are we exploited?

[Aldous Snow]

There is something that i am confused by.

In England, if you don't work you can still get the dole, enough for food and fags, are we exploited?

I have read some Marx, and it seems, when he wrote the Manifesto, Workers were living in far worse conditions than they are now throughout europe.

People in India and Brazil etc are exploited, many can barely afford food even whilst working themselves to death, but any working class kid can eat and have fun on the benefits alot of us have, it seems the two hostile camps marx predicted are not between just workers V capitalists, but first world V third world.

I think anyone who just repeats the same old, your relation to the means of production defines your class is stuck in the past and ignoring material conditions, if a first world worker can afford converse and stuff their face, as we all enjoy doing, but third world workers are starving, then it seems, we who vote for bourgeois parties and politicians, are siding with the ruling class and abandoning our 3WW

[Obs]

Being allowed a certain standard of living does not mean you are free.

[Aldous Snow]

but being working class means you are exploited, even though we have the ability to live a decadent lifestyle, shoveling food down, wearing nice clothes, owning a car, having a tv, i mean, are workers in England for example, really exploited, I have never met anyone who feels that way.

The only way communism could happen, is if people choose it out of morals and what is right, because there is a lopsidedness with the first world and third in total contradiction.

First world workers will never want communsim out of material conditions, Che for example, chose communism after he witnesses the poor throughout latin America, Che was middle class, and driven by morals, not conditions.

I am not even a big political guy, reason being, the workers in the first world like it how it is for the most part, i myself hate capitalism as it exploites and rapes millions, but because people here, seem to be ok with us being better off than them, we will never have the society i would like to see.

[Quail]

Compare the dole to how much people who own a business or work high up in a company get. It's fuck all, and barely enough to live a decent life on. Of course we're exploited, even with these concessions from the government.

[Obs]

but being working class means you are exploited, even though we have the ability to live a decadent lifestyle, shoveling food down, wearing nice clothes, owning a car, having a tv, i mean, are workers in England for example, really exploited, I have never met anyone who feels that way.

Of course workers in England are exploited. All workers are exploited. Anyone who is forced to sell their labour to the bourgeoisie for less than it is worth is exploited. Are you sure you're really against capitalism? You might just be some subspecies of liberal who wants the third world to be given some kind of allowance.

[Aldous Snow]

yeah the rich have loads more than us, but we have far far more than third world workers, so does this not mean there are now three classes?

Workers
First world population
Capitalists

If i was living in some thirdworld shithole, i would fucking hate first world workers, i would feel so much hatred for every person who feels justified in being able to have all we have, due to their super exploitation.

I am working class and can have fun, buy clothes and video games, am iexploited, or am i afforded privelage?

Freedom after all, is only privellage extended, unless its enjoyed by one and all... right?

[Boboulas]

if a first world worker can afford converse and stuff their face, as we all enjoy doing

Many in the first world cant actualy do this though.

http://www.poverty.org.uk/summary/key%20facts.shtml

UK isnt much of a paradise for most workers. But still your point about 3rd world workers is correct, they work for pennies so that we can wear nike trainers and primark jeans. Neo-liberalism is a *****.



it seems the two hostile camps marx predicted are not between just workers V capitalists, but first world V third world.

But people in the 3rd world are like that because of capitalists in both idustrial western countries and in their own countries. The gap between rich and poor is at an all time high and its only growing, in 3rd world countries the mega rich literaly live next door to the mega poor.

If these workers had control over society they would be able to gain better living standards and take control of their destiny, which is what most if not all people here advocate.



I think anyone who just repeats the same old, your relation to the means of production defines your class is stuck in the past and ignoring material conditions

The world constantly changes. What do you think defines class?

P.S I think i heard these arguments before ;)

[Obs]

am iexploited, or am i afforded privelage?


These two are not mutually exclusive.

[Admiral Swagmeister G-Funk]

Being able to buy clothes, video games and all the rest of it does not make you free from exploitation. I was able to do these things until I was laid off from my job and forced to live on the dole (which is in no way a "privilege"!).

Look at it in context; some people are able to buy clothes, but while they do this, a company owner is getting very rich from them; in the mean time, a child in Indonesia makes these clothes for a dollar a day. Oh glorious freedom!

