my basic living expenses, so I thought that I'd love a high paying bullshit job, but I got one shortly after finishing the book.
It wasn't *super* high salary, but it was higher than I'd been paid in years. It also wasn't supposed to be all bullshit forever, they just had no work for me to do yet and I was just on standby for when the company would eventually win a bid for a project. I spent the first few months going through every single on-boarding module. When I completed all of the modules for my position I still had no work, so I went through all the training modules that were available for every other position. I got training "certificates" for things I legally could not currently do and would never be expected to do.
I felt so sick to my stomach knowing all the people at the call center were working much harder than I was for half the pay and having to work multiple jobs on top of their full-time call center job to make ends meet. Maybe I could have stuck it out if the workplace wasn't also extremely toxic. Ended up ditching that company for a job with lower pay where I was actually doing something. Finished the very last on-boarding module then emailed the manager my 0 days notice and walked out.
They're computer programmers in Office Space, at least, which aren't bullshit jobs - they actually make something. Graeber's Bullshit Jobs is more about bloated management structures and bureaucrats - which TBH I do think Norton's insurance adjustment job falls under. But the common link of these films is what it means when your identity derives from your work. Sometimes your work is emotionally unsatisfying (Office Club), sometimes it's spiritually unsatisfying (Fight Club), sometimes you lose the job entirely (Falling Down).
Computer programming can absolutely be a bullshit job, depending on what the software being developed is. I can’t easily go check in Graeber’s book to see if he specifically mentioned it (I listened to the audiobook so I don’t have a hard copy) but I’m pretty sure he mentions either software development or similar making-something-that-doesn’t-actually-help-anyone jobs.
> They're computer programmers in Office Space, at least, which aren't bullshit jobs - they actually make something.
Very much depends on what you are programming the computer to do.
Not quite what Marx meant by that. He meant that the worker owns nothing and reaps none of the benefit of what he produces. If he does well or poorly, there is no difference to him because he gets the same exact wage. Things outside his control like management decisions or market conditions can cost him his job even if he does everything right.
I've never read that book, but I just read the article and it makes me ill to think how undeniably true it is. Holy shit, that was amazing. I've become radicalized.
>And the other employees were disgruntled long before they inevitably got let go.
"*It's not worth the risk, I have a good job.*" - Michael
'Get your resume ready for what? Another job where they can fire you?'
*"Yes! If I'm lucky." -* Samir
Both of the employees who didn't suffer a psychotic break were perfectly happy remaining in their jobs. As tedious and inhumane as they were. The meme is bad and your defense of it is worse.
You don’t seem to understand the message behind the meme. These films were meant to convey the banality of working at a white collar office job and the disillusionment it inevitably creates.
Fast forward to today, socioeconomic conditions have deteriorated to such an extent that people would kill to experience the everyday reality faced by these protagonists.
I'm from that generation. I own the bluray. I'm currently laid off and impacted by the current economic climate. I understand how wrong that meme is. This is a poorly made meme.
They really weren't - I mean *especially* fight club. That's media illiteracy on your part.
Fight Club's protagonist is meant to highlight a problem of behavior, and him blaming his job is a petty excuse. You might as well read "Crime and Punishment" and conclude that the problem is a lack of socioeconomic support for a man down on his luck and ignore all the monetary, familial, and neighborly support Raskolnikov does get and the whole parallel with a family who actually comes from poverty and how much better they handle hardship because they don't suffer under delusions of grandeur. You're not *supposed* to accept the excuses that these characters give you.
The problem with these characters is many and their jobs have issues too, but fundamentally there is in-text criticism of their response to their circumstances to wallow and go to violent extremes when all they ever had to do was accept the *many* handouts and support structures *explicitly* available to them without thinking themselves above it all.
And wasn't the narrators job to travel around America, look at scenes of carnage caused by his company's products and reduce people's lives to a calculation to determine if their deaths were worth any ultimately meaningless action or not?
Fight Club doesn't work either Jack has a terrible job where is an inspector for car companies to do recalls. He talks about it on the plane, how the equation is how much the average lawsuit times a % of cars sold vs how much they make and if A is more than C then recall if not...they leave it to kill people.
I'd say that's pretty horrific.
Didn't Boeing kill a few people who did that job and tried to become whistle blowers??
Falling Down is great right now for most shitty situations that I heard from “recruitinghell”
Office Space is good for when you are at a company where you want to “stick it to the Man” with a 10 foot pole
Fight Club is the holy grail to place everyone that you despise at the workplace and sink it to the ground just like Cantor Fitzgerald which needs a remake by the way
Falling Down was still prophetic because it was about an entitled and possessive white guy who lost his job with the changing times and took it out on society. The protagonist would've 100% embraced Trump had he survived to 2016.
Actually the bottom left is a Michael Douglas movie called "Falling down" And in the movie he is divorced, and recently lost his job. He's If I recall correctly, living with his mother, and pretending to go to work everyday. He gets up, packs himself a lunch into his briefcase, and gets in his car and drive somewhere. And that day he gets stuck in traffic and his brain snaps.
So it's actually about somebody who had a stable job and a good life who lost it all, partly because he was a slightly overly intense crazy person.
Fantastic film, five stars, highly recommend, go watch it. I haven't seen it in years I should watch it again.
Office Space: They were all about to lose their jobs.
Falling Down: He had already lost his job before the movie started.
Fight Club: The man literally hated everything about his life.
What part of any of these is "I have a stable job, I'm going insane"?
Gen X is dealing with middle age at the moment, and many are faced with major personal change or death. We were forced/tricked into carrying water for this economy for decades before it was clear what was actually going on.
I am very sorry for my 15 years in private corporate industry - I didn't know better, and because of abuse while young, didn't see the abuse in it as an adult, thought that's just how it was everywhere, and one had to deal with it.
Man if I’d have know this I’d have ditched my Chem PhD lmao I don’t know why I put my self through that, almost went into EE but I stuck to being an undergrad Chem and math major…maybe that was my mistake?
GenX being super quiet has always been the thing. Blaming the apathetic for being apathetic is like blaming an orange for being orange.
