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Antiwork

On the topic of chairs

I'm an American and I've traveled a lot, mostly in Latin America. Cashiers and customer facing employees seemed a lot happier and more genuinely content than the usual fake stuff you get in the USA and can clearly tell they're miserable. The most obvious difference I noticed was that they were all sitting. Cashiers would usually stand up to help a customer and then sit back down, both in small businesses and large American chain stores. I chatted up a cashier in Colombia and mentioned that in the USA cashers aren't allowed to sit, he laughed at me and then said “I don't get the joke.” and I'm like “no joke,” and he said “you serious? my back would be gone before I'm 30 if I didn't die first.” I told him that was just the norm here and he just shook his head and said “you guys are crazy.”…


I'm an American and I've traveled a lot, mostly in Latin America. Cashiers and customer facing employees seemed a lot happier and more genuinely content than the usual fake stuff you get in the USA and can clearly tell they're miserable.

The most obvious difference I noticed was that they were all sitting. Cashiers would usually stand up to help a customer and then sit back down, both in small businesses and large American chain stores. I chatted up a cashier in Colombia and mentioned that in the USA cashers aren't allowed to sit, he laughed at me and then said “I don't get the joke.” and I'm like “no joke,” and he said “you serious? my back would be gone before I'm 30 if I didn't die first.” I told him that was just the norm here and he just shook his head and said “you guys are crazy.” That chat really stuck with me and made me realize how totally fucked our culture is. When poorer countries are allowing these sorts of basic comfort, you have to wonder who decided we can't have it here in the so-called first world.

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