From the Greensboro Minimun Wage Campaign,"We are working to increase the Greensboro minimum wage to $9.36/hour. This amount equals the purchasing power of the minimum wage in 1968. In the richest country in the world people who work should not live in poverty. Santa Fe, San Francisco, Washington, DC, and Albuquerque have already raised their citywide minimum wage. Register. Sign the petition. Vote. Volunteer."
PART I. The News & Record tries to get political?!
Doug your argument against a wage increase is about as relevent as the good old southern democrats argument against "free-labor", silly. first and last, your argument stinks of free-market fetishism and you assume that change can only happen when it is granted and sacrificed from above.
Hell, working for 6 dollars per hour as restuarant dish washers, car washes, chain stores, or package centers all around greensboro hardly making ends meet without skimming off the top or having to stir things up abit in the triad to gain a decent wage??? we will take our chances with the ladder. Doug your opinion is offensive and written from a place of privilege that continues to justify "free-market" vulgarity. the cost, of our dignity and everyday life is at stake and your business minded opinion is not appreciated.
Maybe the problem with the south is lack of labor laws, labor unions, the low wage, the right to work laws, and all other laws and repression of southern workers that continues to put profit over workers rights and high wages. Maybe the continuing problem with North Carolina and Greensboro/triad area is regional goverments favoring businesses while pretending to be all charitable like saying, "look we have brought you jobs after the textiles took off." ah, what a favor...low wage jobs and part-time jobs in place of industrial jobs...having two generations racing for the same job...
No, your arguements and the entire stack of these "well reasoned" arguments against a wage increase are anti-worker and yet another attempt to justify low wages and bad working conditions.
Doug stated,
"Higher restaurant prices might not drive many families out of town for a cheaper meal, but some might eat at home more often. With less business, restaurants likely would lay off staff."
You are automatically assuming that workers will have to pay up for that difference...why not make someone else take that hit....say shareholders and store owners....
After all this is class warfare and your arguments have been used since the 1800's to continue paying workers less than they deserve. Just like back in the day, your form of media has been used to spread misinformation and reactionary ideas throught nations and cities to scare people of change for the better. It is the business world, owners, and goverments fault that we have low wages, dont put that blame on us! Why dont you do something usefull with your time and blog and side with humanity.
"Ain't ten cents[$9.36] worth as much to us as it is to Pulitzer and Hearst[Food Lion, Harris Teeter, etc...] who are millionaires? Well, I guess it is. If they can't spare it, how can we?"
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Newsboys_Strike)
PART II: What is capitalism and how does it work?
I call that bluff. Restaurants would not raise prices because that would cut into profit on top of the raised wages for workers (hypothetically). higher costs equals less business. Rather if a Restaurant wants to remain competative and in operation it will keep the old prices and take the $4.21 x A as an added cost in production. So ya, no worries Greensboro will not become a ghost town.
If a business is already taking a dip in the profit margin from the $4.21 x A("A" being the number of employees) wage increase and you claim that this is such a huge increase in price that a business would have to raise prices to make a profit, then I do not think that $4.21 wage increase is that businesses main concern. If a business has come to such a stand still economically that it can not afford to pay its workers I think the "free-market" shark will eat that establishment for lunch. Plain and simple they can afford it, it is just that "they" dont want to pay it, its called greed.
The age old arguments against wage increases and reduced work hours come from one perspective, the business perspective. First off, higher wages = more consumerism. The money isnt disappearing its being relocated into the pockets of workers who will then spend that money...a nice little economic reform that helps everyone because at the end of the day someone gets paid $9.36 a hour and the company this person works at is still producing products to be consumed, thus the system continues.
Higher wages will make thousands of people in greensboro very happy!
PART III: Enough is Eough...
Doug states, "Look at the auto industry if you want a model of unionism in the 21st century economy: Union automakers are laying off workers up north; non-union (Asian) automakers are hiring for new plants in the South. They're still paying good wages and benefits, just not noncompetitive wages and benefits.
