A Leftist View on Drugs and Drug Abuse?

[Sol Invictus]

I am wondering about the general consensus here about the use of drugs in a socialist, communist, anarchist society.

In America there is a very high problem of drug addiction. I myself am a recovering addict. But nevertheless I believe that all drugs should still be legal, because most drug offenders are nonviolent, and many I know in recovery actually are very productive. Most of them perform manual labor, working in contracting, landscaping, etc. Of course, there is a multitude of different reasons.

But I was wondering what your guy's opinion was on the legality and availability of drugs, as well as the need for substance abuse treatment under healthcare, in a socialist or anarchist society.

[FieldHound]

It's upto an individual to determine whether they want to get high off any substance, whether it's caffeine, marijuana, alcohol, glue or krokodil. Help and treatment should be offered to those (by voluntary associations) that struggle with addiction.

Philosopher and psychedelic-enthusiast Terence McKenna once made the claim that drugs were never a social issue until they became a commodity eg sugar became the mass-produced granulated intense form its in today, alcohol became distilled in cans, opium became heroin etc. I don't know how true that is (a lot of his claims seem quite subjective, I don't know if he really researched the topic) but it would be interesting to find there was a link between capitalism and drug problems. I mean there's definitely a link, but it would be interesting if there was confirmation of a causal relationship.

Edit: I also think that more could be done by pro-drug enthusiasts to put out good safety information and such. Marijuana habituation, for instance (which doesn't affect everybody but affects a number of users) can be very easily avoided from the get go if people come to terms with the basics of how such habituation works before they start smoking. I think that, in the case of marijuana for instance, there's a split between people that portray it as a total social ill and will say nothing positive, and those so hard-pressed for legalisation that they resfure to acknowledge the habituation issue altogether. There's not a lot of great, balanced information out there.

[Rosa Partizan]

no authority of whatsoever kind should be able to ban drugs. I suppose that legalization within a classless society would solve many problems that we are encountering nowadays like shitty, cheap ingredients that make consequences of usage very hard to predict and especially the fact that drugs are used by many lower class or troubled (for whatever reason) people as a form of escapism. This doesn't mean that there would be no individual problems, but not these problems that derive from fucked up strucures like several -isms, poverty etc. Drugs would be rather used for recreational fun. This is what I think on a normative level.

When it comes to the descriptive level of how I see drug use within the left nowadays, that's a different story and I already pissed off several people with my opinion, so, yeah, I'm basically not pro-drugs.

[Loony Le Fist]

As you will observe, if you haven't already, there is no general consensus. Illegal drugs are a controversial issue and will continue to be for a long time. Government propaganda is extremely well funded in those areas, because busts often net money. Another thing fueling controversy is the lack of familiarity; the majority of people don't involve themselves in drug use. Keeping drugs illegal ensures they remain unfamiliar and people remain insulated from what the real effects, both short and long-term, of these compounds are. A significant number of wealthy countries have spent boatloads of money to ensure that it is extremely difficult to do thoughtful, methodical, controlled, and careful research into these compounds. You will find there is a wide amount of variance in opinion for these and other reasons.

A unsolicited suggestion to the OP, Sol Invictus might be to search for an existing poll and if you do not find one, post a new poll topic. That would give you an empirical answer of a sort. If that is what you are looking for. Were you looking for some point/counter-point discussion to help make up your own mind?

[Futility Personified]

Weed should be legal but there's something ya missed
You won't burn down babylon by smoking a spliff

[The Feral Underclass]

I am wondering about the general consensus here about the use of drugs in a socialist, communist, anarchist society.

In my view all drugs should be produced by collectives and made available for recreational and medicinal use (cannabis for pain, MDMA for movement and psychological treatment). The problem is how does a health service cope with those who abuse drugs. There comes a point where resources are being used to deal with the results of drug and alcohol abuse and it impacts on the care of others. How do communities deal with that problem? I.e. how do communities and health care providers deal with resources and time being spent on other people's carelessness? I think that's a more interesting question.

Having said that, in Portugal most drugs are decriminalised if not legalised. They have one of the lowest drug addiction rates in Europe, if not the world. I think that says something about what the widespread legal availability of narcotics can do to lower their abuse.

[Anglo-Saxon Philistine]

Well, you could ask the same thing of pretty much anything in the socialist society - e.g. resources will be used to build beach-side homes because (neutral: ) there is a demand for them or, (portraying the entire thing as negative: ) because of people's whims. But that's what the "economy" of a socialist society (to the extent that it makes sense to talk about an economy in socialism) is geared towards: providing for human needs and wants.

And it's not just that, well, if someone wants to shoot heroin up their eyeballs, more power to them, and obviously no one in the socialist society could stop them (as the socialist society is stateless - here I usually make a joke about the Socialist Police, but it depresses me that so many people can't recognise it as a joke), but addicts and other drug users really get a bad deal in class society. They're convenient scapegoats for cuts to healthcare, economic problems in impoverished areas etc., many people treat them as less than dirt, and a lot of "addiction treatment" is either forced labour, forced religion (usually with forced labour), or outright torture. Fuck that.

[Illegalitarian]

You will be forced to ingest Heroin when the revolution comes.

[The Feral Underclass]

providing for human needs and wants.

That's an incredibly irresponsible and incompetent way to view healthcare and healthcare resources.


And it's not just that, well, if someone wants to shoot heroin up their eyeballs, more power to them, and obviously no one in the socialist society could stop them

But healthcare providers as well as communities in general have a responsibility to try and ensure that people are not injecting their eyes with heroin and that requires time and resources. So I don't think it's acceptable to be so glib about this sort of thing.

[Anglo-Saxon Philistine]

That's an incredibly irresponsible and incompetent way to view healthcare and healthcare resources.

How so?


But healthcare providers as well as communities in general have a responsibility to try and ensure that people are not injecting their eyes with heroin[...]

And that's where the problems start. Why do healthcare providers and "communities" have that responsibility?

[The Feral Underclass]

How so?

There are many health problems that require specialised care. Resources that are being used to deal with some idiot who has injected their eye with heroin, potentially contracting hepatitis or developing an infection, is now taking up time and resources that could be used for other things.

Moreover, the implication that there will be some unhindered, continuous flow of medical resources in a socialist society is a Utopian pipe-dream and it is necessary for communities to try and maintain a continuity of care. That will be hindered if hospitals and clinics are having to deal with people who have become ill just because they wanted to.


And that's where the problems start. Why do healthcare providers and "communities" have that responsibility?

I'm not really sure why you have inverted the word communities, as if it were somehow stupid of me to use the term.

Human beings live in communities and those communities need to function. To function they require healthy, self-possessing, responsible individuals who take seriously their lives and the task of making society function. That means ensuring that the use of recreational drugs is being done in a way that is not going to cause addiction and injury to people, impact on the health of others, such as the spread of transmittable infectious diseases or tie-up healthcare providers and resources.

If people want to take heroin, there are safer and better ways than injecting it into your eyeball and I don't think there is any problem with making that a point of principle.

[Anglo-Saxon Philistine]

There are many health problems that require specialised care. Resources that are being used to deal with some idiot who has injected their eye with heroin, potentially contracting hepatitis or developing an infection, is now taking up time and resources that could be used for other things.

Moreover, the implication that there will be some unhindered, continuous flow of medical resources in a socialist society is a Utopian pipe-dream and it is necessary for communities to try and maintain a continuity of care. That will be hindered if hospitals and clinics are having to deal with people who have become ill just because they wanted to.

It never ceases to amaze me when socialists make this sort of argument. If socialism can't ensure an abundance of material objects and services, what is it good for, exactly? Even under capitalism, which by supposition retards the development of the productive forces, crises arising from the inability of society to manufacture the required medicine and instruments are unheard of - what causes crises in the healthcare sector are artificial price constraints and the insufficient allocation of labour.

Now, "shooting heroin up your eyeballs" was a glib phrase, but people do things that cause them to become ill all the time - and any reasonable person would consider attempts to prevent that an odious imposition on their ability to dispose of their body as they see fit. Life can't be sanitised except by being entirely gutted of activities people generally view as fun.


I'm not really sure why you have inverted the word communities, as if it were somehow stupid of me to use the term.

It isn't stupid, but it gives an entirely wrong picture of both the current society and the socialist society - in socialism, it is not isolated "communities" that administer the employment of the means of production and organise services, but society. Even under capitalism, the global flow of goods links up various local groups (and "community" is such a notoriously vague term) to the extent that they become of secondary importance when analysing society, if that.


Human beings live in communities and those communities need to function.

What does it mean for a community (if you insist on that term) to function? The processes of production, under socialism, would presumably need only a fraction of the available aggregate labour-power to be expended. Thus in socialism people who wish to labour will labour, while others can be lazy, irresponsible, unhealthy, not taking their lives seriously etc.

[Illegalitarian]

There are many health problems that require specialised care. Resources that are being used to deal with some idiot who has injected their eye with heroin, potentially contracting hepatitis or developing an infection, is now taking up time and resources that could be used for other things.

