Antiwork

I’ve been inspired by this quote by MLK Jr lately. Don’t shut up. Make people uncomfortable for ruining lives. Be obnoxious. Knock on the door till it falls off the hinges. Be a gadfly. “Just as Socrates felt that it was necessary to create a tension in the mind so that individuals could rise from the bondage of myths and half-truths to the unfettered realm of creative analysis and objective appraisal, so must we see the need for nonviolent gadflies to create the kind of tension in society that will help men rise from the dark depths of prejudice and racism to majestic heights of understanding and brotherhood.” -MLK Jr, from “Letter from the Birmingham Jail”

I’m leaving my job this week because it is a toxic working environment. I’ve been making many errors in my work due to the anxiety and micromanaging. My manager asked me to explain why I did something at work and realized I made a major mistake again. I had made this mistake at work already and now I‘n feeling very anxious and worried. Has anyone gone through anything similar? How do I get over this stress that my errors will be caught even after I leave.

The price of things and how little motivation I have to go to work has started to really get to me lately. My boyfriend and I have been stressed about how much rent and groceries are, and there aren't any cheaper places that aren't the size of a single room. My boss has been promising a raise for many months now, but I doubt that will come to anything. My team is the lowest paid IT technicians in the entire university system, and we've tried getting a bigger raise than the paltry 3-5% annual increase we get without any luck. My boyfriend wants to quit the big store sell-everything chain he's worked at since he got out of high school, but every other job he tries seems to be a flop (he's trying an electrician job next, but the contact won't contact him back very easily). I want more in…

For context, I am in California working as an Inspector at an Aerospace company. I work close to 50 hours M-F with “optional OT on the weekends” or so I've been told at hire. My department has about 18 people, 3 currently in my shared office and the other 15 are on the shop floor. When I got hired, they said overtime is greatly appreciated but they understand that everyone has other obligations so we just need to give them a heads up. With that said, it has become very apparent that they want me here every weekend despite weekdays overtime. My direct manager, who is an awesome boss, usually goes around and asks us if we are available for Sat and sometimes Sunday before he puts us on schedule. However, he has been out for several weeks in a row and my boss's manager has been sending out email…

Context: Last week I got extremely sick after a work dinner where we were brought to a restaurant that serves purposely undercooked meat. I mean super rare. The following night, and day I was bent over a toilet bowl throwing up, with a pretty high fever to boot. 48 hours was enough for it to flush out of my system but it was Hell. Today, my boss brings me aside to discuss “concerning behaviour”… what? I've been here 4 weeks and get along with everybody, but OK I'll bite. What's up? “Never in my career have I seen someone take so many sick days in such a short time period”. Funny enough I actually worked those 2 days when I wasn't heaving or passing out from my fever. Didn't even take PTO (of which I have unlimited). There was a very serious “your career hangs in the balance” vibe to…