This is Culver’s. They’re a burger fast food joint located throughout the Midwest and have things called “Scoopy Night” where a percentage of the proceeds go toward a specific cause. Schools, dance groups, etc can partake and the kids who attend that school/dance group/etc help take orders and deliver food to tables. Not quite as dystopian as OP has made it seem.
For a few hours? Sure, why not. They’re not actually useful labor. The store is doing you a favor. Your average 8 year old peeled away from Minecraft and told to do a task is going to fuck up more than they help. I know, because I was that kid and I fucked up a lot. Sometimes in very expensive ways. My only worry would be that they would leave the job thinking every day will be fresh and new like that day, and that people are gracious and polite.
For a few weeks? Oh hell yes, now we’re talking. Then they’ll see the monotony and how much corporate sucks. Even more, how much customers suck. At that point, the value of learning a skill that keeps you out of the fast food/retail mines will be obvious.
Yes, of course I would. It's a great experience. We actually did that back in school, had a week when we all went out to check out different jobs. It was a great thrill and fun for all. Certainly not labor. We got to do grownup things. That was shortly before seventh grade, iirc.
And then, we've had school things where we would bake and cook and sell it right there on campus. Is that labor as well? Oh, and when I was in the boy scouts, we sometimes went door to door raising funds and selling trinkets. Child labor?
It's not like we had to do eight-hour days, week for week. A few hours, once in your life. That's not labor. That's a fun thing to do.
Depends on the kid. Do they treat workers disrespectfully, or not understand that money shouldn't be recklessly spent? Absolutely have them work fast food for a night -- so long as an adult is there to make sure there's no safety issues and they're paid full minimum wage for it, I'm all for it.
I had a chemistry teacher in high school who maintained that everyone should have to work retail or fast food once, and as I've grown older I completely understand what they meant. Some people are naturally not dicks. They don't look down on workers at Walmart or McDonald's. For others, it's a lesson they have to learn. They need to work in that position to understand what it's like.
That doesn't mean we should draft all kindergarteners into the work force. But the occasional experience to show them what a minimum wage job is like? Absolutely. If we want kids to grow up voting for minimum wage increases and universal labor rights, they have to learn these things somehow.
No, that's still idiotic. It doesn't matter what the context is of why a child is working at a fast food restaurant. There's a child working at a fast food restaurant. This isn't selling chocolates to raise money for a class hamster.
Being intent on remaining outraged is idiotic. Spending a few hours doing a handful of minor tasks at a fast food restaurant for fun is worlds apart from being required to labor for day after day for a pay check.
Selling chocolates is so much worse though. That always creeped me out because it’s either A) kids learning how to hawk wares on the street outside of stores, B) kids learning how to be door-to-door cold call solicitors or C) run a MLM pyramid scheme by convincing their parents to push their product at work.
Maybe even D) a combination of all of those for the ultimate street hustler training.
This is just kids “playing house” for a few hours. Most probably love that shit. I would have killed to see what the buttons on the register do and how the fries are made.
This is what it is, and it's sad that it's so normalized that people are defending it.
Everyone knows the kids aren't technically required, but they're "required" by social pressure.
I remember having to go door to door selling things when I was a kid. It may have been voluntary in a technical sense, but I was pretty well mandated to do so if I wanted to be part of that group with my friends. And there was even more pressure from my mom and dad because they didn't want to be the family whose kid didn't do the thing.
I think it's time we start taking a long hard look at some of these things like fundraisers and de facto coerced employment of youth (without pay) and ask ourselves if a healthy system would allow this.
It’s indicative of a larger effort by republicans to force children back to work, this is part of that dystopia even if it’s on the “light dystopia” side of the spectrum.
Fuck off whiteknight, keep enabling corporate’s ability to normalize and capitalize off of child labor. This ain’t no goddamn bake sale or car wash.
It's a fundraiser likely for an after school program. It typically pays out a lot better than a car wash or brat fry. Typically the students run orders out to cars.
And yeah, we probably should put more funding into schools for stuff like this instead of asking kids to fundraise.
Yea it makes it worse tbh. We won't fund fun things at the schools so instead we make them work fast food to earn that funding.
It is indeed even more dystopian when you put it like that. It's got the same energy as people giving their coworker PTO so they can deliver a baby or whatever.
when we needed to do fundraisers THE PARENTS IN THE PTA DID IT FOR THE MIDDLE SCHOOLERS.
