Greed & wage slavery contradiction

[Lanky Wanker]

Don't know if I'm a bit late on this one, but oh well. We all know the common arguments in defence of capitalism, the big one being "people are naturally greedy and driven by competition", which we all have our responses to. Another one I've heard quite a lot, usually following on from this, is "what if people consent to being wage slaves?" which completely throws the argument off its own rails. If we (the vast majority of the human population) are driven by competition and personal gain, why would we consent to someone stealing from our earnings? Anyone ever run into this during an argument?

[Caj]

Yes. That's a common argument. The problem with such an argument is that "consent" has no meaning in the context of wage labor. Workers have the freedom to subject themselves to exploitation or die of starvation. This is not a choice, in the same way that threatening somebody with a gun to rob them does not leave a real choice for the person being robbed.

[Vyacheslav Brolotov]

You cannot give consent to becoming a slave. The sentence:"what if people consent to being wage slaves?" is an oxymoron, making the argument already invalid. The circumstances of capitalism cause the proletariat to prostitute themselves to the capitalist class, not that they want to or even should.

[Lanky Wanker]

Yes. That's a common argument. The problem with such an argument is that "consent" has no meaning in the context of wage labor. Workers have the freedom to subject themselves to exploitation or die of starvation. This is not a choice, in the same way that threatening somebody with a gun to rob them does not leave a real choice for the person being robbed.

I think what they usually mean though is if they were actually given the choice between wage slavery or "freedom" as we understand it (take a factory worker who votes conservative, for example). Going by this idea they've contradicted themselves, considering the fact that a greedy competitor wouldn't choose to finish in 3rd place.



You cannot give consent to becoming a slave. The sentence:"what if people consent to being wage slaves?" is an oxymoron, making the argument already invalid. The circumstances of capitalism cause the proletariat to prostitute themselves to the capitalist class, not that they want to or even should.

Again, they basically use the term "wage slave" to try and mock us with our own arguments.

[Night Ripper]

If we (the vast majority of the human population) are driven by competition and personal gain, why would we consent to someone stealing from our earnings?

Voluntary transactions aren't stealing. If you don't want to work then don't. Go live in a box and eat at soup kitchens.

[Caj]

Voluntary transactions aren't stealing. If you don't want to work then don't. Go live in a box and eat at soup kitchens.

As I said, the word "voluntary" has absolutely no meaning in the context of wage labor. If the only other option for the worker apart from subjecting himself or herself to exploitation is to starve, then that is not a "voluntary transaction". It's coercion.

[Prinskaj]

Voluntary transactions aren't stealing. If you don't want to work then don't. Go live in a box and eat at soup kitchens.
Play by our rules, or die!

[Caj]

I think what they usually mean though is if they were actually given the choice between wage slavery or "freedom" as we understand it (take a factory worker who votes conservative, for example). Going by this idea they've contradicted themselves, considering the fact that a greedy competitor wouldn't choose to finish in 3rd place.

I'm not exactly sure what you mean here. . . .

[Lanky Wanker]

I'm not exactly sure what you mean here. . . .

When we say you can't choose whether to be a wage slave or not, we mean under capitalism. When the caps argue that some people might choose to be wage slaves, they (often) mean that they would choose capitalism over socialism. Choosing to live under capitalism to be a wage slave and having your money stolen and going into someone else's pocket doesn't fit in with the competition/personal gain argument they use.

[Rafiq]

God fucking damnit. I wish Night Ripper unblocked me. He's such an easy target it's not even funny. What a fucking joke.

[Lanky Wanker]

God fucking damnit. I wish Night Ripper unblocked me. He's such an easy target it's not even funny. What a fucking joke.

With a -190 rep he's probably tired of being an easy target lol.

[Anon4chan1235]

Don't know if I'm a bit late on this one, but oh well. We all know the common arguments in defence of capitalism, the big one being "people are naturally greedy and driven by competition", which we all have our responses to. Another one I've heard quite a lot, usually following on from this, is "what if people consent to being wage slaves?" which completely throws the argument off its own rails. If we (the vast majority of the human population) are driven by competition and personal gain, why would we consent to someone stealing from our earnings? Anyone ever run into this during an argument?

Logic, the capitalists don't want you to use it. The truth is we are not all motivated by greed, a great deal of us are motivated for the betterment of all humanity. but if you throw that out there the whole argument for capitalism starts to crumble, so they need another cop out excuse.

[DinodudeEpic]

Well, I have to that the whole thread is the best argument for socialism that I had ever seen.

Bravo!

[Night Ripper]

Play by our rules, or die!

Eating in a soup kitchen is not dying. Stop being melodramatic.

[Ele'ill]

Voluntary transactions aren't stealing. If you don't want to work then don't. Go live in a box and eat at soup kitchens.



Eating in a soup kitchen is not dying. Stop being melodramatic.

I'm going to consider these posts to be trolling. Further rubbish like this will result in BM/BA action.

[Ostrinski]

Eating in a soup kitchen is not dying. Stop being melodramatic.Or we could just topple the structure that presents us this dichotomy in the first place. Your proposed society can only exist under the condition that everyone plays by your rules.

