Marxism

Honestly if you could understand the PRINCIPLE involved, the DIFFERENCE between functions of government that are needed to run the society, and STEALING from some to give to others who are not employed in running the society, you wouldn't need to keep haranguing me about this. There's no need to specifically list each individual function of government if you grasp the principle involved, and I doubt I could myself though I've many times listed a few to convey the principle. How about road maintenance, military, police and other security forces, firefighting, utilities of all kinds? Some perhaps we could do without and various opinions can apply, but the point is that they are all put in place in order to serve the citizens and that makes them legitimate work to be supported by our taxes.Taking from one citizen to give to another is a different category. Yet you go on and on and on haranguing me about this TRIVIAL distinction that doesn't require ten thousand words if you simply understand the principle involved. Oh what DID your education do to your poor minds?Public education? You keep bringing that up too but I've said all I know to say on it. It might be a legitimate government function if it didn't involve indoctrination of the minds of children that many citizens don't want done to their children. This puts it in some other category so that it needs special discussion on its own.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.

I honestly don't have a clue how to communicate with you. I see you're trying and I respect that. perhaps I should attempt an argument based on emotions and how I feel about something?Here GoesI think Wal-Mart , Wellsfargo and AIG are evil they "steal" from and cheat people and I think think the people who run these companies and the top executives are no better then the man who stole your car or raped your sister. I think these people are immoral and disgusting and they "stole" and didn't earn the money they have.Obviously I want to justify why I feel this way but I'd like you to respond first and see how you feel about my feeling

Because it is irrelevant. And I HAVE answered it as far as I'm able to answer it. I don't lack the generous spirit, I said I was willing to pay taxes to support public education but you called my generous spirit grudging. I was pointing out your ideological prejudice. Education used to be a private matter. When it was first public in America it taught children from the Bible and the Westminster Catechism. Now THAT would frost you all if that continued today. But that sort of teaching DID make for the kind of hard-working moral citizenry a nation needs most.Now public education teaches evolution and it tacitly supports sexual immorality that Christians and many other citizens don't want to their children learning. It supports all the secular degenerations we abhor, including abortion. Don't tell me you won't get that kind of indoctrination in public schools. I got a heavy dose of anti-Christianity even in 1957 in a high school geometry class and I know it's worse now. The teacher even lauded Timothy Leary who was first heard of at that time for his work on LSD. No wonder the sixties generation were so heavily drugged up. I'm sure my teacher wasn't the only one. But if they didn't get it there they'd get it later. All the "enlightened" and "progressive" teachers always feel it their obligation to overcome the "ignorance" of our children, teach them that capitalism is evil and America is imperialist and homosexuality is normal and all the rest of it.Morally we shouldn't support public education at all for that reason but since there must be some good that comes from it we hold our noses and support it. Tell you the truth, I was just about going nuts in this world because of these growing insanities back then too -- oh not that I wasn't a sinner myself, plenty of that in my life -- but then the Lord had mercy on me and saved me and with all the other benefits of His lovely kingdom comes OBJECTIVITY and SANITY and REASON and LOGIC and CLARITY and GOODNESS, and I feel sorry for anyone who struggles along under the preconceptions of this secular nightmare you all love so much.

And that is why you are not communicating effectively.In order to be an effective communicator, you need to be able to see yourself as others see you. And here the important "others" are those with whom you are attempting to communicate.

But that is what I keep asking you. What is the PRINCIPLE that distinguishes some public spending as entirely necessary and some as "stealing" in your position?What PRINCIPLE provides this distinction that you find so obvious and the rest of us are not seeing? What PRINCIPLE is it that is so blatant and obvious that every government in the western world is failing to apply it?I agree that public policy and spending should be based on principles. But you are applying completely different principles and reaching very different conclusions about what is "stealing" in this context. Why these and not health? For example. Why should I care if your house burns down any more than I care whether or not you get cancer? For example.And "utilities of all kinds"? So gas, water, electricity are all to be publicly funded and provided in your view? That sounds very Marxist!!Edited by Straggler, : No reason given.Edited by Straggler, : No reason given.

How can your FEELINGS tell you anything about TRUTH? Why do you put "steal" in quotes? ARe they really NOT stealing but you just FEEL they are stealing? Do you KNOW these entities steal and cheat or you just FEEL they do? Have you looked at their books? Why don't you just boycott them? They aren't the government. The government oppresses ALL of us, businesses don't have that kind of power. And you KNOW this or you FEEL it? Does TRUTH enter into this at all or is it enough that you just don't LIKE something about how they APPEAR to you and it doesn't matter to you what's REALLY going on in their inner workings? I don't know a thing about Walmart's way of operating. You think they should pay better wages? Maybe they should, I don't know but just because somebody FEELS they aren't paying enough isn't enough for me. I don't like the store myself so I don't go there much, but I'm not going to denounce them as evil, that's awfully extreme. Many people love Wal-mart. They don't feel cheated. I think such things shouldn't be judged by feelings.

