Stefan Molyneux
  • last year
This lecture examines Peter Kropotkin's assertion that production is a social endeavor, emphasizing the complexity of quantifying individual contributions within collective efforts like coal mining. The speaker explores themes of labor rights, the implications of ownership, and the interplay between personal initiative and market dynamics. Kropotkin's critiques of private ownership and production for profit are addressed, highlighting the tension between individual expertise and collective systems. The lecture argues for the necessity of recognizing personal contributions within economic frameworks, challenging the feasibility of Kropotkin's vision of a society without personal property.

GET MY NEW BOOK 'PEACEFUL PARENTING', THE INTERACTIVE PEACEFUL PARENTING AI, AND AUDIOBOOK!

https://peacefulparenting.com/

Join the PREMIUM philosophy community on the web for free!

Also get the Truth About the French Revolution, multiple interactive multi-lingual philosophy AIs trained on thousands of hours of my material, as well as targeted AIs for Real-Time Relationships, BitCoin, Peaceful Parenting, and Call-Ins. Don't miss the private livestreams, premium call in shows, the 22 Part History of Philosophers series and much more!

See you soon!

https://freedomain.locals.com/support/promo/UPB2022
Transcript
00:00All right, well good afternoon, actually it's good evening, and we're going to just do Kropotkin
00:07Part 4.
00:08Where are we at here?
00:09Maybe I'll get through it, maybe I won't.
00:11Production is social.
00:12This is a continuing series on examining why it is that people believe this socialist stuff.
00:22Production is social.
00:23Production, he writes, this is an article about Kropotkin, production is not carried
00:27out by isolated individuals whose economic contribution can be isolated from that of
00:33each other worker so that its value can be determined.
00:37Production is not carried out by isolated individuals, right.
00:41So if you've got a hundred people working on a car, who should get paid what?
00:44That's fair.
00:45To illustrate this, Kropotkin turned to coal mining at the time miners worked either individually
00:50or in gangs, had the coal face and were paid piece rate.
00:54In today's coal mines, of course, the issue of individual production would never arise.
00:58Quote from Kropotkin, one man controls the lift, continually rushing the cage from level
01:04to level so men and coal may be moved about.
01:07If he relaxes his concentration, for instance, the apparatus will be destroyed.
01:11Many men killed and his work brought to a standstill.
01:14If he loses as little as three seconds at each movement of the lead for production will
01:18be reduced by 20 tons a day or more.
01:22Well, that's a very fine observation.
01:26No problem with that.
01:27Well, is it he who renders the greatest service in the mine or is it perhaps the boy who from
01:32below signals to him when it is time to raise the cage to the surface?
01:36Is it instead the miner who is risking his life at every moment of the day?
01:40Or again, is it the engineer who would miss the coal seam and have the miners dig into
01:43stone if he made the smallest error in his calculations?
01:47All the workers engaged in the mine contribute within the limits of their powers, their knowledge
01:51and their skill to mine coal.
01:54And all we can say is that everybody has the right to live to satisfy their needs and even
01:59their fantasies once the most pressing needs of all have been satisfied, but how can one
02:03estimate their labors?
02:08Right.
02:10Everybody has the right to live to satisfy their needs and even their fantasies.
02:18I'm not sure what this means in sort of practical terms.
02:23Everybody has the right to live.
02:27You know, it's kind of hard to make up rights that are not granted by and exist nowhere
02:34in nature.
02:35I mean, nature does not provide us the right to live.
02:40Right?
02:42I mean, with nature, we have to work to live.
02:45We have to produce in order to consume.
02:48We have to go hunt in order to eat.
02:51So nature doesn't provide us the right to live or to satisfy our needs.
02:56Again, if we're looking at children, right, if we're looking at children, then of course
03:03we can say that children have the right to live from the standpoint of the parent, right?
03:12Of course.
03:14Children have the right to live because children do not have to produce in order to consume,
03:19right?
03:20And it's an old sort of fairly cliched thing to say.
03:23I mean, it doesn't mean it's false, but it's an old sort of fairly cliched thing to say
03:27to someone, oh, the capitalist is the parent and the workers are the children, right?
