[ExI] commies vs marxists was: RE: chinese fires, was:RE: book review

[William Flynn Wallace]

I get my garden seeds from Johnny's Selected Seeds, a company started 40
years ago by a R. Johnston.  When he retired it became employee owned.  It
is still a fine business. I think it would be instructive to check out
employee-owned companies and see how they compare in wages etc. to regular
companies.  bill w

On Thu, Dec 1, 2022 at 9:09 PM Will Steinberg via extropy-chat <
extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote:

> Well again I don't think the Chinese people hate Marxism, it's a hard
> thing to hate if you understand it because it's true--workers should get
> fair pay for the value of the work they do.  What they hate is
> authoritarianism.
>
> You say factory working is diminished but I'm pretty sure the majority of
> the world does that kind of work.  And even in America, minimum wage work
> for corporations is very, very widespread, even if a few factories are
> partially automated...
>
> On Thu, Dec 1, 2022, 7:57 PM spike jones via extropy-chat <
> extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote:
>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> *…*> *On Behalf Of *Will Steinberg via extropy-chat
>> *Subject:* Re: [ExI] chinese fires, was:RE: book review
>>
>>
>>
>> >…That's another thing that kinda bugged me, Spike--the way you were
>> talking about Marxism made it seem like you were conflating it with
>> authoritarianism…
>>
>>
>>
>> No worries Will.  Given sufficiently independent Marxist governments,
>> most with populations of one to five, the scenario you describe works just
>> fine and always have.
>>
>>
>>
>> Times have changed, a lot.  Now we no longer rely on human labor to
>> manufacture stuff very much.  A really good example is the Tesla factory up
>> the street.  There are workers there, but most of them are overseeing
>> manufacturing equipment.  It is nothing like the Ford factory that was
>> there 30 years ago where lines of actual biological units made and
>> assembled the cars.  Henry Ford was such a primitive savage that way.
>>
>>
>>
>> Now our biological units are mostly from India and write software to
>> control the construction of the cars.  They have the option of owning the
>> tools, by buying up stock in their own company.  Those who followed that
>> practice in Tesla are in great shape now.  They generally have a very low
>> collective opinion of Marxism, while simultaneously practicing it in their
>> homes, to eaching and from eaching with their spouses and children.
>>
>>
>>
>> Plenty of workers today are software developers, in which case they
>> already do own the tools.  More workers are moving toward that professional
>> paradigm all the time.  That whole gathering in a factory renting the
>> corporation’s tools business that vexed Marx (and his four brothers) is
>> really much diminished.
>>
>>
>>
>> I can easily foresee that Marxism (and every variant of communism)
>> steadily losing popularity, considering the current experience in China,
>> where the population would prefer to not have the exits welded shut because
>> of covid.  This expediency for slowing the pandemic carries its own risks,
>> such as making emergency egress physically impossible when the damn
>> building catches fire.  The Chinese proletariat disapprove of this as much
>> as we would.  The big difference of course is that our asses are heavily
>> armed and we intend to stay that way, lest we suffer the same fate as the
>> Chinese.
>>
>>
>>
>> spike
>>
>>
>>
>>
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