Mutualism

[Remus Bleys]

Is mutualism just capitalism but run in a syndicalist sense? And if so, does that fundamentally change mutualism? Will it always result in a monopoly like capitalism does, and is Marxian economics applicable to it, i.e. will it always fail? Would it still be considered a form of socialism? I feel like it would, because it would be worker owned, but am I just missing something?
Could mutualism work as a transition from capitalism to communism? What about mutualism instead of capitalism?

[Sotionov]

"the means of production and subsistence, while they remain the property of the immediate producer, are not capital. They only become capital under circumstances in which they serve at the same time as means of exploitation of, and domination over, the worker.”

When the producer owns his “conditions of labour” and “employs that labour to enrich himself instead of the capitalist” then that economic system is “diametrically opposed” to capitalism.

Capital, I, 33

[Flying Purple People Eater]

"the means of production and subsistence, while they remain the property of the immediate producer, are not capital. They only become capital under circumstances in which they serve at the same time as means of exploitation of, and domination over, the worker.”

When the producer owns his “conditions of labour” and “employs that labour to enrich himself instead of the capitalist” then that economic system is “diametrically opposed” to capitalism.

Capital, I, 33

What's this got to do with mutualism? :confused:

[baronci]

"the means of production and subsistence, while they remain the property of the immediate producer, are not capital. They only become capital under circumstances in which they serve at the same time as means of exploitation of, and domination over, the worker.”

When the producer owns his “conditions of labour” and “employs that labour to enrich himself instead of the capitalist” then that economic system is “diametrically opposed” to capitalism.

Capital, I, 33

This doesn't really mean that 'workplace democracy' can be a facet of communism, though. Mutualism, syndicalism, and other brands of self-management are just capital's prettier cousins.

[Sotionov]

What's this got to do with mutualism? :confused:
It is a perfect description of it.


Mutualism, syndicalism, and other brands of self-management are just capital's prettier cousins.
Sorry, that's not true. Abolition of capitalism cannot be equated with it, and mutualism (also Individualist anarchist) imply non-existance of exploitation- therefore- they by definition imply abolition of capitalism.

[baronci]

Sorry, that's not true. Abolition of capitalism cannot be equated with it, and mutualism (also Individualist anarchist) imply non-existance of exploitation- therefore- they by definition imply abolition of capitalism.

nah, the core of marx's critique is the criticism of the very existence of money, value, profit, and economy. The fact that the worker does not get the full value of its 'surplus' is only a small part of the bigger opposition to capital.

[Sotionov]

Sure, you can also oppose slavery because it uses markets and money, but it's not what defines it, and certainly not the reason to call for it's abolition- because being that markets and money don't define slavery, it could exist without them (e.g. by the state owning all the slaves).

It is the same with capitalism. Just like the slaveowner-slave relation is the core of slavery, the capitalist-worker relation is the core of capitalism, and not a "small part" of it.

[helot]

This doesn't really mean that 'workplace democracy' can be a facet of communism, though. Mutualism, syndicalism, and other brands of self-management are just capital's prettier cousins.

Cool, so by right of being an anarcho-syndicalist i advocate one of capital's prettier cousins even though like the vast majority of anarcho-syndicalists i'm a communist?



Anyway, i don't think capitalism can be reduced to the market as that completely ignores the class nature of capitalist society. Thus, to consider mutualism as capitalism because it retains market mechanisms is a symptom of a flawed analysis. This isn't to say, however, that mutualism would be beneficial. The market mechanism is destructive, it destroys solidarity.

[baronci]

Cool, so by right of being an anarcho-syndicalist i advocate one of capital's prettier cousins even though like the vast majority of anarcho-syndicalists i'm a communist?

I never mentioned anarcho-syndicalism, but if you support democratic management of the workplace as part of communism then you are essentially supporting the continuation of capitalism.


Anyway, i don't think capitalism can be reduced to the market as that completely ignores the class nature of capitalist society. Thus, to consider mutualism as capitalism because it retains market mechanisms is a symptom of a flawed analysis. This isn't to say, however, that mutualism would be beneficial. The market mechanism is destructive, it destroys solidarity.

There is a lot more to capitalism than just the lack of workplace democracy. The fact that there even *is* a "workplace" is much more important to consider.

[Remus Bleys]

I never mentioned anarcho-syndicalism, but if you support democratic management of the workplace as part of communism then you are essentially supporting the continuation of capitalism.



There is a lot more to capitalism than just the lack of workplace democracy. The fact that there even *is* a "workplace" is much more important to consider. Can you elaborate on this?

[Sotionov]

I never mentioned anarcho-syndicalism, but if you support democratic management of the workplace as part of communism then you are essentially supporting the continuation of capitalism. This must be the stupedest thing I've read. The democratic (hozirontalist) control of production is the core of anti-capitalism.


Anyways:

"The mere existence of a commodity economy does not alone suffice to constitute capitalism. A commodity economy can exist although there are no capitalists; for instance, the economy in which the only producers are independent artisans. They produce for the market, they sell their products; thus these products are undoubtedly commodities, and the whole production is commodity production. Nevertheless, this is not capitalist production; it is nothing more than simple commodity production. In order that a simple commodity economy can be transformed into capitalist production, it is necessary, on the one hand, that the means of production (tools, machinery, buildings, land, etc.) should become the private property of a comparatively limited class of wealthy capitalists; and, on the other, that there should ensue the ruin of the independent artisans and peasants and their conversion into wage workers."

Bukharin, The ABC of Communism, I, 1-7

[baronci]

This must be the stupedest thing I've read.

thanks. you probably haven't read much


The democratic (hozirontalist) control of production is the core of anti-capitalism.

Says you. If the working class could decide the conditions of its slavery to production then it would still be a slave to production. There is nothing inherently communist about democracy within the workplace, as the workplace is antithetical to communism.


Anyways:

"The mere existence of a commodity economy does not alone suffice to constitute capitalism. A commodity economy can exist although there are no capitalists; for instance, the economy in which the only producers are independent artisans. They produce for the market, they sell their products; thus these products are undoubtedly commodities, and the whole production is commodity production. Nevertheless, this is not capitalist production; it is nothing more than simple commodity production. In order that a simple commodity economy can be transformed into capitalist production, it is necessary, on the one hand, that the means of production (tools, machinery, buildings, land, etc.) should become the private property of a comparatively limited class of wealthy capitalists; and, on the other, that there should ensue the ruin of the independent artisans and peasants and their conversion into wage workers."

Bukharin, The ABC of Communism, I, 1-7

Whatever, whether you want to call it "capitalism" or not really does not matter - humans have been enslaved by other before capitalism and in capitalism, sitting here and trying to lecture Bukharin (who, as a Soviet statesman and proponent of SIOC, is an awful resource here) to me isn't going to make me embrace the glories of workplace democracy.



Can you elaborate on this?

Communism is about the destruction of the human's status as a worker, not the affirmation of it. The abolition of class society, after all, requires the abolition of all classes including the working class. See Marx's 1844 Manuscripts, as well as The German Ideology.

[Zukunftsmusik]

Anyways:

"The mere existence of a commodity economy does not alone suffice to constitute capitalism. A commodity economy can exist although there are no capitalists; for instance, the economy in which the only producers are independent artisans. They produce for the market, they sell their products; thus these products are undoubtedly commodities, and the whole production is commodity production. Nevertheless, this is not capitalist production; it is nothing more than simple commodity production. In order that a simple commodity economy can be transformed into capitalist production, it is necessary, on the one hand, that the means of production (tools, machinery, buildings, land, etc.) should become the private property of a comparatively limited class of wealthy capitalists; and, on the other, that there should ensue the ruin of the independent artisans and peasants and their conversion into wage workers."

Bukharin, The ABC of Communism, I, 1-7

I'm pretty sure this quote is used to describe the appearance of capitalism out of the womb of "simple commodity production". He doesn't use it as an argument for mutualism, or that there will be a workplace under communism, as you do, he's simply talking about the development of capitalism. I don't think we want those things that evolved into capitalism present in our future land over the rainbow, no thank you.

[Remus Bleys]

Communism is about the destruction of the human's status as a worker, not the affirmation of it. The abolition of class society, after all, requires the abolition of all classes including the working class. See Marx's 1844 Manuscripts, as well as The German Ideology.But would not everyone in mutualism be a worker? And since there is only one class, no class?

[Sotionov]

There is nothing inherently communist about democracy within the workplace, as the workplace is antithetical to communism.
If horizontalist (democratic) organization is not central to anti-capitalism, that means that in theory someone being an "anti-capitalist" but not a horizontalist would accept slavery if reformed enought to fit his goals. E.g. If one wants nationalization and production for use- a party can gain state power, enslave all the workers, nationalize the economy, it could also give the slaves nice houses, food, education, health-care, etc. but still treat them as slaves.


Whatever, whether you want to call it "capitalism"Is up to whether or not you have any idea about what you're talking about. Which you seem not to have.


Communism is about the destruction of the human's status as a worker, not the affirmation of it. The abolition of class society, after all, requires the abolition of all classes including the working class. See Marx's 1844 Manuscripts, as well as The German Ideology.You obviously never read Engels' Principles of Communism, or at least it's first few sentances, where it clearly says that the working class is not the same as proletariat (wage-laborers), and no one ever said that working people needs to abolish itself as workers, but as proletariat, meaning it needs to abolish wage-labor, not labor. To want to abolish wage-labor is socialism, to want to abolish labor is technological utopianism.


I'm pretty sure this quote is used to describe the appearance of capitalism out of the womb of "simple commodity production". He doesn't use it as an argument for mutualism,
Neither did I said he did, I was just quoting it due to idiocy of many who think that mutualism is capitalism, even though it by definition implies non-existance of capitalists or capitalists relations.


or that there will be a workplace under communismA workplace is a physical space where work is done, e.g. a factory. Afaik- factories will contitue to exist in communism and workers are do work in them.

[baronci]

If horizontalist (democratic) organization is not central to anti-capitalism, that means that in theory someone being an "anti-capitalist" but not a horizontalist would accept slavery if reformed enought to fit his goals. E.g. If one wants nationalization and production for use- a party can gain state power, enslave all the workers, nationalize the economy, it could also give the slaves nice houses, food, education, health-care, etc. but still treat them as slaves.

why are you telling me this when you're the one advocating the continuation of labor? who is going to be the one to order everyone into the factories? Will we be setting up a "workers state" to boss the workers around after they've overthrown capitalism?


Is up to whether or not you have any idea about what you're talking about. Which you seem not to have.is this talk really necessary? can't we be civil?


You obviously never read Engels' Principles of Communism, or at least it's first few sentances, where it clearly says that the working class is not the same as proletariat (wage-laborers), and no one ever said that working people needs to abolish itself as workers, but as proletariat, meaning it needs to abolish wage-labor, not labor. To want to abolish wage-labor is socialism, to want to abolish labor is technological utopianism.um, no, it has pretty much been consistent across marxism that abolition of all classes (thus the self-abolition of the proletariat) is necessary - even Lenin acknowledged this. How something be called "classless" if there is still a huge portion of the population that produces commodities and slaves away in some miserable factories blowing fossil fuels into the air? sounds miserable.


Neither did I said he did, I was just quoting it due to idiocy of many who think that mutualism is capitalism, even though it by definition implies non-existance of capitalists or capitalists relations.Mutualism is capitalist, there is no good reason to think that it isn't. Marx criticized Proudhon very harshly for many of the reasons that people are stating in this thread.


A workplace is a physical space where work is done, e.g. a factory. Afaik- factories will contitue to exist in communism and workers are do work in them.then you can count me (and everyone else on earth) out. Thinking that the working class is going to undergo a worldwide revolution against their condition and then return to the factories is insane.

[Sotionov]

why are you telling me this when you're the one advocating the continuation of labor?
Sure I'm advocating the continuation of labor. The only way humans can survive without labor is to invent technology that will do everything instead of us, which is technological utopianism.


who is going to be the one to order everyone into the factories? Will we be setting up a "workers state" to boss the workers around after they've overthrown capitalism?
You don't seem the grasp the concept of horizontalism (non-hierarchy), it by it's definition implies there being no one who forces anyone to do anything, and also implies there being no bosses.


um, no, it has pretty much been consistent across marxism that abolition of all classes (thus the self-abolition of the proletariat) is necessary
You said that people need to abolish themselves as workers, not proletariat. Workers exited in primitive communism and troughout all of history, the proletariat exists only in capitalism. Workers are people who work. Slaves, serfs, wage-laborers, those are oppressed workers, and workers need to abolish themselves as an oppressed class, not as workers.


Mutualism is capitalist
You're an idiot. I just explained and quoted marxists that acknoledge the simple fact that mutualism is simple commodity production, not capitalism.


then you can count me (and everyone else on earth) out. Thinking that the working class is going to undergo a worldwide revolution against their condition and then return to the factories is insane.
Again- you're an idiot. The only for you to live and not to work is 1) by being a parasite (exploitatior), 2) by having star trek technology that makes food, clother and everything else instead of you. Option one is the point of the revolution and the core of labor emancipation is abolition of such people, option two in not going to happen any time soon.

[Zukunftsmusik]

A workplace is a physical space where work is done, e.g. a factory. Afaik- factories will contitue to exist in communism and workers are do work in them.

Uh, you're aware factories were the first sign of capitalism, right? Factories have been the main place where wage labour has taken place, it's shaped after the logic of wage labour, shift systems etc. I think, as - hopefully - many other communists, that work - the form labour has taken under capitalism - needs to be abolished or radically changed. That would most probably (hopefully) make factories and other workplaces redundant (or "radically changed", at least)

[baronci]

Sure I'm advocating the continuation of labor. The only way humans can survive without labor is to invent technology that will do everything instead of us, which is technological utopianism.

