>From the Economic and Philosophical Manuscripts:
"This estrangement manifests itself in part in that the sophistication of needs and of the means (of their satisfaction) on the one side produces a bestial barbarisation, a complete, crude, abstract simplicity of need, on the other; or rather in that it merely reproduces itself in its opposite. Even the need for fresh air ceases to be a need for the worker. Man returns to a cave dwelling, which is now, however, contaminated with the pestilential breath of civilisation, and which he continues to occupy only precariously, it being for him an alien habitation which can be withdrawn from him any day — a place from which, if he does not pay, he can be thrown out any day. For this mortuary he has to pay. A dwelling in the light, which Prometheus in Aeschylus designated as one of the greatest boons, by means of which he made the savage into a human being, ceases to exist for the worker. Light, air, etc. — the simplest animal cleanliness — ceases to be a need for man. Filth, this stagnation and putrefaction of man — the sewage of civilisation (speaking quite literally) — comes to be the element of life — for him. Utter, unnatural depravation, putrefied nature, comes to be his life-element. None of his senses exist any longer, and (each has ceased to function) not only in its human fashion, but in an inhuman fashion, so that it does not exist even in an animal fashion. The crudest methods (and instruments) of human labour are coming back: the treadmill of the Roman slaves, for instance, is the means of production, the means of existence, of many English workers. It is not only that man has no human needs — even his animal needs cease to exist. The Irishman no longer knows any need now but the need to eat, and indeed only the need to eat potatoes and scabby potatoes at that, the worst kind of potatoes. But in each of their industrial towns England and France have already a little Ireland. The savage and the animal have at least the need to hunt, to roam, etc. — the need of companionship. The simplification of the machine, of labour is used to make a worker out of the human being still in the making, the completely immature human being, the child — whilst the worker has become a neglected child. The machine accommodates itself to the weakness of the human being in order to make the weak human being into a machine."
It's not the best example, but what Marx is trying to get to here is that under the system of capitalism, there is a need for potatoes, but since capitalists have only the desire to fulfil the minimum part of the need, they do not need to make the best. Thus, the Irish, in Marx's ethnic slur, are hungry and the needs of that hunger are fulfilled by potatoes. But because the producer of the potatoes need only fufil that specific need, it does not need to make good potatoes.
On the other hand, when we produce for needs rather than profits, our human desire will be to make good potatoes, good computers, good airplanes, ect...
Oversimplifying it a bit, but I hope you get the point.
Stealing concepts from the book I'm reading, Marx seems(-ed?) to believe that humans, when acting as individuals will be acting at the same time for the species-being under communism. Bruno Baur said something to the effect of "Even Geniuses's accomplishments are my own" (not an exact quote)...
So rather than having to work as if "one had a gun to his head", one would work for humanity (but not in the sense of "For humanity's sake only")
I'll try for a better response later....
--- Ian Murray <seamus2001 at attbi.com> wrote:
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "Gordon Fitch" <gcf at panix.com>
>
>
> > > But leaving that aside, I was referring to
> Chuck0's antipathy to
> > > institutions of any breadth or permanance. He
> seems to be agin' 'em.
> >
> > I seized upon your remark because I'm trying to
> provoke people
> > into answering my question as to whether they
> think coercion,
> > that is, holding a gun to someone's head, is
> necessary for the
> > building of airplanes or computers, and if so, why
> they think
> > so and whether and why the airplanes and computers
> are worth
> > it. So far I haven't seen much development of
> either of these
> > propositions. A _reductio_ based on one facet of
> anarchist
> > thought won't do.
>
> ==================
>
> Don't you think it's a bit of an analogical stretch
> to say that the workers at Boeing and
> Airbus have guns held to their heads?
>
> Ian
>
===== Kevin Dean Buffalo, NY ICQ: 8616001 AIM: KDean75206 Buffalo Activist Network http://www.buffaloactivist.net http://www.yaysoft.com
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