Miriam: Yes. In my small world the money is first and all the rest is second.
Richard
Sent from my iPhone
On Oct 30, 2018, at 11:17 AM, Miriam Vieni <miriamvieni@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
So you don't believe that every working American should earn a wage large
enough to allow him or her to support a family with basic necessities and
some time for rest and rejuvenation and a bit of money saved for emergencies,
even if that worker is doing unskilled labor?
Miriam
-----Original Message-----
From: blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
<blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> On Behalf Of R. E. Driscoll Sr
Sent: Tuesday, October 30, 2018 12:19 PM
To: blind-democracy@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: [blind-democracy] Re: New member
The minimum wage must vary with the nature of the work being performed.
Richard
Sent from my iPhone
On Oct 30, 2018, at 7:51 AM, Bob Hachey <bhachey@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
Hi Evan,
IMHO, one is exploited if one is not paid a fair wage. Just exactly what is
a fair wage is a big question.
If today's minimum wage were to be made equivalent to what we had in the
1970's, it would have to be at least $18.00 per hour.
Bob Hachey
-----Original Message-----
From: blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
[mailto:blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of Evan Reese
Sent: Monday, October 29, 2018 11:10 PM
To: blind-democracy@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: [blind-democracy] Re: New member
Okay, so I am wondering, how is it exploitation to sell one's labor to
someone else? If you buy a product from a person or a business, are you
exploiting that person or business by exchanging your money for the product
or service you want to buy?
In the same way, if I sell my labor to another person or a business, how am
I being exploited? Is it because, unless I get a disability check or some
other form of payment from the government, I need to work to eat?
Would everything be free in a system where noone is exploited?
Evan
-----Original Message-----
From: Roger Loran Bailey (Redacted sender "rogerbailey81" for DMARC)
Sent: Monday, October 29, 2018 10:46 PM
To: blind-democracy@xxxxxxxxxxxxx ; Evan Reese
Subject: [blind-democracy] Re: New member
Libertarian capitalism cannot achieve the goal of maximizing man's power
over nature and minimizing man's power over man simply because capitalism is
an exploitative system by definition. That is like asking if you can extend
someone's life by electrocuting him in an electric chair. You cannot steal
labor value from people and pretend that you are granting them freedom.
Well, on the other hand, I suppose you can pretend. They pretend it all the
time. But it can't be done. But again, science has nothing to do with
whether you should do something or not.
It has to do with facilitating your doing it. If libertarian capitalists
apply scientific method to what they really are doing they are being
scientific. But I happen to think the would also be using science to
accomplish anti-humanist goals.
_________________________________________________________________
Isaac Asimov
“Don't you believe in flying saucers, they ask me? Don't you believe in
telepathy? — in ancient astronauts? — in the Bermuda triangle? — in life
after death?
No, I reply. No, no, no, no, and again no.
One person recently, goaded into desperation by the litany of unrelieved
negation, burst out "Don't you believe in anything?"
Yes", I said. "I believe in evidence. I believe in observation, measurement,
and reasoning, confirmed by independent observers. I'll believe anything, no
matter how wild and ridiculous, if there is evidence for it. The wilder and
more ridiculous something is, however, the firmer and more solid the
evidence will have to be.”
― Isaac Asimov
On 10/28/2018 10:39 PM, Evan Reese wrote:
Hmmm, so if libertarian capitalism were to achieve the goal of
maximizing our power over nature, and minimizing man's power over man,
would that be considered Marxism?
Now we don't currently have anything like libertarian capitalism, but
the version of capitalism we have right now has gone much farther in
increasing our power over nature than any other economic system
previously tried. It would be ironic if the zenith of capitalism
turned out to achieve the goals of Marxism. If he were a real
scientist, then he should have no objection to that.
As for being close to infallible, he thought the revolution would come
in his lifetime. In 1857 in fact.
You should move on. Most of humanity already has.
Evan
-----Original Message----- From: Roger Loran Bailey (Redacted sender
"rogerbailey81" for DMARC)
Sent: Sunday, October 28, 2018 10:01 PM
To: blind-democracy@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: [blind-democracy] Re: New member
Marx was most certainly extremely influential. I suppose we will have
to wait a couple thousand years to see if he was as influential as
Jesus or Mohammad. And as anathema as I find religion it is a case of
objective reality that those religious leaders were extremely
influential. But there is no such thing as a secular religion. The
phrase is contradictory. I suppose that there are people who look to
Marx as infallible and so far he has come pretty close to being just
that. That probably has a lot to do with how he became so influential.