If you think that you are free from exploitation because you have a playstation and some nice clothes, then think again.

[Boboulas]

^^^Good point. They usualy serve as sedatives/distractions from your position in society too.

[Adil3tr]

your class is defined by your relation to the ruling class, if you are exploited through the wage system and are not a manager or administrator, you are a member of the proletariat. Marx wrote that the better you're paid, the more golden your chains. we aren't directly exploiting those in the third world, the bosses are, so we are of the same class

[Aldous Snow]

it would be amazing to see workers overthrow the capitalists, but it will never happen in the First world

In order for the people in the third world to have better conditions, first world workers would have to take a huge drop in their living conditions.

We would not force them to export all their crops and goods to the first world, so we would be the ones starving and their lives would be hugely better, due to nationalising all oil and food and minerals, they would become developed in a few years, while the first world, due to recieving no oil, or food, would plummet into chaos, unless the third world thought it a good idea to help out the Imperialist nations who always bully and destroy them

good luck us lol

Hey i would be cool with that, out of this would become a better and fairer world, egalitarian and classless, but a daydream, as the imperialist nations hold the nuclear warheads, and would nuke the third world if they stopped giving the imperialists oil and other resources

[danyboy27]

we are indeed exploited, the part of the cake we receive on our paycheck is nowhere near the amount of money we rightfuly deserve to make the whole thing work.

[Boboulas]

it would be amazing to see workers overthrow the capitalists, but it will never happen in the First world

In order for the people in the third world to have better conditions, first world workers would have to take a huge drop in their living conditions.

We would not force them to export all their crops and goods to the first world, so we would be the ones starving and their lives would be hugely better, due to nationalising all oil and food and minerals, they would become developed in a few years, while the first world, due to recieving no oil, or food, would plummet into chaos, unless the third world thought it a good idea to help out the Imperialist nations who always bully and destroy them

good luck us lol

Hey i would be cool with that, out of this would become a better and fairer world, egalitarian and classless, but a daydream, as the imperialist nations hold the nuclear warheads, and would nuke the third world if they stopped giving the imperialists oil and other resources

Thats why the revoultion MUST spread.

[Telemakus]

So what if we can afford unnecessary things? To quote the cliche, "money doesn't buy happiness", and it doesn't necessarily buy freedom either (think: Brave New World).

Capitalist society = soul-draining education followed by even more soul-draining work. People become depressed or similar and have no where to turn except to materialistic faux-hedonism. We may be physically better off, and -technically- have more freedom/power but are we -really- better off than those in the third world? Maybe, not necessarily.

I am, of course, for the self-determination of all peoples which necessarily means the take down of exploitative enterprise wherever it arises.

Edit: I'll add also that in first world countries, the general populace (yes, including the workers) have in a sense become the exploiters as well. I'm going to assume that the majority of people generally realize that a) the materials they excessively consume are produced by exploited third world workers, and b) their lifestyles are not at all sustainable = exploitation of resources meant to be utilized by all people, all over the world and at all times. Without consumers consuming, the higher up exploiters would have no means of acquiring excessive amounts of capital.

[Aldous Snow]

Listen guys, i think their is a difference in being exploited, but having good material conditions and being exploited and having bad material conditions, one is shit, the other is slavery.

I have read Marx and even though at first it was reali boring, i agreed with his ideas, but shit has changed bois, first world workers are no longer indistinguishable from the third world workers, we now share the plunder of our exploiters, like terriers.

Also most workers in the UK who are employed, go into debt through decadence.

My dad was on 18 grand a year, my mum on 20, but because they didn't smoke, or drink and just had fun and took me out as a kid and didn't gamble, they mainly went pub for a few and went for meals with each other.

I went on holidays and always had lots of food, because my parent didn't take out stupid loans or buy flashy cars.

But can a worker in the third world have what we have?

so who is more exploited my dad or a 3WW, allof us gain from the imperialist policies and most are in support

[Aldous Snow]

I think all of us on here feel guilty and wish we were opressed rathert than accesories to that oppresion.