03:35But this is really what's being appealed to.
03:39What does it mean to have the right to live?
03:41Well, it means you have the right to someone else's labor, right?
03:46You have the right to someone else's labor.
03:48Okay.
03:49Now, who is it in life who has the right to someone else's labor?
03:54Well, it is of course our children.
03:57It is children who have the right to the labor of others.
04:03The parents must provide for their children the means of survival, right?
04:11We understand that, right?
04:16It is parents that must provide to their children the materials for survival, or to put it another
04:24way, children have an absolute right to the labor of their parents.
04:35Children have an absolute right to the labor of their parents.
04:41So when you say workers have an absolute right to life at the expense of the capitalist profits,
04:49what we're really saying is children have a right to life though it diminish the money
05:01of their parents.
05:03I know this sounds so crazy simple, but it really has to be explained in some manner
05:07because it's so illogical to treat adults like children that it can only be because
05:14children are being considered in an unconscious fashion.
05:17The children are being considered in an unconscious fashion.
05:24So if we say all children have the right to live and any parent who sacrifices the child
05:34for the sake of his own greed is an abusive parent.
05:38I mean, I think that's fairly safe to say by definition, right?
05:41So if a parent who is a glutton causes his child to starve to death because he takes
05:47all the food for himself, well, that would be a murderous parent worthy of the worst
05:52punishments we could consider, right?
05:53I mean, somebody who starves a child to death in order to feed his own obese gluttony, that
05:58would be pretty terrible, right?
06:01Someone who refused to shelter the child or refused to allow the child into the home for
06:09various reasons, and then the child died of exposure outside, well, that would be a
06:13murder, right?
06:14So you owe children a life and resources.
06:20And of course, when you provide resources to your children, then you have fewer resources
06:29for yourself, right?
06:30If I go and buy my daughter a doll when she was younger, I go spend 20 bucks on a doll,
06:36a doll that's 20 bucks less than I have for myself.
06:38And of course, we're supposed to earn money for the sake of the next generation in particular.
06:46So how can people say people have a right to life when it's not granted by nature?
06:53Now, children does grant the right to life to children in a sense, right?
06:59Parents do, nature does provide the right to life to children, but through the parents,
07:06through the devotion and attachment of the parents, so it's important, right?
07:12All right, he says, obviously you can't, right?
07:16How can one estimate their labors?
07:19Obviously you can't, no one but a Marxist would attempt such an absurdity, and yet we
07:22still have not identified everyone who contributes to the production of that coal.
07:26What are the construction workers who built the railways to the pit head, without which
07:29the coal would sit useless?
07:30What are the farmers who raise the food the coal miners eat?
07:33What of those who build the machines that will burn the coal, without which coal is
07:36merely a rather useless dirt?
07:38It was a time, Kropotkin concedes, when a family could support itself by agricultural
07:42pursuits, supplemented by the few domestic trades, and consider the comb they raised
07:53and the cloth they weaved as products of their own and no one else's labor.
07:57What does that refer to?
07:59Does he mean corn here?
08:00Does he mean corn?
08:03I wonder, does he mean corn?
08:05Maybe.
08:06All right, so even then such a view is not quite correct.
08:15There were forests cleared and roads built by common efforts, but now, in the extremely
08:18interwoven state of industry, of which each branch supports all others, such an individualistic
08:23view can be held no more.
08:25If the iron trade and the cotton industry of this country have reached so high a degree
08:28of development, they have done so owing to the parallel growth of thousands of other
08:33industries, great and small, to the extension of the railway system, to an increase of
08:36knowledge and, above all, to the world trade, which has itself grown up.
08:41The Italians who died from cholera intaking the Suez Canal have contributed as much towards
08:44the enrichment of this country as the British girl who is prematurely growing old in serving
08:48a machine at Manchester.
08:49How can we pretend to estimate the exact part of each of them in the riches accumulated
08:53around us?
08:55Now that's an interesting question, and it is, of course, a challenging question.
09:00But in a free market, the challenge of that question is taken up or taken on by the capitalist.
09:11How do you correctly price things?
