Mindless-Employment t1_j679do3 wrote on January 28, 2023 at 5:26 AM

>I’m seeking to help bridge divides in an increasingly polarized America and meet people where they are.

This seems like just...way too much. My idea of meeting people where they are is to talk to them like adults, not tiptoe around their feelings about something that's none of their business, like how you earn a paycheck.

If you've managed to land a job that's meaningful for you (most people are not that lucky), that you enjoy and that pays well, you've already accomplished more than most people. There's really no need to take on the additional burden of trying to heal the American political divide in a mundane conversation about your job.

Do your more conservative friends and relatives feel compelled to explain their vocational choices to you or concern themselves with whether you'll find what they do for a living distasteful or objectionable?

hushpuppylife OP t1_j679tcz wrote on January 28, 2023 at 5:31 AM

No they don’t. And I admit a lot of this is just me overthinking stuff. But I guess it’s just different working a job that is sorta city specific and trying to take that back to more of a small town feel.

Kinda like if you’re in your hometown at the bar with your buddies

I guess explaining how you work for some progressive nonprofit taking zoom calls all day and dealing with policy stuff is different and perhaps more complicated then saying “I work at a bank, insurance Company, a kitchen, construction, etc) where people know what those jobs are

Mindless-Employment t1_j67jc6q wrote on January 28, 2023 at 7:24 AM

If it makes you feel any better, some people you talk to here probably also don't understand. I live and work here but all my jobs here have been contractor positions doing technical work that involves sitting and staring at a two monitors 8 or 10 hours a day, clicking and typing, typing and clicking, rarely getting to talk to anyone at all. The people I know who have these policy/advocacy/issues-oriented jobs explain to me what they do and I nod and say "Oh, OK" but rarely understand wtf they're talking about beyond the absolute basics.

When everyone was suddenly WFH in 2020, I had a neighbor whose balcony was right next to my bedroom window and I could see her out there the whole spring, doing Zoom meetings on her lap top two or three times a day. I was fascinated but also totally mystified that someone's job could entail spending so much of the day talking to people. Some jobs are just hard to understand if they're very different from yours.