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There's a difference, even in the "Protestant Work Ethic" though. You're expected to work for yourself, to get what needs to be done, done. That "work" includes living righteously, starting a/serving a family, contributing to and propping up your community, and making yourself a better person. Nowhere in that is a blanket "Thou shalt do and ask no questions, lest you be punished." There isn't Japan. Blind obedience went out of style in 1945, and should stay gone. We all know where that leads. "A son who does not admonish an unreasonable father leads his family to ruin.", Confucius [paraphrased] again. The 40 hour work week isn't even a luxury. It's required if you want some semblance of social stability. Industrialization was revolutionary in that tooling, factories, and infrastructure created an environment where work could happen 24/7/365. That doesn't mean it should, especially to the benefit of a few, at the cost of the livability of life for everyone else. Industry is meant to cure societal ills, not to act as a building block for exponential manufacture of new societal ills to be fixed by the very root cause of the original malaise. I may not be Chinese, and may not fully understand current pan-Asian culture, but I weep at the tragedy I see unfolding whereby a culture seems to be cannibalizing itself into something nigh-unrecognizable from what it once was. It seems to be happening everywhere nowadays. |