On Mar 14, 2011, at 3:04 PM, Doug Henwood wrote:
>
> On Mar 14, 2011, at 2:54 PM, Carrol Cox wrote:
>
>> The problem is that exploitation is _not_ the major objection to
>> capitalism.
>
> It's not? What is?
Exploitation in the economic (Marxian) sense (appropriation by capital of surplus ["unpaid"] labor-time in the form of value) is the very essence of the capitalist mode of production. At the time when the capitalist mode of production constituted an enormously liberating advance over the dominant feudalistic mode of production only a reactionary could raise such an objection. Exploitation in the moral (Kantian) sense (treating human beings as means, not ends) is the very essence of modern social life and every mode of production (at least since the disappearance of the hypothesized "primitive communism") and has existed equally in every mode of production and every social order. In neither sense of the word does exploitation as such give the basis for any sort of objection to the capitalist order.
The major contemporary objection to capitalism is that, in its present
historically outlived state of imperialist decomposition, its internal
dynamics (grow or perish, compete or die) will destroy the
civilization that it itself built unless it is very speedily
overthrown and replaced by a socialist system whose essential goal is
the restoration of the Earth to a condition that is sustainable and
livable for all its human and nonhuman inhabitants. Exploitation in
both senses will inevitably persist until, in the communist future,
the "realm of necessity" is replaced by the "realm of freedom."
>
Shane Mage
The communist creed: From each according to his ability, to each according to his need.
The capitalist creed: From each according to his gullibility, to each according to his greed.
Joe Stack (1956-2010)