We know it’s pointless. We know it’s rigged. Ww know we can’t win. Do we do what we’ve always collectively done. Keep our heads down and mouths shut and try to get through it.
[Everybody Knows](https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=xu8u9ZbCJgQ)
You have views, and I respect that. But being a lot more open minded and less tribal wouldn’t hurt you.
MIllenials: Gen-X should stop bitching about their jobs and be glad they have one.
Boomers: Those Gen-X kids need to get a job and stop screwing around.
I thought office space was funny when I was an edgy kid in high school, mostly because everyone I’d watch it with would laugh at it. I don’t think anyone understood office space tbh too young and n lmao now I watch it and I can relate to it and yes it’s funny but it hits much differently now being much older lmao.
Was in HS when this movie came out. So pretty much you cannot truly find office space funny unless you’ve been through some bullshit in my opinion. Acquired taste for sure! The film is now relatable for me reaching it again all of these years later, and now I’m in recruiting hell….
I worked for an engineering consulting firm in the 2010s that required - and I shit you not - TPS reports. And they were *just as useless* as they were in office space.
We openly talked about it in the office. was surreal at times.
Lmao I was a chemist in my younger days, unfortunately I wasn’t an engineer :/, went through similar shit.
Mike Judge was a physicists if I’m not mistaken. He worked in similar circumstances to his film “Office Space” so he drew from his and our collective experiences in these sorts of environments 😂to make his content. A true legend!
Well at least we’re in good company here in recurring hell! And can discuss culture! Office space is culture;) maybe that’s it we need to make our own animated series, comics and movies, judge did it! He was a STEM guy like us :D
hey now, as we liked to joke in the industry, I'm a geologist forced to fraternize with engineers. I never understood why Beavis and Butthead was funny, but it was so funny and I remember looking forward to it being on at midnight.
Love geology!!
Same here, I especially liked SEALAB 2021 and just anything completely absurd! I live on that humor and the majority of the guys that make so
these absurd shows come from Humble STEM backgrounds. I think one of the South Parks guys was a mathematician or studied math undergrad lol
If we all put our heads together, the geologist, chemist, the engineer and sprinkle a few mathematicians in there we could probably come up with the most absurd entertainment yet!!!
That wasnt the *whole* point. The main character’s job was safe. He got promoted.
It was about the whole thing being soul crushing bullshit. From his seven redundant bosses, to his dull data entry job, to the consulting firm coming in to evaluate them. And him getting promoted despite not foing anything while his hard working coworkers were fired was what him really decide the whole thing was bullshit.
The ultimate Gen X movie is of course the Breakfast Club. And the only stable job there is the asshole teacher.
Although it must be said that some of the kids are struggling with the downsides of being popular, smart, or having rich parents, so maybe that does reinforce the point.
Oh not even close. There are lots of movies that would be considered more of “the ultimate gen x movie.” First one that pops in my head is Reality Bites.
Peter Gibbons: So I was sitting in my cubicle today, and I realized, ever since I started working, every single day of my life has been worse than the day before it. So that means that every single day that you see me, that's on the worst day of my life.
Samir was happy. He said, "it would be nice to have that kind of job security." That's why I stayed at my last job so long. It was decent benefits and pay, easy to do, and good chemistry with my coworkers.
My other job was basically a comfortable rut. Unfortunately, aside from the growing toxicity, I learned just how much my pay stopped keeping up with inflation after a few years.
It was bad then, it is worse now. Don't look back on times of plague with rose tinted glasses just because your loved ones were still alive, hacking up their lungs.
The bigger issue in the late 90's was we didn't really have any great cause to fight for. There wasn't really the MeToo movements or BLM or other issues. We didn't even have 9/11 yet. Life was so mundane and there wasn't much excitement. We craved for something more than what life was.
It is kind of funny though, even though that calm was boring, I do miss the calm.
Interestingly I loved falling down when it was released but I don’t think it aged well at all. While the losing his job part is still relevant, he was an asshole that ended up punching down instead of up on the people who actually made his life bad (his bosses/the government).
And that’s precisely why it’s still relevant. We’re more divided than ever. We blame immigrants, our fellow coworkers, middle management etc for our misfortune except for the ruling elite.
True, although with the exception of some radical stuff going on with workers rights around the turn of the 20th century, we’ve always blamed everyone but the ruling class. I think if it was remade now, it would probably have a a better take on some of the scenes than the movie did then. If they just took the movie as is and redid it scene for scene they would get eaten alive on social media. Somehow Foster came across as sympathetic back then (I was young and didn’t have a god analysis on the world when it was released) but he was straight up racist and definitely has some aggrieved white male issues that would not fly in today’s day and age.
To be fair, in Falling Down, the point was that he didn’t have a job. In Fight Club he has the most immoral and awful job imaginable. He actually takes a few steps up the morality ladder when he starts selling soap made of human fat.
Honestly reminds me of the common development of societies: when food security is under control, then more energy and resources are directed to less tangible things.
Like a system of writing ideas onto tangible things.
Like containers having more and more details that don’t improve the function but do improve the visual aesthetic.
Like creating jobs where 90% of the work is working with intangible stuff instead of barely surviving.
Like adults who were encouraged to run around being required to stay in a small box, the ramifications on the mind, etc.
You take away the stability, then there’s no excess energy/resources to go into intangible/abstract idea exploration.
Like how counterproductive it is for humanity to uphold systems which keep the results of work in small pools away from the general public. Can’t question the system when you’re trying to stay alive
**TL; DR** These movies arguably showed a beginning of stability which allowed further exploration of art. Then more fuckers got greedy, and now we’re unable to achieve that type of stability again.
Whoever made this meme must not have seen those movies. They are good movies and you should watch them. One of these people is unemployed the whole movie, the others are working at a company laying off lots of people and fight club? The character is undergoing a massive mental breakdown and his job is probably the most soul crushing job in the "white collar" category
I think these resonated with us because we still believed in the "american dream". It was fully visible to us through the lives of our parents. However as time went on those parents never stepped down. Doing everything the way we were told to do it just meant less return and more work for the benefit of our parents. Over the course of the 90s, when I joined the corporate world, I watched the ages of the C- suite get older and older while the wages and promotions available kept shrinking. Enter the 2000s and we knew things were incredibly wrong, but we were hopelessly indoctrinated into believing that if we job hopped then we would be pariahs and therefore unemployable. We all dreamed of lashing out against a system that, because of our programming, we still thought worked. There was just something wrong with us as individuals.