We had plenty of 'kids' working at fast food and grocery stores but not until 15 minimum. this kid looks like he's 9. that's too young to be fucking around near fryers and hot grills.
15 year old kids are probably capable of cashier work so long as they aren't overworked and it doesn't get in the way of school. It is not particularly dangerous like certain factory jobs could be, and is legal in most cases if the child has a parent's permission.
The child in the photo does not look like he is 15 years old though, probably closer to 10-11 which generally is too young to be working.
Ive been working since I was 15 to support my family. This is a problem with a late stage capitalist society. Your complaining about something that alleviates this problem. Obviously its not a good thing for a child to need to work to support their household, but the solution is sure as hell not to stop them from being able to eat at all.
I.e. your locally owned mom-and-pop Chinese takeout. I’ve seen the kiddos answer the phones there a couple of times, tho most of the time when picking up food for the wife they’re just playing in a blocked off side area that used to be dining pre-pandemic.
Yeah, I agree it's fucked up but there's almost no way that kid's under 14, which is the youngest age Culver's will hire at, he's just a late bloomer probably. I think a lot of people would disagree with calling that age group a "literal child."
I don't think most people would disagree that "teenager" is a more accurate word to describe that age. Trust me, there is plenty fucked up with the OP picture, we don't need to resort to hyperbolic language to get our point across.
Its not hyperbolic, 14 is a teenage child. Teenager is not more accurate, because when you say a 'teenage worker' most would assume they were at least in the usually accepted 'young adult' range, 16-19, the image here is of a child worker. If they were 17 or 16 that might be different, though still literally, legally a child.
I don't think most people would disagree that "teenager" is a more accurate word to describe that age. Trust me, there is plenty fucked up with the OP picture, we don't need to resort to hyperbolic language to get our point across.
It is blatantly the opposite of accurate. When teenager describes both a thirteen year old who hasn't hit puberty and a nineteen year old who could fight and die for their country, it's obviously not an accurate enough term
Assuming the literal meaning of “literal”, a child is, according to the OED, literally:
a young human being below the age of puberty or below the legal age of majority.
I'm not in any way defending child labor in general or Culvers in particular, but factually speaking, a 14-year-old fits between those two definitions (above the age of puberty but below the legal age of majority).
So that's an inclusive "or" in the definition. If EITHER of those criteria are fulfilled, then the definition can be applied. Since the criterion about the age of majority is true then the definition is true.
So conversely, a person above the age of majority who hasn't reached puberty yet (medical condition maybe? Just suspend disbelief for the sake of the argument) is still by definition a child.
I have a 14 year old right now and I’d have zero issues with him getting a job. He’s already been eyeing some places. I know this isn’t what you’re exactly saying, but once they hit puberty they’re a bit different than young kids.
I respect that, but your 14 year old is probably quite unusual in that respect. To his credit, of course! Some kids mature faster, and in different areas at different rates. I have a 13 year old and a 16 year old and neither of them would be capable of paid work in my opinion. I love them from the bottom of my heart but they would crumble after a shift at BK
I got my first job in ‘95 when I was 13. This was in a Toronto suburb at a computer shop and it was awesome although only got $5 an hour and had to stay in the back mostly shrink-wrapping a million cd cases. There was a cute 16 year old older girl at the register that I still remember lol.
Didn’t love wearing a large Windows ‘95 box costume and standing at the corner like a hooker though.
Jeeziz. We're about the same age and I was unable to even make a sandwich at that age I think. Mind you, I bet 13 year old you was ecstatic about that 5 dollars an hour in 1995. I hope you've got a picture of yourself in that box for the laughs.
My first job was call centre work at 16. I answered an advert in the local paper. Trying to use a script to swindle old ladies out of their pension for a commission, it was horrifying. I remember thinking "is this what adults do for a living? Cheat each other??" Looking back, I wasn't that far off in a lot of cases I think.
Oh man that’s a terrible first job lol. I would absolutely hate doing that.
By the time I was 16 I had moved to the states and got a job at KB Toys at the mall. They paid 7.75 an hour which was better than the rest of the mall at 5.25 an hour. Mall was the place to be though!
I liked service work. I tended bar and worked in kitchens for years while I got my qualifications. I sometimes think everyone should have to do retail or service for a bit so they can meet as many different types of people as possible. I work in research now, and I see a lot of the graduates coming in in their twenties and they don't understand shit about how the world works, or how people work. I think there's a lot of value in the experience you get in those jobs that people look down their noses at. If it paid the bills as well as science and engineering, I would've stayed.