If Marx was alive today, he would not be so dogmatic and flippant about the new structure of contemperary society, he would probably draw new conclusions, and would be pretty dissalusioned by the way those great hostile camps were mutated, with one half of the oppressed class, siding with the oppressors, to gain better conditions, while condemning the real 3ww to real slavery.

I think our decadence is behiond all these phsycological burdens we suffer from, like anorexia, how many third world workers have time to reflect on their weight and how it will be percieved by society.

Ho many 3ww moan about how trhey can't stick to a simple fucking diet?

The thinbg is, due to our better conditions, we can studfy and philosiphise and concont our own little dramas, which are no more problems than they are bullshit.

I am not any different, i too, am afforded a good life compared to any 3ww.

I consumer impulse

[Admiral Swagmeister G-Funk]

Is this not a third worldist troll?

The whole purpose of an international revolution would be to liberate all people, not one set whilst repressing one other because they had life a bit easier (due to no fault of their own, as it is wholly important to point out now).

Many revolutionaries are revolutionary because they want to liberate the third world, because they feel for the third world, however, they also recognize their own conditions as exploitative and wish to abolish them too. The liberation of humanity cannot be done by selective liberation; it has to be done to cater for all oppressed people, otherwise it is not an end to class struggle.

[Boboulas]

You have lived a much better life than most then. Most people have mortages to pay, families to feed and a car to fuel on low paid incomes, these people havent taken out debts to buy new cars, they take them to survive.

Its no illusion that we are freer over here, and because we have that freedom we owe it to those that dont, the ones our leaders exploit to help change our societies and inturn help them to change theirs.

We arent opressed as much as 3rd world workers are or exploited as much but it doesnt change that fact that we are opressed and we are exploited.

Cutting liberty for security isnt liberty at all.

[Scary Monster]

You have lived a much better life than most then. Most people have mortages to pay, families to feed and a car to fuel on low paid incomes, these people havent taked debts to buy new cars, they take them to survive.

Its no illusion that we are freer over here, and because we have that freedom we owe it to those that dont, the ones our leaders exploit to help change our societies and inturn help them to change theirs.

We arent opressed as much as 3rd world workers are or exploited as much but it doesnt change that fact that we are opressed and we are exploited.

Cutting liberty for security isnt liberty at all.

Yeah the OP strikes me as a suburban kid who's never had a to work 7 freakin days a week,take care of kids as a single parent and goes with little food every other week. Im not giving a sob story, rather, this is the reality of life for the majority of the population (not to mention the people of the third world where families are bombed- the bombing of the wedding in iraq, for instance- due to neo-liberal policies). The kids in the first world who have plenty of food every day and a steady income thanks to their parents not being divorced or seperated, are an extreme minority in the global population, including the first world. The fact is, 1% of the US' population here (practically the same in the UK) hold more than 60% of the wealth generated each year by the working class, while the working class barely get by. Dont even get me started with the situation in Detroit

[DaComm]

but being working class means you are exploited, even though we have the ability to live a decadent lifestyle, shoveling food down, wearing nice clothes, owning a car, having a tv, i mean, are workers in England for example, really exploited, I have never met anyone who feels that way.

The only way communism could happen, is if people choose it out of morals and what is right, because there is a lopsidedness with the first world and third in total contradiction.

First world workers will never want communsim out of material conditions, Che for example, chose communism after he witnesses the poor throughout latin America, Che was middle class, and driven by morals, not conditions.

I am not even a big political guy, reason being, the workers in the first world like it how it is for the most part, i myself hate capitalism as it exploites and rapes millions, but because people here, seem to be ok with us being better off than them, we will never have the society i would like to see.

Comrade, decent lifestyle does not pertain to Exploitation. The theory of exploitation states that it is the workers and the workers alone that create value, but it is the Capitalists that make the majority of the profits. That is, for example, a Capitalist invests $10 in raw materials (lets say wood) and $20 on labor. The worker alone turns this $10 wood into a $150 fine chair. The laborer added a value of $140. However, his pay is only $20, which means his wage is only 1/7th of what it should have been. The capitalist, who did not add any value, is undeserving of the wealth he has gotten, therefore he has extracted, nay, he has leeched off of the worker's doings. This is Exploitation, and it is irrelevant to living standards.