Moreover, the implication that there will be some unhindered, continuous flow of medical resources in a socialist society is a Utopian pipe-dream and it is necessary for communities to try and maintain a continuity of care. That will be hindered if hospitals and clinics are having to deal with people who have become ill just because they wanted to.

That's non sequitur I'd have to say. What does this have to do with the flow of medical resources in a socialist society? Of course there are always hiccups in the flow of such resources simply due to the logistics of it all, but why could there otherwise not be a steady flow of needed supplies?




I'm not really sure why you have inverted the word communities, as if it were somehow stupid of me to use the term.

Human beings live in communities and those communities need to function. To function they require healthy, self-possessing, responsible individuals who take seriously their lives and the task of making society function. That means ensuring that the use of recreational drugs is being done in a way that is not going to cause addiction and injury to people, impact on the health of others, such as the spread of transmittable infectious diseases or tie-up healthcare providers and resources.

If people want to take heroin, there are safer and better ways than injecting it into your eyeball and I don't think there is any problem with making that a point of principle.

So basically you're hung up on the fact that he said "shoot heroin into their eyeballs". I'm quite sure he did not mean that literally, and was using hyperbole to express the idea that people should not be restrained from drug use in a socialist society.

[The Feral Underclass]

It never ceases to amaze me when socialists make this sort of argument. If socialism can't ensure an abundance of material objects and services, what is it good for, exactly?

Liberating working class people from economic and political inequality and alienation...


Even under capitalism, which by supposition retards the development of the productive forces, crises arising from the inability of society to manufacture the required medicine and instruments are unheard of - what causes crises in the healthcare sector are artificial price constraints and the insufficient allocation of labour.

I accept what you're saying, but I don't share your optimism that the international system of supply and demand in a socialist world is going to run as smoothly as you think it is.

In any case, we're not just talking about objects, we're talking about the [hu]man power and time it takes to care for patients, many of whom are chronic, either because of addiction, mental health problems or because of infectious disease.

I hope that in a socialist society the nursing crisis in the UK will no longer exist, but if it does, then having to deal with the care of people who could just not have done what they did, has to be addressed more seriously than just shrugging our shoulders and saying "well they can do what they want."


Now, "shooting heroin up your eyeballs" was a glib phrase, but people do things that cause them to become ill all the time - and any reasonable person would consider attempts to prevent that an odious imposition on their ability to dispose of their body as they see fit. Life can't be sanitised except by being entirely gutted of activities people generally view as fun.

No one is saying that someone should be prevented from anything. If someone comes into the hospital with an infected eyeball because they stabbed themselves with a needle full of heroin, or with cirrhosis through Hep C or alcoholism, they should be treated equally and fairly to any one else without judgement or penalisation. What I am trying to do is move beyond this puerile, teenager mentality of "I can do whatever I want" and proposing that people take more responsibility for the way they behave. I am also suggesting that communities, society, healthcare providers, whatever you want to call it, also takes a responsibility for promoting that as a principle.


It isn't stupid, but it gives an entirely wrong picture of both the current society and the socialist society - in socialism, it is not isolated "communities" that administer the employment of the means of production and organise services, but society. Even under capitalism, the global flow of goods links up various local groups (and "community" is such a notoriously vague term) to the extent that they become of secondary importance when analysing society, if that.

The term community is used to refer to a geographical location of a group of people, whether that's a city, town, region. You can call it society if you want to, it makes no real difference. The point is that the place in which we live will require a whole host of goods and services that will be the responsibility of those that live in it. If that community is full of people who can't function without narcotics or alcohol or who have long term chronic health problems, that's a problem -- not just in terms of labour power, but in terms of the work load those who are working have to take responsibility for.

There has to be a balance between what people do in their lives and a responsibility to the society in which you live.


What does it mean for a community (if you insist on that term) to function? The processes of production, under socialism, would presumably need only a fraction of the available aggregate labour-power to be expended.

By function I mean to ensure that everyone is fed, clothed, homed, warm, happy, healthy and able to enjoy their lives.


Thus in socialism people who wish to labour will labour, while others can be lazy, irresponsible, unhealthy, not taking their lives seriously etc.

If people really want to be lazy, irresponsible, unhealthy and indifferent about their existence that's all fine and well. Let them. But aside from the fact those things are usually indicators for depression, I don't see why that should be a point of principle for us.

People who are living lazily, indifferently, irresponsibly and unhealthily are not living a productive, happy life. That's just a fact. I don't know any person and have come across no one in my work and life who has those traits and is a happy person. Have you?

Even if they were really happy with being unhealthy and irresponsible and lazy, and didn't give a fuck about their life, why would we want to promote that? It's one thing saying we can't prevent it, it's another to say it should be how things are.

I don't agree that healthcare providers or people at large should be satisfied with that. Healthcare providers -- especially -- have a duty of care for those they serve. If someone is eating themselves into a diabetic coma or heart attack through their unhealthy living, it's the responsibility of their healthcare provider to help them not die at the age of 40 or have their feet cut off. Why do you have a problem with that?

[Illegalitarian]

I don't agree that healthcare providers or people at large should be satisfied with that. Healthcare providers -- especially -- have a duty of care for those they serve. If someone is eating themselves into a diabetic coma or heart attack through their unhealthy living, it's the responsibility of their healthcare provider to help them not die at the age of 40 or have their feet cut off. Why do you have a problem with that?


You're attacking a blatant strawman. No one is saying it should be the new norm, 807 is merely saying that it is not our place to condemn and shame people out of doing what they want with their body.

The information about what this sort of thing can do to you is out there. If they're still wish to continue to do drugs, live lazily, etc, it's their decision, and condemning it as "not productive" and saying people who engage in these activities are "not happy" simply isn't correct.

[consuming negativity]

Drug abuse is just that - abuse. There's a difference between recreationally using drugs, really liking to recreationally use drugs, being addicted to drugs, and using drugs as a way of retreating from society. Drug addiction won't be nearly as big a problem in the future, though. Check this out:


Rat Park was a study into drug addiction (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drug_addiction) conducted in the late 1970s (and published in 1980) by Canadian psychologist Bruce K. Alexander (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bruce_K._Alexander) and his colleagues at Simon Fraser University (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Simon_Fraser_University) in British Columbia, Canada (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canada).

Alexander's hypothesis was that drugs do not cause addiction, and that the apparent addiction to opiate (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Opiate) drugs commonly observed in laboratory rats exposed to it is attributable to their living conditions, and not to any addictive property of the drug itself.[1] (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rat_Park#cite_note-Senate-1) He told the Canadian Senate (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canadian_Senate) in 2001 that prior experiments in which laboratory rats were kept isolated in cramped metal cages, tethered to a self-injection apparatus, show only that "severely distressed animals, like severely distressed people, will relieve their distress pharmacologically (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pharmacology) if they can."[2] (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rat_Park#cite_note-2)

To test his hypothesis, Alexander built Rat Park, an 8.8 m2 (95 sq ft) housing colony, 200 times the floor area of a standard laboratory cage. There were 16–20 rats of both sexes in residence, an abundance of food, balls and wheels for play, and enough space for mating (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mating) and raising litters.[3] (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rat_Park#cite_note-Slater-3):166 The results of the experiment appeared to support his hypothesis (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hypothesis). Rats who had been forced to consume morphine hydrochloride for 57 consecutive days were brought to Rat Park and given a choice between plain tap water and water laced with morphine. For the most part, they chose the plain water. "Nothing that we tried," Alexander wrote, "... produced anything that looked like addiction in rats that were housed in a reasonably normal environment."[1] (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rat_Park#cite_note-Senate-1) Control groups of rats isolated in small cages consumed much more morphine in this and several subsequent experiments.

The environment plays a much larger role in this shit than we think it does. Drug addiction is a social behavior as much as it is anything else. The correct response to drug abuse in any society would be to just ask the person "Hey, you know, you're drunk every fucking night and you've been shooting heroin into your dick because you've collapsed the veins in both of your arms. What's going on and how can we help you?" You don't make it illegal, you don't shoot people's dogs by running into their house to take a joint from them, but what is healthy and what is not healthy is what it is and nobody wants a person to lose themselves to a substance; a feeling, or whatever. Reality is pretty sweet, and everybody likes a vacation, but a vacation can't be a life.

[Sasha]

As a first aid responder to drug incidents I can only argue for full legalization, not because all drug use is that great (though some is) but because the alternative (prohibition) is far more harmful. As with other topics that are often considerd controversial (prostitution, abortion, euthanasia) the discussion shouldnt beabout wheter we like the actual act (in this case the production, sale and use of drugs) but the harm of prohibition vs legalization, and then the answer should be legalisation with remaining minimized problems by good regulation.

[blake 3:17]

I'm in favour of an immediate decriminalization across the board. Any problems that might result (impaired driving, other antisocial behaviour) are already covered by laws that should be respected.

There have been some interesting proposals for legalization of harder drugs eg making them for sale at specialized stores that will only sell a certain amount.