09:15It's insanely complicated, which is why it can never be part of central planning, and
09:19it's why, you know, average or lower than average IQ proletariat or workers, on average
09:27they would be, they can't do it.
09:31They can't do it.
09:34So yes, it is insanely complicated to figure out how to price things.
09:42Sometimes.
09:45You want to price enough to gain people's business, but not so much that you lose their
09:51business.
09:52Sometimes people want to pay more because they view it as a mark of high status, right?
10:00Like, I don't know exactly how Starbucks did it, I assume by getting the Kardashians or
10:04some celebrities to do it, but having that white Starbucks cup is a mark of high status,
10:09and therefore people are willing to pay five bucks for coffee they could brew for 50 cents
10:13at home or buy from two bucks from some coffee shop, right?
10:19So it's very complicated.
10:22It's very complicated to know what people are willing or are not willing to pay for
10:27things.
10:28It's also not clear, of course, that you should automatically, if you've got excess money,
10:38invest it in new production capacities when you could in fact invest it in something like
10:42advertising, right?
10:44So Coca-Cola was a summer drink, but then they did a lot of work and spent a lot of
10:49money to associate Coca-Cola with Christmas, with it being a winter drink, and that made
10:54them a lot of money.
10:59So he says, yes, you can't possibly figure out the exact part of each person's labor
11:11in the riches accumulated around us.
11:13You can't do it, because there is no such thing.
11:15There is only supply and demand.
11:17People who were really good at screwing on the front plates of rotary dial telephones
11:24lost that skill or lost the value of that skill when touch phones were introduced, right?
11:31People who made physical keys on, I guess, the numeric pad on early cell phones lost
11:44the value of that when touch screens were introduced.
11:46There were people, especially young people, who were insanely good at typing out messages
11:52on the sort of one to zero to nine keypads, right?
11:55Each keypad had a series of letters, right, A, B, C, D, E, F, and so on.
12:01So you'd have to push twice for B and then once for D and so on, right?
12:07So people were insanely good at typing out lengthy messages using the zero to nine keypad,
12:15and those people have lost that ability now, or they no longer have a use for that ability,
12:24because now there are touch screens.
12:26People were good at the old BlackBerrys.
12:28They could type out messages on the tiny keyboards the BlackBerrys had.
12:35Now you don't need to do that, because again, everything's a touch screen, right?
12:42People were really good at using those little joysticks that came with the old IBM ThinkPads,
12:46the little red joysticks in the middle, which was the mouse substitute.
12:49Now those are very rare, and there's a lot of touch screens and so on.
12:51So you kind of get all of this, right?
12:57The purpose of more sophisticated operating systems is to make it easier to use and to
13:05program.
13:06So that's one of the skills that people had.
13:08I was very good at writing batch files to accomplish particular tasks in DOS, right?
13:18And now there's really little point doing that.
13:23I mean, I had an old notebook that had 640 by 480 screen, but if you attach an external
13:30monitor to it, you could get to 800 by 600, but changing the resolution was a real pain
13:35in the neck.
13:36So I took the Windows.ini files and copied them over and created a whole batch to copy
13:40over the necessary files.
13:42So if I was using the local screen, I would open Windows 3.1 or 3.0 using one set of batch
13:49files, and then if I had an external screen, I would open it using second batch files,
13:53and that saved me a lot of time.
13:54It saved me a couple of minutes, because I didn't have to go into Windows and change
13:58the settings and come back, right?
14:05So people are gaining and losing skills all the time as technology improves and increases,
14:16right?
14:18I used to be very good at what was called, I don't know, I think it was called high-loading.
14:23So the RAM between, what was it, 768K and 1MB was normally reserved, but you could load
14:32programs up in there, thus freeing up more RAM.
14:36My wife was very good at using WordPerfect 5.1, which was a DOS program, and it had reveal
14:41code so that you could see all of the sort of quasi-HTML that it used to format all of
14:46its stuff.
14:47I remember the very first time I saw something that had been produced by a laser printer,
14:50the guy basically had to use C programming to make the laser printer work.
14:53Now it's just WYSIWYG, right?
14:54What you see is what you get.
14:56So what is the value of all of these things?
14:59It comes and goes.