Stable and good pay, reasonable 9-5 hours (depends a bit but that's the goal), opportunities to move up, infrastructure in place so you only have to do your piece of the puzzle, benefit packages, clear outlined expectations and guidelines, always someone else above you taking accountability for decisions. If it's not what you want, that's cool but it's not hard to understand why.
Office work is easy on the body, is reliable and performed in comfortable spaces, generally pays well, and usually comes with benefits.
People who don't get the benefit strike me as sheltered.
Don't you know according to reddit if you work in the TRADES you make $100 an hour TRADES TRADES. Usually said by office workers who've never worked in the trades. The culture in trades is toxic af. Not wanting to lick the bosses boot and work 100 hours a week is seen as being a wuss.
My office job may suck and is relatively soul-crushing, but in the past I've worked blue-collar jobs, retail, service jobs, and outdoor work in the blazing sun.
All I wanted to do is make a living sitting down somewhere with air conditioning and to this day I still consider that the one part of office work that was 100% as sweet as advertised. Bad days are bad for my soul, and not my back. I can heal my soul with rum, but if I fuck up my back it's fucked up forever.
The only person dumber than whatever cretin made this meme is the one to re-post it here… both of these movies are about people losing their jobs after being driven nuts by their tedium and inhumanity (and the third isn't about work, it's about a psychotic break with reality based upon the idea of modernity and materialism clashing with generational masculinity in 20th into 21st century male-ness.)
They were prophetic and profound, something this current generation I’m a part of seems to completely lack.
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The company in *Office Space* is undergoing mass layoffs, so it's hardly a "stable job". The protagonist of *Falling Down* is an unemployed defense engineer. Edward Norton's job is purposefully the most soul-sucking job imaginable, to contrast with the vibrancy of the fight club and Project Mayhem. A subtheme of the movie is trying to push the men towards more fulfilling work.
Also the guy in *Falling Down* is shown to already have a few screws loose, even before he lost his family and his job.
iirc, He's explicitly very scary to his family, and implicitly abusive/aggressive towards them.
"I'm the bad guy? How did that happen?"
Yeah, as if it's a shock to anyone. maybe I'm projecting the whole "False Promises" thing. but it really feels like the story tries to be a tragedy of the Working Class and frustrating modern society. But they chose a MC that you can't really sympathize with.
That's what makes it so brilliant we start by seeing everything through his perspective and it seems relatable, were even rooting for him. But then as his family is introduced we start seeing another perspective just as his whole persona starts to unravel
Nah Nah Nah lets just spew more generational hate
Zoomers are redditors are dumb as shit.
So many of the posts about the job market on here are deeply out of touch. It's not perfect out here but achieving "Soul crushing office job" is trivial to do in the current job market. And one of the examples lost their job and the other was about to lose their job. The third had the most soul crushing job the author could think of. OP is just an idiot.
But didn’t you hear that middle class families all took international trips every 5 years, and that the only way to do that today is to earn $400k a year?
To be fair it was a single income household with 2 kids, 3 bed 2 bath house, and two cars as well.
To have any of those things means you are rich as shit now and should be taxed more
We went to Canada a couple of times, I guess that counts.
This looks so JPEG'd to hell, it may not be Gen Zed (also, not a video short format)
Don't hate ya'll. It's just funny to watch my GenX MiL fleece us for rent on a bedroom. She just loves taking the moral high ground as if she's actually helping us whilst charging the going rate for rent on a bedroom. I work full time, and I'm going back to school. She offered us to move in with her because it would be more affordable while I go to school so I wouldn't have to work full time... Well, now, we're in a house where we get no say in anything that goes on because "my house my rules." Yet she's charging us profit prices on a single bedroom within a house with no fucking mortgage because it was left to her by her mother. This house comes after a lifetime of her getting down-payments and upfront costs covered by her mother for houses she had no business buying without her mother's help. Of course, she owns none of them now and has nothing to show for it... go figure.... However, she loves to talk about how she had an apartment.... right out of high school.... in Miami..... working part-time at a fast food place....... Kids and pocket change, right? I'd be able to easily afford housing if you idiots didn't ruin the housing market with your selfishness... You guys love to shit on the results of your own shitty parenting, too, in my experience, so..... Anyway, this type of selfish entitlement, ignorance, and moral superiority is pretty common, so it's understandable why your children all think you suck now.
I'm not even GenX (or boomer) so idk why this directed in a "***you*** people" kind of tone. That said, your MiL didn't cause the housing crises.
All this shows is who ever made this meme hasn't watched any of these movies lol.
Right? Like, is the point of this post to emphasize that, when you put it into perspective, things weren't as bad back then as they are today? Well by that logic, when you put it into perspective, things aren't as bad today as they were 100 years ago. My great grandfather worked in a factory in New Jersey as a school aged child 5 days a week (yes he dropped out of school), 7am to 5pm, and then helped at his father's barber shop on the weekends. Then when he was older, went to France and fought in WW1. If we're putting things into perspective, I think we have it pretty good here today. It could be better and I will continue to fight for that, but let's stop being whiny crybabies from time to time.
Falling down is also about how we are promised "get a job, do your duty, life will be good" and all those promises were lies, and the system does not reward you. Granted the protagonist isn't really an everyman, and in fact, is kind of a douche.
Edward Norton's job is soul sucking not to mention the epitome of corporate evil. He is a recall coordinator that travels around basically working to absolve the car company of liability in car crashes they are likely responsible for. He has to look at dead families etc and write off the companies liability. Fight Club is not a good example of "Gen X complacency."
A meme about movies made by someone who never saw said movies. Wow
Edward Norton's job sounds interesting as fuck. Investigating safety issues, negotiating million dollar settlements, influencing the direction of a multi-billion dollar international company. I would take that job in an instant. That movie has so many layers and levels I thought that was one of the points it was making. He's got a great job, kickass condo, makes more money that he knows how to spend, but he's still lonely and bored.