What? Humans survived for over 100,000 years without laboring or living with any sort of economy, until slavery and civilization emerged. Mass production has only ever existed to serve the desires of the ruling classes.



You don't seem the grasp the concept of horizontalism (non-hierarchy), it by it's definition implies there being no one who forces anyone to do anything, and also implies there being no bosses.yep, I'm aware of that, but what I'm asking is: what if people don't even want to control their workplaces? What if revolution brings down all existing systems of mass production? Is there going to be a police force pointing guns at them, forcing them to work, like there was in the USSR and other places?



You said that people need to abolish themselves as workers, not proletariat. Workers exited in primitive communism and troughout all of history, the proletariat exists only in capitalism. Workers are people who work. Slaves, serfs, wage-laborers, those are oppressed workers, and workers need to abolish themselves as an oppressed class, not as workers.there is an arguable difference between the concept of the "proletariat" and the concept of the "working class" but you're not anywhere near that. the two words mean the same thing in this context.



You're an idiot. I just explained and quoted marxists that acknoledge the simple fact that mutualism is simple commodity production, not capitalism.nope, all you did was quote people and twist the words around to fit your own argument. Give me a quote by a marxist defending Proudhonism and I'll acknowledge it.



Again- you're an idiot. The only for you to live and not to work is 1) by being a parasite (exploitatior), 2) by having star trek technology that makes food, clother and everything else instead of you. Option one is the point of the revolution and the core of labor emancipation is abolition of such people, option two in not going to happen any time soon.lol, this is really odd. "Parasite?" you sound like some right-winger trashing welfare recipients. Again, there are ways for humans to survive without being enslaved to mass production - it existed for the majority of our existence, in fact, just like all other animals. This concept of "work" had no meaning until people started enslaving others.


just out of curiosity: have you ever worked a job doing menial labor? If so, would you really think that having a say in the god-awful work you do would make it any better? I can't think of any reason why anyone would want to work an 8 hour shift, and then have to go to a boring ass meeting discussing what everyone wants, and then having to vote on it every time.

[Sotionov]

Uh, you're aware factories were the first sign of capitalism, right?
And agriculture is a sign of slavery, yeah?


Factories have been the main place where wage labour has taken place, it's shaped after the logic of wage labour, shift systems etc.Factory is a building. A building by itself doesn't imply any particular form of organization, let alone an entire economic system.


I think, as - hopefully - many other communists, that work - the form labour has taken under capitalismWork is synonous with labor. Please consult a dictionary. Wage-labor is the the form of labor under capitalism- that needs to be abolished.


That would most probably (hopefully) make factories and other workplaces redundant (or "radically changed", at least)Wait, wait, wait. Are you really saying you think that there will be no factories in communism? Like, all factory buildings will be demolished or transformed into kintergartens, what?


What? Humans survived for over 100,000 years without laboring or living with any sort of economy,
Hunting to feed your family/ clan is laboring, and gathering fruits, berries and nuts is also. Romantisation of hunter-gatherer communities is plain self-delusion, it's the "original affluent society" if by affluence you consider having food, a leaf oven your groin, a few spears, and nothing else. Nothing else. No clothes, no house, no furniture, no modern food, no technology whatsoever. Do you like your iPhone? Well that means you like modern industry, and even in communism, someone will need to run that industry, things we use are not gonna make themselves.


what if people don't even want to control their workplaces?Then they won't establish a classless system, but will have a ruling class over them.


Is there going to be a police force pointing guns at them, forcing them to work, like there was in the USSR and other places?Why are being an idiot? I just told you that horizontalism by definition implies a system diametrically oppossed to the one in USSR.


Give me a quote by a marxist defending Proudhonism and I'll acknowledge it.If you're gonna mention argumentation, try not to make a complete moron out of yourself and request an appeal to authority quote in the very next sentance. Marxists can say what they want- the point is that anyone who thinks mutualism is capitalism doesn't have any clue whatsoever about what he's talking, being that there is no exploitation in mutualism, mutualism is "simple commodity production", to use a marxist term.


. Again, there are ways for humans to survive without being enslaved to mass production - it existed for the majority of our existence, in fact, just like all other animals.Wait, marxists trash mutualism for wanting a return to pre-capitalist artisan mode of production, but then you turn up and advocate a pre-civilization form of production? Wow. Sure, go live in a cave, hunt animals and collect berries from bushes.


just out of curiosity: have you ever worked a job doing menial labor? If so, would you really think that having a say in the god-awful work you do would make it any better? I can't think of any reason why anyone would want to work an 8 hour shift, and then have to go to a boring ass meeting discussing what everyone wants, and then having to vote on it every time.Actually, I have been working blue-collar jobs all my life, warehouses, gas-stations and construction, at the moment I'm a night watchman. I'll give you a reason why would someone want to work- not being lazy and spoiled and not being parasitical. If you want to survive, you have to work.

What is your vision of communism? Sitting around doing "hobbies" while someone else makes food, clothers, houses, roads, etc? Sorry, that's not communism, that's capitalism with you being one of the capitalists. If you are able and don't work (according to Kropotkin's assumptions- 4 or 5 hours a day, 5 days a week), you will be a new exploiter- living off of work of other people.

Or is your vision of communism sitting around while machines do all the work? Sorry, that's technological utopianism, if that's your view you should go to a trekkie site, not be on a leftist one, being that the revolutionary left is a movement of the working people, not of utopian sci-fi dreamers or zerzan idiots.

[baronci]

you're resorting to the same logic that capitalists use to force people into getting them money by calling those who don't want to work "parasites". a parasite is something that takes from something without contributing any of their own help, that isn't what anyone here is asking for. We want an end to all forms of wage labor - whether the labor is done for a monetary wage or a social wage. it is all slavery.

[Sotionov]

Whereas it is obvious that their 'logic' is self-contradictory being that they are parasites themselves.

Sure, of course that's what we all want, I'm just talking about that calls for abolition of work is poor choise of words, being that what we want to abolish is wage-labor, and not all labor. Maybe some want to abolish all labor, but those people are called technological utopians.

[baronci]

Sure, of course that's what we all want

then why not fight for it?


I'm just talking about that calls for abolition of work is poor choise of words, being that what we want to abolish is wage-labor, and not all labo

you already know what we mean when we say that we want to do away with labor - meaning that we want to put an end to reality based upon mass production and mass consumption, and break survival down to purely communist social relations.


Maybe some want to abolish all labor, but those people are called technological utopians.

no, they're actually called proletarians

[Sotionov]

then why not fight for it?
I don't know, tell us why you're not fighting for it..


no, they're actually called proletarians
Sorry, nope, wanting to abolish not wage-labor but all labor is trekkie technological utopianism.

[bcbm]

Sorry, nope, wanting to abolish not wage-labor but all labor is trekkie technological utopianism.

i think 'work' is a more useful term than 'labor,' as it denotes a specific type of labor while labor itself is, i think, more general in referring to any manner of activities that may or may not be 'work.' in spite of these semantics, i think what firenze is trying to get at is that work is production enforced by political or economic means and the goal of proletarians is the destruction of work and the creation of new modes of life and activity.

[Zukunftsmusik]

And agriculture is a sign of slavery, yeah?

Insofar agriculture constitutes the society that developed out of hunter-gatherer-societies, then I suppose so, yes.


Factory is a building. A building by itself doesn't imply any particular form of organization, let alone an entire economic system.

It does though. There were few skyscrapers around in feudal society.


Wait, wait, wait. Are you really saying you think that there will be no factories in communism? Like, all factory buildings will be demolished or transformed into kintergartens, what?

The factory exists to enable mass production. Mass production exists to feed capital. In think a better question is why you want or think factories should or even can exist in a society where capital is abolished.


Ginormous strawman

This isn't what they're saying

[Sotionov]

i think 'work' is a more useful term than 'labor,' as it denotes a specific type of labor while labor itself is, i think, more general in referring to any manner of activities that may or may not be 'work.'
Still, it's wage-labor/ work-for-wage that is to be abolished in socialism, not all labor/ all work.


i think what firenze is trying to get at is that work is production enforced by political or economic means Sorry, but that's just not the meaning of the word work.


Insofar agriculture constitutes the society that developed out of hunter-gatherer-societies, then I suppose so, yes.

It does though. There were few skyscrapers around in feudal society.
You are somewhat using the converse error fallacy- the fact that the feudal societies that existed didn't have skyscrapers doesn't mean that having no skyscrapers implies having feudalism, being that people without skyscrapers can have any economic system, and there is also no impossibility in people with skyscrapers establishing feudalism.


The factory exists to enable mass production. Mass production exists to feed capital. In think a better question is why you want or think factories should or even can exist in a society where capital is abolished.Because I disagree with your starting premise- that factory production's only purpose it to feed capital. Maybe I'm a rational person who just thinks that factory production is just production of products in a factory, and that such production can be done under a boss, or under workers' self-managment, and that it can done for sale in capitalist market, simple commodity production market, or for use.

[Tim Cornelis]

But would not everyone in mutualism be a worker? And since there is only one class, no class?

Everyone in mutualism would be a capitalist.


Neither did I said he did, I was just quoting it due to idiocy of many who think that mutualism is capitalism, even though it by definition implies non-existance of capitalists or capitalists relations.

It does not imply the non-existence of capitalists, it implies the universality of capitalists. Everyone will be an owner and controller of capital, producing commodities to generate profits.


Uh, you're aware factories were the first sign of capitalism, right? Factories have been the main place where wage labour has taken place, it's shaped after the logic of wage labour, shift systems etc. I think, as - hopefully - many other communists, that work - the form labour has taken under capitalism - needs to be abolished or radically changed. That would most probably (hopefully) make factories and other workplaces redundant (or "radically changed", at least)

Slavery was the first sign of civilisation, this does not mean that every civilisation has to be built upon slave relations.



The factory exists to enable mass production. Mass production exists to feed capital. In think a better question is why you want or think factories should or even can exist in a society where capital is abolished.


To satisfy human needs you need mass production. Mass production currently exists to feed capital, but our experience is limited to capitalism. It does not mean it can only exist to "feed capital".



Because I disagree with your starting premise- that factory production's only purpose it to feed capital. Maybe I'm a rational person who just thinks that factory production is just production of products in a factory, and that such production can be done under a boss, or under workers' self-managment, and that it can done for sale in capitalist market, simple commodity production market, or for use.

Factory production and simple commodity production are incompatible. Simple commodity production is that, simple. It is not generalised, it is not mass produced.

[Sotionov]

Factory production and simple commodity production are incompatible."Simple commodity production" is a marxist term for mutualism. And mutualism as an ideology of a movement came into existance after the industrialisation, and it thus naturally has a place for factories in the framework of it's system.

[Tim Cornelis]

"Simple commodity production" is a marxist term for mutualism. And mutualism as an ideology of a movement came into existance after the industrialisation, and it thus naturally has a place for factories in the framework of it's system.

No it's not. Simple commodity prodction has nothing to do with mutualism, it is a term describing pre-capitalist commodity production, such as took place under feudalism and slavery. These commodities were produced by slaves, artisans, peasants, serfs, and the character of production was simple, usually involving manual labour using simple tools. There was no extensive production of a generalised nature for exchange as is the case now with mass production.

To quote ABC of Communism:


"The mere existence of a commodity economy does not alone suffice to constitute capitalism. A commodity economy can exist although there are no capitalists; for instance, the economy in which the only producers are independent artisans. They produce for the market, they sell their products; thus these products are undoubtedly commodities, and the whole production is commodity production. Nevertheless, this is not capitalist production; it is nothing more than simple commodity production. In order that a simple commodity economy can be transformed into capitalist production, it is necessary, on the one hand, that the means of production (tools, machinery, buildings, land, etc.) should become the private property of a comparatively limited class of wealthy capitalists; and, on the other, that there should ensue the ruin of the independent artisans and peasants and their conversion into wage workers."

The ABC of Communism, I, 1-7

[Sotionov]

No it's not. Simple commodity prodction has nothing to do with mutualism, it is a term describing pre-capitalist commodity production, such as took place under feudalism and slavery. Feudalism included serf-labor, slavery slave-labor, capitalism wage-labor. If a production includes none of that, but produces for sale on a market, it's called simple commodity production.

The "simple" in "simple commodity production" doesn't imply simpleness of the production technology or the smale scale of production, but it implies that the production, is simply run by the worker himself, there is no boss.



In the simple commodity economy which was described in §6 (http://www.marxists.org/archive/bukharin/works/1920/abc/01.htm#006), there were to be found in the market: milk, bread, cloth, boots, etc.; but not labour power. Labour power was not for sale. Its possessor, the independent artisan, had in addition his own little dwelling and his tools. He worked for himself, conducted his own enterprise, applied his own labour power to the carrying of it on.

WE SEE, THEN, THAT THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN THE CAPITALIST ECONOMY AND THE SIMPLE COMMODITY ECONOMY CONSISTS IN THIS, THAT IN THE CAPITALIST ECONOMY LABOUR POWER ITSELF BECOMES A COMMODITY. "

The ABC of Communism, I, 1-8"Simple commodity production", is therefore, a type of production where workers who own their means of production (peasants, artisans, workers' coop) produce for the market. That's exactly what's colloquially called mutualism.

[bcbm]

Still, it's wage-labor/ work-for-wage that is to be abolished in socialism, not all labor/ all work.

all work but not all labor, was the point i was trying to get at in differentiating between those two words. i'm not using them interchangeably.


Sorry, but that's just not the meaning of the word work.


its the meaning being used here to denote a specific type of labor. it has been used consistently this way by those who call for the 'abolition of work' for some time, so i think it fits with the discussion.