15:02I can't even tell you the number of skills that have lost value for me over the years.
15:10I mean, I used to remember all the key combos for my word processor when I was running low
15:14on dot matrix ink.
15:16I used to know ZOAC4 control.
15:19I used to know all of the key codes for my Atari 800 when I was running low on printer
15:24ink to make it double print and bold to get another, you know, 50 or 70 pages out of the
15:31dot matrix printer.
15:33I haven't used that in, my God, I haven't used that in 45 years, right?
15:38Never will again, right?
15:41So I also remember on the Atari 800, it normally would only allow you three lines of programming,
15:47but if you used short forms like GR dot instead of graphics, you could get even more.
15:53So anyway, it's impossibly complicated, which is why it has to all be left to the free market
15:59because no one person can ever figure this out.
16:01No committee can ever figure this out.
16:03All right, so what does he say next?
16:14And if there is no individual production, then how can private ownership of property
16:17be justified?
16:19If there is no individual production, then how can private ownership of property be justified?
16:24Well, everything is individual production.
16:29So try producing something without ever using an individual of any kind.
16:35Try producing something without using any individual.
16:39So even this computer that I'm producing this show on, people built the computers, they
16:45built the operating system, they built the screen, right?
16:49Everything, all production is individual production.
16:53So saying that because there is nothing that is produced solely by an individual, therefore
17:01there's no such thing as individual production, to me doesn't make much sense at all.
17:10It's like saying, well, some of my cells are dead, right?
17:14Scratch my nose, right?
17:15Kill millions and hundreds of millions of cells.
17:17Some of my souls are dead, therefore I'm dead, right?
17:22So there is no individual production, how can private ownership of property be justified?
17:27What does he say?
17:28Just as it is impossible to argue that any one person created a lump of coal or a ball
17:33of cloth, so it is impossible to justify private ownership of buildings or land.
17:38Homes after all are not built by their owners.
17:41Their construction is a cooperative endeavor involving innumerable workers in forestry,
17:44timber yards, and brick yards.
17:46Homes are not built by their owners.
17:49Well, there is to build and to cause to be built, to be built, sorry, I used to know
18:00English, I was pretty good at it too, right?
18:03There is to build something and then there is to cause to be built.
18:10Now if you cause something to be built, in general, you own it.
18:18So let's say that Bob has a big backyard, he's got a bunch of little kids, and they're
18:22all desperate for a swimming pool.
18:25So Bob goes out and finds someone who's going to build him a swimming pool and pays that
18:30person, I don't know, 50,000, I don't know, what does a swimming pool cost, $50,000 to
18:34build a swimming pool.
18:36Now Bob has not built the swimming pool, Bob has caused the swimming pool to be built
18:46by exchanging his labor for the swimming pool.
18:52It would be the same if Bob and his neighbor, Bob's neighbor was really good at building
18:56swimming pools and Bob was really good at re-roofing and they simply exchanged labor.
19:03So you build me a swimming pool, I'll re-roof your two houses and three barns, I don't know,
19:0950 grand, whatever it would be, right?
19:10So you build me a swimming pool and I will re-roof your two houses and three barns.
19:18Okay, so what is causing the swimming pool to be built?
19:22Well, the exchange of labor with the re-barning, right, re-roofing, the re-barning, re-barning
19:29the re-roofing.
19:30I'm really fast good at English, I swear, there's evidence, all right.
19:35So by trading his labor for a swimming pool, Bob is causing the swimming pool to be built
19:43and by building the swimming pool, Bob's neighbor is causing the two houses and the barns to
19:49be re-roofed.
19:50Do you see what I mean?
19:57So there is building something and then there is causing something to be built and both
20:05of these establish ownership.
20:10And I'll give you another example that is why we're all alive.
20:14So no individual can make a baby.
20:19It takes two baby, right?
20:22So no individual can make a baby.
20:26However, two individuals cause a baby to be born, for the egg to be fertilized with the
20:35sperm, fetus to grow, to be born.
20:38So no individual makes a baby, but two individuals cooperating together produce a baby.
20:44They cause a baby to come into existence, therefore they own the baby.
20:49They have not made the baby, but they have caused the baby to come into existence.
