Hard work

[Yoshie Furuhashi]

>--- Yoshie Furuhashi <furuhashi.1 at osu.edu> wrote: >
>  > No sweat -- there won't be any work in "financial
>  > markets" under socialism (not even under Justin's
>  > market socialism, I'd say).
>
>I think that actually I keep my job under Justin's
>plan, as a consultant to plant management syndicates
>on the optimum investment of their allocation of
>performance-related pay claim certificates.  Unless
>he's changed his mind in the meantime, or unless we
>achieve enough of a state of utopia for me to spend
>the whole day talking crap around a pub table.
>
>But even under a fully planned economy, there's bound
>to be a nice cushy job for me in a planning agency or
>as a salesman or propagandist.  That's why I'm not
>particularly worried about Charles B's periodic
>threats to have me sent off to a re-education camp
>(always with the camps!  what is it about Leninists
>and the great outdoors?  gimme the textbooks and I'll
>re-educate myself at evening classes) .
>
>Even the most ideologically pure of totalitarian
>regimes tend to be tolerant towards bright lads who do
>what they're told.  It's bolshy buggers like the rest
>of lbo-talk who end up against the walls :P
>
>dd, awaiting the revolution

A shrewd political bet, Daniel.  It shows that you must be a smart 
banker; I'd entrust my money with you were I in the money (but you 
know where I stand financially -- I'd more likely need the aid of a 
good bankruptcy lawyer).

Rest assured, however, that in my Wilde socialism there will be no 
"labor camp."  Only under the persistent pressures of Chuck Grimes & 
his likes (no ilks here, to humor you) will I consent to the building 
of a "temple of labor" (an indoorsy solution to placate labor 
spiritualists):

At 7:14 PM -0500 12/18/00, Yoshie Furuhashi wrote:
>From: Yoshie Furuhashi <furuhashi.1 at osu.edu>
>Subject: Re: Hard work
>Sender: owner-lbo-talk at lists.panix.com
>Reply-To: lbo-talk at lists.panix.com
>
>Gordon:
>
>>Yoshie Furuhashi:
>>>  ...
>>>  Moreover, work time should be as short as possible.
>>
>>Well, what about all these people who think that labor --
>>hard, difficult labor --  is spiritually meaningful, even
>>ennobling, that it connects them with humankind in some profound
>>way?
>
>Well, if they insist on "hard, difficult labor," I suppose a 
>socialist society can oblige them: create a special "temple of 
>labor" -- modelled upon Zen temples in Japan, perhaps, but without 
>any modern conveniences -- where they can spend their free time 
>spiritualizing themselves through such tasks as cleaning, sweeping, 
>carrying water, rearranging stone gardens, etc.
>
>Yoshie

I hope, however, that if socialism goes Wilde (as I think it should), 
there won't be a whole lot of technocratic jobs for bright lads, who 
shall be, instead, teaching mathematics, physics, statistics, civil 
engineering, & such subjects to workers & peasants under my plan (in 
the USA, unlike in China, your work is more likely in demand in inner 
cities -- Youngstown, Ohio, Daniel? -- than in countryside).

Alternatively, you may continue to take evening classes in Porn & 
contribute literally & literarily to the enjoyment of the only kind 
of "manual labor" -- or "homework" as Mike LeFevre puts it in his 
oral history collected in _Working_ -- that I wholeheartedly endorse: 
masturbation, solo or duo or collective.

Yoshie