Yet another capitalist defence argument thing

[Lanky Wanker]

I imagine you're probably sick of reading these but I'd appreciate your responses to this. I think he's still not understanding the idea that the filthy rich boss exploits the worker far more than vice versa. This was after I briefly explained the whole exploitation and selling your labour story. Cheers.


Yes, I imagine it is... The thing is, businesses don't exist to provide people jobs.... Alot of us forget that. Businesses exist to earn a profit, and they exist because they are profitable. If they were run like charities, there would be very few jobs available for people.

I as a business owner, risk my money in an attempt to increase my wealth. In doing so, if I'm any good at it, I'm able to provide jobs to people who would like to have a job. No one has to work for me. It's that simple. If I refuse to pay my employees enough, if I treat them poorly, if I don't run my business well, they can leave and find other jobs anytime they wish.

There are two things the leftists you refer to either wont accept, or wont consider.

1. Generally, people are lazy, and only do what they have to do and what they want to do.
- People generally get up in the morning and go to work because they have to eat, and to eat they have to work... It never occurs to them there is another option (owning a business).
- The rest of the time they're seeking pleasure through enjoyable activities.

2. Our relationships with others are selfish by nature.
- We start out our life exploiting our parents for food, warmth, and clean diapers.
- When you start dating someone at the very beginning, you're attracted to them because of something they provide you (you're exploiting them for something). Generally this moves into a mutually exploitative relationship.
- The worker and the employer exploit each other. The employer pays the worker in order to be able to exploit the workers labor. The worker works for the employer in order to exploit the employer for paychecks.

I guarantee if the worker was getting nothing out of the relationship, they'd find a new job or join the unemployed. When that exploitative relationship becomes unbalanced, one of them will terminate the relationship. If the worker stops producing at the level the employer expects, the employer will fire the worker and find a new worker. If the employer stops paying or continues treating the worker like shit, the worker will find a new job and terminate the relationship.

The radical left will not acknowledge any of that. Now the real problems aren't with small businesses, but with huge multi-national corporations. When you have a CEO (the CEO is an employee, not a business owner) making more every month than most of his employees do in a year, that's a problem that should be delt with, and that's where the government comes in. We can and should regulate huge corporations so that those excesses don't happen like they are right now.Yes, I imagine it is... The thing is, businesses don't exist to provide people jobs.... Alot of us forget that. Businesses exist to earn a profit, and they exist because they are profitable. If they were run like charities, there would be very few jobs available for people.

I as a business owner, risk my money in an attempt to increase my wealth. In doing so, if I'm any good at it, I'm able to provide jobs to people who would like to have a job. No one has to work for me. It's that simple. If I refuse to pay my employees enough, if I treat them poorly, if I don't run my business well, they can leave and find other jobs anytime they wish.

There are two things the leftists you refer to either wont accept, or wont consider.

1. Generally, people are lazy, and only do what they have to do and what they want to do.
- People generally get up in the morning and go to work because they have to eat, and to eat they have to work... It never occurs to them there is another option (owning a business).
- The rest of the time they're seeking pleasure through enjoyable activities.

2. Our relationships with others are selfish by nature.
- We start out our life exploiting our parents for food, warmth, and clean diapers.
- When you start dating someone at the very beginning, you're attracted to them because of something they provide you (you're exploiting them for something). Generally this moves into a mutually exploitative relationship.
- The worker and the employer exploit each other. The employer pays the worker in order to be able to exploit the workers labor. The worker works for the employer in order to exploit the employer for paychecks.

I guarantee if the worker was getting nothing out of the relationship, they'd find a new job or join the unemployed. When that exploitative relationship becomes unbalanced, one of them will terminate the relationship. If the worker stops producing at the level the employer expects, the employer will fire the worker and find a new worker. If the employer stops paying or continues treating the worker like shit, the worker will find a new job and terminate the relationship.

The radical left will not acknowledge any of that. Now the real problems aren't with small businesses, but with huge multi-national corporations. When you have a CEO (the CEO is an employee, not a business owner) making more every month than most of his employees do in a year, that's a problem that should be delt with, and that's where the government comes in. We can and should regulate huge corporations so that those excesses don't happen like they are right now.