20:55Now we can think of this, of course, in terms of a crime.
21:01If Bob shoots his neighbor, maybe the swimming pool is no good, Bob shoots his neighbor,
21:08Bob has not directly caused the neighbor's death, right?
21:12Because Bob has simply pulled the trigger of a gun and Bob may be at a hunting range
21:15or a shooting range and shoot as much as he wants and not kill anyone, so it's not
21:20just the shooting of the bullet, right?
21:21So you say, oh, but it's the bullet that did it, right?
21:24Well, no, but Bob has not directly killed his neighbor, but he has caused his neighbor
21:28to die by pointing a gun and shooting.
21:31By directly killed, I mean in the same way that if I stabbed him in the throat or strangled
21:34him or something like that, right?
21:39So there is the direct creation of something and then there is the causing of things to
21:44come into existence.
21:45So you've heard me, of course, say on my show a million times when I'm doing a live stream,
21:51I will say to people, thank you so much for coming by because if you're not here, there
21:56is no show, right?
21:57If people don't come by and ask the great questions that they do and inspire me to hopefully
22:02decent heights of rhetorical eloquence and so on, then there is no show, right?
22:10Think of love.
22:12If you act in an honorable, noble way and you take reasonably good care of your appearance
22:21then someone hopefully will fall in love with you.
22:26You didn't make that love, but you caused that love to come into being, the love being
22:31the admiration of your moral excellence, right?
22:37So he says, just as it is impossible to argue that any one person created a lump of coal,
22:40a bolt of cloth, justify private ownership of buildings or land.
22:47Homes after all are not built by their owners, right?
22:50But why is there forestry, timber yards and brickyards?
22:54Because there is a demand and an exchange of labor.
22:59So if the doctor says to the home builder, I will treat you and your family for whatever
23:05medical issues you have for the rest of your life if you build me a small house, then the
23:10doctor offering his services for free is what causes the house to be built.
23:17And that is why he owns it, because he's trading, right?
23:20Moreover, and it is here that the enormity of the whole preceding business becomes most
23:27glaring, the house owes its actual value to the profit which the owner can make out of
23:31it.
23:32Now this profit results from the fact that his house built in a town, which is the work
23:35of 20 or 30 generations, has gone to render habitable, healthy and beautiful.
23:39Like the ground they stand upon, buildings are a common heritage.
23:46He writes, for instance, take the town of Paris, a creation of so many centuries, a
23:49product of the genius of a whole nation.
23:51How could one maintain to an inhabitant of that town who works every day to embellish
23:55it, to purify it, to nourish it, to make it a center of thought and art?
23:59How could one assert before one who produces this wealth that the palaces adorning the
24:03streets of Paris belong in all justice to those who are the legal proprietors today?
24:08It is by spoliation that they hold these riches.
24:10Well, I mean, if you're talking about palaces, then yeah, I mean, the aristocracy gets their
24:15stuff through spoliation, through exploitation.
24:18I get all of that.
24:19And of course, there is this constant, constant saying, some property is acquired unjustly,
24:24therefore property is unjust, which is the same as saying some sexual activity is rape,
24:32therefore all sexual activity is rape.
24:38Now when we say there's an incredibly complex thing that no one person creates, therefore
24:45that thing should not be owned, we're talking about children.
24:49It's always coming back to the kids.
24:51There is an incredibly complex thing that no one person can create, and therefore it
24:56should not be owned.
24:59So we're talking about children.
25:00Of course, parents don't own children in the same way that you own property.
25:05Parents have a property relationship to children similar to that of a trust fund, right?
25:10A lawyer who has ownership or has control over a trust fund, it's not his, he's just
25:14supposed to protect it until a certain amount of time has passed.
25:18So if some parents are killed and their five-year-old kid, the money goes into a trust fund managed
25:25by a lawyer, and then the kid gets the money when he's 21.
25:28The lawyer does not own the trust fund, but he has care, custody, and control over it
25:32with the goal of relinquishing that control in the future, and that's the same sort of
25:35thing when it comes to property.
25:40This remains so can readily be seen by examining the value of today's office buildings and
25:45shopping complexes.