[cyu]

I see some different kinds of mutualists.

1) People in a country with a history of red-baiting that makes it dangerous to openly oppose capitalism.
2) Warmed-over liberals.
3) People in a state of transition in their political journey and have yet to settle down.
4) Pro-capitalists that adopt a mutualist disguise in an attempt to infiltrate anarchist circles.

If mutualism means a market economy, where producers are forced to compete on price, then I would say that the word "mutualist" itself would be deceptive advertising. Workers that are forced into competition would have the opposite of a mutually beneficial relationship.

If mutualism means some people get rich while others stay poor, I'd say those that support this type of mutualism are just another type of right-wingers.

If some people support mutualism because they honestly can't see a better way to run an economy, I would say a little education may be in order, depending on what details they actually support.

As for persistent problems of poverty in any economy, I think a lot can be solved by putting power and agency in the hands of the suffering.

http://www.quotesrain.com/gd.php?id=15982&type=1

[Sotionov]

If mutualism means a market economy
Individualist anarchism advocates workers owning their means of production and competing on the market. Note that I'm not talking about anarchists that are philosophically individualist (as oppossed to collectivist), but about socio-economic ideology called Individualist anarchism, whose representatives are Benjamin Tucker, Lysander Spooner, Josiah Warren and Dyer Lum.

Even though they can be said to be a same system, but only two different schools of it emphasisibg different parts of economic organization, mutualism can be distiguished from IndAn by it's advocation of voluntary formation of mutual aid organisations such as friendly societies, building societies, credit unions, and agro-industrial federations (which are almost the same as bakuninist collectives, the difference being they're not territorially organized, but as federations of businesses).

Individualist anarchist do not oppose any such mutual aid organizations (a lot of them advocated credit unions), but they also don't advocate their formation, thinking that a free market of, to use the marxist term, simple commodity production would be a good system that would benefit all.

[baronci]

working totally blows

[cyu]

and competing on the market.


How would they react to Goldman-style anarchists and poor people that will simply take bread instead of allow themselves to be starved?

Or would a mutualist society not result in a situation where people feel like they have to take bread in order to live? If a mutualist economy would prevent this, how? If a mutualist economy will "eventually" prevent this, what about those anarchists and starving people who are willing to take bread right at this moment? What would mutualists do to them?

[Sotionov]

How would they react to Goldman-style anarchists and poor people that will simply take bread instead of allow themselves to be starved?
Question is based on assumptions, ask a sensible one.


Or would a mutualist society not result in a situation where people feel like they have to take bread in order to live?
It wouldn't. It would most probably result in people forming bakuninist collectives and kropotkinist communes in addition to proudhonian agro-industrial federations.


If a mutualist economy would prevent this, how?
Prevent what, poverty or theft?

[cyu]

Let's say there was a "mutualist" revolution, however you define it. The old capitalists have been thrown out, and mutualists hold sway over as far as the eye can see.

However, obviously no society is purely one ideology. So there will be non-mutualists hanging about - some may be Randroids, some may be authoritarians, some may be liberals, whatever.

After any revolution, whether mutualist, Marxist, anarchist, or not, there will still be a period in which things are not settled down. Much of the old state of affairs would remain. For example, starving people in one country will still be starving. Homeless people in your town would still be homeless.

If a homeless guy wanders into a place where there is bread, picks up a piece of bread, and starts eating it - what would your type of mutualists do to him?

[Sotionov]

Nothing.

E.g. Dyer Lum, who was a Anarcho-Individualist, not an even an Anarcho-Mutualist, was a member of the International Workingmen's Association, and advocated insurrectionary methods of establishing Anarchy, only he favored a maket instead of a communistic system as the goal.

Mutualism isn't oppossed to revolution, Proudhon's 'manifesto' is called General Idea of Revolution, and in his Confessions, he talkes about people having a right to insurrection against their oppressors.

Mutualism implies the abolition of capitalism, therefore, it's incompatible with toleratnce of capitalists, so of cource mutualists support expropriation of capitalist property.

[The Douche]

Question is based on assumptions, ask a sensible one.


It wouldn't. It would most probably result in people forming bakuninist collectives and kropotkinist communes in addition to proudhonian agro-industrial federations.


Prevent what, poverty or theft?

Here's my question, me and my friends fuck off after the revolution because we don't want to work for you and your friends in your shitty fucking factory, we don't work in town, we live in cabins out in the woods, we come to town regularly to get food, clothes, beer, and all the other things that people have. We spend all our time fucking off doing what we want. How long until you all decide to put a stop to it?

[Sotionov]

Here's my question, me and my friends fuck off after the revolution because we don't want to work for you One, you assume I am a mutulist, and assumption is the mother of mistake. Also, there is no "working for someone" in mutualismis.


we live in cabins out in the woods, we come to town regularly to get food, clothes, beer, and all the other things that people have. We spend all our time fucking off doing what we want. How long until you all decide to put a stop to it?Immidiately, as would any anarchist, collectivist and communist included, no anarchists are going to tolerate people living off of other people's labor after abolition that very practice in capitalism.

[The Douche]

One, you assume I am a mutulist, and assumption is the mother of mistake. Also, there is no "working for someone" in mutualismis.

No, I am not assuming you are a mutualist. I am confirming that you are a manager of capital and labor, a leftist, as opposed to a communist.


Immidiately, as would any anarchist, collectivist and communist included, no anarchists are going to tolerate people living off of other people's labor after abolition that very practice in capitalism.

So you will forcibly extract my labor power. You're not an anarchist or a communist.

[Sotionov]

So you will forcibly extract my labor power.
You would be stopped from taking anything if you don't contribute. No one would force you to do anything, but no one is obligated to let parasites live off of them. If you take the fruits of someone else's labor without contributing anything- it is you who are extracting labor power from others.


Everyone will have to work if they are to eat. Anyone refusing to work will be free to perish of hunger, unless they find some association or township prepared to feed them out of pity. But then it will probably be fair to grant them no political rights, since, capable of work, their shameful situation is of their own choosing and they are living off another person's labour.



First of all,—Is it not evident that if a society, founded on the principle of free work, were really menaced by loafers, it could protect itself without the authoritarian organization we have nowadays, and without having recourse to wagedom? Let us take a group of volunteers, combining for some particular enterprise. Having its success at heart, they all work with a will, save one of the associates, who is frequently absent from his post. Must they on his account dissolve the group, elect a president to impose fines, and work out a code of penalties? It is evident that neither the one nor the other will be done, but that some day the comrade who imperils their enterprise will be told: "Friend, we should like to work with you; but as you are often absent from your post, and you do your work negligently, we must part. Go and find other comrades who will put up with your indifference!"



That is the very point that our splendid anarchist principle is making. It proposes that every individual in proportion to their needs, provided that every individual places their powers and faculties in the service of society and not that he serve it not at all.

An exception will be made for the children, the elderly, the sick and the infirm. Rightly, society will excuse all such persons from the duty of labour, without denying them their entitlement to have all their needs met.

The moral sensibilities of the toilers' is deeply outraged by the principle of taking from society according to one's needs, while giving to it according to one's mood or not at all; toilers have suffered too long from the application of that absurd principle and that is why they are unbending on this point. Our feeling for justice and logic is also outraged at this principle.

[bcbm]

You would be stopped from taking anything if you don't contribute. No one would force you to do anything, but no one is obligated to let parasites live off of them.

so its exactly like now, but we get to vote at work. yay!

[Sotionov]

It would be exactly like now if some people were to life off other people's labor.

If you want to live without laboring, then don't fool yourself and others you're a revolutionary, you're just an exploitator-wannabe.

[bcbm]

i want to live without working, not laboring. but i don't feel any need to go around braying about 'labor or starve,' which sounds an awful lot like what our options are today.

[Sotionov]

Tell that to Bakunin, those are his words. Anyways, no one is going around braying about 'labor or starve' I was responding to the question of what about if some people don't want to labor, but still want to come to the people who labor and take the stuff they make.

[bcbm]

and the answer is labor or starve

[Sotionov]

yep

[bcbm]

no thanks

[The Douche]

Bbb-but Bakunin said!!!!!!

[The Feral Underclass]

What is meant by labour here?

[bcbm]

What is meant by labour here?


labor itself is, i think, more general in referring to any manner of activities that may or may not be 'work.'

general human activity. sewing, lathing, fishing, whatever

[Sotionov]

no thanks
Let's assume that in a post-capitalist society we still need food, clothing, shelter, infrastructure, and we want a bunch of stuff like furniture, computers etc etc, that is- there will be consumption, so therefore, there will need to be production. How are things going to come into existence?

Even if we don't accept the principle "from each according to their ability, to each according to their contribution" but only "from each according to their ability, to each according to their need", it is my opinion that we are going to have to institue some kind of mechanisms that would see that the first part of the principle doesn't get neglected and turned into "from each according to their mood, or not at all".

If someone doesn't think that such mechanism would be neccessary, that can be by the virtue of two views.

The first one is a view that there will neven be a shortage of volunteers to build roads and buildings, to clean the sewage or mine, a bunch of people will just love doing hard, dirty and dangerous work so everything would function just fine. That level of optimism is simply utopian, it is called the utopian concept of the new man. Of course capitalists are wrong in saying that humans are by nature bad, selfish and lazy, but this kind of thinking is similar in that it assumes that a system will survive due to a oppossite human nature that will emerge post-capitalism. I could express my opposition to this kind of wishful thinking in terms of human nature, but by appealing to biology instead of philosophical concepts, and the epicurean notion that goodness of pleasure and badness of pain and discomfort is obvious as the coldness of ice and hotness of fire, and that it would be therefore perfectly expected and normal of people not want to do hard, dirty and dangerous work even in a free society.

The second view that one might hold is that the techological progress will yield machines that would do all the hard, dirty and dangerous work, so everything would function just fine. The very name of that view is technological utopianism. Sure such a view would be proper for a group of trekkies obsessed with the show enough to think that free society is possible only on the basis of such fiction becoming reality, but I don't think it is proper for people who place themselves on the revolutionary left.

[The Douche]

You're forgetting the third option. The one where a communist future is so radically different from the current world, that we cannot even begin to really lay out an image of that future. (the most we can reasonably expect is small glimpses of it today, expressed in personal relationships)

[cyu]

no anarchists are going to tolerate people living off of other people's labor after abolition that very practice in capitalism.

So if a homeless man walks into a place where there is bread, picks up a piece, and starts eating, what would your type of "anarchists" do to him?

Since you claim he won't be tolerated, what is your alternative?

[bcbm]

Let's assume that in a post-capitalist society we still need food, clothing, shelter, infrastructure, and we want a bunch of stuff like furniture, computers etc etc, that is- there will be consumption, so therefore, there will need to be production. How are things going to come into existence?

we'll make them as we see fit and desire to.


Even if we don't accept the principle "from each according to their ability, to each according to their contribution" but only "from each according to their ability, to each according to their need", it is my opinion that we are going to have to institue some kind of mechanisms that would see that the first part of the principle doesn't get neglected and turned into "from each according to their mood, or not at all".

what kind of mechanisms?


If someone doesn't think that such mechanism would be neccessary, that can be by the virtue of two views.

stop creating strawmen. i don't buy either view. humans are naturally prone to sloth but we also like to get around and do stuff too. we'll get done what we want to get done. if that means we aren't mining bauxite to make cell phones, so be it. i don't think it follows that we just let people starve to death by virtue of their being 'lazy' either, if such a concept will even exist.

[Sotionov]

You're forgetting the third option. The one where a communist future is so radically different from the current world, that we cannot even begin to really lay out an image of that future. (the most we can reasonably expect is small glimpses of it today, expressed in personal relationships)
What would be so different? The utopian "new man" will emerge? The technology will progress and do everything instead of us? These two views are utopian, but at least they're views. Saying "it's gonna be so different, it's gonna be great, and everything will work just fine, but I don't know why and how" isn't even an opinion.


what kind of mechanisms?
If don't your share of work, you will be denied (full) access to what the commune provides for it's members.


stop creating strawmen. i don't buy either view. Then I am eager to hear you explain the view that you do "buy" which explains how mechanisms that I mentioned would not be neccessary, and still everything that people want would still be produced and provided.


humans are naturally prone to sloth but we also like to get around and do stuff too. we'll get done what we want to get done. if that means we aren't mining bauxite to make cell phones, so be it. i don't think it follows that we just let people starve to death by virtue of their being 'lazy' either, if such a concept will even exist.Douche mentioned seeing the glimpses of the future society today. Look a little into the history and practice of the intentional communities of today. Especially the ones organized horizontally and on the principle "from each according to their ability, to each according to their need". If they have concrete plans about what they want and how much of it, and precise calculations and plans about what exactly is needed to provide what they want, including how much labor- if in accordance with such plans they have labor quotas for the able bodied and mechanisms to make sure that the unpleasant work get's done- they succeed. If they don't have all that- they fail. Simple as that. What they want doesn't get produced.

And that's all in the case of small communities- where they don't have to make their own electricity, roads, sell phones, computers, cars, etc. Such things you don't just "get done". You don't get up one morning and say- I want a lap top, and then go into a factory and make it.

Take an example of a pencil. The most simple one, which contains only graphite and wood, the wood isn't even painted. The graphite needs to be mined and proccessed in multiple ways, the glue needs to be made, the wood needs to be logged and processed. There is no way one person can do all that. A lot of people, time, tools, skill, time have to dedicated to making a simple pencil. Without the organization in the manner I talk about, the communist society could not make a pencil let alone anything of the other products that we use daily.