But if you regard Marx as infallible then you are not a Marxist. He
analyzed capitalist economics and he made predictions that did come
true and there were some things that he did not foresee and could not
have foreseen that pushed other predictions off to the future and that
have also required further analysis by his successors. But when it
comes to the goals that he set out your demand for prediction does not
really apply. I am not really so sure that it is all that important in
any scientific endeavor. In an investigative science you make
hypotheses which I suppose you can call predictions. Then you test
them and show that they are either true or false. If your hypothesis
is false that does not mean that you were not being scientific. The
point of conducting the experiment is to find out if it was correct or
not. Using scientific method in order to achieve a goal is another matter
though.
Anyone can use scientific method for that purpose, even capitalists.
The CEO of a company may set a goal for his company to make X number
of sales in the next quarter. If this goal is approached
scientifically that means that objective reality is recognized and
that may mean that the history of sales under similar conditions may
be looked at. The methods that caused the sale goal to be accomplished
in the past may be considered and when failures have been made that
should be considered too. But it is hardly ever possible to know every
possible variable and so if all the employees act according to the
sales theory the goal may not be accomplished. In that case it is
necessary to figure out what went wrong and incorporate that
information into formulating a more refined sales theory. This process
does have its failures, but that does not invalidate that it was
scientific or that it should be thrown out entirely. Marxism applies
the same process to another goal. Now, let me remind you what that
goal is. When Trotsky was asked about it he said that our goal is the
maximization of man's power over nature and the minimization of man's
power over man. Now just how can we tell when that goal has been
reached? Can it ever be reached? Is there ever a time that we will be
able to say that we have manipulated reality to the point that no
further manipulation will bring about any further freedom? That would
mean that we knew everything there is to know about reality and so far
every time we have discovered something about reality that was not
known before that discovery has opened whole new questions about
reality that were not even thought of before. Does that mean that the
objective quest to understand reality is not scientific? Furthermore,
is capitalist economics has been analyzed, even very thoroughly, and
there is more to be investigated does that mean that the original
analysis was not scientific? I think it is important to recognize
science as the objective study of reality by objective methods rather
than to repeat the step by step simplistic algorithm that you are
taught in high school. And, then again, science is as neutral about
human endeavor as it can be. We have to decide what we want to
accomplish with the information we gain with science and use that
information to achieve our goals. Science doesn't care if we do or not. It
is our tool to use.
_________________________________________________________________
Isaac Asimov
“Don't you believe in flying saucers, they ask me? Don't you believe
in telepathy? — in ancient astronauts? — in the Bermuda triangle? — in
life after death?
No, I reply. No, no, no, no, and again no.
One person recently, goaded into desperation by the litany of
unrelieved negation, burst out "Don't you believe in anything?"
Yes", I said. "I believe in evidence. I believe in observation,
measurement, and reasoning, confirmed by independent observers. I'll
believe anything, no matter how wild and ridiculous, if there is
evidence for it. The wilder and more ridiculous something is, however,
the firmer and more solid the evidence will have to be.”
― Isaac Asimov
On 10/28/2018 3:38 PM, Evan Reese wrote:
Well, I would agree with some of this. I am certainly a humanist, and
indeed, Marxism is a product of humanism.
Also, I am a materialist, and Marxist is assumes materialism.
But there are a couple of problems with the idea that Marxism is
scientific.
Firstly, the followers of Marx didn't treat it as a science. They
treated Marx as a religious figure. I can't say it any better than
Peter Singer did in his book, Marx: A Very Short Introduction, so I
will quote him:
"Marx's Impact can only be compared with that of religious figures
like Jesus or Muhammad.
For much of the second half of the twentieth century, nearly four out
of every ten people on earth lived under governments that considered
themselves Marxist and claimed
- however Implausibly - to use Marxist principles to decide how the
nation should be run. In these countries Marx was a kind of secular
Jesus; his writings were the ultimate source of truth and authority;
his image was everywhere reverently displayed.
Does that sound like a scientist?
The second problem is that a real science makes testable predictions,
and if they are correct, then the scientific theory is valid. So
let's say that Marxism is in fact a scientific theory. And further,
let's say that it makes testable predictions. When the resentment of
the oppressed class reaches a sufficient level blah blah.
So how have those predictions turned out? Even you say that there is
no Communism anywhere on Earth. The closest to it is Cuba, which is
socialist.
The Communist manifesto was published 170 years ago. Since Communism
has been tried, or at least those who took power in various nations
said that's what they believed in, (I have my doubts), but let's
grant that they were all honest and really wanted to implement
Communism. So what happened?
The
scientific theory turned out to be wrong.
So how has it been modified since then? You don't seem to quote
anybody except these old guys, Marx, Lenin, Trotsky, who, in the case
of Marx, was the original creator of the theory, or, in the case of
the others, were part of those failed implementations of the theory.