25:46Without even the slightest improvements, their value rise so long as the local economy prospers.
25:53No sum of money invested in maintenance or beautification is sufficient to maintain their
25:56value when the local economy fails, for their value is not derived from the money invested
26:02or from the bricks and mortar and plastic, steel, and cement of which they are constructed.
26:07Not even the labor of the workers who build and maintain these modern temples to capital
26:11undermines their value.
26:12Their value in the final analysis depends almost entirely upon the wealth and prosperity
26:18of the greater society.
26:20That's false.
26:22The value of malls is not dependent almost entirely upon the wealth and prosperity of
26:27the greater society.
26:28No.
26:29It is people who have labor they are willing to trade for the labor in the mall, the labor
26:41concentrated in the goods and services, the labor of building and maintaining the mall,
26:44the labor of the owners, and the labor of the clerks and so on, and the retail workers
26:51in the mall.
26:53Society has, at least in many ways, either stayed as wealthy, or in some ways you could
26:59argue has gotten more wealthy, but malls in general have begun failing, or more than just
27:06begun, it's been quite a while that they've been failing, for a long time because Amazon
27:12and other things have replaced mall culture.
27:18Society has not had a massive catastrophic loss of wealth, at least in terms of people's
27:23everyday perception of things, but malls have become less popular.
27:29The value does not depend almost entirely on the wealth and prosperity of the greater
27:32society.
27:33I mean, a cell phone that cost $2,000 20 years ago, you can't give away today, even though
27:44society has not become broke relative to 20 years ago.
27:47It's just to do with demand.
27:50He writes, the most luxurious hotel built in a dying sitting will soon favor the surroundings
27:53while the meanest hovel increases in value as surrounding properties are developed.
27:57Yes.
27:58We enrich each other, not only spiritually, but materially as well, as we work, complete
28:02and play together, and without the effects of society as a whole, no one prospers.
28:07Yeah.
28:08Yes, so trade involves, it's so retarded, right?
28:12So trade involves more than one person, therefore there's no such thing as ownership.
28:18I mean, my gosh, that's like saying that all children should be orphans because no individual
28:23can produce a child.
28:25Good Lord.
28:27Okay.
28:28Private ownership then is not merely unjust, it is absurd.
28:31As early as 1873, when he was only beginning to become active in revolutionary circles,
28:36Kropotkin recognized that true equality was impossible under capitalism.
28:40True equality is impossible.
28:43True equality is impossible.
28:48Because people are different, and even people who are the same often age differently, right?
28:52Some people get fat, some people exercise, some people don't, so true equality is impossible
28:56in any system, no matter what.
28:59Because the only way you can solve economic inequality is with political inequality.
29:06So the only way you can solve differences in incomes and wealth is to give some people
29:14the right to point guns at hundreds of millions of people or billions of people around the
29:18world and force transfer of wealth under threat of jail.
29:23The only way you can solve economic inequality is with political inequality, which is infinitely
29:33worse.
29:34Can't solve the problem of inequality, can't happen, will never happen.
29:39It's a devilish thing.
29:40So if you give some people the right to steal from others and keep the proceeds, some significant
29:48portion of those proceeds for themselves, then that's political inequality.
29:54That's an inequality in the capacity to initiate the use of force, which is moral inequality,
29:59right?
30:00The only way to solve income inequality is with moral inequality.
30:06In other words, the only way to solve relative wealth and relative poverty is with absolute
30:13good and absolute evil, right?
30:16Respect for property rights and violations of property rights.
30:19So it is a great delusion.
30:26Now why do people believe that?
30:29Because they believe that parents are not coercive when they redistribute things.
30:34And this is very much the case in many ways, right?
30:38So if the older kid, let's say there are two brothers and the older brother keeps stealing
30:45the food from the younger brother, right?
30:46You give them each equal portions and then the older brother steals the food, takes the
30:50food and then the parent makes him give it back.
30:54Well the parent is not initiating the use of force.
30:56The parent is respecting property rights, right?
31:01Because it was the younger child's food and the older child took it, right?
31:05So I think that's why people believe it, right?
31:10But again, adults aren't children and the state is not the parent, so vice versa.
