Dionysus on a Bike

by Justin Marquis

I reject the dichotomy between work and play. If an activity is intrinsically worthwhile to do while being paid, then it is intrinsically worthwhile to do without pay. Literally the only difference between work and play in late capitalism is that one is paid and the other is unpaid. This comes up because I have noticed, now that Zyzzy and I have been planning this bike trip for some time, that a few people do not seem to be particularly happy for me to be taking so much time for it. A particular family member took a not-so-subtle stab at my choice to spend over a year on the road when they emphasized that I need to find a better balance between work and play. I tried to let them know that I don’t value work for its own sake, that there is nothing noble or valuable in making sure that one toils. The reasons that I reject the intrinsic value of “work” are multiple, but I want to focus on what I take to be the most important reason. The most important reason that I reject the intrinsic value of work is because I do not divide human activities into an exclusive binary between work and play. My mom’s pushing me to make certain I am putting enough emphasis and priority on work assumes that what is worthwhile is to labor under capitalism, that for something to be worth doing, one must be paid to do it. As this applies to the bike trip, one might well regard my time on the trail as mere play, but thinking of it as mere play depends on a false dichotomy between work and play.

Work and play are not all there are. If there were only work and play, then how does one regard the work of artists and writers before their creative endeavors become monetized? Van Gogh’s painting can seem like it was work after the fact, now that his paintings are worth fortunes, but what about his activity of painting before he became famous and before anyone was paying him for his work? Was it mere play? What does one do with the activities and travels of Jesus? Was Jesus merely playing since he wasn’t on the job? Ghandi? MLK? Malcolm X? John Brown? Fred Hampton? The distinction between work and play as an exclusive, exhaustive disjunction only makes sense if one disregards the intrinsic value of activities that are not done for pay. Artistic creation, community building, relationship building, care for others, spiritual growth, revolutionary political activity, these seem to be valuable for their own sake completely independent of whether they are paid or not.

Work, for the worker, is a mere means to an end, the end of acquiring the means to survival. The worker might find other value in their work, but that value is completely independent from the transactional nature of the labor relationship in Capitalism. The one for whom the worker labors will find other value in their work to be sure. Often that value is merely enriching themselves, as most labor under capitalism is not useful or valuable for society’s functioning as a whole. Thus, a good chunk of “work” done under late capitalism serves only two essential purposes, scraping up enough for the worker to live and eke out some kind of happiness, pleasure, and comfort and enriching those whose Capital the worker is serving. Regarding those workers who do provide some social benefit in addition to subsisting and enriching capital, such as healthcare workers or farm workers who harvest our food, their work has real value beyond the transaction of labor, and much of this work would still need to be done under another system other than capitalism. However, because the amount of labor that is actually good for society is such a low percentage of the total labor of a late Capitalistic system, and the majority of labor is socially useless other than to obtain the conditions of survival for the worker, it is perverse madness to make a moral imperative out of work.

Once one makes a moral imperative to work for workers whose waking lives are dominated primarily toward the end of enriching the Capital for whom they work, two things happen. First, this moral imperative to work becomes a moral imperative to enrich Capital, a social class which doesn’t work at all. And second, one denigrates the value of any activity which does not produce personal, measurable wealth for someone. The worker who quits their job to pursue things with intrinsic value should not be chastised for not valuing work enough but congratulated and celebrated for securing the time and resources to do what is most valuable and meaningful in life.

One imagines a young Jesus going off into the wildness to seek truth and a vision of his ministry to follow. Upon returning, Mary and Joseph ask concernedly when was the last time he took a carpentry job. Jesus tries explaining that he is seeking the Father to explore his own path through life leading eventually to his ministry, but they remind him that work is more important than play. One then imagines a Poe, a Melville, an Oscar Wilde, or some other giant of arts and letters dying destitute and penniless and without recognition for the work they will eventually be world-historically famous for and people saying they were lazy for not working harder.

The work/play dichotomy in late-Capitalism is a false dichotomy and a dangerous one. First, it devalues the importance of play for humans, but more importantly it ignores all of the human activity that is neither work nor play, but is still valuable. Indeed, I argue that the most important human activities, the ones that bring the most joy, the most pleasure, the most meaning, and the most good are those activities that are neither work, nor play. Artistic creation, writing novels, sketching figures, pasting collages, composing poetry, and building wild flights of fancy in mixed media; building relationships, spending time with family and friends, cooking for one another, providing hospitality and receiving it, making friends; forming community, meeting together and breaking bread, fighting for a more just world; and finally spiritual growth, going on journeys of the mind, body, and spirit, prayer, meditation, losing oneself in nature, exploring the hidden depths of the soul and relating that to our place in the vastness of time and space. All of these things and more are neither work nor play, and they constitute what is best about being human. Work under late capitalism is a mere means to an end. These other activities are the end, the goal, the beauty of living a human life in relationship with others and in honest relationship with oneself.

The bike tour I am embarking on is intentionally not work. I am earning money for no one and I am living off the savings of labor I’ve already completed, as well as the generosity of others. Yes, some of what I am doing on the bike trip could be considered play. I love riding bikes on forest trails for no other reason than the pure joy and pleasure of it. That said, it is to miss the point of what I am doing to say that I am only playing and avoiding work to be on this bike tour. This bike tour is a chance to create, as it is giving me the time and space to write. It is a chance to learn about the people and places I pass through as well as from the books I now have time to read. It is a chance to build relationships with my companion who travels with me and with the people I meet along the way. It is a time to grow spiritually with time to meditate in nature placing body and mind in other rhythms and environments than I am used to. It is a time to worship and commune with diverse communities of faith across the country, connecting over share values of peace, justice for all, and an immense gratitude for the gifts we have been given. To be able to grow, build, create, and be transformed on this bike tour is one of the greatest gifts and opportunities that I have ever had, and none of that value and none of its importance has anything to do with work.

I am privileged and blessed to have an opportunity to spend so much time on the bike trail doing so many things that are of intrinsic valuable to me. As I withhold my labor from a system that exploits human workers, creates slavery conditions, and destroys the earth, I am at the same time exploring what I take to be the most important things in life, our connections with one another, our connection with the earth and what makes the earth possible, and with my own human creative potential. Fellow workers, do not let anyone tell you that the your value is in your labor or that the things that you do outside of work are not valuable. The things you do outside of what you must do to secure food, shelter, and enough to be comfortable are what makes life worthwhile. Your creativity, your communities, your spirituality, your play, your relationships, these deserve your time, so never feel guilt at making as much time for these as you can. Fight for a world where superfluous labor that only enriches Capital is abolished and where those activities that make real life worthy of our affirmation and joy are made possible and celebrated.