Working when you want, how much you're in the mood for and how you like is the way for nothing to "get done". Thinking that anything can be made without having a strict organization of production (at least until the advent of the "new man" or trekkie technology) is just delusional. Maybe the idea of having to work (a ~20 hour work-week, under your own managment in a classless, oppressionless, solidaric free society) doesn't sound appealing to you and you say "no thanks", well, I also don't find appealing the notion that I'm suppossed to get involved in a struggle for a social revolution based on a delusional dream about a land of Cockaigne that would be sustained by magic. And I am confident that the likelyhood of the abolition of oppression and exploitation is proportional to the amount of people sharing my appeal instead of the former.

[The Douche]

Saying "it's gonna be so different, it's gonna be great, and everything will work just fine, but I don't know why and how" isn't even an opinion.


Uhhhh...

All I said was different, not "great", much less that "everything" will "work just fine"...

You're all like "how else are we gonna make big screen TVs if we don't have a factory", I'm wondering why you just take it for granted that there will be big screens in a communist future. And honestly, I think if there are, then you should go about making that shit for yourself, I should not be compelled to donate my labor to that project, I don't want a big screen.

[Sotionov]

how else are we gonna make big screen TVs if we don't have a factory
And you thinkg TVs are going to be made without factories?


And honestly, I think if there are, then you should go about making that shit for yourself, I should not be compelled to donate my labor to that project, I don't want a big screen.
And you don't want to use roads, electricity, computers, etc?

[The Douche]

And you thinkg TVs are going to be made without factories?


And you don't want to use roads, electricity, computers, etc?

I'm thinking if people want these things then they will figure out how to get them, but I think its wrong to just assume that these things will exist in a communist future, or that they will be priorities or whatever, and its what encourages communists to deviate from the revolutionary project and go down the road of leftism and transforming themselves into the new bosses.

[bcbm]

If don't your share of work, you will be denied (full) access to what the commune provides for it's members.

now its '(full) access?' so you wouldn't be denied everything or?


Then I am eager to hear you explain the view that you do "buy" which explains how mechanisms that I mentioned would not be neccessary, and still everything that people want would still be produced and provided.

already said it



And that's all in the case of small communities- where they don't have to make their own electricity, roads, sell phones, computers, cars, etc. Such things you don't just "get done". You don't get up one morning and say- I want a lap top, and then go into a factory and make it.

indeed.


Working when you want, how much you're in the mood for and how you like is the way for nothing to "get done". Thinking that anything can be made without having a strict organization of production (at least until the advent of the "new man" or trekkie technology) is just delusional.

then i guess we will all starve to death


Maybe the idea of having to work (a ~20 hour work-week, under your own managment in a classless, oppressionless, solidaric free society) doesn't sound appealing to you and you say "no thanks", well, I also don't find appealing the notion that I'm suppossed to get involved in a struggle for a social revolution based on a delusional dream about a land of Cockaigne that would be sustained by magic.

i'm not suggesting nothing be planned at all in relation to bigger projects, but i am rejecting the necessity of corralling people into production.

[Sotionov]

now its '(full) access?' so you wouldn't be denied everything or?
The commune will democratically decide.


i'm not suggesting nothing be planned at all in relation to bigger projects, but i am rejecting the necessity of corralling people into production.And the only reasons for not thinking that there is no need for a system to have machanisms that motivate people to work are the two I mentioned.

I'll refrase my view in the light of the Douche's words about the wrongness of assumptions, which I wholeheatedly agree with.

So, today we have two facts:

1. In order to provide for people's needs, people need to work.

2. People don't like to do (hard, dirty and dangerous) work.

Whether you think that the first fact will be done away with by technological utopianism, and the second fact by the advent of an utopian "new man", or you think that these facts will be done away by anything other then then- it's irrelevant. Why? Because thinking these facts will disappear is just an assumption. We cannot know that these facts will be done away with with the abolition of capitalism, we can't ever presume that it's probable that these facts will disappear, we can only assume.

I think it is pretty obvious how irrational, irresponsible and counter-productive it is to base our revolutionary struggle on assumptions.

And I want to point out another important thing. The menachisms I'm talking about are by their nature a contingency plan in relation to the mentioned assumptions. If it turns out that such assumptions, no matter which one, technological utopianism, the utopian new man, or something third, but if turns out that we do overcome the two mentioned facts- even if the mechanisms that I talk about are instututed, they will by the virtue of these assumptions coming true not be used.

So even you are e.g. a techonological utopian (or whatever), there is no reason to reject the mentioned mechanisms, because if you are right if assuming that the two facts will be stop being reality, the mechanisms will not be used.

But if you say I't impossible to have a free society until one of those two facts is overcame, and that therefore- until then oppression and exploitation is ok, sorry, but fuck that, that's simply a reactionary view.

[bcbm]

i wonder how many times this discussion can go in a circle

[The Douche]

The commune will democratically decide.

*vomits everywhere*

[Tim Cornelis]

I'm thinking if people want these things then they will figure out how to get them, but I think its wrong to just assume that these things will exist in a communist future, or that they will be priorities or whatever, and its what encourages communists to deviate from the revolutionary project and go down the road of leftism and transforming themselves into the new bosses.

This is beyond delusional.

[The Douche]

This is beyond delusional.

You are the enemy.

[Tim Cornelis]

You are the enemy.

I'm fine with that. I like my computer.

[cyu]

utopian "new man"

It's not a matter of people becoming some ideal beyond reproach, but that people will indeed be different in post-capitalist society. Don't believe it? How much of what people currently believe is defined by a mass media that is either controlled by authoritarians or owned by capitalists? If the mass media changes, what do you think will happen to the current beliefs in pro-capitalist society? I would say there would indeed be a "new man" - as least "new" with respect to what people believe today - although the range of "morality" in that person may not match up with what you have in mind.


People don't like to do (hard, dirty and dangerous) work.

How much psychology have you studied? Is running a marathon hard and difficult? Is the stuff an astronaut does dangerous? Why do some soliders sacrifice their lives? Even capitalists risk danger by attempting to bribe politicians - why do they do it?

[baronci]

I'm fine with that. I like my computer.

You suck

[The Douche]

I'm fine with that. I like my computer.

I like computers also, I like them so much I would even be willing to put in some work after the rev to own one.

[Ele'ill]

And you thinkg TVs are going to be made without factories?

they're certainly not going to be made if nobody wants to make them





sloth is a healthy part of a balanced life

[Karlorax]

It is easy to declare what we would all wish to live under, it is much harder to actually construct socialism in the real world. It is easy to say this is what we want: a society of harmony, without hierarchy, where everyone enters into voluntary association, where all decisions are made by consensus, etc.

The problem is that in the real world there are people with very different interests and points of view. And people will fight to advance them. These contradictions do not simply go away because you have a nice program about how society should be organized under ideal conditions where hard choices don't have to be made.

[cyu]

The problem is that in the real world there are people with very different interests and points of view.


If you want something, you've just volunteered to help make it happen =]

Excerpt from http://cjyu.wordpress.com/article/equal-pay-for-unequal-work/

I would imagine different people would give their support to many different organizations. Each of these organizations would be supporting advertising for different activities. The more people supporting one organization, the more advertising you’d see for the jobs supported by that organization.

If you’re “lazy” and don’t feel like doing anything, nobody forces you to work. You are free to stay at home and watch TV or surf the internet all day. However, instead of being constantly bombarded with ads trying to get you to want more stuff, you are instead bombarded with ads trying to get you to want to go out and do stuff that society thinks needs doing.

[Supertramp]

Perhaps these texts can contribute to the discussion.

"(...) But there was in store a still greater victory of the political economy of labor over the political economy of property. We speak of the co-operative movement, especially the co-operative factories raised by the unassisted efforts of a few bold “hands”. The value of these great social experiments cannot be overrated. By deed instead of by argument, they have shown that production on a large scale, and in accord with the behests of modern science, may be carried on without the existence of a class of masters employing a class of hands; that to bear fruit, the means of labor need not be monopolized as a means of dominion over, and of extortion against, the laboring man himself; and that, like slave labor, like serf labor, hired labor is but a transitory and inferior form, destined to disappear before associated labor plying its toil with a willing hand, a ready mind, and a joyous heart.(...)" ~ Karl Marx on Inaugural Address

of the International Working Men’s Association goo.gl/OVX5xY

"In stock system already exists antithesis to the old way, in which the social means of production appear as individual property, but the transformation in the form of the action remains trapped barriers capitalists, and therefore, instead of overcoming the antithesis between the social character private wealth, only develops a new configuration.
The cooperative factories workers themselves are within the old form, the first break in the old way, though of course, in their actual organization, everywhere reproduce and have to play all the defects of the existing system. But the antithesis between capital and labor within the same is abolished, although initially only in the way in which workers, as an association, are their own capitalist, ie, applying the means of production to value their own work. They demonstrate how, at a certain level of development of the material productive forces and their corresponding forms of social production, and so naturally develops a mode of production, a new mode of production [from the old mode of production]. Without the factory system arising from the capitalist mode of production, could not develop a cooperative factory and neither could without the credit system arising of that mode of production. This credit system, which is the main basis for the gradual transformation of private capitalist enterprises in capitalist societies by shares, also provides the means for the gradual expansion of cooperative enterprises to a more or less national. Capitalist firms for shares as much as cooperative factories should be considered transitional forms of the capitalist mode of production to the associated mode, only in one case, the antithesis is abolished negatively and the other positively."

(Marx, CAPITAL - Volume 3)
translated with google (I don't find this text in english)

[The Douche]

Marx quotes don't interest me much on this topic. He didn't get to see the failings of "real, existing socialism", so how could he develop a solid critique of it?

But despite that, the old man did say this:


In communist society, where nobody has one exclusive sphere of activity but each can become accomplished in any branch he wishes, society regulates the general production and thus makes it possible for me to do one thing today and another tomorrow, to hunt in the morning, fish in the afternoon, rear cattle in the evening, criticise after dinner, just as I have a mind, without ever becoming hunter, fisherman, herdsman or critic.

One thing today, and another tomorrow, because we are not compelled to donate our labor power to anything we don't want to...

[Sotionov]

My idea would be that a commune sets a labor quota of e.g. 20 hours a week that every adult able member has to contribute, inside of which he can do any job that he wants out of the jobs neccessary to contribute to the commune's plan of production. Abou who would do what job, people would name their preferences and the commune will function according to that, and people would surely rotate on jobs, being that some jobs would be wanted by more people then needed, and some jobs by less people then needed.

But, being able to contribute, if one consumes, yet is no way externally motivated to contribute- such a system would collapse in less then a month.

[cyu]

From http://everything2.com/user/gate/writeups/Reverse+Psychology

The idea is that we all have internal (sometimes subconscious) conversations with ourselves about why we do things. We have self-justifications, self-rationalizations, what we believe are personal preferences, and what we believe are things that external forces are forcing us to do.

When we do activity X, we may tell ourselves that there are many reasons for doing X, but one of those reasons is the most important - the primary reason we use in our internal conversation to convince ourselves to continue to do activity X. That reason may be because we think it's fun or that reason may be because we are being forced to do it.

When a parent orders a child to eat his vegetables, the idea is that the child now has an internal conversation with himself: "I have to eat this vegetable because I'm am being forced to by Mom and Dad." If this reason becomes the primary reason (ie. the primary motivation in the child's internal conversation) for eating vegetables, then it pushes aside all the other reasons for eating vegetables. This often results in the child not wanting to eat vegetables because they no longer see any positive reasons for doing it, and only see negative reasons for doing it (ie. being forced to by his parents).

Even in the case of being convinced that eating vegetables is "good for you" - if that becomes the primary motivator, then the person may become resigned to the idea that he must eat it merely for health reasons, not because he actually enjoys it. On the other hand, if he becomes convinced that the main reason for not eating something else is because it's "bad for you", then that leaves him open to the idea that there are actually many reasons for wanting to eat the "unhealthy food" and the only reason for avoiding it is for health reasons.

One might say the same of some people who eventually end up hating their jobs. If their internal conversation about why they do what they do is because they are after money or respect from the community, any internal reasons for actually liking the activity itself may fall by the wayside. The result, then, is that if they lose the money or respect from the community, they also lose the desire to continue at the job, even if it's something they had dreamed as a child would be something they'd find fun and interesting.

See also:
http://everything2.com/title/Drive%253A+The+Surprising+Truth+About+What+Motivat es+Us
http://everything2.com/title/Punished+by+Rewards

[blake 3:17]

Again- you're an idiot. The only for you to live and not to work is 1) by being a parasite (exploitatior), 2) by having star trek technology that makes food, clother and everything else instead of you. Option one is the point of the revolution and the core of labor emancipation is abolition of such people, option two in not going to happen any time soon.

There's a dangerous side to part of your argument. Not all work is productive labour and not all people are able to work.

Are babies parasites? Are the severely disabled exploiters? I'm sure that's not what you meant, but there is a worrisome side to certain types of workerism. A number of European syndicalists became fascists -- Mussolini most famously.

We do need surpluses to distribute on an equitable and democratic basis.

[Tim Cornelis]

I like computers also, I like them so much I would even be willing to put in some work after the rev to own one.

Well good looking making one without a factory.

[VILemon]

Humans survived for over 100,000 years without laboring or living with any sort of economy, until slavery and civilization emerged. Mass production has only ever existed to serve the desires of the ruling classes.

You're kidding about this, right? I think your idea of labor is that it is defined as "slaving away in an unpleasant environment under coercion," which is a kind of labor - namely, the kind we all want to do away with - but labor is a pretty essential part of human existence since pretty much the get-go.

You don't think that mass production benefits "the masses?" Really? Even if industrialization and the improvement of production techniques were motivated by the interests of the ruling class does not mean that they do not benefit the consumers of commodities...or, at least, that they couldn't be put to use for the purposes of the working class.


what if people don't even want to control their workplaces? What if revolution brings down all existing systems of mass production?

