Bourgeoisie

[Anarcho-Brocialist]

By definition, I'm part of the bourgeoisie based on my occupations (civil engineer and university lecturer). What I have a problem with is, I don't exploit labor, I instead utilize my mathematical skills, and live off of those skills alone. I'm not a proletariat by definition, because I don't work at a shop, factory, mines etc,. I think it's too black and white to describe someone proletariat and bourgeois.

[MustCrushCapitalism]

The issue with that is that you actually are proletarian. Marxists don't define class under capitalism by income, we define it by relation to the means of production.

[Prometeo liberado]

The issue with that is that you actually are proletarian. Marxists don't define class under capitalism by income, we define it by relation to the means of production.

I would also add do you earn a wage? You do not own the Uni, correct?

[seventeethdecember2016]

I too am a Bourgeoisie, by definition, seeing that my occupation is day trading. Unlike you, I make money off of exploitation which greatly diminishes me as a person.

But look on the bright side, by definition Engels and Marx were Bourgeoisie too!
Also, I live in a Bourgeois country, so living a Proletariat life isn't the best choice I could make. And, just to make another point, it is unlikely that I'll see sustainable Socialism or Communism in my life anyway.

I will always be supportive of this cause though.

[Ostrinski]

If you are a wage worker, i.e. if you sell your labor power as a means to subsist, then you are by definition a proletarian. You are not bourgeois if you are not employing labor to accumulate capital.

[Left Leanings]

I too am a Bourgeoisie, by definition, seeing that my occupation is day trading. Unlike you, I make money off of exploitation which greatly diminishes me as a person.

But look on the bright side, by definition Engels and Marx were Bourgeoisie too!
Also, I live in a Bourgeois country, so living a Proletariat life isn't the best choice I could make. And, just to make another point, it is unlikely that I'll see sustainable Socialism or Communism in my life anyway.

I will always be supportive of this cause though.

As long as peeps ideology is proletarian, that's the main thing, especially if they combine it with a commitment to active organization as well :)

[Anarcho-Brocialist]

I would also add do you earn a wage? You do not own the Uni, correct?

Of course not, I don't own the institution, but I was reading a book defening occupations that are of the capitalist class. It showed the following examples : Lawyers, Owners of Land, University Professors and ranked academic officials, bankers etc,. I understand lawyers, bankers, and land owners, but never those who are in academia.

[Ostrinski]

Furthermore, lawyers who don't own a firm or something similar are not bourgeois either.

[Minima]

isn't that why it is useless to think of bourgeois and proletariat on an atomized individual basis? aren't they broader terms used to describe society that are somewhat meaningless and inappropriate to apply to individuals? for all purposes, well paid professionals like lawyers, politicians, managers, day traders, are the bourgeois, in terms of ideology, discourse, comparison in terms of material wealth. (they also likely own retirement/education/savings funds, benefit from relatives who are bourgeois, have money in a bank etc.)

for example we can't really say reliably within a first world country who is a bourgeois, and who is a proletariat, because of the nature of how the global economy benefits us in canada and the states before countries say in africa and asia. alot of people call themselves middle class because of their relative affluence w/e but they are really working class people who have the benefit of a capitalist system that works in their favor regionally.

i'm not saying that you should never think in those terms, but that there serious limits in doing so, and i don't really think it's useful to moralize about people based on your rough categorization of them. especially on a forum full of neurotic teenagers, it's very difficult to say what is inherently proletarian in nature and alot of this forum is about making shit up and identifying with it because it's really difficult to have a stable identity as a leftist in a capitalist society.

that's my simplified somewhat garbled version, if i'm wrong you can shoot me when the revolution comes around anyway

[Danielle Ni Dhighe]

for example we can't really say reliably within a first world country who is a bourgeois, and who is a proletariat
Sure we can. What is one's relation to the means of production, distribution, and exchange? That hasn't changed, even in first world countries.

[Minima]

As long as peeps ideology is proletarian, that's the main thing, especially if they combine it with a commitment to active organization as well

comrade it sounds cool from like an everyday perspective but it doesn't really sound really marxist, and i don't think things are so simple. what exactly is "proletarian ideology" and why does "organizing" make one a proletariat, i'm just thinking, aren't there what you call bourgeois unions?

[Danielle Ni Dhighe]

Of course not, I don't own the institution, but I was reading a book defening occupations that are of the capitalist class.
Which book?

