Reply to Dave

This morning, I made a post on Bluesky [1] and received a reply that inspired a lot of thought. So much in fact, that I decided it would be more appropriate to write a brief blog post than to reply in a meandering thread. For the sake of comprehensiveness, here was the conversation:

Firstly I'd like to say that absolutely my statement was an exaggeration. One of the lessons I've taken to heart from Adorno (and emphasized in Geuss) [2] is the idea that truth can only be expressed in exaggeration, and I've tried to allow myself to indulge in more exaggeration and metaphor as a result. I can say that this has resulted in a great deal more generative and insightful thought, without the baggage of my prior hand-wringing and qualification ad-nauseum. Ocassionaly, of course, this gets me into trouble when communicating to others, but I hope the striking contribution to the discussion is more inspiring than irksome.

However, I would like to clarify my statement as I believe I caused some misunderstanding. My worries about instrumentalization of time have not been limited to those directly (or indirectly) caused by labor, and extend to any external temporal imposition. This covers an unsurveyably vast quantity and variety of situation, and I think the best way to illustrate this is through the now defuct "Log 24" iOS app I used throughout middle school, high school, and sparsely during college. This is my favorite example of my obsession with free time because of how absurd it is.

The app works by defining color-coded categories and then dividing your day into blocks of time. There was some rudamentary data analysis but it was a pretty bare bones program. I would attempt to optimize for the maximization of blue and the minimization of non-blue time. The labels for each of the categories shifted over time; that's why I use the colors instead of the labels. "Free Time" became "Leisure" after I had a few economics classes under my belt, and "Chores" became "Self Care", but the use of each was roughly the same. The real outlier here was purple, since the label and substance went through a lot more variation. When I had jobs, it was titled "Work". When I wasn't employed, purple was essentially "blue but for my current favored central activity that was somewhat 'productive'". So at some points it was Overwatch and at others it was reading philosophy, for example.

I think the rest of the categories are fascinating once you recognize that they are all interpreted by me as profoundly negative and intrusive. Some categories are rather intuitive. School was uninteresting and a massive time and energy sink. "Obligation" sure doesn't sound good; this category was mostly reserved for whatever miscellaneous activities my parents forced me to participate in, whether it be an extended family get-together, church, some ill-conceived weekend event, or eating dinner with them. Green was reserved for benign uniniteresting but required tasks, such as showering or getting ready for school/work.

Other categories are a bit more surprising. "Sleep" was perceived as a massive waste of time, and an unfortunate necessity. Given that this time could have been invested into precious Blue instead, sleep was massively underwhelming. I got in the habit of waking up quite early, sometimes around 2-3AM so I could do whatever I wanted. Often, my parents would wake up and come interrupt me, sending me back to bed. Which made me all the more hell-bent on winning my time back. Lastly, there is Social. I was and am a pretty introverted person, and social interactions were tortorous for me. I didn't have a ton of close friends, and the ones I did have I regarded with disdain most of the time, even though I kinda liked them. That sounds contradictory but basically I mean to say that I enjoyed having the status of friendship with them, but resented spending any time with them because it tired me out and I could have been doing Blue things instead.

At this point the odd phrasing of that last statement should raise the question "What the hell does 'Blue things' or 'Free Time' or 'Leisure' actually mean, and why is it so important?". I chose the wording of my second Bluesky post today rather intentionally in an attempt to answer this: "autonomously determined free time". Unfortunately, I chose these terms to indicate the disreputation of the concepts in use. "Autonomous" was meant to indicate to the reader undertones of Kant. If the current reader knows anything about my philosophical sympathies, this fact already characterizes my definition as polemic. I don't put much stock in 'autonomy' as a concept, and find it rather unedifying, incapable of doing the conceptual work its proponents claim, and unworthy of centrality of consideration.