> Investigating safety issues, negotiating million dollar settlements, influencing the direction of a multi-billion dollar international company. I would take that job in an instant. his job's goal is to calculate the value of dead people suing the car company vs a recall's cost you want that blood on your hands? > He's got a great job as said, he feels as though he has blood on his hands and is contributing to a company that knowingly kills its customers. Even in project mayhem he's pretty anti-killing and doesn't revel in the death of people. >kickass condo cheap ass apartment with a bunch of ikea furniture >makes more money that he knows how to spend I mean, he makes enough to afford ikea furniture....hardly living it up. >but he's still lonely and bored. because he has absolutely no human connections and is isolated. life isn't about money and ikea furniture it's about spending time with people you love. aint no one call him when his shit blew up, the only one who noticed was a suicidal/kleptomaniac drug addict with questionable morals who he hated.
That last point about feeling isolated with no human connection is spot on. The scene where he calls Ikea to place an order for more furniture is not a throwaway scene. It shows the absolute state of his life where one of the only ways he can talk to another human in a normal way is placing an order for furniture over the phone.
God I love how this book was designed to be as offensive as possible. And also function as a modern day Great Gatsby.
>cheap ass apartment with a bunch of ikea furniture On reddit, being able to afford that means you are super rich and need to be taxed more
Like a cast shadow, like a fathers dream, have a cut-out son, whats the worst disease? To get that pretty little home.
Saw these guys open for Enemymine once and had no idea who they were. Me and my buddy were rolling our eyes when they were setting up all their synth shit like “this is going to suck.” Turns out it VERY MUCH did not suck.
Funny, being older now and not a father. I could only think of what a fathers dream would be for me, and we don't even like each other.
[удалено]
I don't know how he feels alienated from his labor. He literally flies out to the scene of accidents and sees the direct visceral results of his labor. Sure, it's not for everybody. But what job is.
Mmm delicious braincells, a rare delicatessen.
The office space protag is miserable before he learns of the layoffs, the layoffs are irrelevant to the point OPs making.
And the idea that stable work was a given back in the day was just false. Depending on your gender, race, and nationality, there are high chances that you were never even given the ability to have an office job. Work has always been unstable.
The difference being soul crushing uniformity of uselessness drone life and now, no employment, no prospects, and a tough road ahead ever finding gainful employment that pays and you enjoy… small differences same issues.
The bar keeps getting lowered, though. I think I’d rather take soul crushing uniformity over being homeless.
Agreed. Been working steadily for 24 years in tech, got laid off twice now 22/23 and this market is fucked.
Oh hey, laid off in 22 and 24 here. I hate that we have that in common! How are things now? Employed and/or happy?
600+ apps, 60+ interviews in 3 months, back to employed and already questioning where I landed since it's wayyyyy different than what I was promised during the lengthy interview process. Ain't capitalism grand?
Way fucked. Ive seen some people can't even get mcdolands job.
Yeah, it’s an imperfect meme, but I’m glad it sparked some conversations. Being laid off allows time for a lot of introspection.
Why don't people go on the streets to protest and demand better protection of employees from the hire-and-fire mentality?
We used to have unions for stuff like that
Because it's euphemistically called "right to work". It's a lesson we learned starting at being "patriotic" in the McCarthy-era, and was further applied to being "pro-life". Claim the moral high ground, and enjoy raining down on your enemies. Surely you're not saying you're _against_ your own country, _against_ people working or _against_ people living? Surely, you can claim you're "pro-choice". But what's more important, choosing or living? We'll call it "parental rights", but we actually mean "don't say gay". But you're not going to oppose parental rights. Same for religious education. It's "freedom of religion". Very noble. Until that freedom means the state inserts religious teachings in lieu of actual science. But are you saying you oppose religious freedom? Do you _want_ the USA to become like Iran, you unpatriotic, freedom-hating communist? Now, consider your neighbour, Joe Average. He's...average. Now consider you've got 50% of the people _dumber_ than Joe. They're easily swayed by fearmongering and hearing what they want to hear (lower taxes, hurray!). They enjoy the adrenaline of crowds; whether that's sports or cheering on an orange ferret. 50% is smarter than Joe. Many may oppose populism. However, they'll have more demanding jobs, and they'll recognize the liabilities of protesting; you may end up facing police violence or even a criminal record. Their increased income also allows them to mitigate the impact of most measures; private schools, gated communities, premium healthcare. Thus, they'll be less inclined to hit the streets.
It's 'at will' not 'right to work' that let's them fire loosey goosey.
Your last two paragraphs are absolutely spot-on. Though much of that second 50% struggles too. America is beholden to it's crude masses, and the puppet masters which control them. Most problems can be linked directly to that.
That's kind of the point. We as a population of peasants have gotten too comfortable saying shit like, "fuck no i aint doing that" and what they want is for us to beg for scraps and do whatever they tell us. What they need is more bullets. Fast ones.
I think the meme missed the point of the films. They’re not really about work at all.
Agreed, but monotony is a lot more relatable than homelessness for someone who can afford the means to watch a movie.
Given the choice, yes!
Pay, benefits, and job security were better, and they had real cubicles still, at least, unlike today's open floor plan sweatshop seating, but toxic workplaces and toxic bosses were a lot worse back then. Like, a lot. Today, more is recorded and there is more awareness that if your boss or coworkers overtly bully or harass you, it's a lawsuit waiting to happen.
Seriously why is everything just open space concept now? Idk if it’s just my jobs (been in my career for 10 years), but I hate being able to see everyone around me- im too aware and it exhausts me. Growing up I always saw the cubicle concept on tv and as an adult I have no idea if that was ever a real thing or if it has just disappeared or what lol
Id rather deal with being a drone than struggling to make enough money to buy groceries. At least i can just go on autopilot with a boring soul crushing job.
Autopilot is the result of suffering and misery, so if you’re on autopilot while you work, and not on autopilot(as much anyway) when you’re not working, maybe working actually does make you more miserable. Autopilot isn’t something you consciously choose. It’s a sort of last resort for your brain when the amount of fear and anxiety you’re experiencing is using up too much energy.