While I find it strange siding with police, I've the utmost respect for Law Enforcement Against Prohibition. Here's the American site: http://www.leap.cc/

Quite a few folks I know are very involved with the Prisoners with AIDS Support Action Network here in Canada which has done a lot to get harm reduction measures into jails and prisons: http://www.pasan.org/

[Anglo-Saxon Philistine]

Liberating working class people from economic and political inequality and alienation...

But this completely ignores the historical specificity of socialism - its relation to the development of the productive forces. If socialism can't develop the productive forces (in fact, the way people usually phrase these objections about "utopianism", one would think socialism would destroy the productive forces, so that their level under socialism would be much less than under decaying capitalism), socialist "equality" (I disagree that there is any sort of equality under socialism, but let's suppose otherwise) would mean making everyone equally miserable and impoverished - an equality of the convent. I don't think that's at all positive. And it obviously couldn't last, as rhetoric about equality can't fill one's stomach (which is why the "egalitarian" experiments of various Chinese reformers were all doomed to failure).


I accept what you're saying, but I don't share your optimism that the international system of supply and demand in a socialist world is going to run as smoothly as you think it is.

For my part, I think people are smart enough to ensure that it will. But that's neither here nor there - if it does not run smoothly, that is not the fault of the addicts and "irresponsible people", but of the planning organs of the socialist society. Restricting demand so that the administrative organs have an easier time is the tail wagging the dog.


In any case, we're not just talking about objects, we're talking about the [hu]man power and time it takes to care for patients, many of whom are chronic, either because of addiction, mental health problems or because of infectious disease.

I hope that in a socialist society the nursing crisis in the UK will no longer exist, but if it does, then having to deal with the care of people who could just not have done what they did, has to be addressed more seriously than just shrugging our shoulders and saying "well they can do what they want.

But the nursing crisis is, again, not due to an actual shortage of qualified nurses, but because of (1) the outflow of British nurses to better-paying jobs overseas, and (2) the supposed poor English skills of overseas staff. Nursing and other healthcare services will not be an exception to the general tendency of labour to become less arduous under socialism. Just imagine what a difference consistent access to quality equipment without price constraints would mean. Thus nurses would have to expend less of their labour power to achieve the same effect.


No one is saying that someone should be prevented from anything. If someone comes into the hospital with an infected eyeball because they stabbed themselves with a needle full of heroin, or with cirrhosis through Hep C or alcoholism, they should be treated equally and fairly to any one else without judgement or penalisation. What I am trying to do is move beyond this puerile, teenager mentality of "I can do whatever I want" and proposing that people take more responsibility for the way they behave. I am also suggesting that communities, society, healthcare providers, whatever you want to call it, also takes a responsibility for promoting that as a principle.

I don't think the mentality is puerile at all - it's simply a recognition of the autonomy of the individual when it comes to their own body, a principle that many on the Left need to take more seriously in my view. Not to mention that your claim that the people in question should be treated "without judgement" rather contradicts the rest of the paragraph.


The term community is used to refer to a geographical location of a group of people, whether that's a city, town, region. You can call it society if you want to, it makes no real difference. The point is that the place in which we live will require a whole host of goods and services that will be the responsibility of those that live in it. If that community is full of people who can't function without narcotics or alcohol or who have long term chronic health problems, that's a problem -- not just in terms of labour power, but in terms of the work load those who are working have to take responsibility for.

The point was that there would not be many "communities" or "societies" making up socialism, but one global society held together by the global flow of people, goods and services. So the sight of foreign nurses in (what used to be) Britain wouldn't go away under socialism; if anything it would be more prominent.


By function I mean to ensure that everyone is fed, clothed, homed, warm, happy, healthy and able to enjoy their lives.

And this is the crux of the issue, I think. For us Marxists, any public authority in the socialist society has a very limited function - administration of things and the direction of the processes of production, as Engels puts it. Making people happy is not part of that function.

Generally, I think it is a very bad idea to expect society to make people happy, whether they want it or not. That sort of thinking leads to many of the horrors of class society, from forcible psychiatric treatment (and "treatment") to withholding abortion from women with problems because they might change their mind later etc. In the case of addicts it leads to their forcible commitment to psychiatric institutions, forced labour, and so on.


People who are living lazily, indifferently, irresponsibly and unhealthily are not living a productive, happy life. That's just a fact. I don't know any person and have come across no one in my work and life who has those traits and is a happy person. Have you?

Yes? Hell, I would say I was much, much happier when I did nothing productive, didn't think about my own mortality and paying the bills, and would sometimes spend my entire allowance on sweets, then go hungry for a few weeks, than now, when I have a job (sort of), have to go to work even though I'm vomiting my lungs up, and spend a lot of time in front of the mirror wondering if that mole is the melanome that is finally going to kill me.


Even if they were really happy with being unhealthy and irresponsible and lazy, and didn't give a fuck about their life, why would we want to promote that? It's one thing saying we can't prevent it, it's another to say it should be how things are.

Who said "we" would want to promote anything? The public services of the socialist society shouldn't be promoting any sort of lifestyle, period, that is not their function. Their function is to oversee the employment of the means of production and to organise services - the organs of the socialist society are more like a glorified power company than a bourgeois government.


I don't agree that healthcare providers or people at large should be satisfied with that. Healthcare providers -- especially -- have a duty of care for those they serve. If someone is eating themselves into a diabetic coma or heart attack through their unhealthy living, it's the responsibility of their healthcare provider to help them not die at the age of 40 or have their feet cut off. Why do you have a problem with that?

Because I think that, if people don't care about dying at 40, that's their prerogative. And I consider public intrusion into such private affairs to be particularly odious.

[Danielle Ni Dhighe]

Prohibition demands a state, which demands police and prisons. Does that sound like anyone's ideal post-revolutionary society?

[The Feral Underclass]

But this completely ignores the historical specificity of socialism - its relation to the development of the productive forces. If socialism can't develop the productive forces (in fact, the way people usually phrase these objections about "utopianism", one would think socialism would destroy the productive forces, so that their level under socialism would be much less than under decaying capitalism), socialist "equality" (I disagree that there is any sort of equality under socialism, but let's suppose otherwise) would mean making everyone equally miserable and impoverished - an equality of the convent. I don't think that's at all positive. And it obviously couldn't last, as rhetoric about equality can't fill one's stomach (which is why the "egalitarian" experiments of various Chinese reformers were all doomed to failure).

The way in which you are constructing your argument is to assume that I am starting from a position where productive forces are completely failing and incapable of providing goods and services. That's not my position.

The real world just doesn't work in the rosy-way you are imagining it though. Lack of raw materials, human error, fluctuations in the labour forces, natural disasters, the changes in technology and so on. Organising an operation to supply the world with a continuous supply of medical goods for the rest of humanities existence is going to run into problems. That's just inevitable.

In order to maintain a continuity of care, it is therefore incompetent to argue that we should not do what we can to decrease waste and ensure the resources we have are being used in the most efficient way.


For my part, I think people are smart enough to ensure that it will. But that's neither here nor there - if it does not run smoothly, that is not the fault of the addicts and "irresponsible people", but of the planning organs of the socialist society.

I'm not assigning blame. I am simply saying that the success of the international supply and demand system within a socialist society is not always going to be based on how smart someone is.


Restricting demand so that the administrative organs have an easier time is the tail wagging the dog.

Ugh, that's not what I'm suggesting though, is it?


But the nursing crisis is, again, not due to an actual shortage of qualified nurses, but because of (1) the outflow of British nurses to better-paying jobs overseas, and (2) the supposed poor English skills of overseas staff.

That is false. There is a shortage of 20,000 nurses in the UK and it is because not enough people are being trained, an ageing workforce and because many nurses leave the profession due to stress. It has nothing to do with people going overseas.

Even if we had all the supplies and goods we needed to do our jobs, having to deal with the stupidity and irresponsibility of other people in our communities is putting an unfair burden on an already dwindling pool of qualified staff. We have to do something about that.


Nursing and other healthcare services will not be an exception to the general tendency of labour to become less arduous under socialism. Just imagine what a difference consistent access to quality equipment without price constraints would mean. Thus nurses would have to expend less of their labour power to achieve the same effect.

Even if that's true, you'd still have to have enough nurses to begin with. It doesn't matter how much equipment you have or what it's quality is, if there are too many patients (and in big cities the majority of ER admits are usually people who have drunk too much) and not enough nurses, that's going to create a problem.

There are two immediate solutions to that problem: Train more nurses and people taking more responsibility for their behaviour.


I don't think the mentality is puerile at all

Evidently.


it's simply a recognition of the autonomy of the individual when it comes to their own body, a principle that many on the Left need to take more seriously in my view. Not to mention that your claim that the people in question should be treated "without judgement" rather contradicts the rest of the paragraph.

Finding judgement in me saying that I think people should take more responsibility for their behaviour is the sign of a defensive mind.

