A lot of western communities are designed to stimulate consumerism. A lot of things to do in your free time revolve around buying stuff or drinking (alcohol). Even eating in your free time costs money, sometimes a lot of money even.
I live in a city that claims to have the most bars, cafés, restaurants etc. in the world. A lot of free time here revolves around drinking. I also sit down at a café often.
Recently a new park opened close to where I live. When it was flaming hot outside I went to spent my evenings there at some water pools and had diner there. A lot of people around me were just chilling, chatting and playing games. It reminded me of covid, when everything was closed (bars and shops). Everyone in the city was just outside, vibing in parks, playgrounds and similar places.
It made me wonder how a communist society would effect free time. A lot of lesser capitalistic, more collectivist societies already seem to focus on different ways to spend free time.
What do you guys think about this? Does anyone have some interesting theory to read regarding this topic?
I would be really interested in the impact it would have on arts and literature. People creating things without the financial aim but just for the joy of creation.
Even Karl Marx himself noted that one of the major reasons he was a communist was because after capitalism would be destroyed and the state would wither away, people would have way more freedom and lead much happier, healthier lives with freedom to pursue creative interests.
I don’t know of any theory discussing this, but here are some ideas
- People would likely travel more (for leisure) due to the massive decrease in working hours and a well-functioning public transportation system (e.g. high-speed trains)
- District-based planning would lead to more local restaurants/pubs, rather than having them concentrated in a small area, so you would get a different sense of community in your local establishments
- There would be far more public parks and vegetation in general
- There would be many public areas for recreation (e.g. sports), both outside and inside
- Because of the other available activities and the lack of a constant barrage of ads, people would probably spend significantly less time in shopping malls
Sounds absolutely lovely. There should be more public spaces in the, you know, PUBLIC SPACES.
Another thing: free in-person and online education on various subjects, for recreational purposes (e.g. learning to play guitar) or to learn skills for another job. We already have access to a huge amount of educational material online, but I imagine most people lack the time and/or motivation to study after work in capitalist countries
Visit China if you ever get a chance… the public parks are amazedong
That’s one thing I am appreciative of being raised in a muslim household. I eventually did try drinking a few times, and it never really was appealing. It was expensive as well, in that it was an additional expense that you must pay for if you want it.
I think Engels remarked on the drinking habits of factory workers. I actually found it, under his work The Condition of the Working Class in England:
Besides these, there are other influences which enfeeble the health of a great number of workers, intemperance most of all. All possible temptations, all allurements combine to bring the workers to drunkenness. Liquor is almost their only source of pleasure, and all things conspire to make it accessible to them. The working-man comes from his work tired, exhausted, finds his home comfortless, damp, dirty, repulsive; he has urgent need of recreation, he must have something to make work worth his trouble, to make the prospect of the next day endurable. His unnerved, uncomfortable, hypochondriac state of mind and body arising from his unhealthy condition, and especially from indigestion, is aggravated beyond endurance by the general conditions of his life, the uncertainty of his existence, his dependence upon all possible accidents and chances, and his inability to do anything towards gaining an assured position. His enfeebled frame, weakened by bad air and bad food, violently demands some external stimulus; his social need can be gratified only in the public-house, he has absolutely no other place where he can meet his friends. How can he be expected to resist the temptation? It is morally and physically inevitable that, under such circumstances, a very large number of working-men should fall into intemperance … Drunkenness has here ceased to be a vice, for which the vicious can be held responsible; it becomes a phenomenon, the necessary, inevitable effect of certain conditions upon an object possessed of no volition in relation to those conditions. They who have degraded the working-man to a mere object have the responsibility to bear. But as inevitably as a great number of working-men fall a prey to drink, just so inevitably does it manifest its ruinous influence upon the body and mind of its victims.
A south Korean comrade of mine talked about how Soju was used during the heights of the dictatorship by workers to tolerate the terrible working conditions. Maybe drinking now has taken a more cultural value and less strictly as a functional value as in the past, especially in the West, but I think the effect is the same.
Sometimes I think (this is conjecture, don’t take it too seriously lol) that industrial capitalism could have never taken place ‘properly’ in muslim-majority areas like it did in England because of Islam’s view on drinking. Well, atleast in the past.
But definitely I think free time will be spent much differently in a communist society. I for one would atleast stop feeling anxious everytime I spend some time for myself and not for the ‘grind’. Didn’t some doctors in the US started perscribing people to visit national parks to improve their mental health?
