This age-old camp song represents all that’s wrong with the American work culture
Joe pushes buttons. Don’t be like Joe.
My six-year-old came home from camp yesterday singing a song I remember from my own childhood. It’s about this guy named Joe who works in a button factory.
Don’t bother asking what a button factory is, or whether the factory exists to actually produce buttons, or solely to ensure they’re pressed as prescribed, or for some other purpose entirely; all that is beside the point.
The song follows Joe as his boss continues piling responsibility after responsibility upon him. Joe takes on each task with a smile, performing each one progressively more poorly until he finally has no choice but to admit he can’t handle anymore.
I hadn’t heard the tune in decades, but as my daughter sang it and I tried in vain to perform the successively more ridiculous motions, I began recognizing echoes from my own life. By the end, I started to see this simple camp song as something else entirely: a disturbingly accurate parable for the American attitude toward work.
[Author’s note: If you are unfamiliar with the song, you are welcome to scroll to an awkward team-building version at the end of this story, though it’s not strictly necessary. When you’re humming it to…