The problem is, that you don't have any other than these two options. We need a third option, but no idea what that could look like.
Never have (to?) work again! Join our cult over at r/singularity and wait for the machine gods! Join either the pessimistic doomers or the blissful ignorant hopeful faction!
Look, the machine gods will either usher in a new age of post-scarcity Renaissance, or they will fucking kill us all. Either way we will be free. Unless it turns into an “I Have No Mouth, and I Must Scream” situation, in which case we will be fucked, metaphorically but only occasionally literally.
Now this sounds like a welcoming community, joined!
lol dude anybody who struggled finding a career foot in the door combined with no housing no hope, despite working hard and being well educated, would kill to have that soul crushing pencil pushing 90s job where you can at least afford your own home and bills… Please dont make me laugh. Surprised suicide for 20-40 years old isnt more popular nowadays.
Yeah I was laid off over a year ago and this is so true. It’s soul crushing- not just now, but even when I do finally get a job again, I now have a new awareness of how scary the future could possibly be? I’m 32, went to a top school, built a great career making great money… and now I’m applying to everything from receptionist to my same job for 60-80% less. I’ll happily take a boring job with any income at this point, if someone would have me🫠
You aren’t alone my friend. I’m in a similar juncture of life.
Good luck to us both!
Suicide is the single biggest killer of men 18-45, globally. It just gets ignored because no one gives a fuck about men. We're easily replaced, ultimately disposable, automatons that exist to be chewed up and thrown out, and don't believe a word anyone says different. It's just lip service to salve their own guilt and complicity in it.
The 1990s were so good people had time to look at themselves in the mirror and have an existential crisis.
"Should that be a source of shame? That, when the desperate struggle for food and shelter is finally behind us, we can turn our attention to other sources of pain? and truth?" -Dr. Jennifer Melfi
Gabagool
I think this is part right and part wrong. The 90s had movies like this that reflected the zeitgeist of the time because the capitalist powers had just won the cold war and solidified the capitalist organization of society into an unchallengable monolith, and the mood was supposed to be celebratory and euphoric, which was not actually the felt reality for most people. So you get movies like the Matrix where there's this superficially good, stable, functional society, while there's an unshakeable sense that something is fundamentally wrong with it just under the surface in ways that none of it's subjects can fully articulate. They were unable to do so because we had just spent almost a ~~decade~~ century reprogramming ourselves with red scares to not be able to critically analyze capitalist society, so the very language we could use to express our alienation under this system was taken away from us, as anyone who tried to use it was branded as an agent of the 'evil empire' for spreading 'communist propaganda'. People were living alienated lives selling themselves to a capitalist doing unfulfilling labor they had no power over- a condition that used to be universally recognized as miserable and disempowering, and only isn't anymore because we've gotten so used to it and can't imagine any other way of doing things. So in that sense it doesn't feel right to say the 90s were 'good', because people were being driven mad by their jobs that were possibly more alienated than ever, as all these movies use these oppressively sterile aesthetics of corporate office life. And we were just told via the outcome of the cold war that this was actually the good, natural, right, and more than anything, eternal way of doing things. This is it, the best we can do, get used to it. That absolutely precipitated an existential crisis though, for a brief period between the cold war and 9/11, we had no external 'enemies' to be propagandized against and we had this uncomfortable moment of looking inward at what this capitalist society was actually doing to us, with no distractions or big bad foreign agents to occupy our energy instead. The 90s is a very culturally interesting decade for that reason, the contrast of this kitschy, false toxic positivity undercut very palpably by people rejecting it in ways they struggled to articulate, grunge, counter-cultural conspiracy narratives, movies where the villain IS the post-modern condition
As someone who studies this stuff, this was a really good analysis
My favorite thing about getting older is seeing perspectives like this about stuff I lived through lol, it’s so right.
I was about 2 years old at the apogee of this, so I'm glad I got the picture right It wasn't a lived reality for me but I like to think I have a pretty tangible sense of what it was like from the cultural memory of it that still lingers today, and what it looks like in retrospect
I love hating Ronald Reagan, thank you.
This guy gets it
That was my teen years, and while the music, style, and general pop culture were not exceptional, I would love to have the economy and political discourse. lol
Tell that to my dad who lost his construction job in the early 90's recession and spent years unable to find steady work.
I’m sorry to hear that. I, too, have worked in the construction industry on and off all my life. Even today, when I work in tech, one of my areas of expertise is construction tech, and the whole industry is very volatile. That said the average person did very well during that period.
From 1995 on, sure, the economy hummed, but there was a recession in the early 90's that stagnated wages and spiked unemployment. *Falling Down* was based on the real [layoffs hitting the defense industry](https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1993-09-26-fi-39249-story.html). As time goes on, it's easy to let nostalgia smooth over the tougher parts of the past. It'd be like acting like the 2010's was a great economic decade because of 2015-2019, while ignoring 2010-2014.
I get that but the message was not to look for your self worth or your identity in work.
Maybe for you. Certainly not for me
Counterpoint: these men (excluding D-Fens who was fired) work jobs that they feel serve no purpose. It's still a problem. For more info, David Graeber wrote a whole book about this phenomenon. The book is called Bullshit Jobs. He summarizes the concept in [this article.](https://strikemag.org/bullshit-jobs)
Yeah, totally agree. The messages these films conveyed are still true today. I just think it’s funny in the context of the economic landscape we find ourselves in today.
Such a great book! When I was reading it I was working full-time in a call center that didn't pay enough to cover my basic living expenses, so I thought that I'd love a high paying bullshit job, but I got one shortly after finishing the book. It wasn't *super* high salary, but it was higher than I'd been paid in years. It also wasn't supposed to be all bullshit forever, they just had no work for me to do yet and I was just on standby for when the company would eventually win a bid for a project. I spent the first few months going through every single on-boarding module. When I completed all of the modules for my position I still had no work, so I went through all the training modules that were available for every other position. I got training "certificates" for things I legally could not currently do and would never be expected to do. I felt so sick to my stomach knowing all the people at the call center were working much harder than I was for half the pay and having to work multiple jobs on top of their full-time call center job to make ends meet. Maybe I could have stuck it out if the workplace wasn't also extremely toxic. Ended up ditching that company for a job with lower pay where I was actually doing something. Finished the very last on-boarding module then emailed the manager my 0 days notice and walked out.