Then the revolution was a massive failure. Also, bringing down all existing systems of mass production would be a disastrous (and not to say wasteful) exercise. Good luck with your Pol Pot-esque primitivist nightmare. "Hey guys, remember when there were hospitals, the internet, fire hoses, toothbrushes, contraceptives, electricity, and ready access to food and medicine?"

[baronci]

You're kidding about this, right? I think your idea of labor is that it is defined as "slaving away in an unpleasant environment under coercion," which is a kind of labor - namely, the kind we all want to do away with - but labor is a pretty essential part of human existence since pretty much the get-go.

You can't do away with that and keep in place the structures already existing, which have always served and will always serve capital. Humans lived for nearly 180,000 years without "working", because human beings are a creative species - we are able to figure out ways of survival and don't need to be told what to do. And to be completely honest, I'd take living as a nomad any day over going to work for 8-12 hours every day of my life until I retire or drop dead. Communism is all about the negation of class society, and everything that exists in our world today has been built in service of capital, the proletariat is completely subsumed by capital and the only way out is to destroy the social relations which keep capital in power.


You don't think that mass production benefits "the masses?" Really? Even if industrialization and the improvement of production techniques were motivated by the interests of the ruling class does not mean that they do not benefit the consumers of commodities...or, at least, that they couldn't be put to use for the purposes of the working class.Um, little known fact: the working class does not exist in communism, so there's really no reason to talk about what benefits it. Mass production can keep large populations fed, clothed, and cared for, but they also require gigantic amounts of people to produce everything and can only be maintained bureaucratically. All the while causing widespread destruction of the environment.


Then the revolution was a massive failure. Also, bringing down all existing systems of mass production would be a disastrous (and not to say wasteful) exercise.lol, this is really something coming from a guy with Lenin in his avatar. I guess the October rev. was a failure, then, since millions of Russian proletarians resisted the party's calls for 12 hour working days and "communist sundays"? But I guess shooting them all down like rabid dogs and keeping them in line with state terror was a pretty good solution. You're right: I concede!


Good luck with your Pol Pot-esque primitivist nightmare. "Hey guys, remember when there were hospitals, the internet, fire hoses, toothbrushes, contraceptives, electricity, and ready access to food and medicine?"Yeah, no. Pol Pot was not a "primitivist" in any way, all he did was issue a move away from cities and into farmlands, he didn't force hunter-gatherer society on anyone. If you don't even know this then I really don't see any reason to take much of what you say seriously.

[Sotionov]

There's a dangerous side to part of your argument. Not all work is productive labour and not all people are able to work.

Are babies parasites? Are the severely disabled exploiters? I'm sure that's not what you meant,
Then why ask pointless quotestions?


but there is a worrisome side to certain types of workerism. A number of European syndicalists became fascists -- Mussolini most famously.
Which is relevant why? My anti-hierarchical, anti-"unearned income" are somehow going to turn me into a nationalist supporter of political and economic bureaucracies, which are by defition hierarchical and supported by unearned income?

[VILemon]

You can't do away with that and keep in place the structures already existing, which have always served and will always serve capital. Humans lived for nearly 180,000 years without "working", because human beings are a creative species - we are able to figure out ways of survival and don't need to be told what to do. And to be completely honest, I'd take living as a nomad any day over going to work for 8-12 hours every day of my life until I retire or drop dead. Communism is all about the negation of class society, and everything that exists in our world today has been built in service of capital, the proletariat is completely subsumed by capital and the only way out is to destroy the social relations which keep capital in power.

That's exactly right...destroy the social relations which keep capital in power. Not the infrastructure, factories, roads etc. The whole reason that the proletariat is revolutionary is that they are the class which has the wherewithal to take hold of and further develop the productive forces (as well as communication etc.) developed under capitalism, making the existence of a ruling class unnecessary. Production (and technology in general) are neutral. The hammer is not any more primitive than it is feudal or capitalist, and neither is the assembly line or the robot assembling cars. Again, it's about the ownership and control over those things.

And, again, working and labor (defined in a way which does not make it a tautology that it takes place in the service of capital, as you seem to use it) is a creative process distinctive to humans. I don't understand what you mean that we will find a way to "survive" because we're "creative." I (along with most of the planet, I would guess) do not merely want to survive, but to enjoy a certain standard of living which includes, among other things, medicine, computers, space exploration, physics, neuroscience, music made on things that aren't old hubcaps etc. Mere survival is something than can be achieved under capitalism. If you want to be a nomad, you can do that within the current system. I don't see any need to bring everyone else along for the ride.

What I, and other members of the left, want is to exercise meaningful democratic control over the way we live in a society that avails itself of the benefits of the last few hundred years of humanity's technological and scientific development. Our dream cannot be achieved under capitalism, which is why a worker's movement is called for. From what I can glean (from this brief encounter), your dream is just to be free from capital regardless of the costs, and I can't go along with you on that. There are plenty of worse ways of organizing human "creativity" and effort than capitalism, even if that would mean that we are no longer working under the dictates of capital.


Um, little known fact: the working class does not exist in communism, so there's really no reason to talk about what benefits it.
I was talking about under capitalism...that was the point. Read the whole sentence. Even though our production under capitalism is governed by the interest of the ruling class does not mean that we don't materially benefit. The sarcasm is unnecessary, especially when you are either deliberately misunderstanding me or not reading what I'm writing.


lol, this is really something coming from a guy with Lenin in his avatar. I guess the October rev. was a failure, then, since millions of Russian proletarians resisted the party's calls for 12 hour working days and "communist sundays"? But I guess shooting them all down like rabid dogs and keeping them in line with state terror was a pretty good solution. You're right: I concede!

What is the connection here to what I said? How does people not wanting to work 12 hour days (which is understandable) relate to destroying useful facilities like water treatment plants, research facilities on environmental/species protection etc.?


Yeah, no. Pol Pot was not a "primitivist" in any way, all he did was issue a move away from cities and into farmlands, he didn't force hunter-gatherer society on anyone. If you don't even know this then I really don't see any reason to take much of what you say seriously.

Well, I was obviously being hyperbolic for rhetorical purposes. Obviously I don't presume that you want to enact the specific policies of Pol Pot. I was trying to draw an analogy between those who seek an alternative route to the rule of capital and yearning for an earlier communal form of living and yourself. As I have said, capitalism is not the be-all-end-all of oppression or living under undesirable circumstances. In fact, capitalism was at one point a genuinely progressive move away from earlier forms of oppression and backwardness. I just think that your utopia can be achieved in your life personally under current conditions. Leave the rest of the world alone, though, because they aren't interested in reviving hunter-gather society.

[cyu]

Good luck with your Pol Pot-esque primitivist nightmare. "Hey guys, remember when there were hospitals, the internet, fire hoses, toothbrushes, contraceptives, electricity, and ready access to food and medicine?"

Sounds like Greece these days, except Pol Pot has been replaced by bankers that want to make sure the bottom line in their revenue report shows a tidy profit.

[Ravachol]

Well good looking making one without a factory.

It's good to know you'll be the first we'll force into the mines to dig up Silver, Bauxite, Quartz and the rest of this list (http://www.nma.org/pdf/m_computer.pdf) :)

[bcbm]

Obviously I don't presume that you want to enact the specific policies of Pol Pot. I was trying to draw an analogy between those who seek an alternative route to the rule of capital and yearning for an earlier communal form of living and yourself.

the khmer rouge weren't yearning for an earlier form of communal living though

[ÑóẊîöʼn]

Unabashed "technological utopian" here. My thoughts for what it's worth:

I'm fairly sure that the current trend of automation under capitalism is likely to continue, for at least two reasons; one because paying workers cuts into profits and you don't need to pay machines, thus there will always be an incentive for capitalists to automate. Two, wages are rising in the developing world, while they stagnate in the developed world. I've no idea if this trend will last long enough for developing/developed world wages to achieve parity, but I see no reason why it shouldn't. This would eliminate or at least reduce the capitalists' incentive for moving production about in order to find the most cost-effective labour.

The contradiction is thus - capitalists have a strong incentive to automate, but if they automate everything (or close enough to cause problems) then there'll be hardly anyone who can buy the shit they're pumping out.

Of course, I don't believe that full automation would be achieved under capitalism, because such a socioeconomic system would break long before achieving such conditions. In fact, I think we're seeing the fractures even now; we've never been wealthier as a species, and I don't mean in terms of money but in terms of productive capacity. Unfortunately that capacity is firmly under the control of the ruling class, causing all sorts of problems that wouldn't even exist if it weren't for their monopolisation of the means of production.

But, should proletarians take matters into their into their own hands, then the full productive potential of technological civilisation could be realised. With no actual need for unemployment, a post-capitalist economy would be able to distribute the work at the pleasure of its participants. Any perverse incentives or dangerous shortcuts with regards to the means of production would no longer exist. Without money or property, the collective labour of society would no longer be wasted on the management and protection of capital at the behest of an elite few. If there are economic problems then rather than originating from a bunch of coked-up twerps fucking around with funny money, they will be genuine and the whole of society would have an interest in seeing it solved as quickly and effectively as possible. People would control technology, rather than having technology control them in the interests of capital.

Just to be clear, I'm not saying that the contradiction of automation under capitalism guarantees a post-capitalist society that any of us here would actually like or even tolerate living in. However, should proletarian revolution take place and should it be successful, then I would venture that by the time it happens technology would be good enough for everyone to enjoy an eight-hour working week, assuming they're not off doing their own thing in some neo-primitivist commune or whatever.

Probably rambled a bit there, but who gives a fuck. :)

[The Douche]

Noxion, people like me are simply not going to let people like you destroy the planet for luxury goods.

If the new communist technology (because all technology as we know it now is designed in service of capital) is capable of automation of labor, and its environmentally sustainable and everything, then I am not opposed to it. But if you think there will be communist strip mines, well, you got another thing coming.

*Edit. I know you and I have been down this road before, Noxion, but was it you or somebody else who in the past argued in favor of CCTV monitoring living on into a communist world?

[ÑóẊîöʼn]

Noxion, people like me are simply not going to let people like you destroy the planet for luxury goods.

Good thing I have no intention of doing such a thing.


If the new communist technology (because all technology as we know it now is designed in service of capital) is capable of automation of labor, and its environmentally sustainable and everything, then I am not opposed to it. But if you think there will be communist strip mines, well, you got another thing coming.

Strip mining is far from the only way of extracting resources from the ground, in much the same way that open surgery isn't the only way of operating on someone. I don't see why we can't develop the mining equivalent to keyhole surgery.


*Edit. I know you and I have been down this road before, Noxion, but was it you or somebody else who in the past argued in favor of CCTV monitoring living on into a communist world?

I believe that I have stated that I am not personally averse to CCTV monitoring of public areas, but that wouldn't be solely my decision to make, now would it?

[The Douche]

I believe that I have stated that I am not personally averse to CCTV monitoring of public areas, but that wouldn't be solely my decision to make, now would it?

Of course not, I just wanted to refresh my memory. Some people have positions which are just so far divorced from anything that I could meaningfully describe as communism, that there is just no reason for me to engage with them in discussion. And if I were to engage in this discussion again (the nature of technology and civilization) it should be in a different thread.

[Ravachol]

I believe that I have stated that I am not personally averse to CCTV monitoring of public areas, but that wouldn't be solely my decision to make, now would it?

Why on earth would there be CCTV monitoring under communism? For fuck's sake this fucking forum man...

[ÑóẊîöʼn]

Why on earth would there be CCTV monitoring under communism? For fuck's sake this fucking forum man...

I didn't say there would be, now did I? Like I said, it wouldn't be my decision alone to make. I accept that a majority would decide against it.

Also, I don't appreciate you putting down the whole forum because of the opinions of one user. That's not fair.

[blake 3:17]

Then why ask pointless quotestions?

I was questioning your idea that people who don't work are parasites. I guess I was too polite about it.

Are the severely disabled exploiters? Are babies exploiters?

[Ele'ill]

You're kidding about this, right? I think your idea of labor is that it is defined as "slaving away in an unpleasant environment under coercion," which is a kind of labor - namely, the kind we all want to do away with - but labor is a pretty essential part of human existence since pretty much the get-go.

being forced to do your favorite activity in the most pleasant of conditions is coercion, it doesn't serve the interest of people it serves the interest of a slave system

[Sotionov]

I was questioning your idea that people who don't work are parasites.
That's not my idea. I was clear about what my idea is. People who choose to life off other people's labor are parasites.


Are the severely disabled exploiters? Are babies exploiters?
Are those people who can live off their labor, but choose to live off other people's labor? Don't ask stupid questions.

[OHumanista]

This thread was shrinking my brain and severely freaking me out up until the point VI Lemon and Noxion showed up. So thank you guys, for bringing some small amount of sanity to the worst thread I've ever read on Revleft.

[Remus Bleys]

This thread was shrinking my brain and severely freaking me out up until the point VI Lemon and Noxion showed up. So thank you guys, for bringing some small amount of sanity to the worst thread I've ever read on Revleft. I'm sorry I brought it up...
I just wanted to learn about mutualism!

[Sotionov]

I just wanted to learn about mutualism! Anarcho-Individualist society is a theoretical system (there have never been organized groups advocating it, only individuals, which is quite convenient and consistent, I might say :grin:) - it's a free market system where all businesses are either single self-employed people or workers' cooperatives (firms owned and managed by the workers in them), and where there is no ownership of land (only occupation-and-use), no interest on money, and no rent on loans of any property. Money would be either commodity money, representative money, or mutual credit (such as LETS).

