Subject: Re: There's a Problem with "Equality" (or, What is Parity)
Date: Wed, 17 Jun 1998 11:45:07 GMT
David McDuffee (mcduffee@netcom.com) wrote:
: In article ,
: Rich Thompson wrote:
: >On Thu, 4 Jun 1998, David McDuffee wrote:
: >
: >(on "wage slavery":)
: >
: >> That which is voluntarily given has not been stolen.
: >> Voluntary labor is not slavery.
: >
: >I guess it depends on how fast and loose you want to play with the concept
: >of "voluntary".
: If I fill out an employment application without someone holding a gun to
: my head, I consider it voluntary.
Enslavement takes many forms. What they share in common is
that those enslaved must be dispossessed of the means to make
an independent living, by the enslaver. The serfs in Europe
found themselves in this position. One day they woke up to
find that the land belonged to the local feudal lord, who laid
claim to enough of their output that there was no way out
of the bondage to which they had been reduced. Those who did
that to them came to be known as "landed gentry", "the nobility"
and the like. Of course, the truth was that they were neither
noble nor gentle, having deployed the same tactic as the mafioso
continue to do today with their "protection" rackets. After
"slavery" supposedly ended in 1865, the same tactic was adopted
to keep landless "laborers" in bondage under the exploitation
scheme known as "sharecropping". The program is constant, only
the modalities change. The European immigrants to the U.S
fled landlessness in Europe hoping to turn tables in America,
ie. to dispossess somebody else, and to establish *themselves*
as "landed gentry". That is the story of "how the West was won"
(sic), also the story of the "peculiar institution" of the
enslavement of Africans in the Americas, also the story of
European colonial conquest. Capitalism is the system which
has latterly emerged from these beginnings. The program is
constant, only the modalities have changed. Now we have dispossessed
wage-slaves who, best of all worlds from the enslavers'
viewpoint, actually have been brainwashed into believing that
they are "free". They "voluntarily" give their labor in
return for a wage, and "voluntarily" quit whenever the conditions
are not to their liking. Meantime, as individuals they do not
have independent means of survival, and as a subjugated people--
the condition of American Afrikans in particular--the one thing
that the dominate! overlords will not permit is for them to
get too independent, ie. free themselves: Witness the fate of
Rosewood, the Black Wall Street, the Black Panthers, Martin
Luther King, Malcolm X, etc. What you *are* free to do is
to find a j-o-b, to exist in "welfare" dependency, or to be
warehoused in jails, where, guess what, the law specifically
provides for the legality of slavery. The program is
constant, only the modalities change. Choice is not a sufficient
condition of freedom, although I readily concede its necessity.
: >In the discussion about European immigrants, Wayne wants to claim that
: >they were essentially 'forced' to come here because of extreme economic
: >factors. How is this any different, except by degree, from people forced
: >to take unsafe, demeaning, or simply stultifying jobs because no
: >alternatives exist in their neighborhoods?
: Nobody was "forced" to come here by extreme economic factors. Some chose
: to. Some chose to stay in Europe. By the same token, no one is forced
: to take an unsafe or demeaning job. Some choose to. Others choose to
: acquire the skills necessary to qualify for a better job. Still others
: choose to move to areas with more favorable economics, or stand under
: stop lights with a cardboard sign, or mooch off of their parents or a
: significant other. Some choose to point guns at people with money and
: request payment for unspecified services. Lots of choices, but no
: involuntary servitude.
As I said above, choice is a necessary condition of freedom, but
it is not a sufficient condition.
: >By that logic, aren't poor education and limited opportunities factors
: >that are at least coercive?
: What logic? The need to eat is coercive; poor education and limited
: opportunities never forced anyone to fill out a job application.
: I happen to think that honest work bestows freedom, but I know there
: are panhandlers who have other ideas.
The enslavers do very little honest work, and yet have maximum
freedom.
: --
: David McDuffee
: mcduffee@netcom.com
"And the Lord shall bring thee into Egypt
again with ships....and there ye shall be
sold unto your enemies for bondmen and
bondwomen, and no man shall buy you."
--Deuter 28:68
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