You have told me to think outside the box. I think you are in a box
that was created in the 19th century, and has failed to deliver what
it claimed to be able to deliver. Maybe you should let it go. Few
people take it seriously anymore.
True, as Singer says, Marxism's impact on humanity is the equal of
that of the most influential religious leaders. He did indeed have a
tremendous impact on thinking about economics, his ideas brought
about modern sociology. I don't dismiss his influence on many aspects
of modern society.
But that doesn't mean we have to believe everything he said, just as
we do not have to believe what those religious leaders said either,
especially when it turns out that they were wrong about something,
just as Marx clearly is about the historical process of the arrival
of Communism.
You explain this maximum capacity of production concept as when the
revolution is most likely to break out. You have it exactly wrong, or
rather Marx does. It is when capitalism is at its booming best that
the revolution is least likely to occur because people are living as
well or better than they have before. It is when capitalism is in
trouble that people get restive because their quality of life is
threatened. The reason Communism is nowhere to be found is because,
despite its many imperfections, capitalism has delivered more to
humanity than Communism. The modern capitalist system has given a
higher standard of living to more people, billions in fact, than any
other economic system in all history. That is why few people really
believe in Marxism anymore. Even those regimes, such as China or
Vietnam, which still use the word "Communism" in their vocabulary
don't believe in it anymore.
So, I will be generous, for the sake of discussion, and grant that
Marxism is scientific. However, as you say, a real science must
modify its theories when the predictions of those theories don't pan
out. Marx's predictions haven't panned out. So where are the
modifications?
Evan
-----Original Message----- From: Roger Loran Bailey
Sent: Sunday, October 28, 2018 2:28 PM
To: blind-democracy@xxxxxxxxxxxxx ; Evan Reese
Subject: Re: [blind-democracy] Re: New member
Okay, first let me explain maximum capacity. Capitalism is subject to
a boom and bust cycle. Because the capitalists are always striving
for maximum profit they try to extract the maximum amount of labor
out of their workers that they can and that tends to result in
overproduction.
That is, they make more than they can sell. Then when they can't sell
they scale back. It is when the overproduction is at its height in
most all of the competing businesses and when the capitalists are
trying to expand their markets outside of their own country that
maximum production has been reached. That is an ideal time to
transition to socialism because there is simply plenty of goods to
distribute while the new order is being constructed and transitioned
to. Now, simply claiming that something is pseudoscientific without
understanding what the basis of claiming it to be scientific is rather
unscientific itself.
Here is how Marxism is scientific. Before Marx there were many
philosophers who postulated what they thought a perfect society would
look like. Most of them just wrote treatises or novels without making
an effort to bring it about or even formulating a way to bring it about.
Some of them founded utopian communities that most often lasted no
longer than their founders did. Some had a little more staying power
and I am thinking of the Shakers, but they did themselves in by
prohibiting reproduction and relied on recruiting orphans. Foster
care really wiped them out. But it is interesting that most all of
these postulated societies looked a lot alike. They can be lumped
together as utopian socialism. I would suggest the book, Socialism:
Utopian and Scientific by Frederik Engels to learn a lot about the
difference between scientific and utopian socialism. The main problem
with utopian socialism, even the varieties that were put in practice
was that there was no program to transform society as a whole. They
seemed to think that they were doing something great by just
withdrawing from society and living a so-called superior lifestyle.
Then along came Marx who founded scientific socialism. The scientific
method had been around for a long time before he came along, so it is
a bit surprising that no one had proposed this before. But the point
was to look at the real world as it really is and that includes the
real world as it has been historically. Then take note of how great
social and economic changes happened before and what they resulted in
and why they resulted in what they resulted in. That is, the first
step is to assess objective reality. It is necessary to realize that
the way any of us, individually or collectively, get what we want is
to manipulate reality. Praying doesn't do it. Incantations don't do
it. Magic doesn't do it. It is reality that must be manipulated. And
then every time we manipulate reality we change reality and have to
reassess it. There is also the problem that it is not possible to
know every aspect of reality and so any manipulation stands the
chance of resulting in unexpected consequences that have to be
accounted for in the next assessment. But the assessment has to be
made in the first place. Once the assessment of reality is made then
based on that assessment we then have to make theories based on
reality and apply those theories. Once the theories have been applied
we have to examine the new state of reality and assess where we went
wrong and where we went right and develop new theories accordingly.
The goal is socialism and communism beyond that. That means that we
assess reality insofar as how much progress we have made toward that
goal. You might say that each application of theory is an experiment
and the development of new theories is done according to the outcome
of the experiments. Now, I want to say that even as I was writing
this I understood that I was giving a wrong impression because I was
describing the process linearly. That is because I am a bit
constricted by the language. In practice it is not a simple matter of
step one followed by step two followed by step three and so forth.
