From: Lee Daniel Crocker (lcrocker@calweb.com)
Date: Thu Jan 30 1997 - 00:24:10 MST
> > Do you deny that need and scarcity exist?
>
> It only exists in the minds of those who don't realize that it should no
> longer be of concern in an automated society. Uploading is a different
> ball-game and the rules have changed.
Do you really think so? Even in a transhuman world, conservation of
mass-energy leads to scarcity of resources. There's only so much
energy output from the sun, only so much fissionable material in the
crust, and the more powerful and capable humans become, the more uses
they will find for it.
The reason I react so negatively to your excoriation of "capitalism"
and "economics" is that I can clearly see that what /I/ call by those
names--which is pretty much their dictionary meaning--are the only
hope of survival for mankind in the future.
The practices you object to in your screeds are indeed deplorable,
and those who practice them justify them in terms of "capitalism" and
"economics", but that doesn't make capitalism bad, it makes them liars.
Republicans talk aout "free trade" while they steal from the working
man to give welfare to corporations; but that doesn't mean free trade
is bad, it means Republicans are hypocrites. Democrats talk about
"fairness" and "compassion" while they steal from the working man to
line their pockets and promote their agendas; that doesn't make the
ideas bad, it makes them hypocrites.
By taking the predators' definitions of words the way they use them,
you eliminate their power to fight for what they really mean, and you
play into the hands of the enemy by letting them set the terms of
combat. Take back the language! Use words correctly, to mean what
they really mean, not the crimes they are used to justify. Clarity
of thought is the only way to fight propaganda. Economics is just a
science, nothing more. A branch of knowledge to discover. Capitalism
and free trade are man's only means of survival without violence.
They should be fought for proudly, honestly, in plain terms. When
your enemy uses those words to justify his iniquities, you should show
that he is wrong, and why, and fight him; not believe him and retreat.
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