All of those luxuries you have proposed eliminate an aspiration for Communism in the first world are irrelevant because of inherent contradictions in Capitalism which lead to economic crisis’s. And, in an economic crisis, in the 1930's US, people had no luxuries, they were at the bottom of the barrel, and they sure as hell felt it. Also, Capitalists will purposely deny workers of a living because they are afraid of "over-producing", where people who desperately need subsistence's may be given a chance at survival. But no, Capitalism necessarily causes poverty. Besides, we are only happy because people in Southern Asia/Latin America/Africa are super-exploited.

I could go on, but I seriously suggest Das Kapital by the brilliant team of Marx and Engels. :D

[Aldous Snow]

Yeah the OP strikes me as a suburban kid who's never had a to work 7 freakin days a week,take care of kids as a single parent and goes with little food every other week. Im not giving a sob story

end quote

actually i live in a three up two down with five of us, my family had a mortgage and i was poorer than most my mates.

No one was a single parent, because we are not that dumb in this house, if we fuck people we do this thing called wearing condoms.

Thats another thing about some people on the left, you blame your moronic life choices on the system, which is shit, but so are your choises.

Who in this day and age, gets knocked up, or has a kid with a guy who is such a prick he walks outon you, i mean, how could people be so stupid, and so cruel as to have a kid without thinking about the consequences.

And also guys, just because marx said it, dosent mean its true, seriously, you believe anything the revolutionary left say, which makes alot of you so dogmatic and boring, its why the left is so dead.

[Agnapostate]

Well, in a sense, he's right. Living standards have risen despite the continued existence of authoritarian relations of production. I suppose the basis for advocacy of socialism is simply the fact that affairs could be better still.

[#FF0000]

Exploitation is what happens at our jobs every single day. It's us getting paid some shit wage when our labor is what makes society run. Relative wealth and material wealth have nothing to do with it.

[#FF0000]

Well, in a sense, he's right. Living standards have risen despite the continued existence of authoritarian relations of production. I suppose the basis for advocacy of socialism is simply the fact that affairs could be better still.

Living standards have risen in a handful of places. The whole world is capitalist and the vast, vast majority of it is disgustingly poor.

[Scary Monster]

Yeah the OP strikes me as a suburban kid who's never had a to work 7 freakin days a week,take care of kids as a single parent and goes with little food every other week. Im not giving a sob story

end quote

actually i live in a three up two down with five of us, my family had a mortgage and i was poorer than most my mates.

No one was a single parent, because we are not that dumb in this house, if we fuck people we do this thing called wearing condoms.

Thats another thing about some people on the left, you blame your moronic life choices on the system, which is shit, but so are your choises.

Who in this day and age, gets knocked up, or has a kid with a guy who is such a prick he walks outon you, i mean, how could people be so stupid, and so cruel as to have a kid without thinking about the consequences.

And also guys, just because marx said it, dosent mean its true, seriously, you believe anything the revolutionary left say, which makes alot of you so dogmatic and boring, its why the left is so dead.

This is where your ignorance and sheltered view comes out. Im not saying that all people are poor just because they fuck and leave, leaving the woman to herself to take care of her kids, but this is just one example of how life never goes as expected and how most people, no matter how hard they might try, cant conform their lives to meet the conditions set by capitalism just to have a decent life. Like i said, most are not lucky enough to be born to two financially-stable parents. People shouldnt have to be together just for economic reasons.

And like everyone else has said, nothing justifies the capitalists leeching off of the wealth that workers themselves create. But you sound quite right when you say first world workers have a much more comfortable living than the rest of the world.

[Agnapostate]

Living standards have risen in a handful of places. The whole world is capitalist and the vast, vast majority of it is disgustingly poor.

He explicitly mentioned England, and then drew a dichotomy between the first and third world.

[Chimurenga.]

OP is clearly a troll. Why hasn't this been trashed yet?

[Quail]

Yeah the OP strikes me as a suburban kid who's never had a to work 7 freakin days a week,take care of kids as a single parent and goes with little food every other week. Im not giving a sob story

end quote

actually i live in a three up two down with five of us, my family had a mortgage and i was poorer than most my mates.

No one was a single parent, because we are not that dumb in this house, if we fuck people we do this thing called wearing condoms.

