ya:
> This is standard-issue libertarian (fundamentalist liberal)
> dogma on the Net.
LeoCasey at aol.com:
> May be. But it is also classic John Locke. The only question is why those of
> us running around with our bodies as our only capital accept such tripe.
Locke-thought is popular with many of the lower orders. My guess is that they perceive the collectivities to which they are assigned as stealing from them and imprisoning them, and long for a totally atomized society in which they can at least breathe free -- indeed, a desert island -- just as the nascent bourgeoisie for whom Locke wrote did a few centuries ago. Are they wrong? With families, clans, and the orders of Moose, Elk and Odd Fellows pretty much departed, our collectivities are corporations, unions, religious organizations, political parties and governments, who mostly take as much as they can get and give as little as they can get away with. Everyone's in business; one can hardly blame the less well-off for trying to get with the program.
Of course I would like to convert them all to revolutionary anarcho-communism, but that's a bit of a jump. Mostly they will be advised, even by "leftists", to _work_within_the_ _system_, and the more sensitive will naturally become nauseated. We should be glad they're not turning to fascism (yet).
I mean, what are you all offering that guy in San Jose with his dirty jeans, apple crates, and black velvet paintings?
joanna bujes:
> ...
> Finally, I'd like to say that anyone who thinks that their body is their
> capital has absolutely no understanding about what the word capital means.
Well, they may know what it means to them, which could be something different from what it means to some other people. You probably know what Humpty Dumpty said about that sort of thing.