In a prior post, I said some things that were intended to antagonize socialism (with which the woods are lately abounding). Unsure of how many socialists read my blog regularly, I decided to post that blog at a socialist blog entitled Socialism Or Your Money Back (a clever, if ironic turn of phrase). My wordy dart hit it's mark there and a good many socialists as, well, "very mad with me". I invite you to visit the blog, specifically the entry I defamed, and read the comments that ensued. And by all means, leave a bunch of capitalist comments of your own.
As you see in the comment repartee, I met a man named Robert who I took a liking to. In his hopes of helping me get my Marx on, he suggested the writing of a little known Scottish shoe cobbler who came to America to get his Marx on. Robert suggested I do a little lite reading of Keracher and get back to him. I read How The Gods Were Made and I tried my best to read Economics for Beginners, but I kept busting out laughing so hard on that last one that I gave up (see below).
In the course of aplogetics, I always like to read "the enemies" script first. There is usually enough there that I need little by way of commentary from "our side" to refute the enemies errors. Such was the case here. If you are interested in the topic (and the following paragraphs don't resolve enough for you), then by all means do (attempt) to read Keracher (linked above). It is good to know what is driving the Organizer-in-Chief and his comrades.
A reponse to Robert upon reading Keracher:
In How The Gods Were Made, Keracher’s (and so too Marx’) thesis : Workers have traditionally been anesthetized (opiated) by religion to the extent that they cannot see the class inequities that burden them. The socialist plea is for workers to awaken to these inequities and seize the profit of their own production. Individualism is a problem in that it desires self-preservation / self-advancement in opposition to the preservation / advancement of the collective. It is only enlighted self-interest that puts the needs of the collective above the interest of self.
Keracher’s (and so too Marx’) two greatest (proven) errors are 1) there is a gross underestimation of the cost of production (Keracher’s strained and laughable word problem of the making of a piece of furniture omits so many ineluctable costs it is apparent he was reared in a land in which furniture was not a real thing and thus something of which he cannot conceive.), 2) the contradiction between self-interest and enlighted self-interest are irresolvable.
Furthermore, there has neither been a society in which classism did not exist nor has there been an instance of attempted socialism in which any semblance of the theory became operational. Insofar as Keracher has demanded that nothing can exist which does not already exist, the concept of a classless society is pure superstition and worthy of no greater worship than an invented god. “State socialism” is on it’s face a contradiction. If it is not the workers of the world who unite, but their governors who unite to impose socialism upon them (as we have underway in the United States of America in 2009), then it is only more hegemony which contradicts socialism at its core.
A final contradiction within the socialist “movement”. If history is inevitably riding the dialectic wave toward a classless society, then all efforts either to change or to accelerate the course of events would be senseless. Let us remember that no agent causes selection in a natural species, it is the near and apparent need to adapt that leads the organization itself from one state to the inexorable next state. Let the workers of the world unite when nature imposes unification upon them. Let us not, by fiat or firearm, impose evolution on anything or anyone. It would offend the laws of science by which we are bound. To do so would be false socialism, in which case I would demand my money back.
As you see in the comment repartee, I met a man named Robert who I took a liking to. In his hopes of helping me get my Marx on, he suggested the writing of a little known Scottish shoe cobbler who came to America to get his Marx on. Robert suggested I do a little lite reading of Keracher and get back to him. I read How The Gods Were Made and I tried my best to read Economics for Beginners, but I kept busting out laughing so hard on that last one that I gave up (see below).
In the course of aplogetics, I always like to read "the enemies" script first. There is usually enough there that I need little by way of commentary from "our side" to refute the enemies errors. Such was the case here. If you are interested in the topic (and the following paragraphs don't resolve enough for you), then by all means do (attempt) to read Keracher (linked above). It is good to know what is driving the Organizer-in-Chief and his comrades.
A reponse to Robert upon reading Keracher:
In How The Gods Were Made, Keracher’s (and so too Marx’) thesis : Workers have traditionally been anesthetized (opiated) by religion to the extent that they cannot see the class inequities that burden them. The socialist plea is for workers to awaken to these inequities and seize the profit of their own production. Individualism is a problem in that it desires self-preservation / self-advancement in opposition to the preservation / advancement of the collective. It is only enlighted self-interest that puts the needs of the collective above the interest of self.
Keracher’s (and so too Marx’) two greatest (proven) errors are 1) there is a gross underestimation of the cost of production (Keracher’s strained and laughable word problem of the making of a piece of furniture omits so many ineluctable costs it is apparent he was reared in a land in which furniture was not a real thing and thus something of which he cannot conceive.), 2) the contradiction between self-interest and enlighted self-interest are irresolvable.
Furthermore, there has neither been a society in which classism did not exist nor has there been an instance of attempted socialism in which any semblance of the theory became operational. Insofar as Keracher has demanded that nothing can exist which does not already exist, the concept of a classless society is pure superstition and worthy of no greater worship than an invented god. “State socialism” is on it’s face a contradiction. If it is not the workers of the world who unite, but their governors who unite to impose socialism upon them (as we have underway in the United States of America in 2009), then it is only more hegemony which contradicts socialism at its core.
A final contradiction within the socialist “movement”. If history is inevitably riding the dialectic wave toward a classless society, then all efforts either to change or to accelerate the course of events would be senseless. Let us remember that no agent causes selection in a natural species, it is the near and apparent need to adapt that leads the organization itself from one state to the inexorable next state. Let the workers of the world unite when nature imposes unification upon them. Let us not, by fiat or firearm, impose evolution on anything or anyone. It would offend the laws of science by which we are bound. To do so would be false socialism, in which case I would demand my money back.
a quick summary...
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