Service work wasn’t bad at all. First service gig I had was when I was 18 and I worked a catering gig for a golf tournament. Thought I was practically a millionaire because it paid $20 an hour!
Went to college and waited tables at some restaurant named Pargos. Biggest tip I ever got was when I accidentally spilled an ice tea over the patriarch of an 8 top lol. I was mortified. I had been pledging a fraternity and got very little sleep before. Turns out the guy was also a fraternity alum so I got really lucky.
I completely agree with you. You learn so much dealing with customers and not to mention some interesting coworkers. That movie “Waiting” was pretty spot on.
I was laying lines blueberry raking at 14, and doing dishes in a restaurant at 16. I wanted money and it certainly taught me how difficult manual labor is without putting me in any real danger. The worst I got was bread cuts. I'd 100% put my daughter in the same situation when she's older.
Getting a job as an indulgence because they are interested is fine. Getting a job because their parents are not capable of giving them a dignified lifestyle is downright disgusting and such kids should be rescued. Often greedy parents mask the latter as the former because they are scum.
Getting a job because their parents are not capable of giving them a dignified lifestyle is downright disgusting and such kids should be rescued
I just don't understand this leap to conclusions that every young person is out there working because their parents aren't feeding or clothing them. I grew up with rich friends, middle class friends, and poor friends. Random assortments of all three groups grew up working. The vast majority of the time it to earn money for themselves to buy luxuries. One friend was working to support their family due to a parental situation. There's no way putting that person in the foster care system would have been better. They Graduated with decent grades too.
Don't get too worked up over it. The average Stay-At-Home-Lemmy is completely unable to understand the concept that not everyone's mom and dad will buy them an Xbox and that sometimes teenagers will get jobs to pay for things they want.
I enjoyed it. The work was easy and it gave me a sense of purpose and I needed that. It taught me the value of my time, and enabled me to get a car when I turned 16. Some people grow up fast, simply because they have to, or sometimes because they just, do. One size does not fit all.
I think many states allow children as young as 12 to work in specific non-dangerous jobs with permission from the parents. A company recently got in trouble when they had like 20 12-15 year olds working in a meat processing plant which definitely did not qualify for the "not dangerous" qualifier.
"This is a systemic problem. Children should have their needs met without the need for work, and this child working is an obvious symptom of the problem at hand."
"Have you ever considered that I, an individual, worked at a mcdonalds at the age of 15? I used the money to buy a video game. Therefore your argument is invalid."
Your comment was on top when I came here and made me look through the rest of the thread, and holy shit lmao
I remember having to do stuff like this when I was a kid. It was dystopian then, and it's dystopian now.
The fact that it's so normalized here in the US that people scramble to defend this is really tragic and illustrates how hard it is for people to step back and see the true nature of a situation and ask ourselves if this is something a healthy functional society would produce. "I enjoyed it, therefore it's good" is one of the worst defenses for anything, ever.
I've seen some very small statured people working in big chains here. I don't think Maccas and their ilk would be taking the risk of illegally employing children, at least not in countries like Australia.
Also, if this is a young child, is it not a bit wrong to be sharing their image around like this?..
I'm Australian and this reminds me of working at the local fish and.chip store when I was 12. I asked the local general store, but they'd only pay me to do odd jobs, the local bakery said no,.and the local fish and.chip shop said I could help take orders and.package meals during their busy hours each evening.
My Lego collection grew, I got real good at Time Crisis 3, and I went to see a movie each Saturday. It was awesome. I didn't see it any different to scoring cash for mowing lawns or washing cars, just stable and they appreciated my help so I felt good too.
If you'd told me I wasn't allowed, I'd have done it behind your back and said I was going to friend's houses.
The work itself wasn't important but learning responsibility and the value of money was important.
It was the first time I did anything completely on my own without being directed in some way by a parent, teacher, coach, etc. Without that job and after-school/summer jobs I had when I was older there is a good chance I would have made poor financial decisions in early adulthood.
With 18 year-olds getting credit cards shoved in their face the day they show up for orientation, after probably signing up for student loans, it's probably a good idea for them to have earned money on their own for a while.
