#derekthompson

How-- and why-- is our culture shifting? "The Obscure Media Theory That Explains '99% of Everything'" @dkthomp.bsky.social @weisenthal.bsky.social

(Plus- Encyclopædia Britannica)

Sage advice on a currently hot topic: abundance should be a goal, not an agenda "We need usable futures" @himself.bsky.social @adamtooze.bsky.social (Plus- John Warne Gates)

Thompson's understanding of "calling" is simply inadequate to his analysis. To understand why, simply ask, "Called by whom?” Indeed, contrary to Thompson, the way to avoid the temptation to worship work, may be to understand how a "calling" can give work meaning while also saving us from idolizing it. Or to put it another way, we should understand that “faith in an intangible and unfalsifiable force of goodness” is a not a separate and tangential avenue for meaning but is deeply entwined in the tangibility of work.

In the American Protestant tradition, a "calling" gave work meaning by setting it in a larger framework of relationships and purpose. From this perspective, the “particular calling” of being a lawyer is not just "a job" where you make money, or a "career" where you make "partner;" rather, it is a way to serve God and neighbor. Lawyers should do more than serve their families by earning money and providing for them. They should also do more than serve the neighbor who is their client who pays them. Lawyers are called to serve God’s causes on earth through the practice of law. While the call to pursue justice is universal, lawyers, as officers the court, have a special responsibility to seek justice. Weaponizing the law to subvert or avoid justice is a violation of their calling, no matter how legal it may be or how meaningful a lawyer may personally find it.

Extract:

“Creative people often bristle at the suggestion that they have to stoop to market their ideas or dress them in familiar garb. It’s pleasant to think that an idea’s brilliance is self-evident and doesn’t require the theater of marketing. But whether you’re an academic, screenwriter, or entrepreneur, the difference between a brilliant new idea with bad marketing and a mediocre idea with excellent marketing can be the difference between bankruptcy and success. The trick is learning to frame your new ideas as tweaks of old ideas, to mix a little fluency with a little disfluency – to make your audience see the familiarity behind the surprise.”

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