We have all worked twisted jobs.
On later reflection, you probably wonder how on earth you found yourself in that position, or why you stayed there for so long. Gross work, labour intensive work for meagre pay, work that makes you question your reality. Someone’s gotta do it right?
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We’re told that if we work hard, we’ll get where we want to be. We all want to be able to put a roof over our head, pay the bills and eat.
Here’s the basic trade offer (not optional): For the human necessities of food, shelter and amenities, your labour will be commodified, forcing you into an endless cycle of work, play, rest, repeat in eight hour blocks for the rest of your life.
Not disclosed: The fat cats at the top get to scrape chunks of cream off the top of your churnings, for all the hard work and ‘risk’ it took to get them up there.
Late stage capitalism, baby. It’s a waking nightmare.
If only those cats at the top knew what it was like to work some of the jobs out there.
And there are many jobs. Some you could never even conceive of.
Most of the time, you’ll do a cost/benefit analysis about any job. All of a sudden you find yourself thinking: “The hours are 11p.m. to 5a.m., I get out at 6a.m., but at least trams will be running, and the pay is good, $24 an hour flat rate, which is better than the others, and the team is really great.”
And some jobs are definitively, disturbingly, distinctly weirder than others.
Here, we go into some of the best of the worst.
Eden, Hot Girl Jizz Mopper
I cleaned XXX internet booths when I worked at [undisclosed venue]. It was such a bizarre time. There weren’t any towels in the booths we had – just loads of tissues. There were acrylic covered computer screens and plastic wrapped keyboards and computer mouses. There were glory holes that slid open and closed in each of the booths lmao.
It was truly wrecked. Poor 19-year-old me would close the retail store and do a little prayer before going upstairs to clean the booths each night.
There was a rule that if we went upstairs and saw a shit, we’d have to text the managers “code brown” to send in the big cleaners. Like COVID cleaning measures had NOTHING on [undisclosed venue]’s internet booth cleaning processes.
I worked there for about a year and a half. THANK GOD, I never had to call a code brown, but damn, it was actually such a boot camp for preparing me to do full-service sex work, because I saw some of the most cursed stuff working there.
At the time, I was moonlighting as a stripper down the road. When the manager finally found out they FIRED me for it. So fucking rude, because I was making the most sales BECAUSE I was a stripper goddamn it.
The business was so jacked. Thinking back I’m like Jesus christ, they did not pay me enough for the stuff I dealt with.
Honestly, when I first started there the manager was like “yeah, if you need to call a code brown don’t even bother with the booths, just end your shift and have a long shower”.
Got a weird or worst or wildest job experience? We’d love to hear it. Contact Ari at arielle.richards@gmail.com or via the social links below.
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