I'm just not following your magical formula for how businesses can absorb higher wages (other than they should be less "greedy"). I'm sure business owners struggling to keep prices down and make payroll in a competitive market don't think of themselves as greedy."
Doug once again your argument is laced with standard run of the mill "neoliberal" ideas based on romatic notions of generous businessmen running around like chickens with there heads cut off to stay afloat in a the "free-market" gone mad!
I am going to save the both of us a whole lot of writing and just say that we are on two different sides of the arugement. You are for low consumer prices at the cost of a decent living for workers and you claim, through neo-liberal romanticism, that this somehow benefits the workers. No matter how i read or look at your article it states that workers should not attempt to gain higher wages because that will end in corporate bankrupcy.
In essence your arguments and article are anti-worker and pro-business. Not only that, your arguments say more about your perspective than your heartfelt sympathy.
My "magical formula for how businesses can absorb higher wages (other than they should be less "greedy")," is quite simple. If you look all over the globe and throughout history we can see how this "magical formula" was put into practice. Historical materialism shows the history of capitalism as in phases of conflict between workers wanting more and owners of capital wanting more...
Making things simple, currently we are in a period of economic and government reorganization or restructuring on a global scale and both sides are scambling to get a bigger "piece of the pie".
As for unionism, I have a better example of functioning unionism, look at South Korea's labor movement. As for historical unions with something positive to offer the future we have the IWW (industrial workers of the world, wobblies). Neo-liberal anti-unionism is a reactionary and very anti-worker perspective that attempts to get workers to see themselves as their job. We must never forget that people work out of the necessity of survival nothing more. we are not our jobs, we are not wal-mart, gas stations, or computer stores, etc...in a service economy addicted to low-wage labor across the borders and seas it is a race to the bottom and in order to survive campaigns such as these in coordination with campaigns and activism across the globe must happen to improve our lives. we are thinking globally and acting locally.
As for blaming auto-workers and auto-unions for factories closing down and moving out of state is just ridiculous. I understand the point about lower wages and people "willing" to work for less in mexico or asia but I dont buy it. Nor does this argument justify workers to do nothing. To do nothing is an impossibility anyways.
Business owners do not think of themselves as greedy just was kings did not think of themselves as despots. Either way we can never ignore what despotic rule or "competitive business owners" regardless of their justification force the rest of us to scrape by.
My arugment or "magical formula" still stands and i have history on my side. If you are still skeptical you can just ask these questions.
1.In all of human history, especially post-industrial revolution, workers have struggled to improve their lot(8 hour day from 12 hour day, payed holiday, benefits, less work same pay, more workers on the lot same pay, etc...) by various means of action(some peaceful, some not) and through all these changes and raising the cost of labor have businesses still not obtained their profits?
2.Also, during these events in history when workers won union contracts, better working conditions, or higher pay has there not always been present arguments of economic collapse or higher unemployment due to the coming changes to scare people of change?
TO BE CONTINUED???
18 comments:
and here i thought you guys were against wage labor... after all, why abolish it when we can just get paid more?
-parker
of course abolishing wage labor is the main objective but you know its important to have struggle in relation to both everyday life and "revolution". we both know that its hard to be as die hard as the situationist all day everyday.
love, graf.
ps- and here i thought you guys were against technology...after all, why destroy technology when we can just communicate more?
thats a nice turn of my phrase.
fortunately though, you wont be hearing any green anarchists writing articles arguing that an increase in technology will lead us closer to the abolition of technology.
try maintaining "all this" without hyper-specialization and massive access to resources and hand-labor needed to accomplish the toxic drudgery of manufacturing the machines that we "commune with" in lieu of the face-to-face.
communicate more? i'd say less, but sacrificing the qualitative for the quantitative is what the west does best, marxist or otherwise.