[Rafiq]

That is bullshit, the employer cannot give paychecks to the worker without the worker creating the value that the employer can sell. He's the only one exploiting the worker. Yes we are all selfish bastards, so what? We're selfish because we don't like assholes stealing our surplus value, we're assholes because we don't like having to beg for jobs.

It's capitalism that doesn't allow us to love our selfishness, the proletariat has to sacrifice his selfish interest for the interest of the slave owners when he's sent to die in a war.

And we're smart enough to understand that the only way we are going to survive shitty Earth is if we work together without private property.

[graymouser]

Blah blah blah.

Why should the "risk" taken on by an investor entitle him to pay an employee less than the value that employee adds to a product? It's not the risk that adds surplus-value, it's the labor-time provided by the worker in excess of wages. This is exploitation, pure and simple. Essentially this is the morality of the playground bully: if you have enough capital and are willing to take risks, you "deserve" to be able to take advantage of anyone who doesn't have the capital to be self-employed and needs to seek a job working for a wage or salary. Why on earth should this give anyone the right to appropriate surplus-value? Never mind that capital, as Marx says, comes into the world "dripping from head to foot, from every pore, with blood and dirt." It's simply a bad argument from start to finish.

This is then amplified by some generic misanthropic comments: people are lazy and selfish. Why would that justify a system where the vast majority of people do excess work for a few lazy, selfish bastards at the top? And how would charity work, how would open source software projects and hobby sports leagues work, if all humans were unfailingly lazy and selfish? When people are trapped in a system where they can't get ahead for trying, laziness and selfishness are natural byproducts. This doesn't say anything profound about human nature.

It's a tremendously toxic view of humanity, and it's all driven by greed. The person who wrote this wants to justify their position in society by demonizing others; if humans are basically worthless pieces of shit, it's not morally a problem to exploit them. Marx and Engels had some thoughts on that too: the dominant ideas are the ideas of the ruling class. In truth, the ruling class are vicious, exploitative scumbags who would shoot their mothers for a buck. So of course they need to paint everyone else the same way.

[Nox]

We start out our life exploiting our parents for food

Wait, so being fed by your parents as a helpless baby is exploitation?


The worker works for the employer in order to exploit the employer for paychecks.

Hmmm.... Does this guy even know the meaning of the word exploitation?

[Manic Impressive]

No one has to work for me. It's that simple. If I refuse to pay my employees enough, if I treat them poorly, if I don't run my business well, they can leave and find other jobs anytime they wish.

People generally get up in the morning and go to work because they have to eat, and to eat they have to work

while nobody has to work for him everybody has to work for someone. Proletarians are forced to sell their labour to somebody.

I couldn't read the whole thing as I became nauseous but it just looked like a pile of human nature crap.

[Thirsty Crow]

The person in question wants to force a very idiosyncratic use of the term "exploitation", and thereby direct the debate into the very vague area of natural selfishness (has science fostered a new religion?) and mutual "exploitation" or "use".
First of all, stick with the very concrete notion of exploitation at the point of production as expoused by Marxists and anarchists. I'd honestly tell the guy to bugger off with his "kids exploit their parents" idiocy.

Second of all, the whole point of insisting on the determination of the working class in capitalism as "dispossesed" of means of production is to show that they are forced to sell their labour power to a capitalist, which does not mean the relationship is "balanced" or "equal" as the general conditions of capital accumulation determine specific ways of surplus value extraction.
In other words, tell him that I indeed may quit a job I find bad, but there is a good probability that I'll have to face similar conditions in my dealings with other capitalists.

Another point: people are constantly reminded of just how awesome entrepreneurs are, so I doubt that we ordinary workers are too numb to think of that. But that's not the point. However, the point is that capitalist competition dictates just how saturated a market can be without a significant fall in profitability, or in other words: in order that there might be capitalists, there also has to be a good number of wage workers', and now matter how smart they are personally, the whole system will keep on funtioning like that, no matter what. So it's logical to assume that the workings of this system in fact shapes people's lives and their opportunities as it requires low wage, low skill work (and that's only to speak of the lower skill section of the working class!).
It seems that he's very much obssessed by investment initiative which he ties in to being smart, I presume. Well, too bat that if poorly educated people didn't exist capitalism would have to invent them somehow.

