Pictures, Videos, Articles showing just how boring it is to live in a dystopic society, or with signs of a dystopic society.
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"This is a systemic problem. Children should have their needs met without the need for work, and this child working is an obvious symptom of the problem at hand."
"Have you ever considered that I, an individual, worked at a mcdonalds at the age of 15? I used the money to buy a video game. Therefore your argument is invalid."
This comment section is fuckin weird.
This is Culver’s. They’re a burger fast food joint located throughout the Midwest and have things called “Scoopy Night” where a percentage of the proceeds go toward a specific cause. Schools, dance groups, etc can partake and the kids who attend that school/dance group/etc help take orders and deliver food to tables. Not quite as dystopian as OP has made it seem.
when we needed to do fundraisers THE PARENTS IN THE PTA DID IT FOR THE MIDDLE SCHOOLERS.
We had plenty of 'kids' working at fast food and grocery stores but not until 15 minimum. this kid looks like he's 9. that's too young to be fucking around near fryers and hot grills.
"Child labor is ok if the money goes to a school!"
Honestly... the idea that they do this work, and the money goes to a school instead of them, makes it even worse to me?
It's a fundraiser likely for an after school program. It typically pays out a lot better than a car wash or brat fry. Typically the students run orders out to cars.
And yeah, we probably should put more funding into schools for stuff like this instead of asking kids to fundraise.
Are the kids required to work in order to get the money? Because that sounds like a job with good PR.
That's just child labor exploitation with extra steps.
This is what it is, and it's sad that it's so normalized that people are defending it.
Everyone knows the kids aren't technically required, but they're "required" by social pressure.
I remember having to go door to door selling things when I was a kid. It may have been voluntary in a technical sense, but I was pretty well mandated to do so if I wanted to be part of that group with my friends. And there was even more pressure from my mom and dad because they didn't want to be the family whose kid didn't do the thing.
I think it's time we start taking a long hard look at some of these things like fundraisers and de facto coerced employment of youth (without pay) and ask ourselves if a healthy system would allow this.
My thoughts exactly. If it's optional, cool, the kids get some experience and maybe takehome money. If it's required, fuck that shit.
Children do work at McDonald’s though
Just they would keep them in the back so they can’t be seen
yup. 10 year olds running deep fryers.
I was stoked to have a job when I was 14 making smoothies. Legally I could only do 7 hours a week and I enjoyed it. It helped me learn about scheduling and being on time, and I saved up enough money to buy my own Xbox. People in this thread are idiots.
I started working at 15. The owner/manager of my first job would give the 15-17 year-old girls he hired drugs in exchange for sexual favors. Also had us work past legal hours and all the other normal exploitative shit people should expect.
Second job I had also had pedo managers. Asking us questions like, "what was the craziest places you had sex at?" during group orientation. I also had to dispute the hours I was paid for on nearly every paycheck I got.
I'm guessing experiences like this aren't universal, but the fact that my first 2 jobs as a child were very exploitative, it's probably not uncommon.
I think scheduling and being on time could be picked up quickly by adults.
Yeah, minimum age in the US (most states) is 14 yrs old. I wanted a job so bad when I was a kid. I grew up super poor so I never had an allowance. I got a job as soon as a could and I could buy my own things.
My own kid also got a job early, I told them they didn't have to but they wanted to earn their own money (I was super proud of the reason). They worked for a few years, took a year or so off, then after graduating high school, bought their own car. I'm actually so proud of my kid. Kind of a smart ass sometimes but like... That's because they're me too. So like.. 🤙
Yeah, there’s nothing wrong with a 14 year old working a few hours a week if they want to. Lemmy hivemind is pretty fucking stupid sometimes
I think the downvotes are because that kid looks a lot younger than 14, so this sentiment does not apply here.
I also don't have a problem with kids working jobs, but it has to be under very controlled circumstances to avoid exploitation. It's important to remember that children can't enter contracts (which is a requirement of any employment), and for good reason.
I think as well that the recent spike in news stories about kids being killed at jobs they shouldn't have been working in the first place is behind a lot of the sentiment here, so arguing that kids should be allowed to work while ignoring that context isn't going to be received well.
That’s exactly how I looked at 14. Internet detectives don’t know jack shit
Case in point ^
No it isn’t. 14 is legal age to work in most US states
Yeah I'm saying you're on the Internet and also don't know shit
So many Americans in here defending this, get a clue you idiots.
I'm Australian and this reminds me of working at the local fish and.chip store when I was 12. I asked the local general store, but they'd only pay me to do odd jobs, the local bakery said no,.and the local fish and.chip shop said I could help take orders and.package meals during their busy hours each evening.
My Lego collection grew, I got real good at Time Crisis 3, and I went to see a movie each Saturday. It was awesome. I didn't see it any different to scoring cash for mowing lawns or washing cars, just stable and they appreciated my help so I felt good too.
If you'd told me I wasn't allowed, I'd have done it behind your back and said I was going to friend's houses.
They do this often at the Culver's near me. It's a fundraiser for school / extracurricular activities. The group works for a few hours and Culver's donates the receipts for that time.
It's better than having them go door to door selling wreaths and shit.
Somehow that made it even more dystopian. The school system is in on it
The children are working to fund the school.
Nuf said?
The school is funded already through taxpayers. The fact that "the children are working to fund the school" is an acceptable line of logic is already dystopian.