;)
for real though, z-money called out for people to post comments and i looked and no one had posted anything, so i did.
i know where you guys stand on things and i dont think we need to have a fake quasi-public debate about it haha!
it always comes down to this, today we are 6 billion and back then it was 2 million what are we going to do with the other 5 billion plus???
also, it seems that capitalism is getting very hype on this whole green, non-gmo, organic thing as well...i think in order for capitalism to survive it will see the profit and growing market in green foods and products. of course its the militant environmentalists and activists that are turning capitalism into a more green capitalism so it is essientlly part of the working-class vs. the capitalist class, reforms etc... its no cowinkidink that even Bush is starting to come around and supporting the search for alternative fuels, as long as big biz has its tight hand on it.
what we are saying is that capitalism would rather go totally green and allow environmental reforms that would totally reorganize industrial society than go under. after all capitalism has shown us in the past that the profit motive will do just about anything to make a buck. so if capitalist see going green as a good investment then they will go for it. unfortuntally, the ELF is just another form of lobbying the states, citizens, and big-businesss. actions wake people up and thus they vote or spend money for change, its al innerconnected. i think the impending disaster and industrial collapse is still far away even with the currrent shape of things, shitty yes of course, but even if there are collapsing eco-systems it will be in the poor countries and when if ever has the west given a shit about poor countries or what happens in them?
GRAF as written in our points of unity supports radical change on the way we look at the natural world and realize that something drastic must be done but rather than just pitting the environmental against dialectic materialism/marxist materialism/human materialism we realize that it is just as important a question as say working hours or the idea of a wage system.
so with that said of course we support enviromentalist groups no matter how ''militant'' because it takes al types of action to get people to see the reality of our earths condition...its capitalism that has caused this...not workers.
like you said yourself, of course we dont agree with each other and we both know each others points, its just that i know i dont want to live in huts or be a hunter gatherer unless its at my choosing like in camping trips or ruffing it in the woods for fun.
you have more faith in capitalism than my dad.
the UN is already accounting for the deaths of over a billion people by the end of this century from topsoil loss and drought. australia is cutting off water to 55,000 farmers, the prime minister told them to pray for rain. where is capitalism to the rescue? if you think biofuels is a move to sustainability you got another thing coming, its the death knell of agriculture in the western hemisphere and what remains of rainforests worldwide.
the old utopias are vanishing at a rate comparable to species extinction. for the first time ever, humans are thrown into competition with artifacts of their own creation for arable land, for food. the point of diminishing returns has been reached. the crisis that is faced is more of habitation itself, and less how the spoils are divided.
the 'liberatory' technologies and politics you celebrate exist at the pleasure of a basic material foundation which is now being viscerally checked by an encroaching reality.
we're left with a three hundred trillion dollar world infrastructure virtually uninhabitable without oil and natural gas. what new "market paradigm" can replace this? can a person continue running as its legs are being broken?
the same fault lines that have disintegrated every civilization are being brought to bear on this one. the major difference is that where the old ones depended on living systems for their support (water and land), ours depends on artificial systems as well. technical systems cannot operate on "less" energy like living ones. either a machine has enough juice to be "on" or its off. in integrated technological systems one machine cant go down by itself, every other machine that depends on the performance of that one goes down as well.
i think you are right though, this "issue" IS outside the realm of what any political movement can hope to accomplish. the clashes will be cultural, national, and ethnic -just as they have always been- and economics merely an undercurrent.
if 10 bucks an hour makes you feel like theres some progress being made, i'll help you in any way i can. personally, im reaching for something tangible, something i can eat when the barricades go up...
''i think you are right though, this "issue" IS outside the realm of what any political movement can hope to accomplish. the clashes will be cultural, national, and ethnic -just as they have always been- and economics merely an undercurrent.
if 10 bucks an hour makes you feel like theres some progress being made, i'll help you in any way i can. personally, im reaching for something tangible, something i can eat when the barricades go up...''
I do not think you are totally understanding my point in regards to capitalism. I am in no way gloifying capitalism or anything like it. Rather, I understand that capitalism is build on class conflict and the conflict is between classes not ethnic or national. Faith in capitalism? Certainly not, I have faith in us and the antagonistic social forces within capitalism. These social forces (the working class, etc...) are the only group of people that will and can stop capitalism and develop something new.
