[The Theory of the Leisure Class by Thorstein Veblen]@TWC D-Link bookThe Theory of the Leisure Class CHAPTER Three ~~ Conspicuous Leisure 33/42
In order to satisfy the requirements of the leisure class scheme of life, the servant should show not only an attitude of subservience, but also the effects of special training and practice in subservience.
The servant or wife should not only perform certain offices and show a servile disposition, but it is quite as imperative that they should show an acquired facility in the tactics of subservience--a trained conformity to the canons of effectual and conspicuous subservience.
Even today it is this aptitude and acquired skill in the formal manifestation of the servile relation that constitutes the chief element of utility in our highly paid servants, as well as one of the chief ornaments of the well-bred housewife. The first requisite of a good servant is that he should conspicuously know his place.
It is not enough that he knows how to effect certain desired mechanical results; he must above all, know how to effect these results in due form.
Domestic service might be said to be a spiritual rather than a mechanical function.
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