That is because reality changes on a minute by minute basis and on a
second by second basis and on a basis of even smaller measures of
time. We do not have the ability to effect change and formulate new
theories on such an incremental scale, but we have to understand that
the reality we are working in and our goals are all moving targets.
That means that the assessments, the reassessments, the theorizing
and the actions are all taking place at the same time. But the
important point is to recognize reality. Science is the study of
reality. Reality is too vast and complex to fathom all at once and so
the study of reality is a never ending process. Science in and of itself
is a neutral thing too. It does not include value judgements like what is
the desired kind of society.
That kind of thing has to be arrived at by other philosophical means.
The philosophical basis for Marxism is humanism. If you are a
humanist then you see humanity as the ultimate and you adjust your
behavior to effect whatever is best for humanity and even the word
best is subject to your philosophical foundations. There are a good
many subdivisions of humanism too. Marxism falls into secular
humanism. That is, humanity is considered the ultimate without regard
to religious or other idealist considerations. Secular humanism is
also divided into other subphilosophies too, but there is no point
just now to drill down into exactly which subdivisions Marxism
belongs to. But to be scientific it must be secular and it must be
materialist. What the science does, though is not to determine just
why humanity should be the ultimate nor why any particular action
should be moral or immoral. The neutral science is only used as a
tool to get what we want. It helps us to decide which actions we
should take in order to move closer to our goals. Pseudoscience is a
different matter. Pseudoscience is idealist philosophy dressed up to
look like science. Astrology is an example. It uses lots of charts
and lists of data which look like tools that a real science uses, but
it is not the least based on objective observation and it does not
recognize that new things can be found out about the reality in which
it functions and thereby cause the astrological theory to change. For
that matter, it does not even recognize the precession of the Earth
and so the astrological charts are about a couple of thousand years
out of date and as a result the sun sign you may have been taught
that you were born under is about a month off. Alchemy is also a
pseudoscience. It uses reagents and laboratory glassware and so gives
the impression of something like the science of chemistry, but then relies
on the same kind of static assumptions that astrology does.
Marxism is dynamic, though, and recognizes the possibility of being
wrong at every turn and then deals with the objective reality that
results when it does turn out to be wrong. It is not a precise
science like physics or chemistry are though. All science has to deal
with variables because reality is in a constant state of change, but
in something like chemistry you can count on the mixing of certain
reagents to result in the same chemical reaction every time. In
Marxism the experiments are much slower in being made and every time
they are made the conditions change considerably before the next
experiment can be done. Instead of taking a precise action under a
precise set of conditions and observing a precise outcome that can be
repeated exactly the next time it is necessary to take similar
actions under similar conditions and observe the similar results and
explain the dissimilar results. That does not mean that it is a
pseudoscience. It just means that it is a science in which it is a lot
harder to get precise answers.
Still, though, the recognition of objective reality, the action on
objective reality and the objective consideration of results is what
makes it a science. Sometimes I think of psychology as a pseudo science.
But it is not really a pseudoscience. I think psychoanalysis is though.
I am inclined to think that talk psychotherapy is a pseudoscience too.
But psychology as a whole is actually scientific. Its problem is that
it is also a science that is not as precise as the so-called hard sciences.
The results are harder to trust and may change under differing
conditions. But that does not mean that psychological researchers do
not recognize reality and investigate it objectively. The same
applies to Marxism.
_________________________________________________________________
Isaac Asimov
“Don't you believe in flying saucers, they ask me? Don't you believe
in telepathy? — in ancient astronauts? — in the Bermuda triangle? —
in life after death?
No, I reply. No, no, no, no, and again no.
One person recently, goaded into desperation by the litany of
unrelieved negation, burst out "Don't you believe in anything?"
Yes", I said. "I believe in evidence. I believe in observation,
measurement, and reasoning, confirmed by independent observers. I'll
believe anything, no matter how wild and ridiculous, if there is
evidence for it. The wilder and more ridiculous something is,
however, the firmer and more solid the evidence will have to be.”
― Isaac Asimov
On 10/27/2018 10:52 PM, Evan Reese wrote:
It is scientific to make historical observations, note
commonalities, and then recognize what human behaviors lead to those
commonalities. The corruption of the Soviet revolution may have had
unique conditions, but so does every historical event. I'm sure one
could explain the objective conditions of Mao's corruption of the
Communist revolution in China. But the underlying cause was the same.
Ditto for Pol Pot.
Besides, Marxism isn't even scientific. It is pseudoscientific at best.
Some call it more of a religion with some justification. Humans are
under the control of historical forces rather than being under the
control of a deity, but the underlying mode of thinking is the same.