I don't understand the people down voting you. Having a job growing up taught me a lot of responsibility and how to manage my own money and act in a professional environment. Invaluable skills that you wouldn't get anywhere else, certainly not school
These jobs you are speaking of--washing cars, mowing lawns, even kids working in their parents' store--do you think that is the same as working for a multinational conglomerate handling food with no breaks and minimum wage?
No they're not the same. The multinational conglomerate is far better.
Chores for the neighbors and the paper route paid peanuts. Once I was old enough to work for the conglomerate (where I received food safety training) my pay after taxes more than doubled (a little more than minimum wage, which did, and does, exist), I started contributing to my future social security check, I received paid breaks, and there was a maximum amount of hours I was legally allowed to work.
Flipping burgers beats the hell out of lugging Sunday papers around the neighborhood or knocking on doors to mow lawns in the summer heat or shovel driveways in the freezing cold. Back then I counted the days until I was old enough for a "real" job.
This is what I don't understand about all the angry people in this thread. Of course it's not okay to have children working in like fucking coal mines and not regulating the hours they can work and the pay you can give them. Of course that's not cool and should be stopped. But the people doing that (and there are many) aren't usually the ones doing it out in the open in a fast food restaurant.
All this constant hyperbole for every single issue is exhausting. No one is defending sending 13 years olds out to replace someone's roof. We're talking about "unskilled" labor like taking orders, stocking shelves, running registers etc.
Immigrant children are already being exploited and are dying doing roofing work. You want to put children in the workforce but they would not be safe. If we had a pilot program in place and had some successful results that would be a different situation, but we have kids working 30 feet in the air with no safety gear. https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2023/12/14/us/roofing-children-immigrants.html
Learning things a little at a time, when the stakes are low/non-existent is the way to go. From early teens to partway through college when you get an off campus apartment you can learn how to apply for a job, how to interview, responsibility, managing your money, responsible credit use, professionalism, bill paying. All this over the course of years, with a support system when you make mistakes (hopefully).
I guess some people think you should just have all that dropped on you like a ton of bricks the day after you get a diploma.
Your example is very extreme. Having an after school part time job as you're growing up will prepare you for quite a bit, and set us apart from our peers that didn't work, and instead wasted their days after school or on the weekends. I take it you never worked growing up ? It's building essential life skills, not inhaling noxious fumes working 16 hr days in mines, this isn't the 1800's. I loved flipping burgers and making a paycheck at 15
I wasn't sure where I stood on this and read a lot of comments.
One thing that seems common is that many of those who worked young seem to think it made them better than the other kids somehow. They "wasted" their summer, while you built "essential life skills" unlike the person you're replying to, who did not? Are you still "set apart" from the person you replied to?
I might think getting thrown into the system at a younger age is the real waste of life. I've had a job since I was 15, but I really don't think it made me better than anyone.
It didn't make me "better" but from talking to people I went to college with (that didn't get jobs early), I'd definitely say I was more prepared for the workforce.
Also having money was dope and my fast food job was fun. I still enjoyed my life and summer outside of work, even more so because I could afford to do and get shit that my parents might not have been able to give me. It's not an all or nothing deal it's just a different life experience. I think it would be infantilizing to take the choice away from teenagers, though it is important to regulate it as shitty people will take advantage of it.
I think there's a line somewhere and for me the line is whether the job is suitable for children. Like, doing chores around the house or on your grandparents' farm. Paper route riding a bike. I worked summers at a carnival, and at a pool when I was a bit older. Low physical labor, low responsibility, low customer interaction, family friendly environments. You're right it should never interfere with education.
If I saw a kid at the register of a fast food place or a store, I would turn around immediately and never return. Just leaves a bad taste in one's mouth.
First of all, I generally agree with you that child labor such as in the OP is bad.
That being said, responding to people who had positive experiences with it in their own lives by jumping directly to sending then to the mines is absolutely fucking insane. They are not the same thing.
I think children should be free to focus on more important things than working.
"Freedom" to do what you want them to and nothing more, not even to earn it over summer break or learn the value of money.
Fuck 'em, just wait until they get out of highschool at 18 before they ever even see real money and have no idea how any of it works, who the predators are, and what the risk is.
Fuck 'em, just wait until they get out of highschool at 18 before they ever even see real money and have no idea how any of it works, who the predators are, and what the risk is.
Why is this worse than the literal same thing at a younger age?