This isn't about recognising the autonomy of the individual. You're reducing this argument down to an issue that has never been in question. I recognise the autonomy of the individual, but that doesn't mean that others shouldn't disagree with those choices when they negatively impact on other people. Someone can go and stick whatever they want wherever they want, but that doesn't mean that healthcare providers have to say "yeah, that was a good idea," especially since coming to hospital for treatment usually indicates that it wasn't.

It shouldn't be someone's right to get completely pissed out of their face and then expect other people to deal with the consequences of that. People don't have the right to negatively affect other people's lives. It's an incredibly selfish, individualist and irresponsible way to view your behaviour in society. I'm not entitled to go around punching people, am I? I mean, I might really enjoy it? What if I want to show my penis to people irrespective of whether they want to see it? It's my autonomy, right? What if I want to masturbate on the bus? Or walk into people's homes, eat their eggs, kick their dog and take a shit in their toilet? I mean, do you think that people who commit suicide and are brought into an ER shouldn't have attempts made to resuscitate them?

You don't think these things are comparable with coming to a hospital completely pissed out of your face and pissing all over the ward? You don't think these things are comparable with recklessly injecting your eye with poison, getting an infection and then expecting someone to clean it up for you?

Well, I do. And therein lies the issue.


The point was that there would not be many "communities" or "societies" making up socialism, but one global society held together by the global flow of people, goods and services. So the sight of foreign nurses in (what used to be) Britain wouldn't go away under socialism; if anything it would be more prominent.

Communities exist by virtue of groups of people living in the same area. There's nothing you can do about that...Even in socialism.


And this is the crux of the issue, I think. For us Marxists, any public authority in the socialist society has a very limited function - administration of things and the direction of the processes of production, as Engels puts it. Making people happy is not part of that function.

It's not about "making" people happy, it's about ensuring that people are able to be. That means providing the tools for people to achieve that. If people don't want to be happy, that's their choice, but if they do, healthcare providers should exist to provide that care. And I'm afraid happiness will rarely, if ever, be found at the bottom of an alcohol bottle, with diabetic amputations, heart disease, obesity and other preventable diseases.


Generally, I think it is a very bad idea to expect society to make people happy, whether they want it or not. That sort of thinking leads to many of the horrors of class society, from forcible psychiatric treatment (and "treatment") to withholding abortion from women with problems because they might change their mind later etc. In the case of addicts it leads to their forcible commitment to psychiatric institutions, forced labour, and so on.

Obviously there is a thin line and we have to be careful of that, but the fact is, healthcare providers are not going to just become these automated, box-ticking service providers who clean up your piss, bandage you up and send you on your way without any care about what you do when you get home.

That's not what healthcare is about and if you're saying that's what you want to make it about, then in a socialist society we are going to have some problems...If your socialist administration wants to try and implement that policy you're going to end up with a nurses strike -- but since nurses and other healthcare providers are going to be the ones who run hospitals, I'm not sure what there is you can do about it.


Who said "we" would want to promote anything? The public services of the socialist society shouldn't be promoting any sort of lifestyle, period, that is not their function. Their function is to oversee the employment of the means of production and to organise services - the organs of the socialist society are more like a glorified power company than a bourgeois government.

Well, I for one, and I know many other healthcare providers who would want to promote things like healthy living -- you know, since that's our job. I would also want to promote HIV/AIDS preventative measures, the risks of smoking, vaccinations. That's what healthcare providers do -- they provide care for people's health.

These "organs" you're talking about can do whatever they want, but for the rank-and-file workers on the ground, in the hospitals and clinics, we're the ones who have to deal with patients who come and see us, it is our decision on how to manage that healthcare. We have a job to do and that job is to try and protect people's health, and be advocates for that. If you have a problem with people wanting you to be healthy, that's just tough shit.


Because I think that, if people don't care about dying at 40, that's their prerogative. And I consider public intrusion into such private affairs to be particularly odious.

You're so dramatic. No one is talking about people being intrusive into your life. If you really want to die at 40 then die at 40 for crying out loud, but that doesn't mean that healthcare providers on the ground, in communities, shouldn't say, "well maybe it would be better if you didn't."

[The Garbage Disposal Unit]

Weed should be legal but there's something ya missed
You won't burn down babylon by smoking a spliff

Holy fuck! So good! Where is this line from?

[Os Cangaceiros]

Spliffs are a real European thing

[Futility Personified]

Holy fuck! So good! Where is this line from?

Me ;) I'll post up some tracks when I can get someone to help me produce.

[Slavic]

Just going off of what Feral posted in response to 870.

Using the liberal view of body autonomy as an excuse to play "hands of" with health care workers is a weak excuse. There are times when upholding the liberal ideal of the body autonomy will actually cause social harm. For example.

If someone were to contract influenza or some other airborne infectious pathogen, should they not be allowed to operate in their place of work?

The correct answer is yes, someone with an airborne infectious pathogen should not be allowed to continue to work in their place of work while sick. Such behavior could lead to the spread of said pathogen to other workers.

Does this violate the person's body autonomy? Yes, they are being physically restricted from certain public function. It it ok to violate body autonomy in this case and cases similar? Absolutly, it is not an individual issue when dealing with infectious diseases, it is a social issue.

This can be extended from infectious diseases to examples that Feral brought up such as the injecting heroine in your eye or becoming shitfaced drunk. You can yell individual autonomy all you want, but these issues are social issues when the ramifications extend into the social sphere, ie. being treated at a hospital for being a dumbass.

[Atsumari]

On the topic of drug legalization and abuse, there is also the issue of what happens afterwards. I would hate to live in a society where hard drugs are privatized and advertised/sold on a humongous scale like the Brits did in China. I mean, just take a look at the advertisement of sugar products and pharmaceutical drugs for example.

[Slavic]

On the topic of drug legalization and abuse, there is also the issue of what happens afterwards. I would hate to live in a society where hard drugs are privatized and advertised/sold on a humongous scale like the Brits did in China. I mean, just take a look at the advertisement of sugar products and pharmaceutical drugs for example.


Taking your sugar and pharmaceuticals as an example. How often are pharmaceuticals and sugar sold to the public with low purities and cutting agents such as baking soda, flour, or drywall?

Legalization of illicit drugs well allow said substances to conform to FDA regulations which will greatly improve the quality and purity of drugs produced. Improved quality of substances decreases the chances of adverse reactions due to hazardous chemicals left in the final product.

Im sure it happens in other states, but there is at least one hot shot of bad heroin that goes around once a year in my state that causes upwards of a dozen deaths and/or serious illnesses.

[Os Cangaceiros]

It'd be interesting to see if something like LSD would be legal in a left-wing environment.

On the one hand there really isn't any valid reason in my mind why it wouldn't be, but on the other hand it facilitates a lot of thinking that a lot of people in power would find extremely subversive. It's not exactly something that's conducive to a well-oiled collectivist machine, LOL

[Spatula City]

I'm kind of divided on this one.

On the one hand, several countries around the world have very successful drug prohibition laws-- South Korea springs to mind.

Some people would claim that the difference between South Korea and the US is sociocultural homogeneity, and this is to some extent true... but I don't think that it completely explains why drug use isn't even close to being at the epidemic proportions it is in the US.

It seems to me that the key difference between the two is the US for-profit prison industry and its dependence on drug offenses to maintain a constant supply of cheap labor.

It's not something where there's always a clearcut answer, but I do think that capitalism promotes and exploits drugs, even if the politicians don't always publicly condone it. So a more left-wing society might seek to restrict or even prohibit their use, which might not be so difficult if conditions like poverty and social inequality were addressed.

I can't really go into the psychological factors that motivate someone to use drugs because they're probably very complex, but I think it's connected to a person's sense of self-worth, and if society is equal and everyone has the same value (or potential value) to society, it seems like the people in such a society would be less inclined to use drugs.

[Anglo-Saxon Philistine]

The way in which you are constructing your argument is to assume that I am starting from a position where productive forces are completely failing and incapable of providing goods and services. That's not my position.

Nonetheless you seem to assume that things that are a regular occurrence under decaying capitalism will be effectively impossible under socialism. This is odd to say the least, and if we accept that it is the case, it raises the question of whether socialism is desirable at all. Socialists don't fight for abstract equality in destitution, after all.

(Nor do we ignore the progressive nature of those modes of production that, dependent on the dispossession of the direct producers as they were, were able to develop the means of production in their time. Otherwise we should consider the end of primitive classless communalism to be an unparalleled disaster.)


The real world just doesn't work in the rosy-way you are imagining it though. Lack of raw materials, human error, fluctuations in the labour forces, natural disasters, the changes in technology and so on. Organising an operation to supply the world with a continuous supply of medical goods for the rest of humanities existence is going to run into problems. That's just inevitable.

Do you really think that capitalist enterprises don't have to deal with all of this, and more, right now? I mean, I think it's curious when people try to be "realistic" (confusing realism with pessimism) and end up implying things that are obviously not the case - e.g. that there would be constant shortages of material goods (and not simply restrictions on access to material goods due to the market) in capitalism.