[Ocean Seal]

He's absolutely right. In capitalism I'm not forced to work for BOSS A, instead I can just quit my job any day of the week and work for BOSS B. Does he treat me poorly? Does he exploit me? Yes, he takes my surplus value. Its okay I'll work for BOSS C. Still exploiting? How about BOSS D, BOSS E, and BOSS F. Its okay I'm sure BOSS G won't take my surplus value.

[Lanky Wanker]

He's absolutely right. In capitalism I'm not forced to work for BOSS A, instead I can just quit my job any day of the week and work for BOSS B. Does he treat me poorly? Does he exploit me? Yes, he takes my surplus value. Its okay I'll work for BOSS C. Still exploiting? How about BOSS D, BOSS E, and BOSS F. Its okay I'm sure BOSS G won't take my surplus value.

This was exactly what came to mind when he mentioned that, but I just thought someone else could word it better.

[Nox]

This was exactly what came to mind when he mentioned that, but I just thought someone else could word it better.

Which brings us to our next flaw in his theory - the fact that Capitalism can never give 100% employment, so soon he will run out of 'bosses' and will be left unemployed.

[CAleftist]

Ah, the old "the big corporations are too excessive, but the system itself is fine" defense.

Regulations inevitably hurt small business more than the large businesses, so either way, monopolies will be created under capitalism. That is in the very nature of the system.

As for the "the worker is free and has the choice" argument, giving someone the "choice" of starvation or wage-slavery under any number of employers is no choice at all.

[Ocean Seal]

Which brings us to our next flaw in his theory - the fact that Capitalism can never give 100% employment, so soon he will run out of 'bosses' and will be left unemployed.
Which brings us to another flaw in his theory. Everytime a person quits their job they are taking the risk of falling into unemployment and having to dip into their rainy day fund or not being able to pay their bills. And going homeless/hungry. Hey the boss takes a risk, investing some of his extra cash on me, the workers take a risk everyday they don't have a job with their lives.

[Nox]

the workers take a risk everyday they don't have a job with their lives.

The proof is that out of 29,000 only 1,800 shows this

[Lanky Wanker]

Apparently on the other forum we're not supposed to be quoting other sites/people, plus, we all know this argument isn't going to go beyond what it already has millions of times before, so I'll leave it at that. I'll still post his response(s) though for anyone who wants to keep it going.


I'm not sure if it violates etiquette of this site or not to quote statements made on another website, and debate them here with you, but since you kind of started it I'll continue it until asked by admin to stop.

>>>how would open source software projects and hobby sports leagues work, if all humans were unfailingly lazy and selfish?

--->People definitely are selfish, and most (not all) people enjoy some degree of laziness from time to time (I know I certainly do). The things people do may appear to be selfless, but there is something they are getting out of it, no matter how hard to see it may be, that feeds their self needs.

>>>When people are trapped in a system where they can't get ahead for trying, laziness and selfishness are natural byproducts.

--->I refuse to accept the premise that anyone in the US who is legally allowed to be here is "trapped in a system where they can't get ahead for trying". That's just not reality. The reality is, anyone in this country has the opportunity to move the ball forward. If you can't, that's because of your own shortcomings, not because "the man is keeping a brother down", lol.

>>>The person who wrote this wants to justify their position in society by demonizing others;

--->That's not true at all. I haven't demonized anyone. Everyone has a legitimate role to play in the economy, and we all choose where we fit in based on our capabilities and our desires.

>>>if humans are basically worthless pieces of shit, it's not morally a problem to exploit them.

--->That's a straw man, because nowhere in what I wrote did I suggest anything like that. Their biases when they read what I wrote caused them to infer that. That's their problem.

>>>Wait, so being fed by your parents as a helpless baby is exploitation?

--->The first definition for the word on wikipedia is "The act of using something for any purpose. In this case, exploit is a synonym for use." So my answer to that question is yes. We use each other in all of our relationships to serve our selfish needs. Eventually, as we mature, and as our relationships mature, the selfish nature of our relationship appears more and more selfless, as the benefit becomes harder to identify and more abstract, but it's always selfish.

>>>Does this guy even know the meaning of the word exploitation?

--->I believe I just quoted it. Maybe they need to look it up for themselves.