Mutualism is different from An-Ind in three things. 1) It advocates people forming communes- municipal ('commune' means something like a 'municipality' in french, and Proudhon was french) directly democratic financial institutions in a settlement of a few settlements that are next to each other, and they would provide interest-free development loans (LETS) to it's members, and would also function as an insurance to provide education, child-rearing, sick-leaves, health-care and pensions (and security if needed) to all people. This is very similar as Bakuninist collective, only with a real market for most goods instead of an artificial one. 2) It advocates that coops form agro-undustrial federations, by which they would opt out of the market and it's competition, giving their members everything they need only by internal trade, making it possible to reduce work-hours; and 3) mutualism also thinks that communes (different communities) shouldn't have contact only by firms in them competing againsts each other (or being in the same a-i federation), but advocates cooperation by communes in order to build roads, railways, and similar infrastructure- as oppossed to Anarcho-Individualism which says that a socialist totally free market could through competition provide all the above-mentioned efficiently to everyone.

[The Douche]

This thread was shrinking my brain and severely freaking me out up until the point VI Lemon and Noxion showed up. So thank you guys, for bringing some small amount of sanity to the worst thread I've ever read on Revleft.

You're saying you're scared to have your ideas critiqued? And you can't engage with such a critique, you just hope somebody else comes along? You think that's good? You think you should have ideas you can't defend? A discussion on the nature of alienated labor is one of the worst threads you've ever read on revleft? If that is really the case, then fucking leave, because you're part of the problem.

I disagree whole-heartedly with Noxion, I think he is wrong and his ideas are anti-communist, but I am glad he's here, to participate in the conversation, to make an argument for his position, to actually engage with ideas, because that's how we learn, and that's how others learn.

If you think a discussion about alienated labor and potential communist social relations shrinks your brain, I would like to know what topics you think would be more interesting and valuable to discuss?

[cyu]

it's a free market system


Does this imply workers will be forced to compete with one another? If so, what happens to the ones that cannot compete? Will they be forced to suffer economically? If not, what prevents it? Will your utopia use suffering as a way to force people to work?

[Sotionov]

Does this imply workers will be forced to compete with one another?
Someone pointing a gun at the workers and ordering them "compete!"? No one forces anyone to do anything.


Will your utopia
"Your"? Whose?


use suffering as a way to force people to work?
As oppossed to what?

[cyu]

Someone pointing a gun at the workers and ordering them "compete!"?


Property claims can only be enforced by violence or threat of violence.



As oppossed to what?


So you believe suffering is only way to motivate people? If not, why do you believe other forms of motivation do not work?

[Sotionov]

Property claims can only be enforced by violence or threat of violence.
Unless it's legitimate property, also called possession by mutualists.


So you believe suffering is only way to motivate people?
So you believe in not answering questions, but asking other counter questions instead?

[bcbm]

As oppossed to what?

not coercing people into work

[Sotionov]

That's what I advocate- not coercing people into work.

[bcbm]

starve or work = coercion

[The Douche]

That's what I advocate- not coercing people into work.

Why do you think that work under capitalism is coercive?

[Anarcho Jackson Jones]

That's what I advocate- not coercing people into work.


no, you already advocated that earlier in this threat. How is this different from capitalism? Starve or work is exactly what exploits us as a class now. So your system, from what I understand, would just put the communes in charge of exploiting workers rather than a boss.

This idea that we must threaten people with starvation in order for them to get work done is just outright silly. If your sewage system is overflowing I highly doubt you would sit there and say "well I really don't wanna work on this". People will do the work that needs to be done. And they will develop the means of technology and production that need to be there as well. I would argue that they would do this more efficiently if they live under a system where their essential needs of survival are being met.

[Sotionov]

starve or work = coercion
"Coercion" by laws of nature isn't coercion. Please explain how this "coercion" would dissappear in your ideal society.


Why do you think that work under capitalism is coercive?
Because of the capitalist monopoly over the means of production which is maintained by the state.


So your system, from what I understand, would just put the communes in charge of exploiting workers rather than a boss.
Then either haven't read what I wrote or didn't understand it.

[The Douche]

Because of the capitalist monopoly over the means of production which is maintained by the state.


That's not an answer.

[Sotionov]

What is it then?

[bcbm]

"Coercion" by laws of nature isn't coercion.

we're talking about advanced societies here, not a band society in the jungle. 'laws of nature,' come on.


Please explain how this "coercion" would dissappear in your ideal society.

nobody would be made to work on threat of death

[The Douche]

What is it then?

An evasion.

You essentially said that work under capitalism is coercive, because it is under capitalism.

Is that really your position, its as simple as that?

[Sotionov]

we're talking about advanced societies here, not a band society in the jungle. 'laws of nature,' come on.
"Advanced societies" haven't done away with the law of reality that in order for people to survive, labor is needed so that necessities will be provided for.


nobody would be made to work on threat of death
How? If they don't work, what then?


You essentially said that work under capitalism is coercive, because it is under capitalism.
I essentially said that because of the monopoly of one class workers don't have free access to what they ought to have free access- land and natural resources, and that we are exploited and expropriated of most part of the the fruits of our labor because a class of people has a monopoly over the instruments of production, and that such a system is maintained by coercion of the state.

[The Douche]

I essentially said that because of the monopoly of one class workers don't have free access to what they ought to have free access- land and natural resources, and that we are exploited and expropriated of most part of the the fruits of our labor because a class of people has a monopoly over the instruments of production, and that such a system is maintained by coercion of the state.

That doesn't answer my question, which was:


Why do you think that work under capitalism is coercive?
(emp. added)

[Sotionov]

I essentially said that because of the monopoly of one class workers don't have free access to what they ought to have free access- land and natural resources, and that we are exploited and expropriated of most part of the the fruits of our labor because a class of people has a monopoly over the instruments of production, and that such a system is maintained by coercion of the state.

[The Douche]

Why is work under capitalism coercive? Not why is capitalism coercive.

[Sotionov]

Work under capitalism is [indirectly] coercive because capitalism is coercive.

[bcbm]

"Advanced societies" haven't done away with the law of reality that in order for people to survive, labor is needed so that necessities will be provided for.

How? If they don't work, what then?

we're not talking about everyone sitting around smoking dope, we are talking about if some people are not laboring they will not be cast out of the city walls to be eaten by wolves.

[Sotionov]

we're not talking about everyone sitting around smoking dope, we are talking about if some people are not laboring they will not be cast out of the city walls to be eaten by wolves
And the other people, that do work, why do they do it? Could it be that the work in order to (among other things) not to starve? :ohmy: What coercion.

[The Douche]

we're not talking about everyone sitting around smoking dope, we are talking about if some people are not laboring they will not be cast out of the city walls to be eaten by wolves.

Nah, but really, fuck this dude and the party he wants to ride in on.

If I wanna sit on my ass and smoke fucking twigs all day long in communism, that's my goddamn prerogative.

I mean, its not realistic, because we only want to do that right now because of the alienation of work, but under communist social relations there are gonna be people who're like "fuck it", and I don't see any reason why saying fuck it means you gotta be cast outside the walls either.

[bcbm]

And the other people, that do work, why do they do it?

well hopefully nobody would 'work,' (see: a couple pages back) but i expect most would 'labor' because humans like to do stuff, create, etc.


Could it be that the work in order to (among other things) not to starve? :ohmy: What coercion.

are you really this thick or what?

[Sotionov]

If I wanna sit on my ass and smoke fucking twigs all day long in communism, that's my goddamn prerogative.
I have no problem with that, I only have the problem with the notion that you, doing that, have the right to live off my labor.


but i expect most would 'labor' because humans like to do stuff, create, etc.
Without absolutely no motive? So, people don't produce because they need to eat (as in- they will starve) but simply because they do stuff. Interesting.

[bcbm]

Without absolutely no motive? So, people don't produce because they need to eat (as in- they will starve) but simply because they do stuff. Interesting.

once again, are you really this thick or purposefully completely missing the point?

[Sotionov]

I really want you to answer the question- do people work to make food (hunting and gathering is also working) for no reason, or because they will starve if they don't eat?

[The Douche]

I really want you to answer the question- do people work to make food (hunting and gathering is also working) for no reason, or because they will starve if they don't eat?

That's not work, you fucking turd.

[bcbm]

I really want you to answer the question- do people work to make food (hunting and gathering is also working) for no reason, or because they will starve if they don't eat?

i don't think anyone, least of all me, was attempting to argue that humans labor for 'no reason,' and certainly 'survival' is one of the reasons that people do labor. but it is not the only one by any means. it also is not the issue at hand here.

[baronci]

This is really just getting silly. start putting forth some at least partly convincing arguments or just stop posting

[Sotionov]

That's not work, you fucking turd.
Why would you insulting me because I use words in their meaning as writen in the dictionary (as oppossed to you who invents arbitrary new meanins for them) is beyond me.


and certainly 'survival' is one of the reasons that people do labor.
What?! So people are forced to labor? They are threatened by death to labor? Work or starve = coercion! :ohmy: Or are you going to tell that's just a law of nature? "Law of nature", come on!

[bcbm]

Oh really? So people are forced to labor? They are threatened by death to labor? Work or starve = coercion! :ohmy: Or are you going to tell that's just a law of nature? "Law of nature", come on!

you must feel very accomplished having brought this bullshit line of reasoning all the way around, despite my acknowledging i knew exactly where it was heading and that it was bullshit as soon as you started it. if you can't figure out the difference between the general conditions wherein we need to labor for survival, and a mass society capable of providing for all of its members using the same argument as grounds to deny certain members access to something like food, which is what we are talking about here and have been for pages and pages, then i really don't know what to tell you.

[Sotionov]

despite my acknowledging i knew exactly where it was headingSo? You knew I was going to point out the hyprocricy of your bullshit comment "starve of work = coercion" applied to a free classless society where everyone owns his means of production, and? That's no any big accomplishment.

[bcbm]

no hypocrisy at all, actually, due to 'the difference between the general conditions wherein we need to labor for survival, and a mass society capable of providing for all of its members using the same argument as grounds to deny certain members access to something like food, which is what we are talking about here and have been for pages and pages,' to explain it exactly as i did in the last post which you chose not to address.

[Sotionov]

Being that in no socialist society (including anarcho-individualist or mutualist) no one denies access of anything to anyone, you're making no point. The only thing that socialist society oppposes are oppressing people or exploiting them.

Let's say someone is born blind or is blinded by accident. Let's then say that the community in some imposed communist society decides to take one of my eyes and arrange a transplantation so that person can see. ,Again, two things- they want just one eye, I'd be perfectly able to see with the other, and they're not asking that I give it voluntarily- they're coming to take it from me. If I fight against that, is that "denying access" to someone, or is that resisting oppression?

[The Douche]

Being that in no socialist society (including anarcho-individualist or mutualist) no one denies access of anything to anyone, you're making no point. The only thing that socialist society oppposes are oppressing people or exploiting them.

Let's say someone is born blind or is blinded by accident. Let's then say that the community in some imposed communist society decides to take one of my eyes and arrange a transplantation so that person can see. ,Again, two things- they want just one eye, I'd be perfectly able to see with the other, and they're not asking that I give it voluntarily- they're coming to take it from me. If I fight against that, is that "denying access" to someone, or is that resisting oppression?

HOLY FUCKING SHIT.

You do realize, that forcing you to give up your eye for somebody else, is actually analogous to compelling people to work, right?

Like, the analogy you just made up actually supports our arguments against work, not your arguments for it.

You're saying "if you don't work, you will starve", that is compelling people to work, forcing them, just as, in your analogy, you will be forced to give up your eye.

So I put the question to you, if somebody is going to come to my house to make me go work a shift in the factory, not because I want to do it voluntarily, but because some committee somewhere has decided that I must. If I fight against that, is that "denying access" to someone, or is that resisting oppression?




Why would you insulting me because I use words in their meaning as writen in the dictionary (as oppossed to you who invents arbitrary new meanins for them) is beyond me.

Arbitrary, yeah, you caught us, me and bcbm are the first people to ever theorize about work/alienated labor.

[Sotionov]

You do realize, that forcing you to give up your eye for somebody else, is actually analogous to compelling people to work, right?
Exactly, your system of imposed communism is in it's core compelling people to work for others.


Like, the analogy you just made up actually supports our arguments against work, not your arguments for it.
Argument agaist involuntary participation in eye-communism is an argument in favour of involuntary participation in product-communism? You don't seem to be on friendly terms with logic and rational thought.


So I put the question to you, if somebody is going to come to my house to make me go work a shift in the factory, not because I want to do it voluntarily, but because some committee somewhere has decided that I must. If I fight against that, is that "denying access" to someone, or is that resisting oppression?
Resisting oppression. It is your system that oppresses people to involuntarily work in a communist system, because they disallowed from working outside of it (even if they don't oppress or exploit anyone) but their only other option is to starve.

[bcbm]

Being that in no socialist society (including anarcho-individualist or mutualist) no one denies access of anything to anyone, you're making no point.

If don't your share of work, you will be denied (full) access to what the commune provides for it's members.

hm.

[synthesis]

I see the new rule for the Learning forum is at least not being applied selectively, in that it is not being applied at all.

[Sperm-Doll Setsuna]

I see the new rule for the Learning forum is at least not being applied selectively, in that it is not being applied at all.

If you are referring to bcbm's post, I think it was valid and entirely relevant and justified. I see no problem with its brevity, as its quote exposes the incoherency of another user.

[synthesis]

If you are referring to bcbm's post, I think it was valid and entirely relevant and justified. I see no problem with its brevity, as its quote exposes the incoherency of another user.