I know the figures just as well as you do, 35,000 some people die of starvation everyday and if the UN reports that a billion some people die then it probably will happen due to the state of our eco system. What I do not understand is how your point concerning my faith in capitalism turning into a more green economy somehow makes the arugment in favor of capitalism. Capitalism itself is an economy riddled with contraditions and warfare or starvation will insure that capitalism still remains. Capitalism is as fascinating as it is horrible because of its ability to restructure or reorganize itself.
So, due to increasing awareness and militant action coming from ourside of things concerning the environment governments and corporations are starting to realize that something must be done. The market itself is proof of this, but just because I state how it is doesnt mean I support capitalism. I will not support capitalism no matter how animal friendly, environmentally safe, workers safety friendly it gets. Like the situationists before us said, ''no matter how green the economy gets, remember that green is the color of money, a check will always be presented and that check must be paid...'' it is the social forces against capitalism who are forced to pay that check year in and year out.
I am merely stating the material reality, the condition in which we live our lives under an economic system that is organized from the top to the bottom that doesnt care how environmentally safe or sound it is just as long as it makes a profit. That is the number one problem with our society, our society because we live in it, not weather we are green or red. Capitalism or somekind of heirarchical economic society will continue to operate as long as material resourse, NO MATTER HOW PRIMATIVE OR MODERN, are needed be all but not enough to go around. I agree and I think anyone who is realistic realizes that our way of living is not sustainable, hell I am probably the biggest supporter of eco-defense, militant action, and radical results concerning radical change in the way humanity interacts with the earth. It is just that I see green-anarchy or anarcho-primitivism just as idealist as I see Leninism nothing but mechanical-idealism.
GRAF has stated that we are for a radical change in the way we interact with nature. Though Quinn is so 98 he made a lasting impression on me, civilization must be build according to the physics of civilization just like airplanes are build according to the physics of aerodynamics.
10 dollars an hour would make me feel better because it is an improvement of my everyday life. I do not think any campaign in itself has to be reformist aslong as it is carried out with a radical perspective or a radical perspectice is present and builds on that flow in a community. We, as in you and I are both students living a very privileged life in comparsion to the billions around the world living on 1 dollar aday. But this has nothing to do with us being less radical or less worthy of a struggle for a post-capitalist society. Instead, we must look at our own struggles and our own lives to realize what needs to be done and also realize that a radical's life its riddled with contradictions, hyopcrisy, compromises, and REFORMS. The difference between a radical and a liberal is that a radical is willing to work on those negative aspects and fight to change them rather than justify it. We must struggle to gain control of our lives and communities not just run around with good ideas. Theories never do anything of people, nor do es anything build on idealism.
-d, GRAF.
NOTE:
''hell I am probably the biggest supporter of eco-defense, militant action, and radical results concerning radical change in the way humanity interacts with the earth.''
What I ment to say is that I am probably the biggest supporter of eco-defense within the pro-technology, anti-primitivist, red anarchist category. I am in no way stating that I am the end all be all eco-warrior. sorry for that sentence sounding the way it did.
love,
d, GRAF.
"i think you are right though, this "issue" IS outside the realm of what any political movement can hope to accomplish. the clashes will be cultural, national, and ethnic -just as they have always been- and economics merely an undercurrent."
This statement is pretty shocking and resembles the ideology of the far right. If, as you say, the clashes will be national, cultural, and ethnic would it not then be best to organize on the lines of national identity, race, and culture? I know that primitivist stand on the side of small tribes across the planet and respect their autonomy and different ways of living but I dont see how cultural and ethnic violence is the end all be all of western civilization.
love,
d, graf.
haha, no. im not saying 'we' should organize around cultural, national, and ethnic lines. im saying thats where the major clashes will be (and are) and have always occurred.