I like to end with this quote that one of my lecturers used, taken in the same section as the previous text.
When a class can purchase few and only the most sensual pleasures by its wearying toil, must it not give itself over blindly and madly to those pleasures?
I lived in South Korea for a couple years, have family there, and visit often, so will supplement your input on South Korean drinking habits with my own observations.
South Koreans definitely ingest a lot of alcohol (many boast it is the most in the world!), and in many cases bosses mandate workers drink together after work most nights. One might argue this would improve relationships between workers… except for the fact that management is nigh always present so workers still need to maintain the mask.
And in those workplaces that don’t mandate those sorts of things, workers still very frequently drink after work together. Students and friends also usually resort to drinking almost instinctively there.
While the nightlife, drinking, and eating in Korea is a lot of fun (or at least I loved it), it is a struggle to find alternative ways to spend your time if you wished to do so. There weren’t a lot of parks where I spent most of my time (Seoul), and you need to search a bit harder to find other ways to spend time.
Outside of alcohol and restaurants, it wasn’t hard to find tea shops, open air markets, and the like, but those all still require the expenditure of money.
To Korea’s credit though, there were a number of museums and cultural artifacts like old palaces that were interesting to visit all free of charge. And spiritually the Buddhist temples were very beautiful places to spend my time (I’m a Buddhist, so I gravitated there spiritually). With the exception of the temples though, most of those types of things closed after dark, which meant day shift workers would’ve been working during the opening hours.
Also, workers very frequently work 6-7 days a week for 12 hours at a time, not including time spent in mandatory drinking time. And the hourly wage is absolutely insufficient for maintaining a healthy lifestyle. Rents in Seoul are absolutely atrocious, even in slums. Public transportation while I lived there was affordable and reliable, and still is, but now taxi rates have skyrocketed and are approaching levels common in the US. Public transportation shuts down at night, usually from 11pm to 7am), so often during those hours taxis are the only way to get home or anywhere. Of course, pubs and restaurants stay open until about 6am, so many workers spend that time there instead of trying to get a taxi home.
There is definitely a lot more I could say, but needless to say workers there definitely need more options! And my experience is mostly in Seoul, the most developed city in South Korea. As you get to less developed areas, the conditions only worsen, except rent rates. Seoul is definitely the most expensive for rent.
Also, workers very frequently work 6-7 days a week for 12 hours at a time, not including time spent in mandatory drinking time
what
Yup. And the new president of South Korea wants to make it longer while reducing the minimum wage.
Edit: Some sauce, feel free to look for more - https://english.hani.co.kr/arti/english_edition/e_national/1048407.html
Wow, that’s completely deranged. By contrast, I remember reading that the DPRK has something like 36-hour work weeks
According to Understanding Korea part nine, Article 30 of DPRK constitution:
The working day shall be eight hours, and the length of the working day shall be reduced by the state in arduous trades and other special categories of work.
Additionally, Understanding Korea says:
According to the characteristics of the working sectors, the DPRK makes differences of daily working hours into eight, seven and six hours, respectively. […] They fully exercise the right to rest. The right to rest is exercised through such systems as daily rest after 8-hour work, rest on Sundays and holidays, annual paid leave, supplementary leave, maternity leave, and accommodation at health resorts and holiday homes at state expense.
(I’m sure in practice there are differences/shortcomings in meeting the ideal expressed in the constitution, but that is the case in all countries; anyway, that’s what the constitution says according to Understanding Korea from 2017.)
Defectors who want to return to DPRK:
Mr Kwon lives in poverty and isolation in a small room in an outer suburb of Seoul, relying on charity to pay the rent. He is unemployed and claims when he did work as a labourer he was paid much less than fellow workers, or not at all.
"Even though North Korea is poorer, I felt more free there. Neighbours and people help each other and depend on each other.
“Life is simpler there and here they are just slaves to money.”
Even defectors like Kim Hyung Doek — who have been in South Korea for 20 years and have forged a successful career, made money and raised a family — want to go back.
Edit: Also there is this article, A Conversation with a North Korean Citizen
One interesting thing which Hyun-Sik told me was that people in the DPRK are generally very happy in their lives, and that he would assume that people in the DPRK are, overall, happier than people in the West. I told him that in the West people often describe life as difficult due to large workloads and the pressure of competition: “Do people in the DPRK view life in a similar light?”