Just one example: What is this "maximum capacity of production" you
refer to? Is that the maximum capacity of production on the planet,
the solar system, or the galaxy? Even if you want to restrict this
maximum capacity of production to the planet, how much of the
planet's material would have to be involved before this maximum capacity
has been reached?
The entire surface? All the material down to what depth? There's no
such thing as a "maximum capacity of production". It's not a
scientific concept.
Evan
-----Original Message----- From: Roger Loran Bailey (Redacted sender
"rogerbailey81" for DMARC)
Sent: Saturday, October 27, 2018 10:21 PM
To: blind-democracy
Subject: [blind-democracy] Re: New member
You might want to consider the objective conditions that lead to the
corruption of a revolutionary state rather than just assume that
corruption is as natural as the sunrise. In the case of the Soviet
Union I would refer you to a book by Leon Trotsky entitled The
Revolution Betrayed. He offers an analysis of what went wrong.
First, Russia was not the ideal place to have a socialist
revolution. Marx himself had said that it would be better to wait
until capitalism had reached a maximum capacity of production.
However, as I have explained, we just do not have the fine control
to decide when to have a revolution and when to wait. If we had
control of social forces that precise we could just skip revolution
altogether and start building a new socialist society without it. As
I have also explained, that is the way we would really prefer it.
But again, revolution is like a natural disaster. When it comes we
have to deal with it and try to control it as well as possible in
order to get the best outcome that we can. The reason Russia was not
the best place to have a socialist revolution was that it was still
economically backwards. Germany or England would have been much
better choices. Russia had an underdeveloped capitalist economy and
was still largely under the influence of the remnants of feudalism.
The serfs had been freed by an earlier tsar, but without an effort
to educate them and to relieve them of the effective enslavement
they labored under there was simply no yeomanry to work with. Then,
Russia had just been involved in the greatest interimperialist war
that had ever been fought. It was such a large conflagration that it
had earned a name that had not been applied to any other war, the
world war. This Russian participation in that war had pretty much
devastated the Russian economy by itself and Russia was far from
free of physical destruction. When the bolsheviks took power they
immediately unilaterally withdrew Russia from the war, but undoing
the damage was not so easy. Then tsarist forces and the white
Russians rather objected to the bolshevik government too and waged
civil war against it. Well, what does more war do after just getting
out of another war? It causes even more destruction. So we had a new
revolutionary government that was dedicated to equality for all, but
there was not enough to go around for all. If all the consumer goods
and food that was available was distributed to everyone equally then
everyone would have been destitute and starving. As hard as it was
to make such decisions it was necessary to prioritize distribution
and production too. Then there was the problem of who was going to
do the distributing. If there is not enough to go around for all and
you are in charge of the distribution then, of course, you are going
to include yourself and your family in a high priority category.
This created an instant privileged layer in the economy. Then along
came Stalin. I have some suspicions about his having been a clinical
sociopath and a solopsist, but whether that is true or not he was a
very strong authoritarian with his own ideas of how the social
system should be arranged and he had no scruples about forcing it no
matter what obstacles were in the way. He tried to rebuild the
Russian productive capacity by brute force without any regard to
other things that should have been taken care of. By decree he
rescinded very many gains of the revolution to suit himself. But on
what basis did he rest his power? It was upon that privileged caste
that had been born as the layer who had been in charge of
distribution. They had accrued power and could lose it very easily
and if they lost it it would not be like just having to get a new
job with lower pay. Stalin rewarded them and severely threatened
them at the same time and so was able to consolidate his own power.
By the way, it did take some consolidation too. Despite the image you
have probably absorbed from capitalist depictions of the Soviet Union he
did not instantly become the absolute dictator. Eventually he did
essentially do that, but for some time his position was pretty perilous.
I could go on about how he distorted the whole world communist
movement and subordinated it to his theory of socialism in one
country and made foreign communist parties instruments of his own
foreign policy. I could go on about a lot of nefarious things he
did. But suffice it to say that the rise of Stalinism was a complete
betrayal of the communist movement.
The task of the uncorrupted communists became examining where the
Russian revolution went wrong and being careful to not repeat the
mistakes that led to Stalinism. This objective examination is all
part of being scientific socialists. Of course it is still necessary
to take whatever revolution you can get, but if you get one in a
country that is less than ideal it is still well to examine the
specifics of what went wrong in Russia. What you should not do is to
ignore the objective conditions and just make pronouncements like it
is just human nature to be corrupted by power. It is more of a
matter that already being corrupt makes one strive for personal
power. But one really should not just ignore the objective causes
for things going wrong. That falls far short of being scientific.
_________________________________________________________________
Isaac Asimov
“Don't you believe in flying saucers, they ask me? Don't you believe
in telepathy? — in ancient astronauts? — in the Bermuda triangle? —
in life after death?