Needless to say, the socialist society would be more capable of dealing with things of this sort than the various capitalist enterprises in mutual competition. Take "lack of raw materials" for example - this doesn't even make sense in a socialist society. It makes sense under a market system where the users of raw materials just wait for the raw materials to appear on the market and, if they don't, well, they're boned. But that is obviously not how production will be organised in a socialist society - we won't wait for raw materials to appear on the market (in fact there won't be a market), we will calculate how much raw materials we need and set the targets for the various production units.


In order to maintain a continuity of care, it is therefore incompetent to argue that we should not do what we can to decrease waste and ensure the resources we have are being used in the most efficient way.

On the contrary, I think most rational individuals will recognise that some efforts to reduce waste - particularly on the side of the end-user - are not worth it. It would probably reduce waste, for example, if every housing bloc had a set number of showers outside the sleeping quarters, but having lived in a dorm with just that sort of arrangement for two years, I think the proposal to do so would be voted down immediately. As it should be.


I'm not assigning blame. I am simply saying that the success of the international supply and demand system within a socialist society is not always going to be based on how smart someone is.

It never will be based on how smart someone is - any system that relies on people being particularly smart is going to last a very short time. Socialism itself is possible because the tasks of administering the process of production are so simple any idiot can do them. The point, however, is that socialism is consciously planned - if anything goes awry it is not the fault of external factors (barring such unlikely events as asteroid impacts etc.) but of those organs of society that were tasked with the direction of the process of production.


Ugh, that's not what I'm suggesting though, is it?

It certainly seems so to me.


That is false. There is a shortage of 20,000 nurses in the UK and it is because not enough people are being trained, an ageing workforce and because many nurses leave the profession due to stress. It has nothing to do with people going overseas.

It sounds very odd to say the lack of nursing staff has nothing to do with qualified people leaving the country. In any case - is this because of a lack of interested people, or because of a lack of funding? I would guess - based on my own experience with what are called "deficitary jobs" here - that the latter is the case.

Anyway, the labour supply is the one factor that society as a whole can't control, as the alternative would mean forced labour, which isn't just undesirable, it's outright impossible in socialism. Thus there is always a very real possibility that there will not be enough workers - society in general can plead its case and so on, but ultimately it's on the workers to decide if they're going to work. I don't particularly like that - it might ruin all of our pretty matrices - but the alternative is far worse.


Even if we had all the supplies and goods we needed to do our jobs, having to deal with the stupidity and irresponsibility of other people in our communities is putting an unfair burden on an already dwindling pool of qualified staff. We have to do something about that.

The point is that certain goods effectively act as labour multipliers - they enable more patients to be processed by less nurses. As for dealing with the stupidity and irresponsibility of other people (again, "in our communities", do you genuinely expect someone from outside "your community" will never walk into "your" hospital), that is generally what doctors, nurses and other healthcare providers do. One branch of my family is one of those "doctor families" - most of them are doctors or nurses, including two head nurses - and from my interaction with them I would say that they would agree (and they're pretty detached from it, I would say, particularly the one who works in the oncology department).

I'm not trying to be a dick, particularly since I know you're in that line of work as well, but ultimately the vast majority of medical problems can be ascribed to "stupidity and irresponsibility". Lung cancer? Many of the patients were heavy smokers. Melanoma? People irresponsibly frying in the sun. And so on. But ultimately the job of healthcare providers is to provide healthcare (oddly enough), not judge the lifestyle of the patient.


Finding judgement in me saying that I think people should take more responsibility for their behaviour is the sign of a defensive mind.

Swing, and a miss. I plan to live forever or die in the attempt; at the same time I think that a society where people have learned to not stick their noses in other people's business and where the public authority has learned to restrict itself to matters of production and distribution is a mature society, the sort of society I would personally wish to live in.


This isn't about recognising the autonomy of the individual. You're reducing this argument down to an issue that has never been in question. I recognise the autonomy of the individual, but that doesn't mean that others shouldn't disagree with those choices when they negatively impact on other people. Someone can go and stick whatever they want wherever they want, but that doesn't mean that healthcare providers have to say "yeah, that was a good idea," especially since coming to hospital for treatment usually indicates that it wasn't.

Except, again, no one is saying that healthcare providers should have to say anything.


It shouldn't be someone's right to get completely pissed out of their face and then expect other people to deal with the consequences of that. People don't have the right to negatively affect other people's lives. It's an incredibly selfish, individualist and irresponsible way to view your behaviour in society. I'm not entitled to go around punching people, am I? I mean, I might really enjoy it? What if I want to show my penis to people irrespective of whether they want to see it? It's my autonomy, right? What if I want to masturbate on the bus? Or walk into people's homes, eat their eggs, kick their dog and take a shit in their toilet? I mean, do you think that people who commit suicide and are brought into an ER shouldn't have attempts made to resuscitate them?

As for the last question - well, yes, if someone wants to die, they want to die. What sense does it make to force them to live? If there is doubt it is probably a good idea to err on the side of caution as living people can kill themselves but dead people are not known for coming back to life. But notice how you've gone from things that harm other people to things that only harm oneself in the last sentence. I find that genuinely worrying.


You don't think these things are comparable with coming to a hospital completely pissed out of your face and pissing all over the ward?

I don't think these things are compatible with each other, as you mix thing that harm others with things that don't. Pissing all over the ward, whether due to being drunk or being without manners, is unhygenic, and does affect other people negatively in an undue manner (I mean, I'm pretty sure two men kissing will impact some of the people who witness it negatively, but those people can stuff it, no?). The person who does that can probably be dragged off to a bathroom stall or kicked out (if there's nothing seriously wrong with him).


You don't think these things are comparable with recklessly injecting your eye with poison, getting an infection and then expecting someone to clean it up for you?

How is that qualitatively different from people taking a walk in nature even though they know they're allergic to insects, getting stung "and then expecting someone to clean it up for them" (of course they should expect that, by supposition they live in a society where healthcare is organised and free).


Communities exist by virtue of groups of people living in the same area. There's nothing you can do about that...Even in socialism.

But the question is not whether people live in "communities" - whatever you define a community as (region? city? city quarter?), if it's inhabited, people live there by definition. The question is whether communities are a good unit of social analysis. If we divide a city into "bommunities" so that each bommunity is a collection of non-adjacent parts of the city, with significant spaces between each part, it would still be the case that people live in bommunities. But they're not a good unit for social analysis. Neither are communities in the present day, as people are no longer restricted to goods, people, services etc. that originate in "their community". This is the case even under capitalism. Under socialism, with all constraints on the global movement of people, goods and services gone, the reactionary identification with "communities" will presumably be gone for good.


It's not about "making" people happy, it's about ensuring that people are able to be. That means providing the tools for people to achieve that. If people don't want to be happy, that's their choice, but if they do, healthcare providers should exist to provide that care.

Which no one disputes. In fact you're the only one that seems to be saying that healthcare providers should be anything "more" (here, I would argue, less is more, as acting like self-appointed health busybodies hampers their primary job).


Obviously there is a thin line and we have to be careful of that, but the fact is, healthcare providers are not going to just become these automated, box-ticking service providers who clean up your piss, bandage you up and send you on your way without any care about what you do when you get home.

I don't think there is a thin line - and there is no reason to "be careful" when we can simply remove any coercive aspect of healthcare (or most of them at least - some are matters of public security, after all). As for "box-ticking service providers" - why this animus for people doing their job? - that is what most doctors are, even today. The bourgeois state gives extraordinary and summary powers to some doctors, namely psychiatrists, particularly in order to maintain the oppression of women, homosexuals, transsexuals and political dissidents, but most doctors don't have such powers. They can't do anything other than do their job (and speaking from personal experience, most of them don't want to do anything but their job).


That's not what healthcare is about and if you're saying that's what you want to make it about, then in a socialist society we are going to have some problems...If your socialist administration wants to try and implement that policy you're going to end up with a nurses strike -- but since nurses and other healthcare providers are going to be the ones who run hospitals, I'm not sure what there is you can do about it.

I don't think "workers' self-management" has anything to do with socialism. Socialism is the social control of the means of production, services etc. And healthcare is a service of particular public interest. I'm not necessarily saying that there is going to be a collegiate assessor sitting in every hospital and overseeing its work, but it is absurd to say that the staff of the hospital have the right to do anything they please because it's "their hospital". Of course, if they don't want to work, then they don't want to work. But they have no right to occupy a public building and disrupt its function.


Well, I for one, and I know many other healthcare providers who would want to promote things like healthy living -- you know, since that's our job. I would also want to promote HIV/AIDS preventative measures, the risks of smoking, vaccinations. That's what healthcare providers do -- they provide care for people's health.

There is nothing wrong with presenting the facts about risks etc. (as long as they are correct - so that if a hospital were to claim vaccines caused autism, contrary to your insinuations about self-management, it would probably be closed down before you can say "complaint"). There is quite a bit wrong about pestering people that have made their preference clear. There is a lot that is wrong about services like healthcare having any sort of coercive power.


You're so dramatic. No one is talking about people being intrusive into your life. If you really want to die at 40 then die at 40 for crying out loud, but that doesn't mean that healthcare providers on the ground, in communities, shouldn't say, "well maybe it would be better if you didn't."

