From: Alexander Sheppard (alexandersheppard@hotmail.com)
Date: Mon Nov 11 2002 - 21:40:09 MST
Date: Sun, 10 Nov 2002 09:05:45 -0600
From: "William" <williamweb@hotmail.com>
Subject: Re: PLEA: Re: Extrops on socialism - U.S. Perspective -
"Socialism is simply diluted communism. Socialism allows for some
private property but saves the most important "means of production" for
the state. The state decides what is important enough to nationalize."
Ok, first of all, I don't understand this idea that communism and socialism
are not on equal footing about how opposed to capitalism they are. I don't
see communists as being any more opposed to capitalism, or socialists as any
less. Second, I don't see how you can characterize socialists and communists
as necessary even favoring the state at all. In fact, many socialists and
communists are libertarians, especially in Europe. The libertarian left in
Europe may well still be more established than the "libertarian" right
there. Libertarian socialism and libertarian communism is often denoted
simply as anarchism, and vise versa. There's a long anarchist tradition
starting with Proudhon and Bakunin--and anarchist tendencies which were
evolving in the Enlightenment much before that--which are anti-capitalist in
nature. In fact, as far as I can tell, the Enlightenment was anti-capitalist
in nature. Not anti-market or anti-private property, now, but definitely
anti-capitalist. I mean, Adam Smith wrote that "the vile maxim of the
masters of mankind" was "all for ourselves and nothing for other people".
Smith's ideas of a pre-capitalist free market were effectively outdated with
the arrival of the industrial revolution. So far as I can see, Smith would
have been horrified to see the effects of modern capitalism, and quite
opposed to them.
Second of all, there's an extremely distorted lexicon, as far as I can tell,
that is currently in use when refering to political ideas. Private property,
or private control of resources, is taken as being something that is
necessarily different from state control. I find this to be a not only
unnecessary but actually impossible proposition, as the state is necessary
to defend private property against being redistributed in ways which reflect
the needs of the group (see the quote after this paragraph by Adam Smith).
In fact, to say that Stalin was not the property owner of the USSR is, as
far as I can see, an Orwellian distortion. Maoism, Stalinismism, Nazism,
etc. can just as well be concieved as a perversion of Marxist theory as a
situation in which one property owner owns everything. And after all, if you
own everything, then why not simply command the state yourself, as you are
effectively the only one it serves?
"Laws and governments may be considered in this and indeed every case, a
combination of the rich to oppress the poor, and preserve to themselves the
inequality of the goods, which would otherwise be soon destroyed by the
attacks of the poor, who if not hindered by the government would soon reduce
others to an equality with themselves by open violence." --Adam Smith
Date: Sun, 10 Nov 2002 14:51:15 -0800 (PST)
From: Mike Lorrey <mlorrey@yahoo.com>
Subject: Re: extropians-digest V7 #304
"On the contrary, there is. Prices need to be set by some means. If the
free market is not to do it (as you have said free markets are
opressive), then some authority must set prices. Your lack of
appreciation for such a simple economic mechanism illustrates why your
opinions on this matter seem to be less and less those of an informed
individual."
Why do we have to have prices, and hence private property, at all? The
argument is often made that people are somehow "inherently" selfish--that
they will fight to dominate other people and give themselves power no matter
what. I don't see this argument should have any basis in fact. Look, I mean,
take the goals of this organization--we want to bring about the
transcendence. But is that somehow a goal which empowers ourselves to
dominate other people? No. In fact, as far as I can see, virtually
everything that has been accomplished of use to other human beings has been
accomplished because people understood that it would be of such use--as is
logical, I think. It did not simply float out of nowhere, some sort of
mystic coincidence that happenend even while all people actually wanted was
to further their own person power. I mean, as far as I can see, it is better
to have a human society which is based on rational consideration of what is
beneficial and subsequent action, than action which is effectively forced
because of survival needs, or action which is driven by some obsessive drive
to further personal wealth and power. I mean, if you want to make a bread
factory, well, why are you making it? Does it make sense to say, well,
people aren't capable of comprehending that running a bread factory will
feed other people, which will allow those people to do other things--they're
too stupid, so thier continued work must be enforced by some mechanism (the
open threat of death by the point of a gun, or enforced starvation, or
lesser but still powerful threats)--which is controlled, ultimately, by the
masters, the people who have control of property and the power to enforce
their control (control, that is, of the state)-- OR does it make more sense
to say, well, if it really IS so important to make bread, then if you take
away all the barriers to comprehending why it is so important, then people
will generally understand it? And I think the latter choice is the best
one...I think that the masters are not inherently more capable of
understanding reality than anyone else.
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