This place is insane sometimes. In their heads they're thinking children being forced into labor, obviously that's not what we're talking about here. I had various gigs I did as a kid to earn some extra money, snow shoveling in the winter, mowing in the summer, I'm doing much better financially than my peers. Most of the guys I was in the military with were losing their whole paychecks just days after getting them, never having that much money in their lives. No one ever taught them and they never developed the skills on their own.
Say what you will, but I don't think there's anything wrong with letting a kid work in an entrepreneur kind of fashion or in limited capacity like what you did on weekends, summer break, etc.
You can't raise someone into an adult if you hand them the keys for the first time on their 18th birthday. Most of us learn by doing and it's best to get the hands on experience.
Sometimes I read comments online and initially think they're sarcastic but then realise the person's serious and flexing way above their capacity, usually by straw manning. And here's one of those moments...
Do you think we should send the kids back to the mines?
facepalm
About as much as you think the police should be shutting down lemonade stands.
I don't know why, but paper boys (yes we were all boys) were some sort of exception to child labour laws. I was selling newspapers when I was 12-13 for 5c ea.
And what about those assholes that never wanted to pay? Just pay the kid you cheap ass. I see your cars, your lights are on, I know you're home motherfucker.
I identified so hard with that "I want my two dollars" kid from Better Off Dead.
One of my customers went and died owing me 80c. I just took the loss. But it would have been hilarious to see some young kid chasing the estate for his debt!
I'm American and I totally agree. It feels like there are two different countries here, with the red one generally mooching off of the blue one while simultaneously claiming they're the "real America". I'm so tired.
There's hardly anything to defend because there's nothing here other than a photo with zero confirmed information about what appears in the photo. People are just making baseless assumptions.
I saw this on Reddit a while back. This isn't an actual employee, it's the kid of a manager who brought them to work for the day (school was closed or something). The dumbass manager thought it would be cute to dress her kid up and put them on the register, but patrons were rightly weirded out. Culver's corp found out and were pissed - I'm not sure if the manager got fired or not, but this definitely wasn't something Culver's was cool with.
I worked at an Arcade/Restaurant when I was 13 for 25-30 hours a week. It was absolutely a positive experience for me and it's a shame to see so many people here crucify the idea of any child working at that age. Y'all haven't the slightest idea whats the motivation and just assume they are being forced into it or something. Having a job so young built character and showed me that I was able to get the things I wanted in life if I put in the 'hard' work. Nobody forced me to work those hours, I wanted to! Props to Culver's for providing the opportunity to kids.
Yup. I was picking up lawn mowing accounts when I was 12-13, and it was the best feeling in the world buying myself the jeep that I wanted two weeks before I turned 16.
I agree 100% but working fast food is very different than an after school work opportunity, come on now.
I never got an allowance and worked after school jobs alt the elementary/hs/uni but that is a far cry from what some of the child laborers are starting to do here in the US.
Normalizing this sort of thing is problematic, it’s not about the kid working for money it’s about the setting and expectations of both the employees and the customers. They should be focused on education and being a kid, but they can’t do that when they spend their afternoons at the factory
I had my own computer and car before I turned 18, and it felt empowering to have accomplished this on my own. You and I have drastically different views on what's exploitative. Full stop.
Child labor laws weren't meant to protect someone like you, they're meant to stop folks from sending their kids to work to pay their rent/mortgage/power/water. Kids should know that paying their parents bills is not ideal, and child labor laws are how we protect them. Without revealing too much about myself, my dad was one of [large number] of children, and they absolutely used those kids for labor at the family farm and were worse off for it. They grew up in poverty (on top of the physical abuse). Basically, these laws aren't supposed to stop young Timmy from buying a [insert gadget here], they're to stop Mom from pulling him out of school for an extra shift because she overdrew her bank account.
There's no way that kid is 13, by the way. Far too young for working the register at Culver's. At least they don't have him at the deep fryer. If the other comment I see in this thread is to be believed (the one that says this is a Manager's child and school was closed), it's probably not as nefarious as it seems. Republican states have been in the news fighting against child labor laws though, people are rightly outraged about that.
Aye you're right I should have specified. 25-30 hours a week was only during the summer months. During the school year it was 10-20 hours, and mostly on weekends. The US has strict laws on what children of that age can work during school days.
For one, we have no idea if it's completely unrelated. We don't know any of the context here just from the picture. This could very well be a summer job. We don't know.
Also, nonce is a really weird insult. Are you meaning to call them an idiot, or a pedo? If the former, sure, but if the latter, that's really weird.