[Minima]

Sure we can. What is one's relation to the means of production, distribution, and exchange? That hasn't changed, even in first world countries.

at a level but i mean you can't really atomize your analysis of society at the level of the nation even. i mean look at north america and the relationship between mexico and the united states in terms of outsourced labour, look at china

[Anarcho-Brocialist]

Which book?

Some book on anarcho-communism.

[Danielle Ni Dhighe]

at a level but i mean you can't really atomize your analysis of society at the level of the nation even. i mean look at north america and the relationship between mexico and the united states in terms of labour.
But how does that change one's relation to the means of production, etc.?

[Deicide]

Marxists do not define class by income brackets or by the prestigiousness of your job, or even by your position in society to practice power, but by your relation to the means of production.

[Left Leanings]

As long as peeps ideology is proletarian, that's the main thing, especially if they combine it with a commitment to active organization as well :)


comrade it sounds cool from like an everyday perspective but it doesn't really sound really marxist, and i don't think things are so simple. what exactly is "proletarian ideology" and why does "organizing" make one a proletariat, i'm just thinking, aren't there what you call bourgeois unions?

By proletarian ideology, I mean subscribing to the Marxist principles of class stuggle and liberation. And by commitment to an active organization, I mean membership of a leftist group seeking to agitate for socialist revoluton, or promoting this in your specific context, even if it's just among your friends and colleagues at work.

[Minima]

But how does that change one's relation to the means of production, etc.?

well you're right it doesn't, i'm sort of not using this weird logic of categorizing people, when i use the terms i'm trying to use it to think of society in more broader marxist terms,

I am rather thinking about something like a country which relies heavily on on a resource/agricultural export industry like sugar canes and then after a communist revolution still depends on the same exports for it's basic survival as a small country within a globalized capitalism. the economy of many central american countries is based on these relationships in a global economy which has it's roots in the legacy of colonialism and mercantilism. such a country would basically be proletarian in nature in a global capitalist economy and has alot of barriers to development etc.

the problem in saying whether someone is proletariat or not where for example some bullshit degree gets someone a job in a prestigious institution peddling liberal dogma in university like economics or marketing or critical art studies and gets paid 3 times a normal persons working wage. this is a luxury afforded on the exploited proletarian nature of other nations like china india and brazil who provide most of the cheap and dangerous labour and resources for our affluent lifestyles.

[Anarcho-Brocialist]

the problem in saying whether someone is proletariat or not where for example some bullshit arts degree gets someone a job in a prestigious institution peddling liberal dogma in university and gets paid 3 times a normal persons working wage. this is a luxury afforded on the exploited proletarian nature of other nations like china india and brazil who provide most of the cheap and dangerous labour and resources for our affluent lifestyles.

I'm lost. What are you trying to say, comrade?

[Minima]

we have a society where if you chose not to work, objectively you can still live, but in the majority of countries around the world, you won't survive for very long. Now extend that logic into contemporary capitalism where you have what i basically think is makework, paper pushing, service industries, basically fake bullshit that creates no value. I mean if a bunch of bourgeois start throwing money at each other arbitrarily, for like luxury services, makeup salons, tanning salons, overpriced food, divorce lawyers, social networking gurus, that expropriated labour in the form of money still came from somewhere, and it came from exploitation. every day i see a new house in my neighbourhood being built for new chinese owners (i know lots of people in housing construction) probably from ceos, managers and corrupt officials trying to get their money out of china. that drives up house prices and suddenly every hardworking proletariat who owns a house in this area from 2 decades ago suddenly has a neat half a million in their pocket, someplaces up to a million.

because of tariffs, neo-liberal economic policies, mercantilism, colonialism, all of this stuff that got us here it's not really possible for me to think of myself as a proletariat when i benefit so directly from other people's exploited labour merely by living in canada.

[Anarcho-Brocialist]

Oh, OK. I don't consider my self bourgeoisie, but I had to clarify the issue.

[Jimmie Higgins]

Oh, OK. I don't consider my self bourgeoisie, but I had to clarify the issue.I think your occupations tend to be considered petty-bourgeois, rather than bourgeois. Both are "professional" positions where you may have somewhat more autonomy than most wage-workers and might be contracted rather than paid a regular wage or you might have some managerial oversight over assistants or whatnot. But even then while you are not strictly "proletarian" you are part of the petty-bourgoise with many shared interested with the working class.