No, I am not dramatic. I uphold certain principles - social control as well as individual bodily autonomy - and I don't think doing so makes me dramatic. But what you propose - and why this obsession with "communities" again? it hints at populist communitarianism more than socialism - I find worrying at several levels.

[The Feral Underclass]

I don't think "workers' self-management" has anything to do with socialism.

Spoken like a true Trot.

So, I mean, what more is there to say? Unless either of us are going to reassess the fundamentals of our conceptualisations of a socialist society there isn't going to be any common ground here. I don't really see much point, other than stubbornness, to continue banging our heads against walls, which is essentially what this conversation is turning in to.

I will add that this quote...


it is absurd to say that the staff of the hospital have the right to do anything they please because it's "their hospital". Of course, if they don't want to work, then they don't want to work. But they have no right to occupy a public building and disrupt its function.

...Aside from not being what I said, demonstrates to me your absolute contempt and total lack of trust for working class people, not only to run their own affairs, but to do so for the benefit of a socialist society. This is why Trotskyism is, as far as I am concerned, an anti-working class ideology, constantly seeking to dis-empower people.

[Anglo-Saxon Philistine]

Spoken like a true Trot.

Thank you, I do try. Even so, I don't think we Trotskyists can claim as ours a basic tenet of all socialist groups before people like Tito, Ben Bella and Pablo (the last one being a revisionist Trotskyist, of course) started preaching a glorified codetermination scheme as the height of socialist thought.

Socialism means social control of the means of production - having individual groups of workers control "their own" means of production is simply a particularly nonviable form of capitalism, as neither private property nor the market have been abolished.


So, I mean, what more is there to say? Unless either of us are going to reassess the fundamentals of our conceptualisations of a socialist society there isn't going to be any common ground here. I don't really see much point, other than stubbornness, to continue banging our heads against walls, which is essentially what this conversation is turning in to.

I think it is always useful to make clear the point of political divergence. In this case, there are several such points - self-management being merely one. I think, for example, that you have been extremely vague on whether you expect healthcare providers to have any coercive power outside matters of public security. But if you wish to stop the conversation, be my guest.


I will add that this quote...

[...]

...Aside from not being what I said, demonstrates to me your absolute contempt and total lack of trust for working class people, not only to run their own affairs, but to do so for the benefit of a socialist society. This is why Trotskyism is, as far as I am concerned, an anti-working class ideology, constantly seeking to dis-empower people.

Now this is odd.

I am fairly confident that the members of the socialist society (who, of course, will not form any sort of working class) will be able to "run their own affairs", and in fact I have argued for their prerogative to do so without interference throughout this thread. What I reject as absurd is the notion that the employment of "their" means of production in "their" production unit (mine, factory, smelting plant, whatever) is "their own affair".

Even assuming that the production unit will have the same workers over time (and why would you assume that?), these workers are members of society. The means of production they use were made by society, they produce in order to satisfy the aggregate social demand, and they can live and work only because of the actions of other members of society who work in production and distribution. Everyone laughs at American right-"libertarians" and their notion that each man is a self-sufficient island who interacts with other people only incidentally, but the same sentiment applied to isolated groups of workers is no less ridiculous.

Furthermore, unlike you, I have full confidence that the members of a socialist society will be able to plan production and distribution rationally. Incidents of isolated groups of workers acting as if they own "their" workplaces will probably be rare at best under socialism, but unfortunately they will probably be a noticeable problem in the transitional period (see the VIKZheDor incident).

[The Feral Underclass]

I think, for example, that you have been extremely vague on whether you expect healthcare providers to have any coercive power outside matters of public security. But if you wish to stop the conversation, be my guest.

The only way you could think I've been vague on that is if you're not really listening to what I'm saying.


Socialism means social control of the means of production - having individual groups of workers control "their own" means of production is simply a particularly nonviable form of capitalism, as neither private property nor the market have been abolished.

[...]

I am fairly confident that the members of the socialist society (who, of course, will not form any sort of working class) will be able to "run their own affairs", and in fact I have argued for their prerogative to do so without interference throughout this thread. What I reject as absurd is the notion that the employment of "their" means of production in "their" production unit (mine, factory, smelting plant, whatever) is "their own affair".

Even assuming that the production unit will have the same workers over time (and why would you assume that?), these workers are members of society. The means of production they use were made by society, they produce in order to satisfy the aggregate social demand, and they can live and work only because of the actions of other members of society who work in production and distribution. Everyone laughs at American right-"libertarians" and their notion that each man is a self-sufficient island who interacts with other people only incidentally, but the same sentiment applied to isolated groups of workers is no less ridiculous.

Furthermore, unlike you, I have full confidence that the members of a socialist society will be able to plan production and distribution rationally. Incidents of isolated groups of workers acting as if they own "their" workplaces will probably be rare at best under socialism, but unfortunately they will probably be a noticeable problem in the transitional period (see the VIKZheDor incident).

None of this has anything to do with anything I have said...All I said was: "since nurses and other healthcare providers are going to be the ones who run hospitals, I'm not sure what there is you can do about it. [promoting healthy living and criticising irresponsible behaviour]" How you have constructed this argument from that one sentence is beyond me.

Either you allow healthcare providers to provide healthcare as they see fit (organised locally, regionally, nationally and internationally between healthcare providers), or you institute some central regulatory body to force them to do what you have decided is appropriate. There isn't a middle ground. Clearly we know which side of that coin you fall on, and that's the side that institutionally dis-empowers workers, irrespective of whether you're "confident" it doesn't.

[Anglo-Saxon Philistine]

I don't really understand why that's vague.

Well, among other things, when I mentioned the coercive power some doctors have today, your response was "there is a thin line". And we all know that drug users are subjected to coercive "treatment", and that almost no one with the exception of some socialists and extreme liberals finds this to be objectionable.


None of this has anything to do with anything I have said...All I said was: "since nurses and other healthcare providers are going to be the ones who run hospitals, I'm not sure what there is you can do about it. [promoting healthy living and criticising irresponsible behaviour]" How you have constructed this argument from that one sentence is beyond me.

You explicitly stated that the staff would run hospitals, and the implication seems to be that they would be able to do as they please, without social oversight.


Either you allow healthcare providers to provide healthcare as they see fit (organised locally, regionally, nationally and internationally between healthcare providers), or you institute some central regulatory body to force them to do what you have decided is appropriate. There isn't a middle ground. Clearly we know which side of that coin you fall on, and that's the side that institutionally dis-empowers workers.

Quite so: there is no middle ground between socialism and federalism. A socially-controlled, rationally planned economy is impossible without central bodies. The question is, why do you think these "dis-empower workers"? Workers are not some strange kind of creature separate from society in general.

[The Feral Underclass]

Well, among other things, when I mentioned the coercive power some doctors have today, your response was "there is a thin line". And we all know that drug users are subjected to coercive "treatment", and that almost no one with the exception of some socialists and extreme liberals finds this to be objectionable.

When I say -- repeatedly -- that body autonomy should be upheld, that should indicate to you that I do not believe people should be forced to have treatment.


You explicitly stated that the staff would run hospitals, and the implication seems to be that they would be able to do as they please, without social oversight.

Who knows what horrific thing "social oversight" is a euphemism for when said by a Trotskyist...:crying:

Staff are going to run hospitals. You can't avoid that. I don't really understand how you could possibly dispute it. Since healthcare providers are going to be doing that, they are justified -- as specialists -- to determine how to go about ensuring waste is decreased and resources are allocated efficiently, as well as how to tackle irresponsible and dangerous behaviour and promote healthy living.

If you think that doctors and nurses in a socialist society require some kind of central oversight then by all means advocate that, but all that does is indicate precisely what I have already said: Your contempt and distrust of workers.

Now, people in a socialist society can continue to argue to be allowed to eat a pound of sugar for breakfast, stick poison in their eyes -- and indeed they should be allowed to do that, as much as they want. Even to the point of killing themselves. And we will go on treating them. But we will also continue to argue that eating a pound of sugar isn't good for you and putting poison in your eye is dangerous and irresponsible.


Quite so: there is no middle ground between socialism and federalism. A socially-controlled, rationally planned economy is impossible without central bodies. The question is, why do you think these "dis-empower workers"? Workers are not some strange kind of creature separate from society in general.

There is no chance in hell I am going to get involved in a conversation about hierarchy, power, federalism and centralism with you. Aside from it being a complete waste of time, I'm not that much of a masochist.

[Anglo-Saxon Philistine]

When I say -- repeatedly -- that body autonomy should be upheld, that should indicate to you that I do not believe people should be forced to have treatment.

I am glad we agree on the question of forced treatment (and "treatment"), but I do not think I was being unreasonable by refusing to conclude anything in the absence of explicit statements for or against forced treatment (this entire sentence sounds forced to be honest but such is life), your statements about bodily autonomy notwithstanding. Many people, after all, claim to uphold bodily autonomy and then advocate actions and policies that constitute a gross violation of that autonomy, particularly on RevLeft.


