u/IranianAlan

Follow-up to my last post, because judging by some of the replies, a fair number of people either skipped the actual point entirely or sprinted straight into the comments with their favourite preloaded speech. The original point was not especially difficult. I was not saying every job on earth can be done remotely. I was not suggesting surgeons should be on Zoom, or warehouse staff should move pallets from their kitchen, or that every human being must now work from home forever. That would obviously be stupid.

The point was much simpler than that: if a job can be done remotely, and done well remotely, then “but some jobs can’t” is not the devastating counterargument some of you seem to think it is. It is just a completely different point. And yet, right on cue, the comments filled up with exactly that. “What about mechanics?” “What about nurses?” “What about construction?” Yes, thank you. That was very much the category of argument I was referring to. You have all been extremely helpful in demonstrating it live.

Then there were the very polished, very balanced, very oddly bloodless replies that read like they were assembled in a beige meeting room by a committee called Workplace Synergy. Lots of “both sides have value” and “it depends on the individual,” which is a lovely way of sounding thoughtful while saying absolutely nothing. And naturally we had the usual talking points wheeled out as well: culture, collaboration, visibility, innovation, leadership presence, and all the other sacred office buzzwords that mysteriously become important whenever someone wants to justify dragging people back into traffic to sit on Teams calls from a different building.

To be clear, none of this really disproved anything I said. If anything, it made the point better than I did. A lot of people seem unable to hear “remote work is better for roles that can support it” without responding to an entirely different argument that no one actually made. So thank you, genuinely. The replies were a very useful demonstration of how online discussions now work: half the people are arguing with a version of the post that only exists in their head, a few are recycling corporate scripts, and a few seem to have confused “missing the point” with “winning the debate.” Anyway, I am glad we cleared up that “some jobs cannot be remote” is, in fact, still true. Groundbreaking stuff.

Look, this argument goes nowhere. No matter what you have or what you want, some people will resent it. That is life. Every time remote work comes up, the same objection appears: “what about the people who can’t?” There are plenty of reasons why some people cannot work remotely, and that is true, but it does not change the fact that if someone can work remotely and wants to, that is their choice and there is nothing wrong with it. Stop attacking people for having that option or taking it.

There will always be critics. It is like saying I want chicken curry for dinner and someone replies, “well what about people who can’t eat chicken, or people who only have beef?” That does not invalidate the original point. Not every discussion has to bend around every exception.

So let’s end the debate. Remote work is better for the environment, better for quality of life, and better in a lot of cases overall. If some people cannot do it, that is unfortunate, but it is not an argument against the people who can.

Look, this argument goes nowhere. No matter what you have or what you want, some people will resent it. That is life. Every time remote work comes up, the same objection appears: “what about the people who can’t?” There are plenty of reasons why some people cannot work remotely, and that is true, but it does not change the fact that if someone can work remotely and wants to, that is their choice and there is nothing wrong with it. Stop attacking people for having that option or taking it.

There will always be critics. It is like saying I want chicken curry for dinner and someone replies, “well what about people who can’t eat chicken, or people who only have beef?” That does not invalidate the original point. Not every discussion has to bend around every exception.

So let’s end the debate. Remote work is better for the environment, better for quality of life, and better in a lot of cases overall. If some people cannot do it, that is unfortunate, but it is not an argument against the people who can.

Recently the nursery installed Hikvision cameras on site, including outdoors. Am I right to be concerned about them using a Chinese-owned brand that is often reported as being hacked, and about footage potentially being sent to Chinese servers for analysis?