Thats another thing about some people on the left, you blame your moronic life choices on the system, which is shit, but so are your choises.

Who in this day and age, gets knocked up, or has a kid with a guy who is such a prick he walks outon you, i mean, how could people be so stupid, and so cruel as to have a kid without thinking about the consequences.

And also guys, just because marx said it, dosent mean its true, seriously, you believe anything the revolutionary left say, which makes alot of you so dogmatic and boring, its why the left is so dead.

Wow, judgemental much?

[Blake's Baby]

Oh bloody hell, I've donr that thing where I reply to a post on page one of a thread not realising there's a whole nother load of posts on page two. Sorry comrades, not paying attention.


Anyhoooo....


it would be amazing to see workers overthrow the capitalists, but it will never happen in the First world

In order for the people in the third world to have better conditions, first world workers would have to take a huge drop in their living conditions.

...

This isn't actually true. Expropration of the capitalists and re-investment of wasted social product (eg the arms budget for a start) would be able to raise the standard of living of 3rd-world workers a very very long way without seriously impacting on the share of the social product that 1st-world workers get.

3 days US arms spending, for instance, would guarantee every person in the 3rd World access to decent water, for a start.

It's a very artificial way of looking at things, but recently it was calculated that if we just levelled everything and shared it all out right now, every person, man woman child baby sick or healthy young or old would get $9,000 - this is a vast increase in wealth for the majority of the planet and a cut for about 15% of people. But for a family of four in the West, $36,000 (about £25,000) isn't too bad (especially since 2 adults in that family would be working maybe 24 hours a week each), given that's 'after tax' and anyway the entire economy is being restructured around them.

These calculations are pretty meaningless given that resource distribution and economic restruction will make the theoretical worth of '1/7 billionth of the social product' vastly more 'worthy' than it is now. This isn't obviously how things will work, we won't just get a voucher saying 'you are entitiled to 1/7 billionth of the total social product'.

BUT: and this is the most serious thing, I think, there will be some changes for the worse. I think it's very unlikely that people in Britain and Ireland (the biggest consuming nations per head) are going to be able to get their hands on tea very easily after the revolution, for instance.

[DaComm]

Yeah the OP strikes me as a suburban kid who's never had a to work 7 freakin days a week,take care of kids as a single parent and goes with little food every other week. Im not giving a sob story

end quote

actually i live in a three up two down with five of us, my family had a mortgage and i was poorer than most my mates.

No one was a single parent, because we are not that dumb in this house, if we fuck people we do this thing called wearing condoms.

Thats another thing about some people on the left, you blame your moronic life choices on the system, which is shit, but so are your choises.

Who in this day and age, gets knocked up, or has a kid with a guy who is such a prick he walks outon you, i mean, how could people be so stupid, and so cruel as to have a kid without thinking about the consequences.

And also guys, just because marx said it, dosent mean its true, seriously, you believe anything the revolutionary left say, which makes alot of you so dogmatic and boring, its why the left is so dead.

Yeah, you know, your right. Your absolutely right. The people of Africa and Asia are noticeably impoverished because they don't wear condoms! Of course, why didn't I think of that! Condoms! Who needs Socialism when you've got a condom!


Give me a fucking break...

[dearest chuck]

I simply cannot see what one wishes to do with the European worker now one has made a question of him. He finds himself far too well placed not to go on asking for more, or to ask more and more impudently. After all, he has the great majority on his side. There is absolutely no hope left that a modest and self-sufficient kind of human being, a type of Chinaman, should here form itself into a class: and this would have been sensible, this was actually a necessity. What has one done? - Everything designed to nip in the bud even the prerequisites for it - through the most irresponsible thoughtlessness one has totally destroyed the instincts by virtue of which the worker becomes possible as a class, possible for himself. The worker has been made liable for military service, he has been allowed to form unions and to vote: no wonder the worker already feels his existence to be a state of distress (expressed in moral terms as a state of injustice). But what does one want? - to ask it again. If one wills an end, one must also will the means to it: if one wants slaves, one is a fool if one educates them to be masters.

[Brady]

Oh bloody hell, I've donr that thing where I reply to a post on page one of a thread not realising there's a whole nother load of posts on page two. Sorry comrades, not paying attention.


