- 26 Dec 2010 04:42
#13585749
It's Christmas and I've had a few glasses of wine but I'll try to show you what I've seen recently.
Look, Marx is NOT AN EASY READ. Such things can take hundreds of years to filter into the mainstream of society. But fortunately THIS IDEA is not coming from just one direction, nor even just a marginalized direction. Christianity has at its root the same potential.
This is hard. If you don'y really try you probably won't get any of it.
At the heart of the argument for Communism there's an argument about human nature that revolves around consciousness. Essentially it suggests that we are defined by our context. That there is no other definition of the public person. That there is nothing other than this in social terms. A person is what they are in society. The counter-proposition which capitalism puts forth is essentially mechanistic individualism, that a person lives in their brain and is a survival machine.
You have soft skin. This I know, because you are human. A moderately sharp knife can spill your intestines. This is not a mistake of evolution, we are not built to fight, but to feel. Our vulnerabilities come with sensitivities and a subtle creative imagination. We are more parts storytellers than warriors. Bear with me.
The reason we are like this is that we've developed to cooperate. We share a consciousness. I cannot emphasize this strongly enough. The implications are so enormous it has been the source of religions, religious wars, revolutions, on-going animosity, you name it, much blood and rage. If we accept this idea - even remotely, even experimentally, it suggests that no matter what we do individually THE REALITY WE EXPERIENCE is essentially shared, essentially not ours individually, but part of a narrative. We are nothing without each other, and with each other we are what we do to each other.
If we accept this the whole paradigm of capitalism appears idiotic.
What do you want to be? An enemy? A creature in a vicious battle? A pawn of money? These questions become important when we cease to think of people as determined machines, and begin to think of them as creative and improvisational social elements.
What do you want? It can be anything.
So Marx says at this point, look, we don't live forever. We don't really gain for having our senses pandered to. We gain because we gain in the esteem of others - basically because we are good to each other. Where self comes in, it's like - our special nature is contributing. We are important. We are artists. This is what fulfills us. To have a family we love, to have friends we trust. Good times follow these things. Not money. Certainly not money gained by robbery or lies.
Marx was a shit-ton smarter that the vast majority of the human race, but people come to these same conclusions all the time. It's intuitively understood. We know bad from good, and all that gets in the way is this constant rationalizing about MONEY. Money is how we excuse being asses to each other. And for all our efforts it doesn't work. It doesn't make it ok. Competition has its limit because we are defined by what we do to each other, and we LIVE in that definition.
So, to the topic. If you think profit is the only motive, it's natural to say so, and unnatural to think so, because it's what we are taught, and it's what we can NEVER LIVE. To live that is to become a villain. To become a villain is to make oneself incapable of feeling, of loving, of hope, of trust, of excellence, of grace... To die wretched.
When communists talk about the means of production they mean control of their destiny. When given control of their destiny people are not the wicked boogeymen of capitalist lore. By this theory, they want nothing more than to be good and productive. Nihilistic individualism is the PRODUCT of capitalism, and this is what capitalists blame. But this is not really a communist/capitalist question. I've studied comparative religion, world history and art, it's all saying the same thing. Drop a couple bucks and go to a movie, if it's worth anything it's saying the same thing.
Being good is not about winning at the expense of others.
The non-profit motive rules the world. That's why capitalism has to use force and lies.
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Wild geese flying over a lake don't intend to cast a reflection
and the water has no mind to retain their image