Stress

The New York Times recently reported (July 10) about workplace “stress” and the emergence of a new job: “burnout coach.” Apparently, so many employed people are so stressed and burned out in their jobs that they need the therapeutic voice of a “burnout coach” to help them cope. The story even discusses a 33-year-old woman “who left a high-powered legal career” to “coach.”

When I lived in Poland, I knew a woman who worked with Americans. She was dumbfounded how twenty- and thirty-somethings were “stressed.” She had gone through the hell of the Warsaw Uprising. For those who don’t know, it was a 63-day period that began in August 1944 when, as World War II was winding down, free Poles in Warsaw sought to liberate their own capital after almost five years of brutal German occupation. Russian soldiers were sitting on the other side of the Wisła River but deliberately refused to move so that freedom-loving Poles could be slaughtered and then the Russians would move in and take over (which is why the Poles wanted to free their city first). For 63 days, young people fought against the Germans through the ruins of the city and in its sewers. Without Allied aid, the Germans prevailed and then began blowing up Warsaw so that, by January, two bricks did not stand atop each other.

My friend considered that “stress.” She considered what she was hearing from those young people “life.” I wonder sometimes whether the therapeutic culture in which we live fosters these debilities. A generation that grew up with helicopter parenting never realized that skinned knees without antiseptic wipes can be normal.

A 33-year-old who could give up her “career” means, if she’s average, she spent 7-8 years as a lawyer, for which she presumably invested a six-figure sum. As she “transitioned” to “burnout coach,” the Times says she did freelance legal work and dog walking to pay the bills. One has to be comfortably situated or foolish to make that leap in order to “coach” others to cope with “stress” or, rather, life. That week’s Times also included an “Ethicist” column about whether it was fair for a twenty-something graduate who gave up a solid career (to pursue her dreams as an “artist”) to collect Food Stamps in the meantime. I just wonder if the “burnout coach” reduced her career prep stress by getting a Joe Biden bailout of her tuition. Finding out I as a taxpayer would be on the hook for it would stress me out.

And the Therapeutic Voice

Users of the Washington, D.C. Metro have heard it: the “therapeutic voice.” Consistent with a bureaucratically overgrown capital, the therapeutic voice keeps you from enjoying silence with a series of canned announcements. Three particularly get my goat.

The first is the “bombs and coffee” announcement. “See it, say it! If you see something suspicious on a Metro train or bus,” call the transit police. There’s a variant (with a Spanish repeat) about reporting unattended bags.

Now, I’m not against reporting suspicious activity. What bothers me is how the “see it, say it” announcement ends. “And, as a reminder, eating, drinking, and smoking on Metro trains or buses is prohibited, to include elevators and escalators” (although that day, as often happens in the Washington subway, they were immobile stairs).

It’s the combination that’s, frankly, stupid. I get you want to have a clean Metro. But bundling unattended bags that go “boom” with a McDonald’s hamburger in the same announcement is ludicrous. The fact nobody finds that nexus risible is telling.

The second is the “instructions” memo. “Is this your first time riding Metro?” If it is, you’ll be informed that you should wait for people to get off a train before you try to get on. Once upon a time, that was called “common sense” if not “upbringing.” You’re then told “when using escalators, grasp the handrail. Don’t play on escalators!” If you have to be instructed how to use stairs, your problems are far bigger than escalator novelty. The fact we have to discuss this is itself telling.

Finally, there’s the “your safety is important!” announcement. Americans’ eyes are opening up to the crime wave around us, in part imported across our borders, in part the result of liberal “prosecutors” confused about their roles (they think they’re “public defenders” working for the criminals) and refusing to prosecute. That’s why Americans are afraid of their cities. Washington has not been spared that scourge: Congressmen have been carjacked and, this week, apparently somebody tried to assault a federal protection detail outside Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor’s house.

However, there’s a phrase, “inside the Beltway,” that stands for the different worldview (and, thus, different concerns) of the class that lives within the boundaries of I-495 (the Washington Beltway road) versus the rest of “flyover” America. “Inside the Beltway” types must be protected so they can parrot the line that crime is going down. So, to feign greater safety, the DC Metro has gone to a security service and hired rent-a-cops who roam the trains to foster an appearance of greater safety (and crack down on that illegal food). The announcement tells us about the “special police initiative” (like, otherwise, would Metro not bother to police the subway?), urging us to “reach out” to a cop if we need one (you gotta tell me that?), concluding with “your safety is important.” That’s it. To whom is that last line directed? It’s always been important to me. Is it now important to Metro? But it doesn’t say that — it just says “it’s important.” Well, duh, yeah. I guess it’s even more important as politicians up-and-down ballot realize Americans may no longer tolerate being victims of their woke policies.

Punish Them Tourists!

Also in the rarefied world of Times readers’ concerns is the growing phenomenon in parts of Europe of supposed “over-tourism.” Venice, for example, has imposed its own non-automotive congestion tax on tourists, demanding they pay a fee to be tourists. But the Times also reports some Europeans’ choice to use carrots rather than sticks. Copenhagen is offering free admissions and discounts to tourists that do approved things, e.g., cycle rather than ride or offer volunteer time in “return” for being tourists in Denmark (see article here).

This nonsense is exemplary of a certain European snobbery lashed to climate fundamentalism. At the beginning of this century, the United States and EU had comparably sized economies; today, Europe’s has shrunk. European productivity — making things, stuff — has been stagnant or declining. If you ramp up costs without providing services, people may very well just stay home.

One pundit observed that Europe has largely turned itself into one big, pretty museum. If the European powers-that-be discourage tourism, then they’ll find that a museum that doesn’t attract or outprices visitors doesn’t succeed for too long.