The other main piece I wanted to emphasize was 'free', as in 'freedom'. Principally in mind I had Quentin Skinner's Genealogy of Liberty [3], in all its varities. That is to say, my understanding of 'freedom' of time at any given moment was a moving target. Alongside the rest of the tradition, my conception frequently emphasized the role of non-interference. In other words, I first defined interference (non-Blue activities), and my definition of freedom was the negation of that set. There were all sorts of ways one could meet my criteria for interference, much wider than that which could be captured in my measly six Log 24 categories [4].

Over time, I became increasingly sensitive to what could be conceived of as an interference, in a way that I can analogize to much of Skinner's work. Among the external agencies interfering with me, they could act upon my body by force, or they could act upon my will via coercion, rending alternatives ineligible. My parents can not only dictate my location, but can also threaten punishment if I do not comply. The nature of the threat can be incredibly subtle, and the agency interfering and my relation to them can be complex. What is the correct subject of my ire? My parents could actually turn out to be mere enforcers of another agencies force, or the interfering agency could turn out to be my girlfriend whom I value and care deeply about, but want absolutely nothing to do with at that exact moment. The nature of the interference can be complicated as well - sure, I may not be forced into the physical presence of someone against my will or to do an activity I would rather not, but the very fact that I could conceivably be contacted (my parents are in the house, I have a cell phone and my friends can text me, etc.) is bothersome enough to make my time unenjoyable.

Plenty of these examples, particularly with my parents, revolve around relations of dependence as well. Dave reminds me of this in his post and Skinner recognizes this as another strand of unfreedom. I could continue discussing Skinner's genealogy as analogue through non-interference of the self and self-realization, but I think you get the point. I have been preoccupied with this idea of 'free time' for quite a while, and have become aware of many of the ways it can be thwarted, even if the younger me couldn't recognize and typologize it out in such a way.

However, with freedom too, I don't think it stands up to significant scrutiny. It's not just that I have an increasingly stringent definition of what amounts to freedom, it's that the definition is internally incoherent and changes based on the context. This is one of the main challenges I have elaborating an explanation and analysis of the phenomena; in the final analysis, it's on shifting ground oriented around concepts I find disreputable but ultimately appropriate to the emotions I feel. Apt concepts would be differential and not categorical, but the emotions I harbor during bouts of irritation due to imposed time forbid me from communicating with anything less than the force of the categorical imperitive. The nature of what counts in any given case as unfree or as not autonomous will always require contextual specification and it is unclear whether or not these will always be the relevant criteria for capturing the frustration of my relation to time in a particular circumstance.

To Dave's point, I have actually attempted to write about the subject in the past in Otaku and Instrumental Reason. This attempt failed spectacularly, largely due to my deficiencies as a writer, lack of specificity in scope, not being well-read enough (particuarly Adorno/Horkimer and their critics on the subject of instrumental reason), and unwillingness to generatively exaggerate. I'd actually love to return to blogging, and taking a bit more care to construct something with longer form and additional structure. However, to return to the topic of this piece, I struggle to muster the energy and time commitment to do so. Inspiration for my blog posts strikes acutely, and there is a limited window of a flurry of passion and interest in which I am capable of writing. When an idea fascinates me, I like to dedicate some time to do some reading relevant to the subject, to reviewing notes and personal history, and to an extended period of focused contemplation. Nowadays, I find this prohibitavely challenging to manage. I used to be able to sacrifice concurrent days to a rabbit hole and immerse myself in a particular issue, and this simply does not seem physically or psychically possible any longer. Even when I technically have the time to dedicate, I am frankly exhausted and incapable of entering the proper frame of mind to work properly.

I could moderate this stance and say something like: However, it's not like that approach to blog writing ever resulted in anything I was particularly proud of, so maybe a different strategy of more long term and dispersed meditation on on a subject would be best after all. Honestly though, this seems like a lot less fun, and as a result I don't think it would be motivationally viable. I have a whole host of blog post ideas sitting around in my to-do list, and the only way I see myself ever getting back around to them is if they become relevant in my life once more (for example, an inciting comment from a friend on Bluesky *wink*).

In any case, I think it's about time I wind this one down. I'm rather tired and need to focus on the reproduction of my labor-power [5].