“We have many rights regarding labour, like the Right to Work and Right to Relaxation. We work between 7-10 hours a day, varies by job” The working week would be “between Monday and Saturday with Sunday off”.
“Do citizens of the DPRK feel the same way about their work that Westerners do?”
“Frankly that is a question difficult to answer, it’s really a personal one. I know some people who throughly enjoy their career and come home happy and satisfied, some absolutely hate work and their lives. Mostly it is seen as positive,as we in the end are all helping each other”.
Oh, so they work six days a week? That’s more than I thought
That’s one of the reasons why there are so many bars in this city. It’s a rougher working class city originally. And having a lot of bars where the workers can just drink away the hardships of life just ‘happens’ to prevent worker uprising really.
It’s one of the things that led me to created this post. If the working class no longer gets exploited, other means of recreation can be found. Means that don’t wreck the health and lifes of so many people (not that I am against alcohol or something, just the role it plays in current day society).
Definitely. I would rate alcohol on par with other conventionally banned or illegal drugs, meaning it shouldn’t be illegal (like it is for muslims in my country), atleast in an ‘ideal’ future. Controlled use is completely fine.
This is why it’s so important to have a good marital life you guys… especially sexual life. Remember that having sex with your spouse costs $0.00 and enriches you and your spouse, but does not enrich capitalism. If your only source of entertainment takes away the money that you just made, you’ll never improve your conditions. I understand not everyone is in the conditions or even wants to get married, but married couples must learn to have fun without spending money.
Not if they criminalize/ban abortion.
Very sad that it took a rampaging virus for the capitalist nations’ citizens to escape the machine (and for a month, at that).
I also have a HUGE gripe for fast food. I myself have of course indulged (and still do) and am in no way shaming anyone who does as well, all I’m saying is that the only reason that shitty cheap stuff exists and is so damn profitable is that we are so overworked and used to consumerism. The last thing I want to do coming home from a 9 hour shift is cook a healthy meal that takes more than 30 minutes. To McDonald’s or the bar we go, I guess. I’ve even spent money on a fake ID in the past. What a world.
Sadly I don’t have any theory to point you to, but my gut tells me a communist society would have thousands of times higher quality free time than capitalist ones.
Edit: just realized alot of what I said was said in droves in the comments in much higher quality. I’ll leave this here though, lol.
Drinking culture in the UK is a plague and I wish it didn’t exist.
It enables the worst of us and ruins lives as alcohol becomes more and more of a crutch to deal with this normal island 😔
Same goes for here. If you want to do anything, with anyone, drinking will probably be involved at some point.
You don’t HAVE to drink but must people do.
I don’t hate drinking and I think Belgian beer brewing is a culinary art, but you’d be damned if you don’t want to sedate yourself in your free time.
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This is why it’s so important to have a good marital life you guys… especially sexual life. Remember that having sex with your spouse costs $0.00 and enriches you and your spouse, but does not enrich capitalism. If your only source of entertainment takes away the money that you just made, you’ll never improve your conditions. I understand not everyone is in the conditions or even wants to get married, but married couples must learn to have fun without spending money.
Although that particular activity can be quite expensive without protection which does cost a small amount of money.
Excellently put
I don’t think restaurants will disappear. Eating and social eating is a very, very human thing to do. Just a lot about it would change.
A focus on nutrition and sustainability over profit.
That stupid tipping culture the yankees have. That can fuck off.
Authentic cultural cuisines, instead of mutilating it to suit the palates of local markets but still calling it authentic. Not that dishes would never be altered for diverse palates, but it wouldn’t be hidden.
Affordability, instead of restaurants charging a month’s salary to serve a single sliver of ham that’s been marinated in the Queen’s chamber pot.
“It’s only called Champagne if it comes from the Champagne region, otherwise it’s sparkling wine” fuck you… unless at least 70% of people can tell the difference in a double blind test, you’re price gouging.
You got my upvote, but I feel personally attacked when you target my chamber pot ham.
As a young person, I feel as if all my friends are in a rush to experience life in their free time as if the coming weekend is their last. They go all out, get drunk, do drugs, have sex, and spend an unstable amount of money, then when it’s all over its back to the jobs they hate where they will spend all their time thinking about how they would rather be doing something else thus continuing the boom and bust cycle of western social life.
If we had more free time and less resentment towards our jobs I assume most people would choose to live a more sustainable lifestyle, which would hopefully drastically change how our communities look and function.