Who knows what horrific thing "social oversight" is a euphemism for when said by a Trotskyist...:crying:

It means exactly what it seems to mean at first glance: that the socialist society will oversee the operation of the various subordinate institutions, delegated organs and so on.

If the people currently working in the Steel Foundry 1014 wish to ignore their targets and arse around, they will be told to move aside and let other people use the machinery of the foundry. No one can force them to work of course. But at the same time they do not have the prerogative to use the means of production that belong to society at their whim.

If the people currently working in Hospital 7010 wish to ignore best medical practices as defined by the central bodies of the socialist society, and preform unsafe or quack medical procedures, they will, again, be told to move aside.

If you consider this horrifying, I think that says more about your notion of socialism than anything else.


Staff are going to run hospitals. You can't avoid that. I don't really understand how you could possibly dispute it. Since healthcare providers are going to be doing that, they are justified -- as specialists -- to determine how to go about ensuring waste is decreased and resources are allocated efficiently, as well as how to tackle irresponsible and dangerous behaviour and promote healthy living.

If you think that doctors and nurses in a socialist society require some kind of central oversight then by all means advocate that, but all that does is indicate precisely what I have already said: Your contempt and distrust of workers.

Really now, it is "contempt and distrust of workers" to say that society, which is made up of workers, should oversee institutions that are essentially social? That only exist because of the collective effort of all of the members of society and only make sense in a society? And to uphold the political decision of society as opposed to fetishising specialists? I see.

[The Feral Underclass]

I am glad we agree on the question of forced treatment (and "treatment"), but I do not think I was being unreasonable by refusing to conclude anything in the absence of explicit statements for or against forced treatment (this entire sentence sounds forced to be honest but such is life), your statements about bodily autonomy notwithstanding. Many people, after all, claim to uphold bodily autonomy and then advocate actions and policies that constitute a gross violation of that autonomy, particularly on RevLeft.

My views on body autonomy are well documented on RevLeft over the last 10 years.


It means exactly what it seems to mean at first glance: that the socialist society will oversee the operation of the various subordinate institutions, delegated organs and so on.

That is just verbiage. If this discussion is not about practical application, then I am not really interested.


If the people currently working in the Steel Foundry 1014 wish to ignore their targets and arse around, they will be told to move aside and let other people use the machinery of the foundry. No one can force them to work of course. But at the same time they do not have the prerogative to use the means of production that belong to society at their whim.

More contempt and distrust...I don't accept the premise that if workers in a steel foundry are not governed by a central body and left to manage their own workloads, they will "ignore targets and arse around." Frankly, there's no difference between that view and the view of any manager in a capitalist place of employment. This is yet more evidence of Trotskyism's clinging to capitalist social relations. This is precisely why it's an anti-working class ideology.


If the people currently working in Hospital 7010 wish to ignore best medical practices as defined by the central bodies of the socialist society, and preform unsafe or quack medical procedures, they will, again, be told to move aside.

Who is more qualified to oversee medical practices than medical providers?

But we're not talking about unsafe or quack medical procedures, we're talking about standing on the principle that healthy living is better for you, dying at 40 is not a good idea and poisoning yourself is dangerous. That is what we are talking about.


If you consider this horrifying, I think that says more about your notion of socialism than anything else.

Well, what's happened is that you've taken some very basic principles that I have been arguing healthcare professions should insist upon as a course of operating, and twisted that into an irrelevant discussion on body autonomy and nonsense about unsafe and quack medical procedures.

I don't find medical oversight horrifying and I don't find it horrifying that we insist on safe and medically competent procedures, but of course me being put into a situation where I have to state that is because you have constructed an argument in response to a position I have never held or expounded.


Really now, it is "contempt and distrust of workers" to say that society, which is made up of workers, should oversee institutions that are essentially social? That only exist because of the collective effort of all of the members of society and only make sense in a society? And to uphold the political decision of society...I see

If you are talking about medical oversight being managed by medical professionals then we are talking about the same thing, which is why I have said "hospitals run by healthcare professionals." If you're talking about some central political authority that dictates the practices of healthcare professionals, then you better believe you'll have a problem on your hands.

But let's put this into perspective: This discussion arouse because I insisted that healthcare professionals should actively promote healthy living, support networks and an active principles of discouraging unsafe and irresponsible social behaviour, and that this was a good thing.

From that, I am now being boxed into a corner where I have to defend myself against accusations of wanting to allow healthcare providers run amok, performing all manner of horrendous medical procedures against people who don't want them :rolleyes:...I can't tell if this is because you're confused or whether it's because you're purposefully employing some devious method of debate.


...as opposed to fetishising specialists?...

It's quite a leap to make from acknowledging that qualified healthcare providers will know how to manage healthcare to "fetishising specialists"...If your not prepared to trust healthcare providers in a socialist society to be the best people to advocate for people's health, then I don't really know who you can trust or what to say to you.

[Anglo-Saxon Philistine]

My views on body autonomy are well documented on RevLeft over the last 10 years.

That might well be the case, but as I haven't been on RevLeft for so long, and as the search function is borked beyond belief, I don't think it was particularly stupid or bloody-minded of me to wait for an explicit statement on your part.


That is just verbiage. If this discussion is not about practical application, then I am not really interested.

Understandably so, but I gave two (admittedly extreme, but I don't think extrapolation is difficult in this case) examples of the "practical applications" (it sounds odd to describe as "practical" something that has not happened yet) immediately below.


More contempt and distrust...I don't accept the premise that if workers in a steel foundry are not governed by a central body and left to manage their own workloads, they will "ignore targets and arse around." Frankly, there's no difference between that view and the view of any manager in a capitalist place of employment. This is yet more evidence of Trotskyism's clinging to capitalist social relations. This is precisely why it's an anti-working class ideology.

I don't accept the "premise" either. The sentence was conditional: if - then. I fully expect that in the socialist society people will have learned to not be rebels without a cause and to cooperate with each other. But they do not have some sort of prerogative to do as they please with "their" workplaces.

Likewise I would say that if a member of the socialist society tried to assault another member sexually, he would be stopped by the rest of society - but this does not mean I think sexual assault will continue to exist in any significant number in socialism.

Or consider the targets themselves - without central organs having access to information about society-wide demand, how would the targets be calculated? To me it seems there is a fairly stark choice: either centralism or de facto market mechanisms.


Who is more qualified to oversee medical practices than medical providers?

Society itself, as not only does society in general provide for the intersection of various kinds of professional knowledge (and I imagine the medical providers are not themselves experts on gamma knives), the decisions that need to be made are political decisions. There is no possibility of retreating into some form of apolitical technocracy.


But we're not talking about unsafe or quack medical procedures, we're talking about standing on the principle that healthy living is better for you, dying at 40 is not a good idea and poisoning yourself is dangerous. That is what we are talking about.

Poisoning yourself is dangerous, which I imagine most people know, but the rest, I'm afraid, seems idealist and semi-theological to me. There is no per-determined "real" good that humans strive toward; there are various human desires, and rational or irrational ways of achieving those desires. If I want to die, slitting my throat is the height of rationality.

[The Feral Underclass]

Poisoning yourself is dangerous, which I imagine most people know, but the rest, I'm afraid, seems idealist and semi-theological to me. There is no per-determined "real" good that humans strive toward; there are various human desires, and rational or irrational ways of achieving those desires. If I want to die, slitting my throat is the height of rationality.

Ugh :rolleyes:

Eating lots of sugar is going to give you diabetes. Smoking is going to increase your risk of lung cancer and cardio-vascular disease. Long term heroin and alcohol use will cause addiction. Exercise and a balanced diet are going to be better for your body than being sedentary and having a bad diet. These are facts. If you want to dispute those facts, then by all means do so, but all this existential nonsense is just that: nonsense.

There is a healthy way of living and there is an unhealthy way of living. Healthcare providers are always going to promote and insist -- as a point of principle -- that people live their lives healthy. That is never going to change. Ever. No matter how much of an emo you are about it.

[Anglo-Saxon Philistine]

Ugh :rolleyes:

Eating lots of sugar is going to give you diabetes. Smoking is going to increase your risk of lung cancer and cardio-vascular disease. Long term heroin and alcohol use will cause addiction. Exercise and a balanced diet are going to be better for your body than being sedentary and having a bad diet. These are facts. If you want to dispute those facts, then by all means do so, but all this existential nonsense is just that: nonsense.

There is a healthy way of living and there is an unhealthy way of living. Healthcare providers are always going to promote and insist -- as a point of principle -- that people live their lives healthy. That is never going to change. Ever. No matter how much of an emo you are about it.

I haven't heard the term "emo" used as an insult since middle school, this really takes me back. Needless to say, I haven't been emotional in this thread once, although you seem to be quite agitated.

You can't even get the terms right - the position (that I had no idea anyone would dispute in the year 2014) that rationality is instrumental is called, surprisingly, an instrumental view of rationality. A rejection of the semi-theological position that there is one "objective" good - as well as moral pap in general - is noncognitivism. Existentialism has nothing to do with it - existentialists were great proponents of a "socialist morality" as they tailed Thorez.