31:19He says, Kropotkin says, it is desirable that a person beginning to work not enslave himself
31:24and not yield part of his labor.
31:27His strength is independence to private individuals whose arbitrariness always will determine
31:31how great the part should be.
31:34Then it is necessary that private persons control neither the instruments of labor nor
31:38the earth nor the means of existence during work.
31:46Thus we arrive at the elimination in the future society his realization we desire of any personal
31:50property.
31:53Which means nobody can control property.
31:59Nobody can control property because all property is controlled by individuals.
32:03All property is controlled by individuals.
32:07And I mean, if a monkey steals your glasses and runs off into the jungle, it's now unowned,
32:12right?
32:13Because they haven't actually stolen it, just taken it, right?
32:15So all property is individuals.
32:19All property is individuals because concepts and collectives don't exist.
32:24If you say, oh, well, the government should own everything, well, the government is composed
32:27of individuals and it's individuals who control everything.
32:31They simply control that which they have not created or traded for or was given to them
32:36voluntarily in some other fashion.
32:40So if you're going to say there's no personal property, then no one can use anything.
32:45Because all exercising of property rights is performed by individuals.
32:55If some bandit comes along and steals your stuff, well, he's unjustly gained control
32:58of your property, but it's still an individual.
33:02I mean, has the concept of a bandit, the idea, the concept, the definition of a bandit ever
33:08stolen anything from you?
33:10No.
33:11It's always an individual.
33:12Always an individual.
33:14Because only human beings can exercise moral control over property.
33:19And so all property transfers are based upon individuals.
33:25And so saying there's no personal property, since all control of property is through individuals,
33:31you say, oh, well, you can have your own toothbrush maybe, but you can't have control over the
33:35means of production.
33:36You say, okay, well, who does have control over the means of production?
33:38Oh, it's a collectivist of, a collective syndicalist of workers.
33:43It's like, okay, but someone at some point has to exercise individual control.
33:47Someone has to push a button.
33:48Somebody has to lift up the broom.
33:50Somebody has to put the bolt on the wheel of the car.
33:53Somebody has to exercise control over property.
33:57To say no one can exercise control over property, well, of course, that would mean that nobody
34:01could eat, because eating is exercising self-control, using your body as your personal property.
34:06So nobody can exercise property, which means nothing gets grown, nothing gets touched,
34:10nothing gets moved.
34:11People don't even get out of bed.
34:12Right?
34:14All property, says the writer, no matter how it was created, must become the property of
34:19all, available to all who contribute to society through their labor.
34:23Okay?
34:24How do you know who contributes to society?
34:27Are you going to say, I know what is valuable?
34:32I objectively know that which is most valuable to society.
34:37But my God, if you objectively know that which is most valuable to society, you can end up
34:42ruling and controlling just about everything in a capitalist society, because you'll become
34:47the most stupendously wealthy capitalist in the known universe, because you know objectively
34:51that which is most valuable to society, so you simply create an entire massive amalgam
34:56of companies to produce that which is most valuable to society, and then you can be as
35:00nice to the workers, and you can be as socialistic and capitalistic as you want.
35:06You can have anarcho-syndicalism run the whole thing.
35:08You can be an anarcho-communist, because you know that which is most valuable to society,
35:14so you can produce it and gain staggering amounts of Crocian-style wealth, a Midas touch,
35:23but you can still eat a burrito.
35:25And so, if you know objectively that which society most needs, then you can have your
35:31socialist paradise in a capitalist society.
35:34Of course, if it turns out that you don't have a big idea of what society most needs,
35:38wants, and desires, because you don't have the price mechanism to tell you these things,
35:42then you're going to go broke, and then wind that the reality is unfair.
35:47All right.
35:49Let's see here.
35:50This was and remains necessary, not only on grounds of social justice, but because all
35:54production is necessarily social.
35:56Yeah, all production isn't necessarily social.
35:59Sure, yeah, I get that.
36:03I get that.
36:04So, I've interacted with other people in order to produce this podcast, right?
36:08Microphone, computer, internet uploads, cables, blah blah blah, wires, fiber, whatever, right?
36:15So I have interacted with others, and we've traded.