even france in 68 exhibited the massive racism against foreign workers by people (french workers) who had supposedly transcended their roles imposed by capital. the failure of the left in attempting to understand (even co-opt) the ethnic and tribal violence of today by way of their economic theories is uniform across the board. economic theories may unite some people, but its usually not something anyone is willing to die for or kill to challenge (or at least not as willing to kill as those in power). one needs the promise of an infinite and awesome future condition to accomplish this task... which it appears GRAF is in the process of creating.
challenges to structures of power have almost without exception been expressed in the language of religion. youre so fond of quoting the same vaneigem to me again and again, read Movement of the Free Spirit! (if you can get past the first chapter indicting sedentary agrarian/productionist societies as the root of modern domination).
maybe what it comes down to is we just have fundamentally different views of capitalism. i see it as just another way of organizing mass societies, whose form, pattern, and function have remained largely unchanged over the past several thousand years. the language these societies use to justify and explain themselves to each other changes from time to time, but that is the extent. if you look at what they DO its all the same. if another economic model (ie socialism) can accomplish the same task of industrialization, resource extraction, modernization, mass production, etc. better (as it has in certain times and places), it will be adopted.
im not out of line in this respect, the frankfurt school was writing about the totalitarian nature of mass society/production and the technified condition of humanity long before the 'birth' of the environmental movements in the west.
you seem to think im interested in organizing people haha. well im not. i'll leave the "gaining control over our lives and communities" to the enemies of life and community, whatever form they take.
well, I have always known that we have a very different understanding of capitalism but what is of more importance is our different take on anti-capitalism and proactive "anarchism". I always thought there was some form of "anarcho" in the whole anarcho-primitivism thing but what I see is nothing more than people wanting to revert exactly back to whatever humans did post-sedentary life. So this leaves me with a few questions...
Why are primitivists riding on the coat tales of anarchism, a left-wing collectivism, an anti-capitalism pro-collectivist social current?
And yes I would enjoy reading any book the primitivists think tanks have to offer and I find it equally fascinating reading about the effects of mass society on human beings be it physical or mental as I do reading emma goldman.
If there is no real social aspect to primitivism why even connect the "anarcho" to it?
so then for primitivists there is no need to organize anything but their own tribe and begin to destroy industrial society....
if trying to collectively organize communities and our everyday lives is the tool of the enemy then I dont see anything in common with "anarcho-primitivists", all i see is confusion over the meaning of "anarcho".
"even france in 68 exhibited the massive racism against foreign workers by people (french workers) who had supposedly transcended their roles imposed by capital. the failure of the left in attempting to understand (even co-opt) the ethnic and tribal violence of today by way of their economic theories is uniform across the board. economic theories may unite some people, but its usually not something anyone is willing to die for or kill to challenge (or at least not as willing to kill as those in power)."
and,
"he clashes will be cultural, national, and ethnic -just as they have always been- and economics merely an undercurrent."
I am not sure you know how strange this sounds to me. I am not really understanding your point. I see your politics starting down a slipperly slop dealing in race, nationality, cultural, and ethnic "difference". please correct me if i am wrong or atleast elaborate.
fine... if this is what you want to focus on...
(one of) the problems with the left is they are part of a western tradition that believes humans are rational creatures that act in their own interests. so rational that even when we are shown how our 'real' interests SHOULD trump our 'perceived' interests (as if there is a difference in the mind of the perceiver) that we would rationally choose our 'real' interests.
this is why the left cant figure out "whats the matter with kansas?" why people consistantly vote AGAINST their economic interests when their cultural values and ideas about themselves are perceived as being 'at stake.'
im touched that you are worrying about me! i have a feeling you might be reading ME the wrong way. fredy perlman's The Continuing Appeal of Nationalism may shed some light. Also... the book i recommended: Movement of the Free Spirit, was written by RAOUL VANEIGEM in 1986. thats 1986. not 68 and not by a primitivist think tank.
i think you keep wanting to read primitivism into some basic post-left anarchist critiques of schmarxism that im making. Green Anarchy has been called a cultural movement, possibly because it recognizes the profound ways that culture and the texture of experience (personal and social) are mutilated to serve the interests of domination by specialists. its profoundly social, but just not in the way economists like marxists, capitalists, fascists, and communists can recognize, understand, and manipulate a society of objects.