The kid in the picture looks under 13. We all thought he's not high school, lol.
I'm not American but i saw a South Park episode poking fun of children working, as those older refuse to work under bad pay and toxic working condition as the result of pandemic. Is there any truth to this despite the satire?
They do this often at the Culver's near me. It's a fundraiser for school / extracurricular activities. The group works for a few hours and Culver's donates the receipts for that time.
It's better than having them go door to door selling wreaths and shit.
The school is funded already through taxpayers. The fact that "the children are working to fund the school" is an acceptable line of logic is already dystopian.
Traditionally, children do fundraisers to fund extracurricular activities, like a field trip. If the school is taking that money to add to their budget, that's crossing the line into exploiting kids' labor for money.
Where do you live that public schools are properly funded by taxes? American schools are embarrassingly underfunded, and teachers are tragically underpaid and typically have to spend their own money to buy supplies for their students.
The fact that public schools used to be properly funded by taxes and aren't any longer is part of the dystopia. Do you think I'm defending the current system?
I was surprised to find out how much the U.S. actually does spend on education, given how shitty it is. Idk where the money is going, but it's definitely funded
Part of this comes from the fact that most public schools are funded from local property taxes, so naturally wealthier residents have better public schools due to better funding as they naturally pay more in taxes
Most School systems are financially gutted to the bone. It's dark but most red counties school districts are near bankruptcy and blue areas are slightly better off. So expect more of this as public schools try to keep the doors open.
When looking at homes in the more rural areas I noticed that the schools basically shoved all the kids from a good bit around different towns and areas into one. I’d guess to consolidate as much funds as possible in an effective manner, rather than having to pay for more infrastructure that was really needed.
While I would have liked the slower pace….all I could afford out that way were 100 year old farmhouses with very questionable bones. One you could literally walk the dip between the kitchen and living room. Another had electric, propane and fireplaces for the heating in different areas of the home. Had to tell my wife to stop looking at those.
I remember having school assemblies in middle school with some third party fundraising company trying to get us to sell...I don't even remember what as a fundraiser for the entire school. At the time it felt weird and as an adult looking back I find it far more concerning that that's how they made up the budget shortfalls instead of raising property taxes by fraction of a percent
I had to help out behind the register at a mcdonald's for a scout thing, I was supposed to upsell coupon books. I spent about 2 hours standing next to a teenage girl who calmly stood there and took a near non stop stream of abuse from entitled idiots. People got mad at her when the kitchen messed up their order. They got upset at her over price changes since their last visit. They got mad at her when an item was missing out of a 4-bag $80 order (they unbagged and checked everything there on the counter). One particular piece of shit actually got mad because the girl didn't recognize him and know his usual order as he was in there a lot, according to him. That one really blew my top. The casual way in which people were awful to the cashier just blew my mind.
They got mad at her when an item was missing out of a 4-bag $80 order (they unbagged and checked everything there on the counter).
That one seems valid. That person got burned before with the staff not bothering to do their job and were NOT going to short their friend whatever item(s) the staff kept for themselves. Sure, you can say the counter girl didn't do the bagging, but she's the one that the customer is supposed to tell, and it is hard not to be angry when you've paid for stuff and you're getting shorted -- AND there's almost surely another person relying on you to get it right this time. It shouldn't take so much effort to just get the stuff you paid for.
it's definitely not valid. Anyone getting upset at fast food workers just doing their jobs can get fucked. They could have resolved the issue without being assholes, she was nothing but polite to them and it wasn't her fuckup.
... but they WEREN'T doing their job. I've been a counter cashier at a burger joint. Most of the job was getting the order correct and taking in money properly, but I also has to to things like add extra relish packets and see that I was giving them the correct food. That's the job. You give the customer what they ordered. That is the EASY part. The hard part is dealing with the people trying to scam you with bill-switching/wrong-change schemes (though I suspect those are less common as fewer people use cash now).
That's true, but I don't know how much of a stink was made. If someone is unbagging everything at the counter, they've probably been burned before, so I can see some reason to take a harsh tone -- enough to show they're tired of the BS. If, instead, they started throwing things and screaming obscenities, yeah, that'd be an overreaction.
Also weird as fuck to be sneaking photos of children like this.
EDIT: I am ABSOLUTELY not defending child labor like this. It's all kinds of messed up. But it's also not an excuse to photograph children, and put their image online without their consent.