36:20I've traded my labor, they've traded their labor, and it only exists because we've individually
36:27traded our labor.
36:28All right.
36:29Production for needs.
36:30Kropotkin refused to separate his analysis of what was from what could be.
36:34He insisted on asking not merely if the present economic order worked on its own terms, but
36:38whether, a quote, the means now in use for satisfying human needs under the present system
36:42production for profits was really economical, right?
36:47So his argument, I think, is that if people have no sense of profit or loss, things will
36:53become efficient.
36:55Things will become efficient.
36:56If people have no skin in the game, they're spending other people's money, they suffer
36:59no negative consequences for bad decisions, and no positive consequences for good decisions.
37:05So what he's saying is, if the test is meaningless, you can't be failed, then people will be much
37:12more economical in studying for their tests, and the tests will be much more effectively
37:17prepared for.
37:18That's completely false, of course, right?
37:22Do they really lead to economy in the expenditure of human forces, or are they not mere wasteful
37:27survivals from a past that was plunged into darkness, ignorance, and oppression, and never
37:31took into consideration the economical and social value of the human being?
37:35The economical and social value of the human being, for Kropotkin, was the key to anarchist
37:41economics, to the building of a free society, blah, blah, blah.
37:44Okay, so that's the end of the article, and it's an interesting article, and so on.
37:52It is, I mean, it's satanic, right?
37:54It is satanic to say, we can create a society where you don't have to work, and you'll never
38:02be exploited, and, I mean, it's just a fantasy.
38:07It's just a fantasy.
38:09It's offering up some sort of bizarre, diaper-based, pre-toddler infancy where all of your needs
38:17get taken care of, and you can be selfish, right?
38:23So saying that the economy should work for me, we're saying, but the economy should work
38:28for everyone.
38:29Well, I didn't even know what that means, because there's only individuals.
38:31There is no everyone, right?
38:33Who are you going to sell to?
38:34Everyone.
38:35That's not an answer in the entrepreneurial world, or in the rational world at all, right?
38:39So if you're going to say to people, the economy will work for you, and you're going to get
38:44paid more, and things are going to be better for you, and you'll get free stuff, and all
38:49of that, it's saying that the economy is going to work for you, and you're going to
38:54get more.
38:57So that's selfish, right?
38:59Because the way to get more is to give more.
39:04I mean, if you want your kids to enjoy your company as you get older, you should be nicer
39:10and more available to them when they're younger.
39:12To get is to give.
39:13If I want my wife to continue to love me, I should be kind and generous and helpful
39:18and virtuous and arouse her admiration and other things, or whatever, right?
39:22So to get is to give.
39:26And it is an appeal to thwarted and frustrated toddlerhood to say, you should get without
39:32giving.
39:33That you have value independent of what you provide.
39:37Well, that doesn't mean babies and toddlers and little kids.
39:39Of course they should have value outside of what they provide.
39:43Of course they should.
39:44No question.
39:45You should have value outside of what you provide.
39:47But only when you're a baby and a toddler and a little kid.
39:50When you get older, then parents have to start training their kids for reciprocity, right?
39:55To not just figure out what they can get, but also what they can give.
40:00The growth from immaturity to maturity is recognizing the mutuality of humanity.
40:06That just as you want things, other people want things.
40:10Just as you have preferences, other people have preferences.
40:12And negotiating for win-win solutions is an adult thing.
40:16To simply say, well, you should just get things without having to give them, which is this
40:21sort of anarcho-syndicalist madness, is an appeal to regression.
40:28It is an appeal to narcissism, to selfishness.
40:31To saying, I should get without having to give.
40:33I should get more without having to give more.
40:35I should get more value without having to provide more value.
40:38Well, that's greedy.
40:40And it is actually an appeal to the very aristocracy and greed that these people always
40:44project onto the capitalists unjustly and on the aristocracy just itself.
40:49I hope this helps.
40:50I really do appreciate your attention in these matters.
40:53Freedomain.com slash donate to help out the show.
40:55I really would appreciate that.
40:57Have yourself a glorious, wonderful, beautiful evening.
41:00I look forward to your support.
41:02Take care, my friends.
41:03Bye-bye.