2022-08-25
55 分钟We end up with an impoverished sense of self, an impoverished sense of society, and an impoverished sense of a flourishing life when we let companies be our temples and our churches and our mosques that define who we are as people.
Because in the end, in these companies, the spirituality, your self actualization, your wholeness, is in service to productivity.
So your value is always defined by your productive worth.
So you may not think of your work as your religion, but for many, it is trying to become exactly that.
Without us even realizing it.
Question is that a good thing, a bad thing, or just a thing?
Today's guest, sociologist, associate professor of ethnic studies at UC Berkeley and co director of the Berkeley center for the Study of Religion, Carolyn Chen, has a lot to say about this silent yet deeply impactful phenomenon.
She spent five years studying workplace culture with a focus on the near religious cultures of Silicon Valley as home to startups, major tech companies, and some of the world's most innovative and arguably faithful entrepreneurs and professionals.
She noticed the lines between doing meaningful work and religion have not only been blurred, but work has in many ways squeezed out and even become employees.
Religion.
The problem is, the goal is not personal and societal betterment here, but rather in service of one central purpose, working harder and smarter and making more money.
Carolyn is the author of getting saved in America, taiwanese immigration and Religious Experience, and the co editor of Sustaining Faith, Traditions, Religion, Race, and Ethnicity among the latino and asian american second generation.
And her latest book, Work Prey Code when Work becomes religion in Silicon Valley, is a fascinating account and exploration of her time spent interviewing the best and the brightest in the tech world to unfold how tech giants are reshaping spirituality to serve the religion of peak productivity.
In our conversation, we explore big questions like why are so many people leaving traditional religion?
How do religion and spirituality meet our needs in the first place?
And what are the ways big tech or corporations in general, or filling those gaps?
What does it look like for us to choose what we want to worship and find meaning and belonging in healthy, non traditional spaces?
And is this conversion of work into faith actually a societally destructive phenomenon, even while organizations might benefit from it?
And by the way, these topics and questions are on display in tech.
But don't think for a moment that a wide range of organizations aren't exploring them as well, and along the way bringing us into the fold, sometimes wittingly, other times, maybe not.