The Protestant Ethic, Instrumentalizing Everything, and Devotion to Work

Today’s episode is Pan-Optic’s first ever "personal case study" response, where we react to listener Sep’s account of working in big tech and grappling with feeling intellectually and morally limited by her work requirements and the logic of the firm. In reacting to Sep’s personal case study, we explore: Max Weber on the protestant work-oriented ethic; the tendency to justify something’s existence by instrumentalizing its purpose; Jason’s aversion to divine command theory; being socialized and acculturated within neoliberal and meritocratic structures; research on what motivates high-output performers; and who should be let on the plane first. Thank you Sep for an excellent submission. We hope we did you justice. Pan-Optic is always accepting personal case study submissions. Share your story by contacting us at panopticpod@gmail.com or through any of our social media platforms. We look forward to hearing from you and reacting to your story. Addendum: we are issuing a correction after failing to do our homework... Sep, who we addressed using he/him/his pronouns, goes by she/her/hers pronouns. HUGE apology to Sep! We really feel bad about this and won’t make the same mistake again. Thank you for going easy on us and for making our first personal case study reaction possible and so much fun. The views expressed on this podcast are our own. If you enjoy what you're hearing, please follow/support us through any of the below media: Twitter: twitter.com/Panopticpod Patreon: www.patreon.com/panopticpod Website: www.panopticpod.com/ Apple: podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/pan-…st/id1475726450 Spotify: open.spotify.com/show/0edBN0huV1GkMFxSXErZIx