No, there's nothing wrong with bcbm's post. It was a statement about the entire thread and the prevalence of "hostile remarks," which are apparently supposed to lead directly to infractions now, rather than verbal warnings first.

It seems that, in practice, this policy leads to people not getting admonished for flaming at all, since mods can't give out verbal warnings first, and infracting almost everyone in this thread (including some mods) would probably be a little much.

Sorry for going off-topic; please continue.

[Polaris]

Being that in no socialist society (including anarcho-individualist or mutualist) no one denies access of anything to anyone, you're making no point. The only thing that socialist society oppposes are oppressing people or exploiting them.

Let's say someone is born blind or is blinded by accident. Let's then say that the community in some imposed communist society decides to take one of my eyes and arrange a transplantation so that person can see. ,Again, two things- they want just one eye, I'd be perfectly able to see with the other, and they're not asking that I give it voluntarily- they're coming to take it from me. If I fight against that, is that "denying access" to someone, or is that resisting oppression?
If I have understood correctly:
the eye=the products of Sotionov's labor
the blind person=someone who doesn't labor
Edit: My bad.

This analogy doesn't work. Mainly, there is a huge difference between taking an eye, which you will find that you actually do need to see "perfectly well", from someone and giving products of their labor that they do not need to someone who chooses not to work.

No one is being compelled to work for others. You could just produce what you need and not make any extra. Or you could not work at all.


Work under capitalism is [indirectly] coercive because capitalism is coercive.
Combined with what you said earlier, you seem to be saying that work under capitalism is coercive because you can only work under capitalism. But by itself that makes no sense, there has to be something that makes people want/need to work in the first place, or else they could just sit around all day and do nothing. And now we're back to

starve or work = coercion

[The Douche]

No, there's nothing wrong with bcbm's post. It was a statement about the entire thread and the prevalence of "hostile remarks," which are apparently supposed to lead directly to infractions now, rather than verbal warnings first.

It seems that, in practice, this policy leads to people not getting admonished for flaming at all, since mods can't give out verbal warnings first, and infracting almost everyone in this thread (including some mods) would probably be a little much.

Sorry for going off-topic; please continue.

There has always been a tolerance for insults, when they are included in an otherwise reasonable argument/post. There also tends to be some leniency when the argument goes round and round and round and round...

The thread ought to be closed, we're not talking about mutualism anymore, and the discussion is no longer productive because somebody is being impossibly dense.

[synthesis]

There has always been a tolerance for insults, when they are included in an otherwise reasonable argument/post. There also tends to be some leniency when the argument goes round and round and round and round...

The thread ought to be closed, we're not talking about mutualism anymore, and the discussion is no longer productive because somebody is being impossibly dense.

Of course that's the case, but the new rule was created specifically to try to change that, strictly in the Learning forum. Anyway, I was trying to criticize the rule (or rather the unintended effects of it) as much as the discourse in this thread. Even without that rule, I was pretty surprised that someone didn't weigh in a few pages ago to remind people to be civil.

Also, I think it's pretty obvious that there is a resistance to finding a common ground coming from both sides here; it just seems to be very difficult for anyone involved to see that.

[The Douche]

I'm pretty sure at some point there was a warning, cause I think I even edited a post cause I thought I was overly harsh.

What common ground can be found when somebody isn't making a rational argument? Sotionov isn't arguing for anything anymore, he's just going back and forth with me and bcbm cause he doesn't want to walk away or concede any ground, even though he has lost the argument. Not saying that my ideas are just automatically right, but he has been out-argued, he hasn't presented a good position in pages of comments, and the behavior is borderline trollish and amounts to a childlike repetition of "nuh-uh".

[Sotionov]

if don't your share of work, you will be denied (full) access to what the commune provides for it's members. hm.
That's a mechanism present in anarcho-communism, advocated by Kropotkin, Makhno, Bakunin, and basically every non-utiopian supporter of anarcho-communism, including myself.


If I have understood correctly:
the eye=the products of Sotionov's labor
the blind person=someone who doesn't labor

This analogy doesn't work.
Because that's not the analogy.


Mainly, there is a huge difference between taking an eye, which you will find that you actually do need to see "perfectly well", from someone and giving products of their labor that they do not needFirstly, the person with one eye is perfectly able to see, and do everything normally as when had two eyes. Eye-communism and similar forms of imposed organ redistribution is a logical conclusion to the principle of imposed communism.

The "huge difference" here is in that if you support the first example, you're basically saying that dissidents (those who do not want to participate in imposed communism) in the society are to be slaves of the majority, and if the second, you're basically saying that the dissidents in the society are to be serfs of the majority (we're not going to take from your body what we need, but we are from the products of your labor).

[synthesis]

I'm pretty sure at some point there was a warning

Well, there's not supposed to be; that's the entirety of the new policy. And there's also not supposed to be any leniency for flaming or hostile remarks based on how irritated you are with the other person or how frustrating you find their argumentation.

I believe Sotionov was the first to do it, so even though I actually sort of sympathize with his thoughts on the subject, this isn't specifically addressed to you or bcbm or whoever. That's why I said, "At least it's not being applied selectively," since it would be easy to do it to just him, as he's in the extreme minority here.

I'm not arguing for or against the implementation of the policy, and I'm certainly not trying to be some kind of douchey politeness police; at this point, I'm just trying to clarify the first remark I made here.

[The Douche]

Firstly, the person with one eye is perfectly able to see, and do everything normally as when had two eyes. Eye-communism and similar forms of imposed organ redistribution is a logical conclusion to the principle of imposed communism.


You. Are. The. One. Arguing. For. Imposed. Social. Relations. Through. The. Maintenance. Of. Work.

[Vladimir Innit Lenin]

This is not the place to discuss forum policy. No more posts on board policy in here please, or i'll be forced to close the thread, which I don't want to do because it's an interesting topic.

If you have a problem with board policy, feel free to bring it up in the Committed User forum, or message a mod/admin to discuss further.

[Sotionov]

You. Are. The. One. Arguing. For. Imposed. Social. Relations. Through. The. Maintenance. Of. Work.One- I am pretty much the only one in this discussion that is against imposed labor and exploited labor. Two- the only way for work to be abolished is to invent self-sustaining machines that produce everything we need.

[The Douche]

One- I am pretty much the only one in this discussion that is against imposed labor and exploited labor. Two- the only way for work to be abolished is to invent self-sustaining machines that produce everything we need.

You are lying. You have stated all through the conversation that you will force people to work or deprive them of resources.

Your position is "if you don't do any work, you can't have any food", that is the position you have argued for. That is the maintenance of alienated labor, that is not communism, that is coercion, that is "work or starve", that is the same formulation which exists today under capitalist social relations.

[bcbm]

That's a mechanism present in anarcho-communism, advocated by Kropotkin, Makhno, Bakunin, and basically every non-utiopian supporter of anarcho-communism, including myself.


which directly contradicts what i quoted right above it.

[Polaris]

Because that's not the analogy.
My bad. Would you mind explaining it? It's just so confusing, as the interpretation I originally had of it seemed contrary to what you were arguing; I was forcing square shaped pieces in circles.


Firstly, the person with one eye is perfectly able to see, and do everything normally as when had two eyes. Eye-communism and similar forms of imposed organ redistribution is a logical conclusion to the principle of imposed communism.
You cannot see perfectly if you are missing an eye. If you cannot understand this, please take a look around. Then close one eye and look around again without moving any other part of your body. Can't see everything you did before can you?


One- I am pretty much the only one in this discussion that is against imposed labor

My idea would be that a commune sets a labor quota of e.g. 20 hours a week that every adult able member has to contribute,

no anarchists are going to tolerate people living off of other people's labor
Yep. We're the ones for imposed labor. You caught us!

[Sotionov]

You are lying. You have stated all through the conversation that you will force people to work or deprive them of resources.
I have stated all though the conversation that I oppose you system where people are forced to work for other people. One that advocates involuntary communism advocates feudalism where everyone who doen't want to participate in that system is treated as a serf by those running that system. Only voluntary communism is genuine communism.


Your position is "if you don't do any work, you can't have any food", That's not my position, that's reality's position. Food doesn't come into existence by magic, it comes into existence by labor. Even collecting wild berries is labor. Therefore, if we want to have food, he must work.


That is the maintenance of alienated laborYou seem to have no idea what alienated labor is.


My bad. Would you mind explaining it?
I make more then I need for my subsistence. That "more" is not mine, the society takes it from me on some dubious explanation- it belongs to the society, the society needs it, etc.
I have two eyes. The society takes one from me on some dubious explanation- it belongs to the society, the society needs it, etc.
There is no argument that approves of the first situation but not of the second. So unless someone's going to argue and prove how people with the two eyes who "deny access" to their eyes to other people are "coercing" people to be blind, you're basically calling for "Workers of the world you unite, you have nothing to lose but your chains! Except your eyes, kindeys and other organs you can do without, which will be taken and redistributed."


You cannot see perfectly if you are missing an eye. If you cannot understand this, please take a look around. Then close one eye and look around again without moving any other part of your body. Can't see everything you did before can you?Yes, I see how that proves the incorrectnes of my statement, being that it assumes the obviously true premise that missing one eye also makes you not able to move any part of your body.


Yep. We're the ones for imposed labor. You caught us!Are you for a society of unexploited voluntary labor? No, you're for imposed exploited labor.

[synthesis]

I like how this has suddenly become a discussion about optometry.

[cyu]

Unless it's legitimate property, also called possession by mutualists.

When I first started reading about Proudhon's anarchism, I thought the distinction between possession and property was pretty novel too. The capitalist claims as "property" thousands of factories around the world, however, he doesn't actually "possess" them - they are "possessed" by the people who actually show up at the factories everyday. I get that. It is a very useful distinction - especially in terms of how a capitalist's supposed control of vast resources can be instantaneously wrested away from him by a mere change in employee behavior.

However when it comes to actual "defense" of property (or "possessions" if you prefer to call them), I prefer the anarchist state of property as formulated in Ursula Le Guin's The Dispossessed. I would say that decisions over control of economic resources (which one might summarize with the word "property") started as a matter of pragmatism, and in fact should return to a matter of pragmatism.

In ancient society, if two hunters kept arguing over who got to use which spear, it was less economically efficient than spending the time hunting instead of arguing. Simply agreeing that spear A was "your" spear ultimately led them to have more time to provide more food to everyone in their clan. However, as the generations passed, legalism crept in, and the original pragmatism was forgotten. Thousands of different types of property, contract, and corporate law came into being to rigidly define who gets to control what resources, while the survival of society itself was remembered only by "hippies" outside the legal profession.

So yeah, today they got all kinds of laws and theories about property, while at the same time they leave whole sections of society, even entire nations, to die from lack of control of economic resources. Some pragmatism.


"Coercion" by laws of nature isn't coercion. Please explain how this "coercion" would dissappear in your ideal society. "Advanced societies" haven't done away with the law of reality that in order for people to survive, labor is needed so that necessities will be provided for.

Yes, this is all true. It is also true that there are many ways of motivating people. In slave society, pain, suffering, and death were used as one of the primary economic motivators. We've since evolved beyond that. But how far have we evolved? Lethal force is still generally considered acceptable when stopping someone from killing you.

But the question is, why not continue to have slavery? The answer is that a society that depends on the unhappiness of its people to continue, is less fit to survive that a society that does not require its people to be unhappy - the more your slaves want to kill their masters, the more your peasants want to guillotine your kings, the less likely your system will continue.

So what else is there to motivate people, if not pain, suffering, and death?

I would say that is one of the primary problems that policy makers have today. When someone goes to a university and majors in political science, in economics, or in political philosophy, they've already walled themselves off from the solution. While all those majors may touch on psychology, none of them are psychology majors - and you can't really make claims about motivation if you're going to be a noob about psychology - yet that doesn't stop these other majors from assuming things about psychology that they shouldn't be assuming.

From http://cjyu.wordpress.com/article/equal-pay-for-unequal-work/

There was a movie director that stated all great films are about either death or sex. Another director replied that he had to add money to his list. The first director responded that money is only used to avoid the first and get the second. I would add another thing to the use of money: to get pride – whether it’s to buy status symbols, or simply to hold and be able to say you have a large amount of it. The thing with death and sex is that they are fairly absolute – death is death and sex is sex in every culture. Pride on the other hand is much more malleable. Different cultures (and subcultures) are proud of different things. Humans can take an active role in changing culture in any direction (which is basically what advertising and marketing is).

In today’s system, you convince people to work by offering them money. You convince them to want money by advertising goods they can buy. Without product advertising, would people still want those goods (or money) as much? What then is the purpose of it all? It supports all of network television.

I'm sure you understand that the economic effort that lives or dies by advertising is all non-essential work. If this is not the type of work you have in mind when you say "if you don't work, you don't eat" - what are the real questions we should be asking when examining the economy we live in? How are we able to maintain such levels of motivation to produce things we don't need and try to force it on people that wouldn't otherwise want it? Is it by hitting the consumer with pain, suffering, and death?

[Rafiq]

Exactly, your system of imposed communism is in it's core compelling people to work for others.


Argument agaist involuntary participation in eye-communism is an argument in favour of involuntary participation in product-communism? You don't seem to be on friendly terms with logic and rational thought.


Resisting oppression. It is your system that oppresses people to involuntarily work in a communist system, because they disallowed from working outside of it (even if they don't oppress or exploit anyone) but their only other option is to starve.

These aren't arguments, they're bullshit morals. What the fuck does "resisting oppression" mean and explain to me why your conception of oppression is superior to everyone who isn't a liberal.

Sent from my SPH-D710 using Tapatalk 2

[Polaris]

I make more then I need for my subsistence. That "more" it's not mine, the society takes it from me on some dubious explanation- it belongs to the society, the society needs it, etc.