>>>Proletarians are forced to sell their labour to somebody

--->Really? Who are homeless people forced to work for? Who are retired people forced to work for? Who are housewives, disabled, and retarded citizens forced to work for?

>>>The person in question wants to force a very idiosyncratic use of the term "exploitation", and thereby direct the debate into the very vague area of natural selfishness

--->I indeed may quit a job I find bad, but there is a good probability that I'll have to face similar conditions in my dealings with other capitalists.

--->That's just not true. There are lots of great employers out there. Ofcourse, if you're too lazy to try, it's much easier to just say fuck it, it's not going to be any better anywhere else.

>>>So it's logical to assume that the workings of this system in fact shapes people's lives and their opportunities as it requires low wage, low skill work

--->What's logical is to understand there are always going to be a surplus of low skilled workers, because many people choose not to lift themselves out of their current conditions. With the social programs and educational opportunities that are available today, there is absolutely no reason you cannot do this other than you just do not wish to do this. I know, as I did it myself.

>>>Which brings us to our next flaw in his theory - the fact that Capitalism can never give 100% employment, so soon he will run out of 'bosses' and will be left unemployed.

--->god forbid you take responsiblity for yourself instead of expecting someone to GIVE you a job, and you learn how to sell your skills to the market.

The problem talking with these leftests is they are just like radical christians. They have a unrational dogma they've attached themselves to, and they simply reject anything that doesn't fit with their dogma. It's a religion for them.

They can choose to start their own business and sell their skills on the market, or they can choose to put their skills to work for someone else, or they can choose to be homeless. I guarantee everyone of those business hating assholes have chosen one of those 3 options, and for those who chose number 2, if it wasnt' for a business being willing and able to hire them and pay them for their labor, they'd be in a much worse position than they are now.

[Apoi_Viitor]

Really? Who are homeless people forced to work for? Who are retired people forced to work for? Who are housewives, disabled, and retarded citizens forced to work for?

These are just mere exceptions to the rule. No one is physically coerced into this system of exploitation, but every proletariat who engages in the capitalist system is exploited. I could give specific examples of why each of the groups listed "don't have to work", but to do so is pointless. The only premise he needs to understand is that the majority of the populace is forced to sell their labor on the market.


That's just not true. There are lots of great employers out there. Ofcourse, if you're too lazy to try, it's much easier to just say fuck it, it's not going to be any better anywhere else.

The way the system works, exploitation is a necessity. Sure it's better or worse depending on the employer, but exploitation is still exploitation.

[Conscript]

if it wasnt' for a business being willing and able to hire them and pay them for their labor, they'd be in a much worse position than they are now.I'll just leave this here.


Labor is prior to, and independent of, capital. Capital is only the fruit of labor, and could never have existed if labor had not first existed. Labor is the superior of capital, and deserves much the higher consideration.

This guy's just refusing to fathom the idea that labor doesn't need capital.

[Die Rote Fahne]

Yes, I imagine it is... The thing is, businesses don't exist to provide people jobs.... Alot of us forget that. Businesses exist to earn a profit, and they exist because they are profitable. If they were run like charities, there would be very few jobs available for people.The point of capitalism is for one group to make the profits at the expense of others. The point is not to run them like charities, but to eliminate the capitalist mode of production, and put the means of production in the hands of the proletariat, in doing so producing for the common need, and not for profits.


I as a business owner, risk my money in an attempt to increase my wealth. In doing so, if I'm any good at it, I'm able to provide jobs to people who would like to have a job. No one has to work for me. It's that simple. If I refuse to pay my employees enough, if I treat them poorly, if I don't run my business well, they can leave and find other jobs anytime they wish.Here, the person is having a problem. He incorrectly believes that there are swathes of jobs out on the market. Little does he know, that no, there are not. Unless he runs a minimum wage, fast food chain, in which case his employees probably have two other jobs, in the same field, already to survive. So, if the employees in question think that they will face long term unemployment, or hardships from quitting, they will remain in the job, regardless of treatment or conditions.

Second, he needs to realize that "risking" his money is not "earning" his money. The exact money he "risks" is created by the production labour of his workers, because he does not pay the employee the worth of his product.

