Writes Sheon Han in "The Case for Selective Slackerism/How a Korean term helps me reconcile my moments of discipline and sloth" (The Atlantic).
In this view, as I understand it, it's not that you avoid all chores. It's that you differentiate among chores and you view the chores as the source of the laziness. It's interesting to think of the activity itself as producing the feeling and to relieve yourself of a moral burden in feeling lazy.
Is English lacking the words for this distinction between 2 types of laziness? I can see that I have a tag for "laziness" and a separate — and important! — tag for "idleness." There are also many English words in the general area: "apathy," "inertia," "lethargy," "sluggishness," "sloth," "lassitude," "loafing" (I loafe and invite my soul, I lean and loafe at my ease...)....
But perhaps none of these words expresses the difference between the general resistance to work and the resistance only to a particular type of work. And yet, let me suggest "irksome." We speak of the "irksome task." That does seem to blame the task itself and not our own laziness. It makes sense, in English, to say I am not a lazy person, but that is an irksome task.
१९ टिप्पण्या:
so there can be nuance to being lazy : desultorily and slovenly v suave and with panache
I’d go with “tedious.” It can refer to persons (as can irksome), but is normally applied to activities. Irksome implies irritating, but tedious can mean simply boring.
Mahon
"all progress is made by a lazy man looking for an easier way.
Lazarus Long in" the man wh was too lazy to fail" by Robert Heinlein
I make a pretty decent living helping manufacturers help their employees be lazy.
There is entirely too much unnecessary work being done in American industry.
John LGBTQ Henry
Lazy contains both concepts. A lazy person is lazy about everything—the judgmental kind of lazy. But a person can also say ”I’m feeling lazy” at a particular time or about a particular task. That lazy has no judgment. It’s not an exact match to the Korean as the laziness is within the person either way, but it’s pretty similar.
I nominate “antipathy.”
Man needs excuse for sitting on his ass....finds one.
down by the lazy river
In retirement, I have been forced to confront a number of tasks I had previously found irksome: budgeting, taking control of my portfolio investments (strategy and individual buy/sell), handyman repair projects in the house and yard. Once you get over the frustration and awkwardness of learning new skills, there is a deep satisfaction in accomplishing tasks you would have avoided (or did) for decades. (This is particularly true of demanding physical jobs.)
Patience and discipline are virtues, and being willing to confront irksome tasks is a great way to cultivate them.
Think my spouse will buy into definition #2 about my ever expanding Honey Do list?
Me neither.
Look busy. Busy work. Wikipedia has a Busy Work page. It ends with a comment on busy work in the military:
"Busy work is used in armed forces to keep servicemembers from becoming bored, inactive and idle. Tasks of this sort include drill, memorizing regulations, getting haircuts, spit and polishing footwear and other cleaning chores such as scrubbing the deck.[3][4]"
Strikes me as a very weird paragraph. It's missing bed making for one thing. And if you're around boats at all first thing you learn is you spend more time cleaning the thing than out boating. Very disappointing to learn when you're 11 and your dad gets a used motor boat.
>> let me suggest "irksome." We speak of the "irksome task." That does seem to blame the task itself and not our own laziness. It makes sense, in English, to say I am not a lazy person, but that is an irksome task. <<
Bingo.
English easily makes the same distinction and does so more directly by applying an adjective to the task making it clear that the irkee is irked by the irksomeness of the irklesome task itself. You can quickly come up with a dozen other adjectives that serve the same purpose (as some commenters above have already done). "Irksome", "tedious", "boring", "eye-glazing", "stupor-inducing", "soul crushing", etc.
There are a lot of articles like this where an author pretends they have found a delightful subtlety in another language that can't be captured in English. But English, like most languages, is pretty flexible and you can usually get pretty much the same effect in English as well. English speakers can describe snow in dozens of different ways by using descriptive adjectives.
Larry’s Second Law is “Laziness is the foundation of efficiency.” For generations, inventors have created labor saving devices to make routine tasks easier. Few have benefited more than traditional housewives. Look back 100 or so years ago and see how demanding housework was. Cooking was done on a wood stove, and keeping that going alone was work. Electric and gas stoves made cooking much easier. Laundry was done on a scrub board and was physically demanding. Now, you can start a load in a washing machine and go do something else. The same goes for countless other chores - people work hard to invent devices to save labor. Labor saving devices are perhaps a trillion dollar industry worldwide.
Preach it, Larry!
Henry Ford grew up looking at the ass end of a mule. He wanted to invent a tractor that would be cheap enough and easy enough to operate and maintain to replace all of them.
Problem was the technology, metallurgy, financing, distribution etc did not exist in 1905.
So he invented the model t to develop his dream tractor.
The Fordson, that came to market in 1917 it probably did more for global food security than the any thing before or since. (maybe Norman Borlaug)
Because Henry Ford was too lazy to plow with a mule.
Then there is lazy Henry Potter and the newcomen engine. But that's another story.
John LGBTQ Henry
I used to tell my history students that before the Industrial Revolution, the most common labor-saving devices were slaves or serfs.
Down here, the congenitally lazy are "shiftless."
"Onerous" works for tasks I am avoiding.
"Dolce far niente" seems even more positive than the Korean term.
It's a woman's work. It's a man's work. It's a shared responsibility. Toxic humanity.
languorous?
Verilazyitude
Drudgery
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