If this was a playground or doing normal childhood activities, then yeah, but this is a fucking Culver's (I think)... This is not normal.
Are we supposed to take OP at their word or something? "Guys there's a kid working fast food! I would have taken a picture but it would have been weird. My Canadian girlfriend who was in town that you all have never met urged me not to!"
You take photos of extraordinary sights. I'm sure the shitheads who have allowed this to happen would agree with you since they want to normalize it.
I'm hoping there's a legitimate, innocent reason for this.
There was an innocent reason apparently, from the now top comment:
"This is Culver’s. They’re a burger fast food joint located throughout the Midwest and have things called “Scoopy Night” where a percentage of the proceeds go toward a specific cause. Schools, dance groups, etc can partake and the kids who attend that school/dance group/etc help take orders and deliver food to tables. Not quite as dystopian as OP has made it seem."
Oh my fucking god it's a kid working behind a register in full work clothes, in broad daylight, surrounded by people. There is absolutely nothing about this that suggests predatory behavior except possibly some Capitalist tossing on a shiny wrapper for a reason this happens at all. Which, btw, this image circulates periodically. You can find explanations even in this comment thread.
Nobody s documenting anything with that photo. It's an out-of-context snapshot. Could be anything.
Part of a make a wish with a cancer patient. A school thing to experience five minutes of adulthood. A prank. Staged. You name it. What exactly is documented here?
So yeah, just posting some picture is weird as fuck.
I don't see how this was since one doesn't see children working at Culver's. OP wasn't aware that it was part of a fundraiser for some school thing... So now it's weird. They probably had signs up and OP missed it.
When was this taken? If it's a Holiday/weekend/afterschool Job, i don't see any problem with that. Also did a lot of them to scrounge up the Money for my PC
People offended just by looking at this picture out of context should really try explaining their preferred authoritarian social policy to a teenager who wants a part-time job but for whom some people would forbid them by penalty of the law.
Spoiler: They won't understand why you should have any authority over their body and time.
I don't understand why you should have that authority either. I mean, where does it end?
What are your criteria for exceptions? Shouldn't it be between the kid and their parents, and not you?
Are you imagining there is a parental figure with a bull whip for this kid in the back office and you want to outlaw physical abuse? There are already separate laws for that!
Children should not be working. We have piles of dead children that died in the past for the profits of capitalists, and it took millions of maimed children marching to DC led by Mother Jones for anything to be done about child labor. I highly doubt that there's anyone, let alone children, that want to be in the coercive environment we call work. If you want to say protecting children from the dangers of a capitalist workplace is authoritarian, then so be it. I don't want to see children in a workplace where they will be exploited by everyone above them.
It's cute that you think I'm talking about murder. Triangle Shirtwaist fire. Children in mines and mills. Children in factories. Children on farms. Children in retail. These are all areas of labor that have killed, maimed, and injured children. These kids were never murdered, they were hurt and killed in accidents that occurred because they were too young to handle the conditions of labor that was demanded of them. Fuck you for advocating for children to return to that type of labor.
Kids routinely get hurt (and sometimes killed) just playing. As long as they're not getting more seriously hurt more often at a job than regular activities, I don't see what the issue is, at all.
I started working at age 13 back in 1980 because I wanted money to buy GI Joes, and comic books. So I started going to construction jobs with my shithead father on Saturdays and helped him put up sheetrock. My first legitimate job was the summer I turned 15, I was big for my age so I started doing deliveries for a furniture store, worked there for two summers until I was fired after a workplace injury. The guy I worked with was a racist Italian from Whitestone New York, and I was a smart slightly autistic black kid. His delivery truck only had one seat so I stood in the open door on the right side holding on for dear life. One day we were moving a heavy office desk upstairs and I was bringing up the rear, he lost control which resulted in the desk sliding downstairs and slamming me into a wall. My ribs were badly bruised so after I got home the store panicked and fired me, they probably thought we were going to sue. Anyway I went into a deep depression and couldn't leave my room for a month. One of my therapists later told me that it was the first appearance of my bipolar disorder.
I was legally employable, and of age but still got hurt on the job. I just had shithead employers.
As others have pointed out, those laws have important exceptions to account for kids who want to work, and that is the question I am asking all of the knee-jerk authoritarians:
What is the actual policy position they support? What are the exceptions they support or are they completely authoritarian about this issue? (I think a strict rule prohibiting all people under 18 from ever earning a living is a pretty embarrassing position to defend.)