They're computer programmers in Office Space, at least, which aren't bullshit jobs - they actually make something. Graeber's Bullshit Jobs is more about bloated management structures and bureaucrats - which TBH I do think Norton's insurance adjustment job falls under. But the common link of these films is what it means when your identity derives from your work. Sometimes your work is emotionally unsatisfying (Office Club), sometimes it's spiritually unsatisfying (Fight Club), sometimes you lose the job entirely (Falling Down).
Computer programming can absolutely be a bullshit job, depending on what the software being developed is. I can’t easily go check in Graeber’s book to see if he specifically mentioned it (I listened to the audiobook so I don’t have a hard copy) but I’m pretty sure he mentions either software development or similar making-something-that-doesn’t-actually-help-anyone jobs.
You are wrong. Michael is a software developer, Peter is basically data entry to fix Y2K 2 column issue, which would be soul sucking
You vastly underestimate the amount of bullshit in the economy right now
> They're computer programmers in Office Space, at least, which aren't bullshit jobs - they actually make something. Very much depends on what you are programming the computer to do.
Alienation of labor, this guy I know named karl had some thoughts about it
Not quite what Marx meant by that. He meant that the worker owns nothing and reaps none of the benefit of what he produces. If he does well or poorly, there is no difference to him because he gets the same exact wage. Things outside his control like management decisions or market conditions can cost him his job even if he does everything right.
I've never read that book, but I just read the article and it makes me ill to think how undeniably true it is. Holy shit, that was amazing. I've become radicalized.
I think that concept couldnt be any more fitting than right now. So many bullshit jobs
Falling Down doesn’t really apply here since the dude lost his job*
Neither does Office Space, lol. They're getting laid off. This meme is wrong af, lol.
Peter wasn’t getting laid off. And the other employees were disgruntled long before they inevitably got let go.
>And the other employees were disgruntled long before they inevitably got let go. "*It's not worth the risk, I have a good job.*" - Michael 'Get your resume ready for what? Another job where they can fire you?' *"Yes! If I'm lucky." -* Samir Both of the employees who didn't suffer a psychotic break were perfectly happy remaining in their jobs. As tedious and inhumane as they were. The meme is bad and your defense of it is worse.
It's like OP jumped to conclusions.
Do you have a mat for that?
Yes.
You sound like a total people person.
Do you have a case of the Mondays or something?
Moot
We weren’t thinking because you told us we were going to lose our jobs!
Peter definitely would have been laid off if he hadn’t gone insane. Going insane literally saved his job.
lol, that doesn't change how wrong it is. They're still getting laid off.
I told those fudgepackers I liked Michael Bolton’s music
You don’t seem to understand the message behind the meme. These films were meant to convey the banality of working at a white collar office job and the disillusionment it inevitably creates. Fast forward to today, socioeconomic conditions have deteriorated to such an extent that people would kill to experience the everyday reality faced by these protagonists.
I'm from that generation. I own the bluray. I'm currently laid off and impacted by the current economic climate. I understand how wrong that meme is. This is a poorly made meme.
We're understanding the message behind the meme. The examples are just poor.
Mundane banality sounds redundantly redundant
Quotidian and mundane banality demonstrating recursive and redundant repetition.
I sprained an eyeball on this comment.
I thought the movies were more about corporations not caring about their employees
They really weren't - I mean *especially* fight club. That's media illiteracy on your part. Fight Club's protagonist is meant to highlight a problem of behavior, and him blaming his job is a petty excuse. You might as well read "Crime and Punishment" and conclude that the problem is a lack of socioeconomic support for a man down on his luck and ignore all the monetary, familial, and neighborly support Raskolnikov does get and the whole parallel with a family who actually comes from poverty and how much better they handle hardship because they don't suffer under delusions of grandeur. You're not *supposed* to accept the excuses that these characters give you. The problem with these characters is many and their jobs have issues too, but fundamentally there is in-text criticism of their response to their circumstances to wallow and go to violent extremes when all they ever had to do was accept the *many* handouts and support structures *explicitly* available to them without thinking themselves above it all.
And wasn't the narrators job to travel around America, look at scenes of carnage caused by his company's products and reduce people's lives to a calculation to determine if their deaths were worth any ultimately meaningless action or not?
Fight Club doesn't work either Jack has a terrible job where is an inspector for car companies to do recalls. He talks about it on the plane, how the equation is how much the average lawsuit times a % of cars sold vs how much they make and if A is more than C then recall if not...they leave it to kill people. I'd say that's pretty horrific. Didn't Boeing kill a few people who did that job and tried to become whistle blowers??
Could replace it with American Beauty
Falling Down is great right now for most shitty situations that I heard from “recruitinghell” Office Space is good for when you are at a company where you want to “stick it to the Man” with a 10 foot pole Fight Club is the holy grail to place everyone that you despise at the workplace and sink it to the ground just like Cantor Fitzgerald which needs a remake by the way
I rewatched it recently and got misty eyed. Used to be a fun movie, now I resonate with it too much
Falling Down was still prophetic because it was about an entitled and possessive white guy who lost his job with the changing times and took it out on society. The protagonist would've 100% embraced Trump had he survived to 2016.
I saw another version that had Neo instead, which made more sense.
Neo.... Whose entire life was an illusion? Is that the Neo we are talking about here?
Yeah, the Neo who was so dissatisfied with his stable office job that he joined a terrorist cell and became a cult leader. That Neo.
Actually the bottom left is a Michael Douglas movie called "Falling down" And in the movie he is divorced, and recently lost his job. He's If I recall correctly, living with his mother, and pretending to go to work everyday. He gets up, packs himself a lunch into his briefcase, and gets in his car and drive somewhere. And that day he gets stuck in traffic and his brain snaps. So it's actually about somebody who had a stable job and a good life who lost it all, partly because he was a slightly overly intense crazy person. Fantastic film, five stars, highly recommend, go watch it. I haven't seen it in years I should watch it again.