Traditionally, children do fundraisers to fund extracurricular activities, like a field trip. If the school is taking that money to add to their budget, that's crossing the line into exploiting kids' labor for money.
People offended just by looking at this picture out of context should really try explaining their preferred authoritarian social policy to a teenager who wants a part-time job but for whom some people would forbid them by penalty of the law.
Spoiler: They won't understand why you should have any authority over their body and time.
I don't understand why you should have that authority either. I mean, where does it end?
What are your criteria for exceptions? Shouldn't it be between the kid and their parents, and not you?
Are you imagining there is a parental figure with a bull whip for this kid in the back office and you want to outlaw physical abuse? There are already separate laws for that!
This is like...yuck.
What if a teen really really wanted to date an adult. They're a child, no one cares what they "understand" because their capacity to understand is literally crippled. Their brains aren't developed yet.
It sounds like you are equating any job to getting sexually abused or raped.
That is "like... Yuck".
It's an irrelevant comparison because the work itself is not abuse. There are other laws that protect kids from being abused, if they are being abused to force them to work(or for any other purpose).
If you don't care what people under 18 think, you should reflect on how selfish and closed-minded that sounds to me and especially to the real human people you are proposing to lose their ability to work.
Do you really think there is a major difference between the brain of a 17 year old the day before their 18th birthday and the day after? There is no significant difference at all.
So, my question is, where do you draw the line for a person under 18 whose quality of life might depend on working? Should they just have that freedom stripped because you don't care what they think?
Even if they are on their own? Or supporting a dependent, like their own baby? Really? If you are that authoritarian about this, I hope you forget to vote on it.
The yuck part is that children under 18 are legally defined as not having full reasoning and consent capabilities.
So, I wasn't saying all work is rape, that's silly and foolish to think.
I'm saying your assertion that teens should have adult independence to make adult choices without laws and support is yuck.
"They don't understand" is literally my point. They CANT
If you're saying teens can consent in the same way adults can, that is yuck. And that is wrong. (For clarity, you need to consent to a working relationship for it to be healthy.)
Never said anything about healthy. I have consented to a lot of “relationships” that weren’t healthy for a healthy relationship.
I agree with most of what you said though
Yeah, we tried to let people have the permission to do that, kids died.
Enough kids died that even America decided we needed to make laws against it, and we love exploiting the under class people
As others have pointed out, those laws have important exceptions to account for kids who want to work, and that is the question I am asking all of the knee-jerk authoritarians:
What is the actual policy position they support? What are the exceptions they support or are they completely authoritarian about this issue? (I think a strict rule prohibiting all people under 18 from ever earning a living is a pretty embarrassing position to defend.)
What are emancipated teenagers supposed to do? Should they live 100% at the mercy of state programs and not improve their living standards beyond the meager social welfare they are afforded until they turn exactly 18 years old? Really? Not even a day sooner, even if they are ready and qualified to work?
That would be completely inhumane. Certainly it's depriving them of their bodily freedom and natural ability to extract capital value from their own labor.
So where is the line? 13? 14? I think somewhere in there is reasonable. Perhaps a test could determine their capacity to participate in their own economic fate? Or an evaluation by a social worker? I could go for something like that.
What if they are NOT emancipated and their parent is supervising them? Should the age minimum be higher then? 17? 18? I do not think so.
I think it's only logical that the age minimum should actually be lower if a parent is directly supervising - their physical and economic risk is lower if the parent is looking out for their best interests. This of course presumes that the parent is not physically or mentally/emotionally abusing the kid(again, separate laws exist for the abuse component and most parents don't abuse their kids).
The wall is usually 14-ish with limitations on what you can do and how many hours you can work.
We have to limit it otherwise adults will take advantage of the fact that children don’t know what they’re doing.
Yes, some of them might be smart enough, but a lot of them aren’t, and it’s better to protect the majority and work on irregular cases on their own merits.
Part of becoming an emancipated minor is showing that you have the means to care for yourself to a judge, otherwise you’re not allowed to become emancipated
Children should not be working. We have piles of dead children that died in the past for the profits of capitalists, and it took millions of maimed children marching to DC led by Mother Jones for anything to be done about child labor. I highly doubt that there's anyone, let alone children, that want to be in the coercive environment we call work. If you want to say protecting children from the dangers of a capitalist workplace is authoritarian, then so be it. I don't want to see children in a workplace where they will be exploited by everyone above them.
I started working at age 13 back in 1980 because I wanted money to buy GI Joes, and comic books. So I started going to construction jobs with my shithead father on Saturdays and helped him put up sheetrock. My first legitimate job was the summer I turned 15, I was big for my age so I started doing deliveries for a furniture store, worked there for two summers until I was fired after a workplace injury. The guy I worked with was a racist Italian from Whitestone New York, and I was a smart slightly autistic black kid. His delivery truck only had one seat so I stood in the open door on the right side holding on for dear life. One day we were moving a heavy office desk upstairs and I was bringing up the rear, he lost control which resulted in the desk sliding downstairs and slamming me into a wall. My ribs were badly bruised so after I got home the store panicked and fired me, they probably thought we were going to sue. Anyway I went into a deep depression and couldn't leave my room for a month. One of my therapists later told me that it was the first appearance of my bipolar disorder.
I was legally employable, and of age but still got hurt on the job. I just had shithead employers.
Name and shame which Culver's it is.