when did we forsake the quest for bread and roses...?

Most men have been condition to understand themselves through what they do: in this we are more human do-ing than human be-ing. As the bottom-line, acquisitive culture of 21st century capitalism becomes normative, women too have increasingly taken to defining themselves by their work and function. Do not mistake me for an old world, male chauvinist lamenting a mythological past where women maintained the home fires with patience, culture, and delicacy while men duked it out in the trenches. Such a fantasy may drive the thoughts of some of the "upstairs" members of the manor, but rarely those working and dwelling down below. No, human equality in all its possibilities guides my understanding of the realm of God in both this life and the next. The anthem of the 1912 Lawrence textile strike got it right:

As we go marching, marching we bring the greater days
For the rising of the women means the rising of the race
No more the drudge and idler ten that toil where one reposes

But the sharing of life's glories, bread and roses, bread and roses

Sadly, my concern is that in 2019 this poem has not become prophetic: hell, it isn't even remembers as life has become so inverted that now men's alienated work/life balance has become that for women as well. Rather than the blessings born of a "rising," there is more despair founded upon our dog-eat-dog culture of lowest common denominators. The recent stories of death and disregard in the new economy's "model workplaces" like Amazon make it all too clear: we have created a brave new world without even a nod to bread or roses. (See https://www.theguardian.com /technology/ 2019/oct/17/ amazon-warehouse-worker-deaths)

What has been lost in our race to the bottom is an appreciation of relationships - real human connections - that nourish our hearts and build community. I have been stunned at how revolutionary the idea of a "smart phone sabbath" sounds to many bright, connected, and engaged people. This morning I read David Leonhardt's' NYTimes op-ed, "24 Hours Without My Phone" that begins:

In 2008, Tiffany Shlain’s father, Leonard, was diagnosed with brain cancer, and she began to change her use of technology when the two of them were together. “Some days he would have only one good hour,” she later wrote in the Harvard Business Review, “and I didn’t want to be distracted when I was with him, so I’d turn off my cellphone.” Eventually, Shlain, a filmmaker, extended the idea into a full day without screen use. She called it a tech shabbat — after the Jewish day of rest — and she has written several articles and a recent book, called “24/6,” about the idea. “The digital revolution has blurred the lines between time on and time off, and time off is disappearing,” she wrote in The Boston Globe. “As for our leisure time, we’ve created a culture in which we’re still ‘working’ while we play: needing to photograph every moment, then crafting witty posts of our ‘fun, relaxing activities’ on Instagram, then obsessively checking responses. We can barely catch our breath in the tsunami of personal and work digital input, which results in us not being truly present for any of it.”(https://www.nytimes.com/2019/10/22/opinion/technology-shut-off.html?rref=collection%2Fbyline%2Fdavidleonhardt&action=click&contentCollection=undefined&region=stream&module=stream_unit&version=latest&contentPlacement=1&pgtype=collection)

He concludes with a celebration of a true sabbath writing: "I really appreciated the break. I spent time reading a delightful book. None of us was distracted by texts when talking to each other. And I was able to ignore all manner of non-urgent work email. We’re not quite ready to sign up for a tech shabbat every weekend, given various obligations. But we are ready to do it again soon, and it served as a good reminder that putting away phones for even short stretches of time is an excellent idea."

I have no words - well, ok, a few. Bewildered. Saddened. Perplexed. And angry. We have lost so much of what it means to be human beings who love and cherish one another beyond our function. Job. Or usefulness. Marrilynne Robinson wrote a brilliant essay in her Death of Adam collection wherein she takes to task the utilitarianism of modern day social Darwinists who refuse to notice that compassion and altruism are built into our species. We save the wounded. We care for the broken. We grieve over death. Not always, of course, and sometimes imperfectly. But we know from the inside out that we are not machines. We care. We treasure relationships. And so much of our bottom line culture works to isolate and ignore our capacity for caring.

Perhaps that is why earlier today I burst into tears upon seeing this Canadian commercial. Yes, it too comes from a corporation wrestling with a bottom line. But it is beautiful and prophetic at the same time. A true embrace of bread and roses in an appropriately tech-savvy manner.