i dont believe any revolution is inevitable. i dont believe things slowly but surely get better. what i DO know is that the greenland norse starved to death (after eating each other) before they would stoop so low as to eat fish like their 'filthy' indigenous neighbors. history is replete with people dying (and killing) in droves to maintain what they believe is their cultural identity. the egyptians worshipped trees and deforested the entire nile valley. its irrational, and i dont see the future as being qualitatively different from the past. if you look around, im confident you'll find the present isn't either.
politicians today have to play to the lowest common denomonator to get votes. in the era of scarcity and disintegration that we are entering people will elect maniacs who will promise them everything they feel themselves entitled to, to maintain what they feel is a standard of living that is culturally appropriate to "the most advanced human society to ever live, ever".
at this point i feel as if we arent really even talking to eachother. you asked me to keep responding and i guess if you want people to check out the blog, the old adage "if you want a crowd, start a fight" applies.
hopefully it brought in some 'viewers'. personally, i would like to see a post (not a reply to this comment) exploring GRAF's definition of 'autonomy'.
take care
''i dont believe any revolution is inevitable. i dont believe things slowly but surely get better. what i DO know is that the greenland norse starved to death (after eating each other) before they would stoop so low as to eat fish like their 'filthy' indigenous neighbors. history is replete with people dying (and killing) in droves to maintain what they believe is their cultural identity. the egyptians worshipped trees and deforested the entire nile valley. its irrational, and i dont see the future as being qualitatively different from the past. if you look around, im confident you'll find the present isn't either.
politicians today have to play to the lowest common denomonator to get votes. in the era of scarcity and disintegration that we are entering people will elect maniacs who will promise them everything they feel themselves entitled to, to maintain what they feel is a standard of living that is culturally appropriate to "the most advanced human society to ever live, ever".''
i am not quite sure how this is a critique of organizing mass society and i dont really see the point in the greenland norse? I get the argument as an example of cultral clash and ethnic differences/racism but what has that go to do with left-wing communism or anarchism?
i would think that norse culture and lifestyle has more in common with green-anarchist ideals than mass-society collectivists. Did the norsemen not live semi-nomatic lives, travelling from here and there as semi-nomatic traders and plundering whatever they needed? i am not sure what the deal was with the greenlanders but i know that skandinavian vikings eat fish until their hearts content. skandinavian vikings pretty much started the tradition of drying out lute fish, something that still happens today. if someone is to stupid to eat fish in order to survive then they are just plain silly. which seems to be one point we agree on but still i dont see this as some point or agrument that culture is more important than the economic needs of the working classes in capitalist societies.
as for voting, we both know that democracy is a fraud. you can debate the reasons of why people vote this way or that until the cows come home. voting against there interests or not eating fish even if it was in there interests, it doesnt really prove anything in regards to mass-society or nomadic cultures. Is it not possible that within both ways of social existence people can and do stupid ass things based on what they believe?
i have been thinking about the whole cultural identity and ethnic clashes and somehow it seems to be more of a steady occurance between ''primitive tribes'', the continual territory scrumishes etc...
When it comes to the green-anarchist's ideal examples from back in the day there are only a couple of good examples: the !kung, bushmen, etc... is this because there is a lack of knowledge concerning other groups or that there also exists and existed plenty of tribes or groups that organized in a heirarchical manner, brutalitalized each other, and had a form of authority or culture that created uncomfortable lives for some so that others could live easier lives?
I undestand that dismantling the entire industry, breaking up the cities, and running into the wild is a solution to not having to work or live in a society that exploits but does this really solve the problem? Does living merely to survive day in and day out offer you or anyone a sense of doing what you want? I know that i am not very interested in just merely surviving.
''''i dont believe any revolution is inevitable. i dont believe things slowly but surely get better.''