Anyhoooo....



This isn't actually true. Expropration of the capitalists and re-investment of wasted social product (eg the arms budget for a start) would be able to raise the standard of living of 3rd-world workers a very very long way without seriously impacting on the share of the social product that 1st-world workers get.

3 days US arms spending, for instance, would guarantee every person in the 3rd World access to decent water, for a start.

It's a very artificial way of looking at things, but recently it was calculated that if we just levelled everything and shared it all out right now, every person, man woman child baby sick or healthy young or old would get $9,000 - this is a vast increase in wealth for the majority of the planet and a cut for about 15% of people. But for a family of four in the West, $36,000 (about £25,000) isn't too bad (especially since 2 adults in that family would be working maybe 24 hours a week each), given that's 'after tax' and anyway the entire economy is being restructured around them.

These calculations are pretty meaningless given that resource distribution and economic restruction will make the theoretical worth of '1/7 billionth of the social product' vastly more 'worthy' than it is now. This isn't obviously how things will work, we won't just get a voucher saying 'you are entitiled to 1/7 billionth of the total social product'.

BUT: and this is the most serious thing, I think, there will be some changes for the worse. I think it's very unlikely that people in Britain and Ireland (the biggest consuming nations per head) are going to be able to get their hands on tea very easily after the revolution, for instance.

No tea after the revolution? Well fuck that then. I'm not giving up my 10 cups a day for anyone, third-world or not. :D

[Blake's Baby]

Damn, another one lost to the counter-revolution over lack of tea... It's a serious problem for the revolutionary movements in Britain and Ireland!

Obviously, the tea's just an example. But a lot of what we have now is produced by back-breaking labour in 14-hour shifts. That's obviously not going to continue after the revolution, and it will be a problem.

[Scary Monster]

Damn, another one lost to the counter-revolution over lack of tea... It's a serious problem for the revolutionary movements in Britain and Ireland!

Obviously, the tea's just an example. But a lot of what we have now is produced by back-breaking labour in 14-hour shifts. That's obviously not going to continue after the revolution, and it will be a problem.

Ya exactly. Lol I dont think anyone would miss not having 15 different brands of ketchup that come in elaborately-designed plastic bottles.

[revolution inaction]

Damn, another one lost to the counter-revolution over lack of tea... It's a serious problem for the revolutionary movements in Britain and Ireland!

Obviously, the tea's just an example. But a lot of what we have now is produced by back-breaking labour in 14-hour shifts. That's obviously not going to continue after the revolution, and it will be a problem.

it probably doesn't need to be produced this way though

[Obs]

Yeah the OP strikes me as a suburban kid who's never had a to work 7 freakin days a week,take care of kids as a single parent and goes with little food every other week. Im not giving a sob story

end quote

actually i live in a three up two down with five of us, my family had a mortgage and i was poorer than most my mates.

No one was a single parent, because we are not that dumb in this house, if we fuck people we do this thing called wearing condoms.

Thats another thing about some people on the left, you blame your moronic life choices on the system, which is shit, but so are your choises.

Who in this day and age, gets knocked up, or has a kid with a guy who is such a prick he walks outon you, i mean, how could people be so stupid, and so cruel as to have a kid without thinking about the consequences.

And also guys, just because marx said it, dosent mean its true, seriously, you believe anything the revolutionary left say, which makes alot of you so dogmatic and boring, its why the left is so dead.

http://img62.imageshack.us/img62/3168/umad1g.jpg

[The Red Next Door]

it would be amazing to see workers overthrow the capitalists, but it will never happen in the First world

In order for the people in the third world to have better conditions, first world workers would have to take a huge drop in their living conditions.

We would not force them to export all their crops and goods to the first world, so we would be the ones starving and their lives would be hugely better, due to nationalising all oil and food and minerals, they would become developed in a few years, while the first world, due to recieving no oil, or food, would plummet into chaos, unless the third world thought it a good idea to help out the Imperialist nations who always bully and destroy them

good luck us lol

Hey i would be cool with that, out of this would become a better and fairer world, egalitarian and classless, but a daydream, as the imperialist nations hold the nuclear warheads, and would nuke the third world if they stopped giving the imperialists oil and other resources


Oh yes, we will.