At any rate, like others said, someone's personal background doesn't make them inherently more or less revolutionary - many workers support ruling class ideas and some rich people of non-working class backgrounds have come to side with the working class.

[Red Rabbit]

This thread might be taking a turn into MTW territory.

[kanto]

By definition, I'm part of the bourgeoisie based on my occupations (civil engineer and university lecturer). What I have a problem with is, I don't exploit labor, I instead utilize my mathematical skills, and live off of those skills alone. I'm not a proletariat by definition, because I don't work at a shop, factory, mines etc,. I think it's too black and white to describe someone proletariat and bourgeois.
Your only bourgeois if you own means of production, and since you dont, you clearly arent.

[Thirsty Crow]

By definition, I'm part of the bourgeoisie based on my occupations (civil engineer and university lecturer). What I have a problem with is, I don't exploit labor, I instead utilize my mathematical skills, and live off of those skills alone. I'm not a proletariat by definition, because I don't work at a shop, factory, mines etc,. I think it's too black and white to describe someone proletariat and bourgeois.
Did Marx and the early socialist movement hold the opinion that only blue collar workers constitute the working class? No, the basic, most simple point of what we call the Marxist class analysis is that social classes in modern society (i.e. capitalism) are formed in production, and that the relationship shared among people to that means of production constitutes class - the working class who are dispossessed of the means of production and consequently are forced to sell their labour power in order to obtain the means of subsistence, and the capitalist class who possess the means of production (as capital), employ wage labourers and exploit labor.
Now, it's hard for me, as an adherent to this view on social class, to see just how you could be considered bourgeois since as you say, you don't employ and exploit labour.

[Prometeo liberado]

Some book on anarcho-communism.

I think this may be the source of your quandary. As the ideology of the Ultra-left/Anarchist tends to gravitate towards the cannibalistic side. By that I mean a addict like need for a narrower and narrower outlook of what is socialism and/or a worker. Until finally there will be only two people left in a room who must eventually feed on each other.

[Ocean Seal]

By definition, I'm part of the bourgeoisie based on my occupations (civil engineer and university lecturer).
Are you sure you know the definition of bourgeoisie?


I'm not a proletariat by definition, because I don't work at a shop, factory, mines etc[/B],. I think it's too black and white to describe someone proletariat and bourgeois.
Are you sure you know the definition of proletariat?

[SpiritiualMarxist]

Does it really matter what your personal position is? As stated, Marx and Engels were bourgeoisie. I aspire to be an independent healthcare practitioner not because of wanting to be in the bourgeoisie class, but because of personal preference and the fact that the conventional healthcare system doesn't support my field very well. I think what matters most is ideology and activity in the struggle.

Surely a self-employed or small business owner are still in a predicament also under capitalism as in being forced to conform to the market system and generally do things you don't want to do.

[Minima]

minding yourself, your career, cult of personal success, etc sounds pretty borgiousie to me. personal choices, lifestyles, all bourgeoisie ways of distancing yourself from analysis out of convenience.

it's better to live in contradiction then in denial.

[Niall]

ok, Im confused, as a teacher am I, by definition,Bourgeoisie or Proleterian

[Deicide]

ok, Im confused, as a teacher am I, by definition,Bourgeoisie or Proleterian

Prole.

[u.s.red]

ok, Im confused, as a teacher am I, by definition,Bourgeoisie or Proleterian

Personally, I think the words bourgeoisie and proletarian have lost meaning in ordinary usage. Why not ask, "Am I a capitalist, a small capitalist or a worker?" Even the word "worker" sounds odd.

Or maybe, are you part of the capitalist class or the working class?

[u.s.red]

Oh, OK. I don't consider my self bourgeoisie, but I had to clarify the issue.

My view is what class do you belong to or what class interests do you represent. I assume you are not part of the capitalist class. As a civil engineer and university lecturer (or, professor, in the U.S.) what class interest do you support? If your position is that you only do mathematics and that you are not engaged in politics, that I think would mean that you have withdrawn from any class struggle and are merely a functionary of the capitalist class.

You may not directly exploit the working class, but the money used to pay your salary has to come from somewhere. Where I live, if a socialist civil engineer and university professor made any kind of statement that building safe bridges is socially more important than tax cuts for the rich, he or she would be looking for a new job.