10 ms·

Why don't workers unite to democratically manage production? The police, propaganda, wage slavery.

deleted 2y ago
[deleted]
nyokodo 2y ago
> Why don't workers unite to democratically manage production? Because the majority of workers are doing the minimum amount of work to get by, because ~50% of workers are below average intelligence, because those with the entrepreneurial skill and/or business management competence necessary to make this happen benefit more from the current system and have less motivation to mess with it.
- harwoodjp 2y ago
  [flagged]
  - K0balt 2y ago
    I can’t speak to op’s emotional well being, but he is spot on with his reasoning. In the rarified air that most of us here inhabit, it’s easy to forget that for every college professor there is someone for whom tying their shoes is a significant cognitive challenge. For every really smart person, there is someone who lacks the cognition to participate meaningfully in society. For every brilliant individual, there is someone whose mental capacity puts them in need of lifelong care. The bell curve is a bitch. The average person just gets by and doesn’t think all that much about anything outside of their immediate surroundings. For most, politics and such is a team sport, not an intellectual pursuit. It’s an uncomfortable fact of life, and those that have talents and gifts above the norm are by default responsible for guiding and advancing society. We ignore that burden at the peril of all.
    - harwoodjp 2y ago
      Your view is called Social Darwinism and it’s really dangerous/dystopian. Also collapses under scrutiny.
      - nyokodo 2y ago
        > Your view is called Social Darwinism The only thing either response to your original reply have done is provide uncontroversial and non-conspiratorial reasons why Mondragons are extremely rare. Calling that Social Darwinism is like calling you a Stalinist, a slander based entirely on a superficial similarity of your rhetoric.
        harwoodjp 2y ago
        You guys are both discussing intelligence hierarchies (wtf?) without regard to actual history of popular labor movements being violently squashed.
        K0balt 2y ago
        I don’t think that asserting that intellectual capacity tends towards a bell curve distribution is an example of social Darwinism. I think that’s just called a testable hypothesis validated by a plethora of studies. As for the idea that people that bother to think about things like their social responsibility to humanity are , by default, responsible for guiding humanity (because people that don’t think about such things will not take an active role in that effort , by definition) seems also uncontroversial. In short, I have no idea what you’re on about. That said, I’m with you on labor movements, and believe that unions and coops are generally extremely positive things most of the time. I just don’t expect much from the average person anymore. Decades of observation has made me skeptical of the ability of the Everyman to act in his own best interests, on average. It’s worth mentioning that it is apparent to me that this inability is fostered in no small part by people and entities that make it their business to subvert otherwise good faith actors that don’t exercise very much independent thought into pursuing goals and supporting policies that are explicitly or covertly not in their collective best interest. Gullible people are gullible, and they are exploited all up and down the political spectrum.
WalterBright 2y ago
There have been over 20,000 communes set up in the US. They are not illegal. Pick one and join it. Or set your own up.
- harwoodjp 2y ago
  Socialism is seizing the workplace from the capitalist.
  - WalterBright 2y ago
    The problem with a system based on taking is that one runs out of things to take. Better to have a system based on creating things.
    - KingMob 2y ago
      > The problem with a system based on taking is that one runs out of things to take. Pretty damning critique of capitalists there, comrade.
      - WalterBright 2y ago
        What was America like before capitalists? and after? Where did all that wealth come from, comrade?
        Apocryphon 2y ago
        Did you know there used to be people who lived on that land
        WalterBright 2y ago
        I missed the railroads, steel industries, chip manufacturers, iphones, etc. that were looted from those people? BTW, studies of the bones of pre-Columbian Indians shows they worked hard and suffered from periodic famines, as well as a lot of violence.

deleted 2y ago

[deleted]

> Why don't workers unite to democratically manage production? Because the majority of workers are doing the minimum amount of work to get by, because ~50% of workers are below average intelligence, because those with the entrepreneurial skill and/or business management competence necessary to make this happen benefit more from the current system and have less motivation to mess with it.

harwoodjp 2y ago
[flagged]
- K0balt 2y ago
  I can’t speak to op’s emotional well being, but he is spot on with his reasoning. In the rarified air that most of us here inhabit, it’s easy to forget that for every college professor there is someone for whom tying their shoes is a significant cognitive challenge. For every really smart person, there is someone who lacks the cognition to participate meaningfully in society. For every brilliant individual, there is someone whose mental capacity puts them in need of lifelong care. The bell curve is a bitch. The average person just gets by and doesn’t think all that much about anything outside of their immediate surroundings. For most, politics and such is a team sport, not an intellectual pursuit. It’s an uncomfortable fact of life, and those that have talents and gifts above the norm are by default responsible for guiding and advancing society. We ignore that burden at the peril of all.
  - harwoodjp 2y ago
    Your view is called Social Darwinism and it’s really dangerous/dystopian. Also collapses under scrutiny.
    - nyokodo 2y ago
      > Your view is called Social Darwinism The only thing either response to your original reply have done is provide uncontroversial and non-conspiratorial reasons why Mondragons are extremely rare. Calling that Social Darwinism is like calling you a Stalinist, a slander based entirely on a superficial similarity of your rhetoric.
      - harwoodjp 2y ago
        You guys are both discussing intelligence hierarchies (wtf?) without regard to actual history of popular labor movements being violently squashed.
        K0balt 2y ago
        I don’t think that asserting that intellectual capacity tends towards a bell curve distribution is an example of social Darwinism. I think that’s just called a testable hypothesis validated by a plethora of studies. As for the idea that people that bother to think about things like their social responsibility to humanity are , by default, responsible for guiding humanity (because people that don’t think about such things will not take an active role in that effort , by definition) seems also uncontroversial. In short, I have no idea what you’re on about. That said, I’m with you on labor movements, and believe that unions and coops are generally extremely positive things most of the time. I just don’t expect much from the average person anymore. Decades of observation has made me skeptical of the ability of the Everyman to act in his own best interests, on average. It’s worth mentioning that it is apparent to me that this inability is fostered in no small part by people and entities that make it their business to subvert otherwise good faith actors that don’t exercise very much independent thought into pursuing goals and supporting policies that are explicitly or covertly not in their collective best interest. Gullible people are gullible, and they are exploited all up and down the political spectrum.

WalterBright 2y ago

There have been over 20,000 communes set up in the US. They are not illegal. Pick one and join it. Or set your own up.

harwoodjp 2y ago
Socialism is seizing the workplace from the capitalist.
- WalterBright 2y ago
  The problem with a system based on taking is that one runs out of things to take. Better to have a system based on creating things.
  - KingMob 2y ago
    > The problem with a system based on taking is that one runs out of things to take. Pretty damning critique of capitalists there, comrade.
    - WalterBright 2y ago
      What was America like before capitalists? and after? Where did all that wealth come from, comrade?
      - Apocryphon 2y ago
        Did you know there used to be people who lived on that land
        WalterBright 2y ago
        I missed the railroads, steel industries, chip manufacturers, iphones, etc. that were looted from those people? BTW, studies of the bones of pre-Columbian Indians shows they worked hard and suffered from periodic famines, as well as a lot of violence.