The Outsource Society

Is it just me, or does anyone else worry that modern man has gotten to the point where all life aspects have been outsourced?

This trend isn’t just growing popular in the business context, but the personal one as well. More and more people today seem to have other people: delivering their groceries, looking after their offspring, driving them to and from work (and that includes taxis, all you cabbie addicts), fixing their meals (forget using that stove!), cleaning their homes, ironing their clothes, talking them through their computer problems – the list goes on.

 The favorite lament is that ‘we have no time to do anything, we’re so busy/tired because of work’. Fair enough. We’re a bunch of workaholics, especially here in sunny-but-we’re-always-trapped-indoors Singapore. But is there not a difference? I should think that there’s a difference between working hard and coming home to find out that you don’t do anything yourself anymore. Are we allowing ourselves to be babysat? Does this spell impending overdependence? In the end, if you ‘only have time for work’, you will ‘only have a life of work’. Nothing else. And that’s not a hole I’d like to fall into. 

~ Lyana Shah recommends you go home tonight, make your own dinner, find your own way to work in the morning, and try assembling your next IKEA purchase yourself for once. Unless you are really DIY-challenged. I want no lawsuits.