[The Feral Underclass]

You can't even get the terms right - the position (that I had no idea anyone would dispute in the year 2014) that rationality is instrumental is called, surprisingly, an instrumental view of rationality. A rejection of the semi-theological position that there is one "objective" good - as well as moral pap in general - is noncognitivism. Existentialism has nothing to do with it - existentialists were great proponents of a "socialist morality" as they tailed Thorez.

Yawn.

If you think having cancer is just the same as not having cancer, that's all fine and well. Good luck to you. But that isn't going to stop healthcare professionals saying that smoking is bad for your health -- since that is demonstrably true.

Also, I didn't say existentialism (http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/existentialism), I said existential (http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/existential?s=ts) (i.e. pertaining to existence).

[Ferret the Anarchist]

As an avid drug user, and someone who has seen and experienced the effects of addiction, I can tell you any sort of prohibition of any substance that can alter your brain chemistry and get you high is a very, very bad idea.

In a post-revolutionary society, why would we not produce and distribute drugs? They can have very good effects, some can have bad effects, but just because a society produces drugs doesn't mean that a society is somehow lacking in the treatment department. Voluntary treatment centers should be set up, certainly not prisons. Prisons imply police. Police imply a state.

Plus, after the revolution things like poverty will be gone. Most drug users are driven to drug uses as a form of escapism; to get away from the monotony of the world, or get away from the soul-crushing material reality of poverty, or to get away from depression or whatever mental health problem one may or may not have. Again, with proper mental health treatment, poverty gone, and the majority of people in society looking out for one and other, why would drugs be prohibited?

Drugs can be helpful, too. We're forgetting that.

[Anglo-Saxon Philistine]

Alright, so, here is one last attempt to clarify what I'm saying, and if that fails, well, such is life.

Do you think pregnancy should be discouraged? I mean, pregnancy is pretty harmful to the body - there is stretching, sickness, scarring, possible complications and so on. That is one of the reasons why an unwanted pregnancy is a pretty horrifying experience (and why forced-birhters are pretty sick fucks).

Yet there are women who become pregnant willingly, because (ideally; of course social pressure plays a part but that pressure is tied to a specific mode of production and would not exist in socialism) they want to have children more than they fear the adverse effects of pregnancy.

Are these women bad? No. Are they irrational? Again, no. Would it make sense to bug them to not be pregnant? No, I don't think so.

Of course, you can provide information about the adverse health effects of pregnancies (in fact, here in the arse end of the universe, none of the texts about human reproduction that are used in schools contain this information). You can likewise provide information about the adverse health effects of smoking, doing drugs, going bareback and whatever. (As long as the information is true - and here, at least, I have seen quite a few medical professionals promote quackery. I don't have contempt for those people, in fact I can understand what's going through their minds. They want to help people, but some people are beyond help. So, they think, maybe this eucalyptus oil or this homeopathic water or drawing pentacles and appealing to Dantalion or whatever, maybe this will help. I don't think these people are bad people. But that does underscore the need for social oversight as in fact eucalyptus oil and water and Dantalion don't help.)

But for some people, the desire to smoke and have fun, or mess around without being restricted by condoms and so on, is of higher importance than their fear of possible adverse effects on their health. Again, are these people bad? No. Are they irrational? Nope.

There's nothing that can be done about that (with the exception of things like shots, where we're going to make you get a shot because the rest of us don't want to die and you can kill yourself using other means), and there's nothing that should be done. Accepting the variety of human goals and the ability of each individual and group to decide for themselves what is important to them is the mark of a mature society that doesn't concern itself with needless busibodyism.

[The Feral Underclass]

Alright, so, here is one last attempt to clarify what I'm saying, and if that fails, well, such is life.

Nothing that you've said has confused me. I have understood everything you have said to me. Repeating yourself isn't going to make a difference.


Do you think pregnancy should be discouraged? I mean, pregnancy is pretty harmful to the body - there is stretching, sickness, scarring, possible complications and so on. That is one of the reasons why an unwanted pregnancy is a pretty horrifying experience (and why forced-birhters are pretty sick fucks).

Yet there are women who become pregnant willingly, because (ideally; of course social pressure plays a part but that pressure is tied to a specific mode of production and would not exist in socialism) they want to have children more than they fear the adverse effects of pregnancy.

Are these women bad? No. Are they irrational? Again, no. Would it make sense to bug them to not be pregnant? No, I don't think so.

Now you've just gone completely off the reservation.

First of all pregnancy isn't a disease nor an injury caused by reckless and irresponsible behaviour, so the comparison is stupid. Secondly, I am not suggesting that people who develop preventable diseases or get injured because they behaved recklessly and irresponsibly are bad people. I do think it's an irrational response, however, but so far your argument to the contrary has not been convincing. Lastly, I have never said that any one should be "bugged" about doing anything.


Of course, you can provide information about the adverse health effects of pregnancies (in fact, here in the arse end of the universe, none of the texts about human reproduction that are used in schools contain this information). You can likewise provide information about the adverse health effects of smoking, doing drugs, going bareback and whatever.

We don't need your permission to do that. It's gonna happen whether you like it or not.


But for some people, the desire to smoke and have fun, or mess around without being restricted by condoms and so on, is of higher importance than their fear of possible adverse effects on their health. Again, are these people bad? No. Are they irrational? Nope.

They're not bad, but they're behaving irrationally, irresponsibly and selfishly. Someone who has HIV and doesn't wear a condom is actively causing damage, for example. Smoking and drinking to excess is all fine and well, but when it affects the lives of other people it is anti-social and unacceptable.

Smoke, have fun, mess around without condoms on, but doing those things without any regard for other people is a completely unjustified way to interact with society. That is a perfectly legitimate point-of-view and it is perfectly legitimate to express that point-of-view, especially in a healthcare provision context.


There's nothing that can be done about that (with the exception of things like shots, where we're going to make you get a shot because the rest of us don't want to die and you can kill yourself using other means), and there's nothing that should be done. Accepting the variety of human goals and the ability of each individual and group to decide for themselves what is important to them is the mark of a mature society that doesn't concern itself with needless busibodyism.

No. It's not the sign of a mature society. It's the sign of an incredibly self-centred, irresponsible society with a teenager "you can't tell me what to do" complex.

Maturity is about taking responsibility for your actions. It's about interacting with society in a way that doesn't adversely affect others and being aware of how your behaviour might do that. The mark of a mature society is being honest, compassionate and rational enough to give a fuck about yourself and other people. And it's not "busybodyism" to call people out on being selfish, irresponsible dicks. Period.

I don't know how you have arrived at your ridiculous beliefs, but they clearly have nothing to do with the real world.

[DOOM]

Ignoring my personal opinion on drugs, I'm convinced that there is no sense in criminalizing substance use in communism. There's no state to enact and execute the tasks that are coming with criminalization (so this argument fails already at this point)
The critique on substance use comes mostly from a utilitarian or emotional point of view. The goal of communism is a society of free humans, using any substance they like. As 870 has stated, communism doesn't make any sense if it couldn't allow an abundance of goods and services to consume. So it's illogical to refrain to utilitarianism (as in maximizing the productivity in return for freedom).

[The Feral Underclass]

This is an interesting and somewhat relevant (to the OP) article.

"Norman Baker says Tories did not like evidence gleaned as deputy prime minister Nick Clegg criticises foot dragging over report that says tough laws make no difference"

UK government’s drug laws survey was suppressed, Lib Dem minister says (http://www.theguardian.com/politics/2014/oct/30/government-drug-laws-survey-suppressed-lib-dem-minister-norman-baker)

[Illegalitarian]

What is the crux of your argument re: TFU and 870

[MonsterMan]

soft drugs, such as weed, should be legalised IMO - ie: ones that don't cause people to flip out etc...

[Loony Le Fist]

In my view all drugs should be produced by collectives and made available for recreational and medicinal use (cannabis for pain, MDMA for movement and psychological treatment). The problem is how does a health service cope with those who abuse drugs. There comes a point where resources are being used to deal with the results of drug and alcohol abuse and it impacts on the care of others. How do communities deal with that problem? I.e. how do communities and health care providers deal with resources and time being spent on other people's carelessness? I think that's a more interesting question.

Having said that, in Portugal most drugs are decriminalised if not legalised. They have one of the lowest drug addiction rates in Europe, if not the world. I think that says something about what the widespread legal availability of narcotics can do to lower their abuse.

I agree 100% TFU. It's a rare point of agreement that we have. I'm going to cherish it. :laugh:

To add, everyone should try MDMA or LSD (or shrooms) once in their life. It's life changing under the right circumstances. I recommend them to anyone. Though it's not for the weak--especially LSD. If you choose to partake in LSD or shrooms, be prepared. It can be a rough experience for the unprepared.

[Team Jac Naylor]

I think that all Lefties hold different views on this topic. Personally, I don't agree with drug use because most drugs can cause very serious health problems. As well as this, people become violent when "high" and they can develop dependencies.