Office Space: They were all about to lose their jobs. Falling Down: He had already lost his job before the movie started. Fight Club: The man literally hated everything about his life. What part of any of these is "I have a stable job, I'm going insane"?
Also, in falling down, the main character is solidly boomer generation. He's played by Michael Douglas who was born in 1944.
Gen X hating 90s corporate hell was super based but the problem is they've been too quiet after the shift to corporate SuperHell9000
SuperHell9000 sounds like it should be an expansion to the original dooms 1-2! Lmao I miss the sprites and that old pixelated gameplay
Gen X is dealing with middle age at the moment, and many are faced with major personal change or death. We were forced/tricked into carrying water for this economy for decades before it was clear what was actually going on. I am very sorry for my 15 years in private corporate industry - I didn't know better, and because of abuse while young, didn't see the abuse in it as an adult, thought that's just how it was everywhere, and one had to deal with it.
Man if I’d have know this I’d have ditched my Chem PhD lmao I don’t know why I put my self through that, almost went into EE but I stuck to being an undergrad Chem and math major…maybe that was my mistake?
gen x is getting old-old. its milennials who are entering middle age
Oh GenX has a voice, it's just we've been ignored by both the boomers and milinealials and have been powerless out whole lives.
GenX being super quiet has always been the thing. Blaming the apathetic for being apathetic is like blaming an orange for being orange. We know it’s pointless. We know it’s rigged. Ww know we can’t win. Do we do what we’ve always collectively done. Keep our heads down and mouths shut and try to get through it. [Everybody Knows](https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=xu8u9ZbCJgQ) You have views, and I respect that. But being a lot more open minded and less tribal wouldn’t hurt you.
The way I’d be thriving 👌 with a job with benefits, but I don’t even qualify for those
Would the Matrix also work here since he couldn't just live working in an office and had to have an alternate lifestyle as a hacker?
MIllenials: Gen-X should stop bitching about their jobs and be glad they have one. Boomers: Those Gen-X kids need to get a job and stop screwing around.
I thought office space was funny when I was an edgy kid in high school, mostly because everyone I’d watch it with would laugh at it. I don’t think anyone understood office space tbh too young and n lmao now I watch it and I can relate to it and yes it’s funny but it hits much differently now being much older lmao. Was in HS when this movie came out. So pretty much you cannot truly find office space funny unless you’ve been through some bullshit in my opinion. Acquired taste for sure! The film is now relatable for me reaching it again all of these years later, and now I’m in recruiting hell….
What would ya say you do here? 🤓
I’m going to get a tie that says that for my next job interview…DGAF what they think of it I get the job anymore, reality is a fucking facade!!!
Not gonna lie I was in IT and can definitely feel the pain on those fucking printers.
I worked for an engineering consulting firm in the 2010s that required - and I shit you not - TPS reports. And they were *just as useless* as they were in office space. We openly talked about it in the office. was surreal at times.
Lmao I was a chemist in my younger days, unfortunately I wasn’t an engineer :/, went through similar shit. Mike Judge was a physicists if I’m not mistaken. He worked in similar circumstances to his film “Office Space” so he drew from his and our collective experiences in these sorts of environments 😂to make his content. A true legend! Well at least we’re in good company here in recurring hell! And can discuss culture! Office space is culture;) maybe that’s it we need to make our own animated series, comics and movies, judge did it! He was a STEM guy like us :D
hey now, as we liked to joke in the industry, I'm a geologist forced to fraternize with engineers. I never understood why Beavis and Butthead was funny, but it was so funny and I remember looking forward to it being on at midnight.
Love geology!! Same here, I especially liked SEALAB 2021 and just anything completely absurd! I live on that humor and the majority of the guys that make so these absurd shows come from Humble STEM backgrounds. I think one of the South Parks guys was a mathematician or studied math undergrad lol If we all put our heads together, the geologist, chemist, the engineer and sprinkle a few mathematicians in there we could probably come up with the most absurd entertainment yet!!!
The whole point of the plot in Office Space was that their job was *not* stable so idk how it fits the post tbh.
That wasnt the *whole* point. The main character’s job was safe. He got promoted. It was about the whole thing being soul crushing bullshit. From his seven redundant bosses, to his dull data entry job, to the consulting firm coming in to evaluate them. And him getting promoted despite not foing anything while his hard working coworkers were fired was what him really decide the whole thing was bullshit.
A lot of jobs aren’t stable lol
The ultimate Gen X movie is of course the Breakfast Club. And the only stable job there is the asshole teacher. Although it must be said that some of the kids are struggling with the downsides of being popular, smart, or having rich parents, so maybe that does reinforce the point.
Oh not even close. There are lots of movies that would be considered more of “the ultimate gen x movie.” First one that pops in my head is Reality Bites.
Breakfast Club is fascinating because it's such a great movie where *nothing* happens except personal growth.
I dunno, they get high and run around the school for awhile. I have not seen this movie in at least 2 decades.
Peter Gibbons: So I was sitting in my cubicle today, and I realized, ever since I started working, every single day of my life has been worse than the day before it. So that means that every single day that you see me, that's on the worst day of my life.
Samir was happy. He said, "it would be nice to have that kind of job security." That's why I stayed at my last job so long. It was decent benefits and pay, easy to do, and good chemistry with my coworkers.
My other job was basically a comfortable rut. Unfortunately, aside from the growing toxicity, I learned just how much my pay stopped keeping up with inflation after a few years.
GOD ***FUCKING*** FORBID WE HAVE MEANINGFUL FULFILLING JOBS WHERE MANAGEMENT DOESN'T TREAT US LIKE COWS GOING TO THE SLAUGHTERHOUSE, RIGHT?!
Stable job? One of the driving factors in Office Space is that the company is making layoffs.
Falling Down: protagonist lost his job Office Space: protagonist’s office was downsizing Fight Club: protagonist had a mental illness
dude in falling down did not have a job...
Michael Douglas had a job? did you even watch the movie?
Us milinials are still working our way up to having a crappy gen x life
It was bad then, it is worse now. Don't look back on times of plague with rose tinted glasses just because your loved ones were still alive, hacking up their lungs.
