Well, I certainly wasn’t expecting 2020 to end up like this. It’s been a wild ride, and I get the feeling that it’s only going to continue in that vein for the rest of the year. Between bushfires, floods and Coronavirus, I’m not really sure how to begin any kind of reflection on the first couple of months of 2020 – nor am I certain that I am in any state of mind to do so. Still, I thin the act of writing can be, in and of itself, a balm for troubled minds, so that’s what I will endeavour to do here. This will be a collection of some random comments and ideas that have occurred to me over the last couple of months and weeks.
The first thought is that, perhaps, we might begin to see how many ‘bullshit jobs’, to use that well known phrase exist within our society – and how poorly we judge those jobs that are so essential. Something that I’ve come to realise – and it is sad that it took me so long to do so – is that there really are no unskilled jobs in society. Rather, the term unskilled is a deliberate classification that hides an effort to minimize and reduce the value workers who do these jobs provide for society – and thus it is an excuse to cut their pay and conditions, to outsource where feasible, and to remove entirely if possible. Events like the pandemic seem to indicate, that will society might continue reasonably well without ‘brand managers’ or ‘thinkfluencers’, it will struggle without nurses, cleaners and delivery drivers. For all the promise of the 21st century, it’s yet to produce robots that can do these things – and perhaps it never will? I don’t know, but we’re not there yet.
A lot of people have commented that this crisis has meant that people will really start to realize the value of teachers, too. Again, I’m not sure I agree with this. Firstly, I think that, according to many surveys, at least in Australia, teachers are quite highly regarded by most of the general public anyway. However, their image is continually tarnished by unscrupulous, ideologically-driven politicians and media who have their own agenda wheelbarrow to push. The problem with the current situation isn’t these same politicians aren’t really thanking teachers for putting their lives at risk by keeping schools open so that children learn; really, they are thanking them for the essential babysitting service that schools provide – in other words, somewhere to park the kids while parents go off to work – and hence keep the economy going. It’s that attitude that’s behind the fervent desperation seen among some politicians to keep schools open, rather than any respect for the challenging and complex contributions that teachers make to schools and society more generally.