And, apparently, overuse of capital letters.

My house burning down threatens YOUR house burning down. Fire threatens the whole community. My getting cancer is my own private nightmare. See I knew I'd get into trouble if I tried to specify everyhthing. You are right to point that out. Right, we consume utilities as private citizens so it's not a government function to provide them. The less government the better for most things.When I have the extra money I contribute to the power company's fund for those who can't afford it. Often in the last few years I'm the one who has needed the help and I do get some of it through government agencies, despite my moral concerns about all this. That's the way things operate these days and I don't have other options. But voluntary giving remains my preferred way of helping people.But you are asking a mere citizen who doesn't think much about these things about an opinion that is utterly meaningless without serious study of the whole situation. Ideologically I'm against big government and I hate Marxist theory with a passion, every version of it I've ever encountered. But there are plenty of areas I haven't thought through and what does it accomplish to try to pin me down?

No, that is a vice left over from my heathen years.

So speaketh Mr. Humpty nwr.

I guess there are some things that even Jesus can't save you from.

This was my point I used the word the way I thought you have. The truth I simply think these bussiness practices are wrong. Now we're getting some place! Do you KNOW the Government steals or do you believe they do? This is the point I was trying to make to you for six pages. Does it not matter to you the practical and economical advantages for the society to help someone get back there feet or Do you only see it black and white. "taking from one to give to another"? I agree

And you would expect to have no help with this I take it. You might go back a few posts and read what RAZD said about his personal experience with this. He needed a helping hand in order to stay on his feet. I am happy to pay taxes in order to help people in such situations.I asked you about the story of the Good Samaritan. Apparently you disagree with the point of this particular parable?I also asked you if you believe that every person is entitled to basic human rights. You have not answered this either but the impression I am getting from you is, "No, sort yourself out because people are not obliged to help you."I can see that you are referring to "stealing" in a moral sense. You are saying that if a person does not want to give voluntarily in order to help their fellow human beings, no one should force them to do it (i.e. by requiring them to pay taxes). The inevitable conclusion to this scenario, which you consistently have failed to address, is that in such a case the vast majority of people will contribute little or nothing -- certainly not the proportion of their income they would otherwise be taxed on. Do you actually care about the people who would suffer because they happen to get ill at some point or lose their jobs?Using tax money to support the vulnerable and disadvantaged in society is moral and Christian; it is loving one's neighbours as oneself as Jesus taught.Telling people that they deserve nothing and that they have to sort their own problems out when no one else can be troubled to help them, is misanthropic.Edited by Kitsune, : No reason given.

That would depend on we're your house is wouldn't it? So I'll ask this.Why should I care if someone took your car or if your domestic partner became violent toward you? Why should I as a tax payer pay for those things? I contend the economy and society suffers as a whole because the middle and lower classes are the ones who create the economy and the society as a whole. It's not a question of morality.Edited by DC85, : No reason given.

Marxism observes that, by your understanding of 'stealing' - the capitalists are stealing something from their empolyees and putting it to uses the employee might not have consented to (from reinvesting in the business to lining their own pockets) and seeks to rectify this theft.What you are complaining about is progressive taxes. Progressive taxes are not Marxism at all. Marx did happen to support the notion of progressive taxes - but they wouldn't be strictly necessary in a Marxist world.To quote Adam Smith, another supporter of progressive tax.

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The necessaries of life occasion the great expense of the poor. They find it difficult to get food, and the greater part of their little revenue is spent in getting it. The luxuries and vanities of life occasion the principal expense of the rich, and a magnificent house embellishes and sets off to the best advantage all the other luxuries and vanities which they possess. A tax upon house-rents, therefore, would in general fall heaviest upon the rich; and in this sort of inequality there would not, perhaps, be anything very unreasonable. It is not very unreasonable that the rich should contribute to the public expense, not only in proportion to their revenue, but something more than in that proportion.