What are emancipated teenagers supposed to do? Should they live 100% at the mercy of state programs and not improve their living standards beyond the meager social welfare they are afforded until they turn exactly 18 years old? Really? Not even a day sooner, even if they are ready and qualified to work?
That would be completely inhumane. Certainly it's depriving them of their bodily freedom and natural ability to extract capital value from their own labor.
So where is the line? 13? 14? I think somewhere in there is reasonable. Perhaps a test could determine their capacity to participate in their own economic fate? Or an evaluation by a social worker? I could go for something like that.
What if they are NOT emancipated and their parent is supervising them? Should the age minimum be higher then? 17? 18? I do not think so.
I think it's only logical that the age minimum should actually be lower if a parent is directly supervising - their physical and economic risk is lower if the parent is looking out for their best interests. This of course presumes that the parent is not physically or mentally/emotionally abusing the kid(again, separate laws exist for the abuse component and most parents don't abuse their kids).
The wall is usually 14-ish with limitations on what you can do and how many hours you can work.
We have to limit it otherwise adults will take advantage of the fact that children don’t know what they’re doing.
Yes, some of them might be smart enough, but a lot of them aren’t, and it’s better to protect the majority and work on irregular cases on their own merits.
Part of becoming an emancipated minor is showing that you have the means to care for yourself to a judge, otherwise you’re not allowed to become emancipated
Why tf should a kid want to work? Why would you want a society to normalize a 14-year-old hustling and working after school? It's not authoritarian to protect children from parasitic businesses. Child-labor is illegal because at that stage a person has less emotional intelligence and rationality, they can more easily be taken advantage of and overworked, and won't understand their rights as a worker as well. You can't even sign a contract at 14 without a parent or guardian and you want them to be able to act at the whim of fast food managers?
Your argument is hardly one step away from the argument I see people trot out when defending child marriage.
What if a teen really really wanted to date an adult.
They're a child, no one cares what they "understand" because their capacity to understand is literally crippled. Their brains aren't developed yet.
It sounds like you are equating any job to getting sexually abused or raped.
That is "like... Yuck".
It's an irrelevant comparison because the work itself is not abuse. There are other laws that protect kids from being abused, if they are being abused to force them to work(or for any other purpose).
If you don't care what people under 18 think, you should reflect on how selfish and closed-minded that sounds to me and especially to the real human people you are proposing to lose their ability to work.
Do you really think there is a major difference between the brain of a 17 year old the day before their 18th birthday and the day after? There is no significant difference at all.
So, my question is, where do you draw the line for a person under 18 whose quality of life might depend on working? Should they just have that freedom stripped because you don't care what they think?
Even if they are on their own? Or supporting a dependent, like their own baby? Really? If you are that authoritarian about this, I hope you forget to vote on it.
The yuck part is that children under 18 are legally defined as not having full reasoning and consent capabilities.
So, I wasn't saying all work is rape, that's silly and foolish to think.
I'm saying your assertion that teens should have adult independence to make adult choices without laws and support is yuck.
"They don't understand" is literally my point. They CANT
If you're saying teens can consent in the same way adults can, that is yuck. And that is wrong. (For clarity, you need to consent to a working relationship for it to be healthy.)
It sounds like you are using a legal framework from medical treatment of minors. If I have that right, then you should know that there is an exception for emancipated people under 18 years of age.
Would you support the same exception for work, now that you know this or perhaps you would also eliminate this exception for them to control their own bodies in a medical context?
Court-ordered emancipation. A child under the age of 18 who lives independently without the support of parents and makes his or her own day-to-day decisions may petition the court for emancipation. If granted, the minor will have the same legal rights as an adult, including the right to consent to (and refuse) medical treatment.
This is the first time I've encountered such extreme and immovable opinions on Lemmy. It's wild to me that people who are (presumably) trying to support social justice for minors cannot even acknowledge that teenagers sometimes need and would prefer to work - that it's a separate issue from child abuse and strict authoritarian prohibition over their labor is itself abusive.
Don't people understand that a 17 year old can have a baby and need a job?
They won't even entertain the possibility and defend an actual policy position. It's devoid of social responsibility.
If they are genuinely socialist or communist, then how can they defend stripping 14-18 year olds of their natural right to profit from their own labor? It's just as bad as a capitalist exploiting that labor with unlivable wages - they are essentially condemning these people to $0 in wages and total state dependence.