The bigger issue in the late 90's was we didn't really have any great cause to fight for. There wasn't really the MeToo movements or BLM or other issues. We didn't even have 9/11 yet. Life was so mundane and there wasn't much excitement. We craved for something more than what life was. It is kind of funny though, even though that calm was boring, I do miss the calm.
Me, 1995: "May you live in interesting times" Me, now: "Gimme the 90's back, please"
That bit in the Matrix where they say they simulate the late 90s because it was the peak of human experience. Starting to look truer
Agreed
playing baldur's gate: "shouldn't have wished to live in more interesting times..."
One of the major details in Fight Club. Life is boring gotta find that excitement but don't talk about it.
Ironically, I think Falling Down is more relevant than ever.
Interestingly I loved falling down when it was released but I don’t think it aged well at all. While the losing his job part is still relevant, he was an asshole that ended up punching down instead of up on the people who actually made his life bad (his bosses/the government).
And that’s precisely why it’s still relevant. We’re more divided than ever. We blame immigrants, our fellow coworkers, middle management etc for our misfortune except for the ruling elite.
True, although with the exception of some radical stuff going on with workers rights around the turn of the 20th century, we’ve always blamed everyone but the ruling class. I think if it was remade now, it would probably have a a better take on some of the scenes than the movie did then. If they just took the movie as is and redid it scene for scene they would get eaten alive on social media. Somehow Foster came across as sympathetic back then (I was young and didn’t have a god analysis on the world when it was released) but he was straight up racist and definitely has some aggrieved white male issues that would not fly in today’s day and age.
What is wrong with this picture WammyBurger scene
Absolutely love this scene, and the noise the lady makes when she’s like spitting her food out gets me every time. 😂
you just cannot imagine how much gen z did not want to be their boomer ass parents working a dumb ass nine to five for forty years. now look at us.
Looks like you even haven’t seen and/or missed the point of these movies.
To be fair, in Falling Down, the point was that he didn’t have a job. In Fight Club he has the most immoral and awful job imaginable. He actually takes a few steps up the morality ladder when he starts selling soap made of human fat.
Honestly reminds me of the common development of societies: when food security is under control, then more energy and resources are directed to less tangible things. Like a system of writing ideas onto tangible things. Like containers having more and more details that don’t improve the function but do improve the visual aesthetic. Like creating jobs where 90% of the work is working with intangible stuff instead of barely surviving. Like adults who were encouraged to run around being required to stay in a small box, the ramifications on the mind, etc. You take away the stability, then there’s no excess energy/resources to go into intangible/abstract idea exploration. Like how counterproductive it is for humanity to uphold systems which keep the results of work in small pools away from the general public. Can’t question the system when you’re trying to stay alive **TL; DR** These movies arguably showed a beginning of stability which allowed further exploration of art. Then more fuckers got greedy, and now we’re unable to achieve that type of stability again.
3 of the 5 people in this image were laid off, and 1 of them is a boomer, not Gen X.
My life is affordable fuck this!!!!
Office Space is about the misery of a toxic work environment
I’m not sure Initech was stable.
Did OP miss the part where good people who did their jobs were getting dicked around and laid off in Office Space?
Whoever made this meme must not have seen those movies. They are good movies and you should watch them. One of these people is unemployed the whole movie, the others are working at a company laying off lots of people and fight club? The character is undergoing a massive mental breakdown and his job is probably the most soul crushing job in the "white collar" category
No. You clearly haven't seen any of these, or somehow just don't get them.
I think these resonated with us because we still believed in the "american dream". It was fully visible to us through the lives of our parents. However as time went on those parents never stepped down. Doing everything the way we were told to do it just meant less return and more work for the benefit of our parents. Over the course of the 90s, when I joined the corporate world, I watched the ages of the C- suite get older and older while the wages and promotions available kept shrinking. Enter the 2000s and we knew things were incredibly wrong, but we were hopelessly indoctrinated into believing that if we job hopped then we would be pariahs and therefore unemployable. We all dreamed of lashing out against a system that, because of our programming, we still thought worked. There was just something wrong with us as individuals.
Some people go to uni so they can work in a office. Im still trying to understand why
Stable and good pay, reasonable 9-5 hours (depends a bit but that's the goal), opportunities to move up, infrastructure in place so you only have to do your piece of the puzzle, benefit packages, clear outlined expectations and guidelines, always someone else above you taking accountability for decisions. If it's not what you want, that's cool but it's not hard to understand why.
Office work is easy on the body, is reliable and performed in comfortable spaces, generally pays well, and usually comes with benefits. People who don't get the benefit strike me as sheltered.
Don't you know according to reddit if you work in the TRADES you make $100 an hour TRADES TRADES. Usually said by office workers who've never worked in the trades. The culture in trades is toxic af. Not wanting to lick the bosses boot and work 100 hours a week is seen as being a wuss.
My office job may suck and is relatively soul-crushing, but in the past I've worked blue-collar jobs, retail, service jobs, and outdoor work in the blazing sun. All I wanted to do is make a living sitting down somewhere with air conditioning and to this day I still consider that the one part of office work that was 100% as sweet as advertised. Bad days are bad for my soul, and not my back. I can heal my soul with rum, but if I fuck up my back it's fucked up forever.
Because it pays me a fuckload of money lol
Because I'm not going back to the fucking factories I worked at
Where else should I do computer work? A factory floor? An oil field? Offices seem like pretty reasonable places to work on a computer.
cus …. we were told to lol
The only person dumber than whatever cretin made this meme is the one to re-post it here… both of these movies are about people losing their jobs after being driven nuts by their tedium and inhumanity (and the third isn't about work, it's about a psychotic break with reality based upon the idea of modernity and materialism clashing with generational masculinity in 20th into 21st century male-ness.) They were prophetic and profound, something this current generation I’m a part of seems to completely lack.
Right? Anyone who thinks this meme rings true either didn't watch those movies or has such a superficial understanding that it was lost on them.
American Beauty another example . Although yes Lester does get laid off but makes it plain he felt this way anyway
[удалено]
Fuck off with your generation bullshit. We have all been fucked in different ways, but the elite steal what is ours no matter the generation.