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From a Marxist point of view, the rich are 'stealing' (your definition) from the poor so Progressive Taxation is a way for the poor to 'steal' some of their money back from the rich. The rich get to keep some of their stolen money. Taking money that was stolen from you is hardly stealing - especially if you don't take nearly as much as was stolen. There are plenty of people who are busy doing this in capitalist contexts already.It is clearly the case that if the farmer is paying his staff more than the value they are generating, he will lose money because they are basically stealing from him. I appreciate a perfect balance is impossible to practically reach. That does not mean we should give up trying to make the system as fair as possible. But you agree with Marx on so many points. The reality he lived in was filled with workers earning nothing and the rich getting even richer and the poor working their arses off just to feed and clothe themselves (and failing even to do that in many events).It seems he was a fairly astute observer of reality.He suggested a system to circumvent this. He also supported the idea of the rich paying proportinally more towards communal upkeep. An idea that the vast majority of western economists (fiscally conservative or otherwise) support as far as I can tell. Violence isn't generally the best way of going about things, obviously. If it was agreed the factory owner had something that he was not entitled to (ie., he morally stole it), then isn't it moral to force the factory owner to give it back? Even if it is only legal forcing as opposed to violent force.Of course, the entire point of Marx's idea is that there is no such conflict with the factory owner since it would be communally owned by the workers. The main problem is what to with the people that presently have legal ownership? If they aren't morally entitled to something, but they are legally entitled to it what should we do? The methods involved are difficult, but I don't think the US has any policies that would be required to lay a decent grounding for a Marxist world. Quite probably - but that did happen and Marx and Engels did happen too. The problem is, that according the principles of fairness these men formulated - business owners are still not treating their workers fairly.Slaves have historically existed, and not always in the American style. It used to be a system that was morally understandable: One person needs something done, another person can do it. The first person agrees to feed and shelter the second person in exchange for doing the job how they want it done.If a slave is very well looked after, are they still a slave?Am I using hyperbole?It depends.By becoming an emplyee, a person sacrifices something that is core to them: Their labour. They give all the value of their labour to someone else, in exchange for food, shelter, and some possible luxuries. The employee gets to choose (within limits) their food and luxuries etc., but they have still given something fundamental to another entity.So ultimately - it all rests on ownership and fundamental issues of what can be said to 'belong' to another person. Some political philosophers (Such as Locke) argue that the only thing that really belongs to a person is their capacity to do things - and taking capacity for your own benefit might be construed as taking more than you deserve by profiting from the hard work of others. The only title to value anyone can lay claim to is based on labour, he would argue. Or as he said:

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Though the earth, and all inferior creatures, be common to all men, yet every man has a property in his own person: this no body has any right to but himself. The labour of his body, and the work of his hands, we may say, are properly his. Whatsoever then he removes out of the state that nature hath provided, and left it in, he hath mixed his labour with, and joined to it something that is his own, and thereby makes it his property. It being by him removed from the common state nature hath placed it in, it hath by this labour something annexed to it, that excludes the common right of other men: for this labour being the unquestionable property of the labourer, no man but he can have a right to what that is once joined to, at least where there is enough, and as good, left in common for others...
God gave the world to men in common; but since he gave it them for their benefit, and the greatest conveniencies of life they were capable to draw from it, it cannot be supposed he meant it should always remain common and uncultivated. He gave it to the use of the industrious and rational, (and labour was to be his title to it not to the fancy or covetousness of the quarrelsome and contentious.

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So if you take someone's property from them - that is theft, by your understanding, yes?
So Locke and Marx's views combined with yours suggest agreement with their ideas, even if you have pragmatic concerns about putting them into practice. Millions may be an exageration. The people that count are those that have the power to change the government. It turns out that the rich and the religious have significant and disproportionate influence in this regard.But that's the authors or even the followers of the Constitution's fault for setting up or blindly agreeing to a governmental style that is difficult to change except by the very people who wouldn't want to change it (ie., if you have power to influence government, why would you use that to lower your power to influence government??) Not true at all. Obviously - in the Marxist system the worker does obviously do it all and they are also the business owner. However, in the capitalist system the capitalist rarely contributes zero value. The business owner certainly deserves some money since the business owner is a worker. They work. They labour. If they don't labour, don't take any particular risks, then yes they wouldn't be doing anything that deserves financial gain. I'm aware of the kinds of disasters businesses face. I work in insurance which is about managing risks to help mitigate losses from sudden disasters like this. I appreciate there are plenty of uninsurable risks too. If we are talking about a capitalist system, then naturally a person should be compensated for accounting for risk and opportunity cost. I know someone that did, and I started working there too. I took a wage below minimum legal wage for a year, secured a big contract - made a nice percentage of the proceeds for doing that, but then left for reasons unrelated to the money. I don't hate business owners. And unless you are making money by extracting the value of the labours of other people, then you aren't under discussion here. You suggested it existed, could you give me an example?