Freedom, Capitalism, and Work: A Progressive Humanist Analysis

[Evoken]

I would like to know how people here respond to the objections against Capitalism raised in this article.

http://naturyl.humanists.net/work.html

I just read it and extracted some relevant paragraphs from it. I will write some comments on them and post them later.

Thanks in advance,

Evo

Edited March 11, 2007 by Evoken

[Galileo Blogs]

My first reaction was that whoever wrote this is a disgruntled wannabe intellectual who spends his days working at Blockbusters and his nights resenting everyone around him who makes more money than he is making. The entire diatribe sounds like a lament that the world does not acknowledge his right to be lazy.

As for the method, it is clearly dishonest. Just the fact of using Nazi metaphors and imagery is an appeal to emotion. On an emotional level, he connects everyone who values work to being someone who runs a concentration camp. That sort of emotional juxtaposition is not an argument.

His essay is a series of these emotional juxtapositions. I did not detect any real argument except for a series of these plaintive appeals to emotion.

[aequalsa]

His essay is a series of these emotional juxtapositions. I did not detect any real argument except for a series of these plaintive appeals to emotion.

Also, he conflates the concept of force. He promotes Sweden and mixed economies and describes capitalism as "delivering slavery". He accuses capitalism of forcing people to be slaves(low paid workers) when actually, it is reality that causes the differences in success levels. So what he is fundementally opposed to-as all communists are-is reality.

His argument really just boils down to "Because reality causes us to have differeing circumstances, it is the proper role of the government to put guns in the faces of the able to help those who are not." That he calls that freedom and actual freedom based on individual liberty, slavery, is laughable. And unfortunately all too common.

[Evoken]

The entire thing is basically a complain that the world does not acknowledges the author's right to be lazy. Also, as is typical of all socialists, communists, the author hates the fact that some people are more successful than others.

There is so much wrong with that article that I don't even know where to start. I started extracting parts of it as I was reading to a text document in order to write some comments, but I ended up with a really large document. Anyway, here are a few paragraphs I think worth commenting on:

Arguments in favor of work's value usually boil down to the question of obligation. We are to work because "the world does not owe us a living." But why doesn't it? After all, we did not choose to be born. To say that we have any obligation in a transaction we did not choose smacks of coercion and even enslavement, but those who point out the fact that no one chooses to be born are customarily dismissed as "childish," "unrealistic," etc. And yet, if I were to give you a candy bar which you never asked for and wait until after you had eaten part of it to inform you that I expected payment, how would you think of me?

I wonder who the author thinks we should ask when we want to know if an unborn child wants to be born or not? Can he imagine an scenario where he chooses to be born?

His analogy with the candy bar fails, it is just not on the same level as people not choosing to be born. The person accepted and ate the candy bar, he had the option to reject it too. One does not have this option when it comes to being born.

There is also a critical mistake the author makes. The world does not has an obligation to sustain your life. It has however the obligation to respect your right to life and also your freedom of action. The world does not has the obligation to provide you food, for example, but it has the obligation to preserve the means by which you may buy food (i.e. the right to work and earn a salary).

Another thing is, parents are the ones who decide to have children, having children entails a wiliness to invest resources and time in educating, raising and taking care of them, until the time that they can take care of themselves. The children are responsibility of the parents, not of the world or society. If we extend the author's logic a bit farther, the act of parents investing in food, clothes and education for their children when they did not choose it also "smacks of coercion and even enslavement". If the author is to be consistent, the mother should give birth and leave the child alone, so that whatever happens to him, happens.

Early in the morning, he is awakened against his will by the blaring of an alarm clock.

Awakened against his will? What a lazy man! What does he proposes? That he be allowed to sleep for as long as he wants any day of the week? So, if it is his will to sleep 16 hours a day, then, well, who are we to say otherwise? Good luck having any form of functional society with that mindset.

In the space of an hour or less, he must shower, dress, and cram down some kind of breakfast. Next, he begins his lengthy daily commute, which he despises. He arrives at the workplace and is reprimanded by an authority figure for being five minutes late (or some other petty concern). He spends the next 8 hours doing exactly what he is told the way he is told to do it, all the while being expected to maintain a compliant "team player" attitude out of gratitude to the employer for giving him the job (and out of fear of losing it).

I wonder why the author thinks that everybody "despises" his job? Why does he inserts the derogatory remark "which he despises"? Personally, I love doing graphic and web design, I am passionate for it. Ergo, I work on that area. Ergo, I do not despise my work.

Also, being reprimanded by your boss for being five minutes late is wrong now? You are the one who failed at your responsibility, assume the consequences. You are being paid to be there at a specific time.

Lastly, the whole bit about "doing exactly what he is told the way he is told to do it" is unrealistic. That is simply not the way things happen in the work place. You are hired because of your skills and knowledge, you are hired because the company that hires you finds you valuable and important for it to achieve it's own goals.

That being the case, the company that hires you expects you to know whatever you are supposed to know in order to perform the role that you were hired to perform. See?

My boss does not sits behind me telling how to do things in any of the graphic and web design programs that I use. My boss is not there telling me how to create any piece of art, ad, etc. Rather, they tell me what they need to do, and ask me to come up with options or solutions to it. Instead of seeking to treat me as a slave, they encourage me to propose ideas, to speak out my mind and to get creative and "break the mold". In that situation, both my boss and I benefit. He benefits, because I provide the solution his company needs to achieve it's goals, and I benefit because I grow professionally and, since they company achieves it's goals, I also get paid.

There is much I could comment on, but I rather leave it at that, at least for now.

Evo

[Whoisjohngalt]

Just a random statement:

In developed nations, most of us have access to clean water, safe food supplies, public roads, free primary education, etc.

I suppose he supposes that the "developed nations" have just sprung up out of the earth by themselves or fallen out of trees.

And, I wonder how he justifies his copyright over this article?

Also, his thinking that the Orwellian world is real is questionable. Because in a communist, totalitarian society, there is almost zero industrial progress and Orwell's story can never exist in a real totalitarian world. Basically, Orwell was one of those guys who said to communists: "I agree with your ideals, but not your practice". Ayn Rand however showed why those ideals were wrong.

[bobsponge]

What I want to know is how this moron thinks that private property equals slavery!?!?!?!