The Triumph of Hope Over Self-Interest

Brian O. Sheppard bsheppard at bari.iww.org
Mon Jan 13 13:47:07 PST 2003


On Mon, 13 Jan 2003, Yoshie Furuhashi wrote:


> The fact that "the top 1%" are "making incomes over $300,000 per
> year" while you are making only, say, $30,000 isn't in itself a
> reason enough for you to get mad as hell at the top 1%....unless you
> also know that the top 1% are making over $300,000 _because_ they
> exploit you and your fellow workers, _because_ the value that you
> produce have and will be making them richer, more powerful, more
> capable of exploiting and oppressing you further.

That's no guarantee that they'll be angry, either. (And likewise anger isn't any guarantee that the angered will organize or do anything else.) Some people can sit quietly through a class explaining, say, the theory of surplus value, and link it to their own job(less) situation, and still not "feel exploited" or become outraged.

As far as workers go, a lot of people "like my boss" or "don't care what executives are doing" as long as they feel like executives aren't personally harassing them or as long as they feel they're getting paid enough to get by. No explication of the exploitative dynamics behind the veil of "freely contracted" labor will change that for some people.

Brian

--

"At times one remains faithful to a cause only because its opponents do not cease to be insipid." - Friedrich Nietzsche

"Il etait enfin venu, le jour ou je fus un pourceau!" - Comte de Lautreamont, Les Chants de Maldoror, 4th Hymn, Strophe 6



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