No, I reply. No, no, no, no, and again no.
One person recently, goaded into desperation by the litany of
unrelieved negation, burst out "Don't you believe in anything?"
Yes", I said. "I believe in evidence. I believe in observation,
measurement, and reasoning, confirmed by independent observers. I'll
believe anything, no matter how wild and ridiculous, if there is
evidence for it. The wilder and more ridiculous something is,
however, the firmer and more solid the evidence will have to be.”
― Isaac Asimov
On 10/26/2018 11:30 PM, Evan Reese wrote:
Hmmm, well, the problem arises when those who are running the state
get corrupted by power; and we've seen that that is what happens
more often than not. I'm being generous here. It would be more
accurate to say that that is what happens pretty much all the time.
That being the case, it is hardly a plausible notion that the state
will stop oppressing, as you put it: "When objective conditions
ease to the point that there s is not possibility that these
regressive forces can overthrow what you have fought for then the
state can start withering away, ..."
What is overwhelmingly more likely to happen, and which history
will verify ad nauseam is that the state will go on oppressing just
for the sake of oppressing, because the people running it have
gotten corrupted by power. They will invent new class enemies, new
regressive forces, scapegoats for why things haven't turned out as
well as was promised, et cetera, et cetera, and the whole sorry cycle
will repeat itself.
Evan
-----Original Message----- From: Roger Loran Bailey
Sent: Friday, October 26, 2018 11:10 PM
To: blind-democracy@xxxxxxxxxxxxx ; Evan Reese
Subject: Re: [blind-democracy] Re: New member
As a matter of fact, upon the completion of a revolution the
oppressed class does become the ruling class. I would recommend
that you read State and Revolution by Vladimir I. Lenin to learn
how the dynamics of this process plays out. That book was written
as a polemic against the anarchists who wanted to just abolish the
state by decree upon the triumph of the revolution and Lenin
explained that would be throwing away the entire revolution and all
of its gains. The reason is that civil war or not and winning the
civil war or not it is impossible to kill each and every person who
benefited from the old order. Let's look at what the state is.
Lenin explained this, but if you read Hobbs you will see that he
was well aware of it too. The state is an apparatus by which one
class exercises power over another class by means of violence or
the threat of violence. The armed forces and the police force are
the instruments of violence that the state uses to wield that
violence. If you don't believe this just try to defy the state.
Pick out a minor crime against bourgeois law. Make sure you are
observed violating it because it is possible to get away with minor
crimes if you are careful.
Try, say, jaywalking in front of a cop. When he tries to give you a
ticket tell him that you do not recognize the authority of his
government nor his authority either. Then when he arrests you
resist the arrest. Defy the power of the state at every turn. When
you are taken to court repeat that you do not recognize the court's
authority and try to walk out. When you are taken to jail do your
best to escape. Continue to resist and defy at every turn and just
see how long it takes for you to get shot. Anyway, abolishing the
state by decree would mean abolishing all armed forces and police
and to do so right after the revolution. If you do that the very
next thing that will happen is that the people who benefited from
the old order will instantly reestablish the state again and the
revolutionary struggle you just went through will be instantly
defeated and you will be worse off than you were before the
revolution even got started. You will be worse off because you
can't really expect that your enemies will not want to take some
revenge. What happens is that the class that was formally oppressed
forms its own state and then proceeds to oppressed the former
oppressors. As time passes this can ease off but as long as there
are regressive forces about both domestic and foreign who would
reestablish their own form of a state as soon as you abolish yours
then you have to maintain the workers state. When objective
conditions ease to the point that there s is not possibility that
these regressive forces can overthrow what you have fought for then
the state can start withering away, as Lenin put it He then said
that the state will gradually cease to administer people and will
start administering things. By things he meant commodities and
services that are necessary to human needs and comfort. When it
administers only things it is no longer a state.
_________________________________________________________________
Isaac Asimov
“Don't you believe in flying saucers, they ask me? Don't you
believe in telepathy? — in ancient astronauts? — in the Bermuda
triangle? — in life after death?
No, I reply. No, no, no, no, and again no.
One person recently, goaded into desperation by the litany of
unrelieved negation, burst out "Don't you believe in anything?"
Yes", I said. "I believe in evidence. I believe in observation,
measurement, and reasoning, confirmed by independent observers.
I'll believe anything, no matter how wild and ridiculous, if there
is evidence for it. The wilder and more ridiculous something is,
however, the firmer and more solid the evidence will have to be.”
― Isaac Asimov
On 10/25/2018 11:54 AM, Evan Reese wrote:
Okay, I've heard this scenario before, and just for the sake of
discussion, I'll grant its vallidity.