I have always assumed that certain ''tribes'' died out because of lack of cooperation between individuals within a tribe which to me is a ''primitive'' and great example of workers refusal leading to the downfall of that tribes way of survival. The historical materialist in me would see new ways of creating tools, as primitive as they maybe, is a way of nomadic or sedentary cultures to ease their daily lives...if cultures and ethnic clashes are the bigger problems how would a primitive society or mass society solve this? I am sure you have your solutions and i have mine.
I am totally out in left feild in thinking that humans have always expressed a huge interest in making their lives as comfortable as possible, with the resources at hand? Shetler from the wind, better tools, etc...These things in themselves are technological or tool revolutions that led to better lives for both primitive societies and mass-societies. All other civilizations fell due to contradictions and so will capitalism. I think that humans no matter what form of social organizing we exist in should not pollute more than the earth can regenerate.
i will take you up on that challenge and try to define what i atleast see as a good definition of ''autonomy'' but i must be honest and tell you that i will probably explain what i think about autonomous communities rather than ''autonomy''. after all i am a collectivist not individualist.
word,
d, graf.
its awesome, because this discussion is incredibly relevant. there is a growing popularity and attraction among leftists to green anarchy, or anarcho-primitivism, whatever it is deemed, and the divide between schmarxists (haha), as parker so eloquently put, and jensenzerzanists is growing quickly.
i understand the idea of techno-culture, as we know it, being an unhealable entity. the way cities function, the unbridaled growth of population and the use of technology as capitalisms current tool for expansion is undeniably unstable, and has to stop, one way or another. what i continually find lacking in this critique however, is something parker touched on earlier, which is western humans (in regards to western anarchism) have continually believed that there is no other way to live, no other human, than that which simply, we are living. were all guilty of it, ethnocentrism, blah blah, whatever specialized term is being used now. now for some reason, this never carries over to our critique of culture itself.
what i mean is that most prmitivist theorists believe modern culture itself to be flawed, that there is no way of building anything postivie or workable out of something so efficiently destructive. why? because the way WE have used it, the way WE create technology, the way WE exploit and consume is the end all, and it must be destroyed to survive. just as daniel quinn pointed out "we are not humanity.", cant we point out that possibly, we are not culture?
there are intrinsic problems with this idea, the foremost being the lack of example. yet what example exists of primitivist cultures existing with the knowledge that they must live that way? there are none. there was no fight put up by prmitivist tribes to preserve there way of life simply because they knew it was the correct way to live. there was a decimation of this way of life when agriculture and domination began to become fruitful, but they were merely protecting themselves for that reason, never with the intent of preserving something we have the ability of knowing is less destructive to the earth and its inhabitants.
i would say most of the problems i have with green anarchy or primitivism is its near religious worship of mother earth, and its almost nihlistic view of everything
capitalism has created, and (therefore) absolutist view of modern politics (including anarchism, and sometimes itself).
i think the critique is an important one, but i do not believe it to be any more radical than capitalism sustaining itself, other than the time frame. just look at the stock market for evidence; green is gold.
most primitivists say things like this: "i dont believe any revolution is inevitable. i dont believe things slowly but surely get better."
an example of the general hopeless attitude, yet dont you all rely on a great ecological collapse to wipe the slate clean? to start over?
"and i dont see the future as being qualitatively different from the past. if you look around, im confident you'll find the present isn't either."
this may be true while looking through the primitivist window, but if i were to believe there have been no social advancements from the beginning of hebrew culture, i would have given up a long time ago.
-isaac
parker, a question. do you believe that nothing positive can be made out of technology? what if the goal of technology was not to increase labor output and decrease input? to hyper-specialize jobs and work for capital? to simply generate market revenue and expediate the destruction of natural processes, thus leaving us unmercifully hung by its noose?
what if none of these things played into the thought process behind creating technological advancements? what if the idea behind creating technology was to sustain a body of functioning, cooperating people on a planet not suited for its numbers? what if it was used to prevent the inevitable death of 5 billion people, and the earth? what if it was used (which it never has been before, i realize) for the benefit of communities, not the exploitation and coersion of them?
shit. twas me again.
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