What were you going to do with the products that you don't need? Stash them away somewhere? Throw them off a cliff? Who would want more than they need? What's the use in having ten apples that you picked when you can only eat three? I don't know about the others, but I would say that you certainly get first dibs on where/who what you produce goes to, just that you can't keep a bunch of things that you are not using. Just like you couldn't go to a "store" and take 20 loafs of bread, and there isn't a logical reason you would want to.

We do have limited resources, so if you were allowed to keep all gold in region just because you mined it then everyone else would be deprived of computers (random example). Anyone who wanted one would be at your will-- this seems contrary to worker ownership over the means of production. If only one worker has a monopoly over a certain mean of production that is used in something a majority of the population wants, they could become the new ruling class. Of course this is a worse case scenario, and you would probably need a group of people working together in order to get a monopoly over a certain good, but if you allow people to keep the entirety of the products of their labor that they are not using this could happen.

This doesn't apply in limited circumstances where everything you use is entirely created by either you or nature, but for the most part the means of production are items that others in society have made. So how much is that gold really yours if you used a pickax and bucket that ten other people contributed in making? Yes, you added your labor to it making it valuable, but their labor was also added to it indirectly so they have a claim on it just as you do.



Yes, I see how that proves the incorrectnes of my statement, being that it assumes the obviously true premise that missing one eye also makes you not able to move any part of your body.

:laugh: Can you please smush around my words some more, just like you've done with other posts on this thread?
I'm not going to elaborate because I honestly don't think the topic of 'whether or not missing an eye affects your ability to see as well as someone with both eyes' needs to be explained, as anyone with a lick of common sense could answer that.



Are you for a society of unexploited voluntary labor? No, you're for imposed exploited labor.

Yep, so exploitative that the extra goods you make are put into society and the only thing you get in return is being able to take anything you want/need from society. The term imposed definitely doesn't apply; no one is being forced to labor or produce more goods than they need, unlike in your scenario. Perhaps you mean that you are forced to give away the goods that you are not using. Okay.

Exploited? What definition of exploitation are you using? In the specific sense that refers to not being returned the full value of your labor-- that doesn't apply because there would be adequate 'payment', you just take what you need from society (although you would be able to do this whether you produced anything or not). In the more general sense it refers to being taken advantage of. I would not say that being prevented from keeping items that you are not using and do not need is being taken advantage of, and in fact doing so can lead to your ability to take advantage of others as I outlined above. Additionally, nothing was forcing you to make extra in the first place, your only motivation for making more than you need is either having something to do or producing things for others.

You are the one not for voluntary, unimposed labor.

[Sotionov]

Yes, this is all true. It is also true that there are many ways of motivating people.
Yes. Having a society based on liberty (lack of hierarchy) and free labor (as oppossed by exploited labor), where everyone is free to do whatever he wants, under his own management and get the full fruits of his labor is the motivation that (libertarian) socialism (whether it's individualism, mutualism, collectivism or communism) offers to people.


These aren't arguments, they're bullshit morals.
If resisting oppression is "bullshit morals" is oppressing people no bullshit morals?


What the fuck does "resisting oppression" mean and explain to me why your conception of oppression is superior to everyone who isn't a liberal.
It means resisting anyone who want to establish themselves as someone's master. Liberals are not against oppression. They say they're 'against oppression', but that's true as much as when they for 'democracy' or when leninists say they for 'socialism'.


What were you going to do with the products that you don't need? Stash them away somewhere? Throw them off a cliff? Who would want more than they need?
No one makes everything they need, so when the make something, they make extra to trade with others for something they need.


What's the use in having ten apples that you picked when you can only eat three?
E.g. trade the rest for organges that someone grows.


We do have limited resources, so if you were allowed to keep all gold in region just because you mined it then everyone else would be deprived of computers (random example).
So? How is would that be my fault, and what justifies seizing the gold I mined?


If only one worker has a monopoly over a certain mean of production that is used in something a majority of the population wants, they could become the new ruling class.
And how is that possible in a society based on possession?


but if you allow people to keep the entirety of the products of their labor that they are not using this could happen.
No, actually, there's no way that it could. The only way that anyone gets a monopoly on the means of production is by recongizing property that violates the labober's right to the full product of his labor. It is by that violation that all class societies have come into being and on which capitalism continues to exist.


So how much is that gold really yours if you used a pickax and bucket that ten other people contributed in making? Yes, you added your labor to it making it valuable, but their labor was also added to it indirectly so they have a claim on it just as you do.
If ten people make a pickaxe, it's their to do whatever they want to (if they don't oppress and exploit anyone). They can sell it, they can mine gold themselves, they can destroy it, they can put it on a wall. If I buy it and mine gold, what does the gold I've mined has to do with the people who made the pickaxe? I've payed them for the pickaxe and it's no longer theirs, it's mine.


Yep, so exploitative that the extra goods you make are put into society and the only thing you get in return is being able to take anything you want/need from society.
This is not an argument. If it were, it would justify slavery where the slave is given all the products he wants/needs.


no one is being forced to labor or produce more goods than they need
So if I were to make something and try and trade it with someone for something he made (there being no oppression and exploitation), you wouldn't stop us, or confiscate what we made?


Exploited? What definition of exploitation are you using? In the specific sense that refers to not being returned the full value of your labor
Exploitation, what maxists call taking of "surplus value", in capitalism- the difference between the wages that the laborer and what his products are sold for. The serf is also exploited, but there are no wages, their exploitation is that a part of what they made is confiscated by those that imposed themselves as their masters. Therefore, the fundamental definition of exploitation is- being denied the full product of your labor.

As Kropotkin says: "Comrades! you have often asked yourselves—"Whence comes the wealth of the rich? Is it from their labour?" It would be a mockery to say that it was so. Let us suppose that M. Rothschild has worked all his life: well, you also, every one of you working men have also laboured: then why should the fortune of M. Rothschild be measured by hundreds of millions while your possessions are so small? The reason is simple: you have exerted yourselves to produce by your own labour, while M. Rothschild has devoted himself to accumulating the product of the labour of others—the whole matter lies in that."

If you want a comprehensive explanation, read this: http://anarchism.pageabode.com/afaq/secC2.html

[The Douche]

It means resisting anyone who want to establish themselves as someone's master.

What is telling me to go to work, if not your establishment of mastery over my life and time?

[Sotionov]

What is telling me to go to work, if not your establishment of mastery over my life and time? Did you not read anything I wrote? Can you not read that I am a horizontalist? It is you who advocate the imposition of communism on people.

[The Douche]

Did you not read anything I wrote? Can you not read that I am a horizontalist? It is you who advocate the imposition of communism on people.

Did you not read anything I wrote? Can you not read that I am an autonomist? It is you who advocate the imposition of work on people.

[Sotionov]

How is it autonomist to impose communism on people? Where's the autonomy of people who don't want communism (and neither to oppress or exploit anyone)?

[The Douche]

How is it autonomist to impose communism on people? Where's the autonomy of people who don't want communism (and neither to oppress or exploit anyone)?

You keep saying things over and over again, but its still not making them any more correct.

[Sotionov]

I was asking, not saying, you do know what the question mark symbol is?

[Polaris]

So? How is would that be my fault, and what justifies seizing the gold I mined?
And how is that possible in a society based on possession?
No, actually, there's no way that it could. The only way that anyone gets a monopoly on the means of production is by recongizing property that violates the labober's right to the full product of his labor.If all you're going to do with the gold is let it sit in your closet then I think it is perfectly reasonable for someone to seize it. However in the context of a mutualist society in which you will trade the gold, in a situation as I have outlined where you have mined all of the gold in a region, you could theoretically ask for anything in return. That is, the LTV could be thrown out of the window, which cracks its own can of worms.
I didn't say the means of production, I said a mean(s?) of production. That is, only one item you could use to make something, like gold. Please explain to me how in a situation like the one I came up with you would not have total control over one item, gold for example.
What I'm trying to say is if you (or a group of people) have complete control over over a certain item (or group of items) you could hypothetically ask whatever you want for it, and thus we get things like asking for someone's entire week's worth of goods for something you made in a second. I would argue that inequalities like this cannot be accepted and are not something anyone should work towards-- certainly it would not be a society that I would want to live in. Now that would be exploitation, since the one trading their entire week's worth is not receiving the full value of their labor. Would there be something to prevent this in your society?


They can sell it... buy it... I've payed them for the pickaxe and it's no longer theirs, it's mine.Two can quote Kropotkin:

And, moreover, Is the coal they have extracted their work? Is it not also the work of men who have built the railway leading to the mine and the roads that radiate from all its stations? Is it not also the work of those that have tilled and sown the fields, extracted iron, cut wood in the forests, built the machines that burn coal, and so on?

No distinction can be drawn between the work of each man.


This is not an argument. If it were, it would justify slavery where the slave is given all the products he wants/needs.No. A slave has no choice over how much, doing what, or even whether or not they work. A slave also has no control over anything else in their life, their body, who they associate with, etc. A slave is a person owned by another. None of those are true in my statement.


So if I were to make something and try and trade it with someone for something he made (there being no oppression and exploitation), you wouldn't stop us, or confiscate what we made?I'm not sure how you drew that from the quote it was a response to, but sure I suppose. Although I wouldn't call it trading because of how society is organized; it would be more like you each taking what you need from each other. If this was a situation where one of the producers required that you trade something for one of his products, then yes I would be against that. I don't think actually acting against it would be necessary though, as I doubt anyone would be tempted to make such a trade since they could get a very similar item without having to trade anything. The same goes for the person asking that an item be traded for theirs-- they could get the same item for free, so there is not point in setting a price for their item.
You seem to have this picture in your head of goonies coming and taking everything you've made for the day. That is not what I intend at all. The products of your labor that you have no use for would just be freely available for others to take. Maybe that means you keep them where you live, and people have to travel there if they want one; maybe you go into town and throw them into a big pile of stuff. I don't how such a future would be organized.
So in short, as I think I said before, you get first dibs on who your stuff goes to, so if you wanted to make sure so and so got a specific item and they in turn made sure you got a specific item, I don't see anything wrong with that.


[insert basic explanation of exploitation here] Therefore, the fundamental definition of exploitation is- being denied the full product of your labor.Yes, I was aware of what the term meant in that context, perhaps my wording wasn't the best and lead you to believe otherwise. If you read the rest of what I said, I replied that you would be more than adequately 'paid' for your labor, by being able to take anything you want/need from society, without even having to trade anything for it. From your viewpoint of a market, yes, not being able to keep the total product of your labor is exploitative. But that isn't what I am arguing for.

that doesn't apply because there would be adequate 'payment', you just take what you need from society (although you would be able to do this whether you produced anything or not).

[The Douche]

I was asking, not saying, you do know what the question mark symbol is?

What are you asking now? What happens to people who don't want to live under communist social relations? I dunno, they fuck off into the desert somewhere? Who gives a shit what they do?

What does that have to do with your penchant for alienated labor?

[Sotionov]

If all you're going to do with the gold is let it sit in your closet then I think it is perfectly reasonable for someone to seize it.
Why? Being that I don't need my second kidney is it perfectly reasonable for someone ti seize it?


However in the context of a mutualist society in which you will trade the gold, in a situation as I have outlined where you have mined all of the gold in a region, you could theoretically ask for anything in return.
One, it's impossible that a single man or a small group mine all the gold in a region. Two, even if it were possible, there are other regions. Three, they couldn't ask for anything, e.g. someone's subjugation, alienated labor.


That is, the LTV could be thrown out of the window
As it should be being that is a virtually meaningless theory.


A slave has no choice over how much, doing what, or even whether or not they work.
You're confusing incidental features with essential, defining features of something. E.g. I can be your slaveowner and you my slave, and I can give you a choice over how much, what and whether or not you work. I don't care about that, I just get a kick of knowing that I have legally the right to do whatever I want to you. Therefore, the traits that you enumerate do no constitute slavery, and it is not impossible for slavery to exist without them. E.g. I could let you not work and still satisfy your needs, but if you do work, logically, all you make belongs to be. The same applies if I would to have the same attitude in the relation of you being my serf.


The products of your labor that you have no use for would just be freely available for others to take.
And if I resist someone just coming and taking a product of my labor?


If you read the rest of what I said, I replied that you would be more than adequately 'paid' for your labor
This "argument" means that feudalism is ok if the lord adequately 'pays' the serf, by fulfilling his needs.


What happens to people who don't want to live under communist social relations? I dunno, they fuck off into the desert somewhere?
So, one is to either work under a system where he is depraved of all he makes or go in the desert. Wow. That's not coercion at all.

[The Douche]

So, one is to either work under a system where he is depraved of all he makes or go in the desert. Wow. That's not coercion at all.

Yeah, like I said, shit for brains:


You keep saying things over and over again, but its still not making them any more correct.



AT WHAT POINT DOES THIS CONSTITUTE TROLLING?

[Vladimir Innit Lenin]

Guys, let's calm it down here. As i've said before, if the thread degenerates into accusations and off-topic sillyness, it'll be closed, so let's stay on track.

[blake 3:17]

Exactly, your system of imposed communism is in it's core compelling people to work for others.

The only economic basis for any form of socialist society is to produce surpluses which will be distributed in some fair and egalitarian way. That will mean some people will work more than others without immediate economic compensation.

[Sotionov]

The only economic basis for any form of socialist society is to produce surpluses which will be distributed in some fair and egalitarian way.
I don't see how is this a necessary part of socialism. Socialism is about production, about workers having control over production and getting what they made, without there being any oppressing class controling production, or exploitatory class taking a part of their product from them.

[The Douche]

Socialism is about production

No. Socialism is about the end of alienated labor.