The problem is what happens after the revolution of the oppressed
class. From the many examples we have seen, what always happens is
that the formerly oppressed class simply becomes the new ruling
class, and the cycle starts all over again. I could go into a long
litany of revolutions, some called themselves Communist, some
called themselves Socialist, where this has been played out, but I
don't think I need to.
When I asked you where this has been tried and how it worked out,
the only example you mentioned was Cuba. And even there, how much
freedom do the people have? When was the last time they were
permitted to choose their leaders? How much criticism of their
government are they permitted?
The reason for this is that dominance hierarchies are wired into
our genetics. You can see it in our chimp relatives and ape
ancestors. It goes back much farther than that into our mammalian
ancestry though.
Until or unless humans get a genetic makeover, the notion of a
classless society will always remain a pipe dream.
Evan
-----Original Message----- From: Roger Loran Bailey (Redacted
sender "rogerbailey81" for DMARC)
Sent: Thursday, October 25, 2018 12:58 AM
To: blind-democracy
Subject: [blind-democracy] Re: New member
Okay, let me explain the inevitability of revolution in more detail.
In
a class society the people who find themselves in the oppressed
classes will resent this. Despite the fact that ruling class
ideology permeates society as a whole on an individual level and
collectively when the individuals combine their actions resentment
is there and people will take actions to lessen the disparities
that they are subject to. These actions may take the form of
organizing unions or it may take the form of engaging in political
action, but the whole point is to make the social system more
fair. During most of the time the organizers of the resistance do
not even see the necessity of overthrowing the entire system, but
think they can reform it into something that will be more fair.
Because of fluctuations in a class economy these disparities may
be greater at some times than at other times and the amount of
resistance may be greater than it is at other times. This is all
called the class struggle. Sometimes the oppressed classes will
make gains and the rulers have to make concessions to maintain
their rule and at other times it is the oppressed classes that
have to make the concessions.
One
thing the oppressed classes do not want to do is to get involved
in a revolution. Let's face it, revolution is not only to the
great disadvantage of the class that is being deposed, but a lot
of workers die and a lot of infrastructure is destroyed and it is
to the great disadvantage of everyone. However, as the class
struggle ebbs and flows the point comes that the rulers see that
they may be in actual danger of being deposed. They will resist
that by any means necessary.
Concessions
is one means, but if the push for an equitable system continues
other means are used. That means violence. In every revolution in
history the violence was initiated by the rulers in an attempt to
maintain their rule. What are the ruled to do? They have to defend
themselves. If they do not defend themselves they lose every bit
of progress they have made up until that time and they are likely
to lose their lives too. As they defend themselves against
violence with return violence the violence escalates. This becomes
a process that cannot be stopped by either side because each side
stands to lose everything if they give up. It is something like a
natural disaster. When a hurricane, for example, approaches you
cannot stop the hurricane no matter what you do. You can only deal
with it. A lot of planning and preparation make it easier to deal
with with, but whether you deal with it well or poorly it is still
going to happen. That is what a revolutionary party is for, to
deal with the revolution when it happens. That is where the
responsibility comes in. It is responsible to have a cadre of
people who are trained in how to deal with revolution and who will
step in to guide the revolution when it comes to make sure that
the best outcome is arrived at.
_________________________________________________________________
Isaac Asimov
“Don't you believe in flying saucers, they ask me? Don't you
believe in telepathy? — in ancient astronauts? — in the Bermuda
triangle? — in life after death?
No, I reply. No, no, no, no, and again no.
One person recently, goaded into desperation by the litany of
unrelieved negation, burst out "Don't you believe in anything?"
Yes", I said. "I believe in evidence. I believe in observation,
measurement, and reasoning, confirmed by independent observers.
I'll believe anything, no matter how wild and ridiculous, if there
is evidence for it. The wilder and more ridiculous something is,
however, the firmer and more solid the evidence will have to be.”
― Isaac Asimov
On 10/24/2018 11:03 PM, Evan Reese wrote:
Sorry, but that sounds like a ducking of responsibility to me.
So Lenin had no choice when he committed his oppression? Was it
all just an inevitable product of ineluctable historical forces?
He was just a tool of history, and had no responsibility for what he
did?
You may consider that too many questions, but they're all
related, so they really boil down to one: Do humans have
responsibility for what they do or not?
Evan
-----Original Message----- From: Roger Loran Bailey (Redacted
sender "rogerbailey81" for DMARC)
Sent: Wednesday, October 24, 2018 10:49 PM
To: blind-democracy@xxxxxxxxxxxxx ; Miriam Vieni
Subject: [blind-democracy] Re: New member
As I have said before, you don't get a choice of whether you get
a revolution or not. When Trotsky was asked if all the
destruction and death was worth it he said that the question was
teleological. When class contradictions sharpen to the point that
revolution breaks out the best you can do is to steer it and
guide it into the best outcome you can and ameliorate the
destruction that occurs along the way.
