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From 'lying flat' to 'quiet quitting'
The latter is a moderate response compared with tang ping (lying flat), the Chinese youth rebellion against work pressures
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John Gapper
In Herman Melville's 1853 short story Bartleby, The Scrivener, the eponymous Wall Street clerk embarks on a mysterious go-slow, and then a complete strike, while remaining at the office.
"I would prefer not to," becomes his refrain when asked by his boss to write documents.