Lastly, has he said what kind of business he runs? Is he petit-bourgeois? Haute-bourgeois?

So

There are two things the leftists you refer to either wont accept, or wont consider.

1. Generally, people are lazy, and only do what they have to do and what they want to do.
- People generally get up in the morning and go to work because they have to eat, and to eat they have to work... It never occurs to them there is another option (owning a business).
- The rest of the time they're seeking pleasure through enjoyable activities.People are not "generally lazy". The perceived "laziness" is a direct result of being forced to work jobs that are of no interest to the worker, and are usually repetitive due to division of labour.

Owning a business is not as simple as taking a shit. It requires planning, capital, and a lost of the time risk; which is something the majority of Americans do not have/are incapable of. They have bad credit or no credit, that means no loans. They have to constantly work to provide for their families, pay bills, etc. they can't take time off to plan, or risk losing their job on a failed business.

**This guy was probably raised upper middle class and thought he had it tough.



2. Our relationships with others are selfish by nature.
- We start out our life exploiting our parents for food, warmth, and clean diapers.
- When you start dating someone at the very beginning, you're attracted to them because of something they provide you (you're exploiting them for something). Generally this moves into a mutually exploitative relationship.
- The worker and the employer exploit each other. The employer pays the worker in order to be able to exploit the workers labor. The worker works for the employer in order to exploit the employer for paychecks.We are discussing human-economic relations, not human-human relations. Though, I'll bite on the romantic relationship part.

How am I exploiting someone in a relationship? I am not taking something from them. It is win-win, unless you're a pig and looking to exploit the persons feelings for sex or money.

There is no mutual exploitation in the workforce. The exploitation occurs solely from the removal of surplus from the worker. The employer gains profits, while the worker is paid compensation (the pay-cheque) for less than the work done.

The three blocks of which exploitation is built on in capitalist society:


the ownership of the means of production by a small minority in society, the capitalists;
the inability of non-property-owners (the workers, proletarians) to survive without selling their labor-power to the capitalists (in other words, without being employed as wage laborers);
the state, which uses its strength to protect the unequal distribution of power and property in society.



I guarantee if the worker was getting nothing out of the relationship, they'd find a new job or join the unemployed. When that exploitative relationship becomes unbalanced, one of them will terminate the relationship. If the worker stops producing at the level the employer expects, the employer will fire the worker and find a new worker. If the employer stops paying or continues treating the worker like shit, the worker will find a new job and terminate the relationship.Yes, because it's always as simple as quitting. Or just living unemployed. Or finding a new job. Idiot. Ignore allllll the other factors in that person's life.


The radical left will not acknowledge any of that. Now the real problems aren't with small businesses, but with huge multi-national corporations. When you have a CEO (the CEO is an employee, not a business owner) making more every month than most of his employees do in a year, that's a problem that should be delt with, and that's where the government comes in. We can and should regulate huge corporations so that those excesses don't happen like they are right now.Yes, I imagine it is... The thing is, businesses don't exist to provide people jobs.... Alot of us forget that. Businesses exist to earn a profit, and they exist because they are profitable. If they were run like charities, there would be very few jobs available for people.Just refuted it.

The issues are with the exploitation of the working class in general. Whether it's by the bourgeoisie, or the petit-bourgeoisie.

They exist in capitalism to earn a profit. We are seeking to end capitalism, and profit.

See the first response of mine.

This was too easy.

[CommunityBeliever]

I imagine you're probably sick of reading theseYou are right about that.

This is just human nature crap. If things like capitalism, greed, and money are natural why did they only arise in the last couple thousand years?

I just got home from a long days work at exploiting my boss, so I won't go into more detail now.

[Lanky Wanker]

You are right about that.

This is just human nature crap. If things like capitalism, greed, and money are natural why did they only arise in the last couple thousand years?

I just got home from a long days work at exploiting my boss, so I won't go into more detail now.

lol hard work, eh? I hate when people say communism is against human nature. Am I not right in saying that the "cavemen" worked in a more communist type society?

[Apoi_Viitor]

lol hard work, eh? I hate when people say communism is against human nature. Am I not right in saying that the "cavemen" worked in a more communist type society?

Yes, Marx and Engels believed that the economic mode of production in hunter gatherer societies was primitive communism.