Bad news recently for all of you who suffer from hot jets. It seems that blowing a fuse is something that increases your chances of cancer, heart attack and probably measles as well, five-fold. Pause for thought, eh? Say instead “Ohmmmm” or “Marenathamarenathamarenatha” and allow your spirit to be in the now peacefully.
Except it’s very hard. Like last night on RTé’s Prime Time, when they were discussing the latest government wheeze to get people back into work. What they’ve done is, they’ve created three thousand places for people, where they’ll be offered jobs. Well yipee and yeeha to that. Except there’s a snag: they won’t get paid. No, that’s not quite true. They’ll get an extra €20 or so a month in acknowledgement of their efforts.
Now you’re probably flinging the cat at your computer screen and shouting “What kind of eejits do they take the people for anyway? They lay people off on local services like libraries, and now they’re bringing in unemployed people to pick up the slack for next to nothing!” And you’ve probably sprinkled a few rude words in there as well.
But you’re wrong. As a couple of people on the panel and in the audience last night said, it’s not the money that counts – it’s the work. If you were long-term unemployed, wouldn’t you rather have something that’d give you a reason to get up in the morning/off your backside and do something? Sitting about the house all day can be so soul-destroying, and that’s where this government wheeze comes in.
Now I know some of you have turned purple in the face at the phrase “Get off their backsides”. This is an expression common among those with a good job who tend to think of the unemployed as a lazy shower of loafers who don’t work and don’t want to work and run a mile when they see a job opportunity coming their way. Your sense of natural justice and rage at the condescension contained in such expressions can rise up in you like a bile, until you taste something nasty in your mouth and a vein bulges on your forehead.
You must resist this. The southern government knows the human heart better than you do, as do many southern employers. They know that people work because they like to work. All this union nonsense about getting a living wage and protecting workers’ rights and fat cat bankers – that’s all the politics of envy. Don’t fall into the trap of railing against injustice and making yourself sick. Instead say “Thank you, Enda. Thank you, Eamon. Ohhmmm. Marenathamarenathamarenatha” and see can you get an application in for one of those 3,000 jobs. Before you know it, if you live south of the border, you’ll be trimming the grass verges for the Tidy Towns competition and realising that the best things in life are indeed free. Free of salary, that is. To sum up: don’t get angry, work for nothing and stay healthy. Ohhhhmmmm.
Some excellent points Jude. It reminds me of a point made by Ernesto Guevara when he referred to ‘Nuevo hombre’. He was keen for the day when financial reward would not be the motivation for people to work, that there would be a genuine love for ones society and community that would inspire us to labour. That day seems further away than ever. This bastardisation of that concept can make you angry, but it can also highlight further the direction that this government in the 26 counties is taking us. I hope it inspires the people to look at the alternative offered by Sinn Fein. For some they will have nothing left to lose.
It’s the same up north sure.
it’s about £15 on top of benefits a week, for a 30-odd hour week.