[RGacky3]

Eating in a soup kitchen is not dying. Stop being melodramatic.

Oh ok, so instead of dying live a life of missery and pain, great.

[#FF0000]

lol

[#FF0000]

Logic, the capitalists don't want you to use it. The truth is we are not all motivated by greed, a great deal of us are motivated for the betterment of all humanity. but if you throw that out there the whole argument for capitalism starts to crumble, so they need another cop out excuse.

Man, I don't even think that's the case. I do believe that humans are self-interested (not "greedy" -- that is a different word with a different meaning), but that self-interest is a pretty broad thing. People will act altruistically because it feels good. People will work ridiculous hours and put insane amounts of work into a thing because they like doing it.

I mean like

working on something feels good.

I built my deck with the help of a few other people. It was good and it felt good to finish it.

but "work" sucks.

[CommunityBeliever]

Go live in a box and eat at soup kitchens.

There is so many things wrongs with this I don't know where to begin. There are plenty of people who don't live in places where being homeless and eating out of soup kitchens is even an option and for those that do their life is still miserable. Besides that did you consider that some people have families to take care of?


Eating in a soup kitchen is not dying.In some of the colder places not having a home with heat leads to death and not everywhere has a soup kitchen so in those places not being able to buy food leads to death.

[Prinskaj]

Eating in a soup kitchen is not dying. Stop being melodramatic.
That is given that there actually are enough soup kitchens around to feed the masses, and that other factors, such as weather, disease, lack of medical care and so on, doesn't kill you..

[Jimmie Higgins]

Don't know if I'm a bit late on this one, but oh well. We all know the common arguments in defence of capitalism, the big one being "people are naturally greedy and driven by competition", which we all have our responses to. Another one I've heard quite a lot, usually following on from this, is "what if people consent to being wage slaves?" which completely throws the argument off its own rails. If we (the vast majority of the human population) are driven by competition and personal gain, why would we consent to someone stealing from our earnings? Anyone ever run into this during an argument?

I haven't heard this put in exactly this way, but you often hear people saying, "well I like my job" or "my boss is good to us" and I'm sure they actually feel this way, but it's also individual and impressionistic, many slaves loved their masters, many serfs idolized their nobles, many people loved Mussolini, but that's not how a system's worth is judged - particularly not from a general working class view.

Another way people put this argument - especially in the last generation of low struggle is, "well if worker's interests are contradictory to capitalism, why aren't people rising up more, people seem content". Again, this is impressionistic and a fair look at the history of industrial society (or any class society, though we have more info about life for "common people" in more modern societies) shows that there are ups and downs in struggle. Even the Communist Manifesto begins by talking about class struggle, "sometimes hidden, bursts forth" out into the open. The ruling ideas of any age are the ideas of the ruling class and so even if people don't like the order of society, in periods of relative calm, most people accept that there is no alternative to the present conditions and so they look for the best possible position given the circumstances. In capitalism that means some become cut-throat while most workers just try and find a niche where they can go to work, not struggle economically too much, and try and enjoy their free-time as much as possible. But this is a tenuous balance to hold and especially when the system goes into crisis, things can be thrown into the air. That's what's happening now and it's already making some of these kinds of arguments harder to reasonably hold.


Voluntary transactions aren't stealing. If you don't want to work then don't. Go live in a box and eat at soup kitchens.Yes this is what the right-wing always says. "You have the right to be homeless if you think wage-work is a raw deal". Except the same people who make these arguments are also the ones gutting public services for the poor while liberals in cities like San Francisco do everything they can to hide homelessness and harass the homeless themselves. It's now illegal to sit in San Francisco - although somehow I think this only applies to homeless people, not business people on their lunch break. Urban development always includes new park benches that can't be slept on, planters that can't be sit on, and of course when people in a movement camped in parks in Oakland, police shot at them and arrested them in massive numbers.

Calling poverty in capitalism a choice, is like making someone walk the plank and then saying if they drown it's their choice for not swimming hard enough.


With a -190 rep he's probably tired of being an easy target lol.
That's why I keep trying the rep him whenever I can. I was trying to keep it above -100, but it may be a lost cause.

[Lanky Wanker]

Man, I don't even think that's the case. I do believe that humans are self-interested (not "greedy" -- that is a different word with a different meaning), but that self-interest is a pretty broad thing.


I think the only innate "greed" or self-interest that humans are born with is greed that would keep us alive in the wild. Hunger and sexual attraction are the only good sort of examples of "greed" I can think of that humans are naturally born with. As for helping other people, what you said explains it all. Even going back to early humans, neanderthals lived in numbers (communes, hey hey) to survive because we are useless on our own, so it makes perfect sense from an evolutionary standpoint that we get gratification from helping others. Self-interest/greed in terms of a 504,837,189 room mansion and a Rolls Royce is certainly not part of human nature, it is a materialistic manipulation of human nature.

[Ostrinski]

Of course we are self-interested. Hunger and homelessness are material situations that fucking suck, people don't like being in those situations, and it is therefore in their self-interest to overthrow the productive arrangement that keeps them like that. It's hard for me to imagine a hungry or freezing person that is bent on humanity's liberation more than feeding or sheltering themselves.