_________________________________________________________________
Isaac Asimov
“Don't you believe in flying saucers, they ask me? Don't you
believe in telepathy? — in ancient astronauts? — in the Bermuda
triangle? — in life after death?
No, I reply. No, no, no, no, and again no.
One person recently, goaded into desperation by the litany of
unrelieved negation, burst out "Don't you believe in anything?"
Yes", I said. "I believe in evidence. I believe in observation,
measurement, and reasoning, confirmed by independent observers.
I'll believe anything, no matter how wild and ridiculous, if
there is evidence for it. The wilder and more ridiculous
something is, however, the firmer and more solid the evidence will
have to be.”
― Isaac Asimov
On 10/24/2018 9:45 PM, Miriam Vieni wrote:
Evan,
What about peaceful change as revolution? That's about the only
kind of revolution I'd support. The problem is, it doesn't seem
as if powerful social forces can be controlled.
Miriam
-----Original Message-----
From: blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
<blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> On Behalf Of Evan Reese
Sent: Wednesday, October 24, 2018 4:48 PM
To: blind-democracy@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: [blind-democracy] Re: New member
I would like to add my voice to the welcomes, Mary.
I've seen you on other lists. You seem pretty tech savvy, which
is cool.
I am also new here. I joined last week. On social issues I'm
definitely left of center, but on economic issues I'm in the
center, or maybe even a bit to the right. I support the current
economic system. I defend the "capitalist running dogs" around
here. (Yes, some people actually talked like that in the 20th century.
Fortunately, humanity has moved on since then. Mostly that
is.)
Seriously though, I am more than happy to talk about
shortcomings of the current economic model and how to fix them,
but I'm not interested in revolution. I'm with John Lennon:
But when you talk about destruction, Don'tcha know that you can
count me out.
So once again, welcome. I hope you enjoy it here.
Evan
-----Original Message-----
From: Carl Jarvis
Sent: Wednesday, October 24, 2018 11:50 AM
To: blind-democracy@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: [blind-democracy] Re: New member
Hello and welcome, Mary.
If you have a natural curiosity and a sense of adventure, you've
come to the right list. We do try hard to stay on target and
not fall into name calling, as happens on the ACB chat list at times.
But a good sense of humor and a moderately thick skin, and
you'll soon be right at home.
As for me, besides being Carl Jarvis, I am a self proclaimed
Progressive, an Agnostic, and 83 years old. My wife and I
provide services to older blind and low vision folks on the
Great Olympic Peninsula, through our organization named,
Peninsula Rehabilitation Services. We've been at it almost 24
years and have worked with well over 3,000 clients. I'm totally
blind...for the past 55 years.
Cathy and I work as a team since living here in the deep, dark
forest does not allow a blind man the ability to travel to many
of our clients alone.
And just for the record, eating, sleeping, working, vacationing
and breathing the same air day after day finds us still deeply
in love with one another.
Carl Jarvis
(PS. Cathy's horse is down this morning. She's called the vet
and is trying to get him up and moving. I was going to buy a
new keyboard today, but it's looking as if I'll have to make do
with these sticky keys for a while longer.)
On 10/23/18, Miriam Vieni <miriamvieni@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
Hello Mary,
This list is suddenly becoming busy. We've acquired two new
members and will, I believe, be acquiring another one. It's an
ill wind that blows no good, they say. I do believe we can
thank Mr. Trump for the rejuvenation of this list. At any rate,
I'll forward one of the Real News Network digests to the list.
It's a website which has excellent little news videos that you
can listen to and also, there's a text of each one, I believe.
I'll forward one of the digests. You go to the heading of the
story in which you're interested, which is also a link, and
then, you move down until you find a play button and press
enter.
If you find the website, you can sign up for your own digests.
The website is in Baltimore. Its founder, Paul Jay, comes from
Canada, and it does national, international, and local Baltimore
news.
Some of my favorite people are on there: max Blumenthal, Ben
Norton, Dean Baker, etc.
Miriam
-----Original Message-----
From: blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
<blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> On Behalf Of Mary Otten
Sent: Tuesday, October 23, 2018 8:44 PM
To: blind-democracy@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: [blind-democracy] New member
Hi folks,
I just joined this list, of whose existence I had no idea until
a friend forwarded me a book recommendation from one of the
BARD lists, where this list was mentioned. I recognize Miriam's
name from the bookshare list of many years ago. We liked lots
of the same books on political/historical topics. Anyway, I
joined out of curiosity to see what the list was like.
I've seen a couple posts, one of which mentioned the real news
network, with which I am not familiar. what is it?
Mary
