RedWizard [he/him, comrade/them]

  • 29 Posts
  • 68 Comments
Joined 3 years ago
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Cake day: July 1st, 2023

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  • The shape of the nature of communal work will take whatever the material conditions demand, but what needs to be true first is that we’re organizing our work around the right ideals and goals. We do that by subordinating the productive forces of society to those goals instead of trying to coax them to those goals like we do now. Automation might be the right solution to the productive process of a given necessity; human labor might be the appropriate solution if automation isn’t sufficiently capable. The boon of our current system is the division of labor and the socialization of labor. That is to say, the revolutionary innovation and progressive force of capitalism is reorganizing labor such that we break down the productive process of any given item into smaller processes that join together to produce a single output. Instead of a handycraftsmen working many hours to build a chair, lathing every spindle, every leg, and every seat, each of those components is produced individually, creating the same chair in a significantly reduced amount of time.

    The regressive side of capitalism as a political and economic organization is that it retained feudalism’s private ownership of the means of production. The tools necessary to produce any given necessity. The handycraftsmen owned his tools; he owned the workshop in which he created his crafts, and in the migration to a socialized production model, he retained the ownership of those tools and workshop, and hired peasents to split the productive process into smaller processes. They used his tools and his workshop, but they retained no ownership over what was produced and, as a result, had no authority over how their output was distributed.

    To answer your question more directly: “So if I understand correctly your point, you assign all that work to a community and we share the benefit?”

    What you’re describing here is a plan. Currently, the productive forces are subject to no plan, just the whims of those who currently own those productive forces. There is no plan that outlines what needs to be produced, what needs to be focused on, to deliver that shared social benefit. Getting to that place is the challenge we face right now. To reach these goals, we have to have a political system that can, and should, place the productive forces that exist now in a kind of cage. One that dictates to the productive forces the priorities of the community.

    “Do I work as an employee, do I work as the business owner, or do I work directly for my needs without need for that much money.”

    I don’t see how these are at all mutually exclusive; that someone within the community wouldn’t be any of these things over another. Again, the socialization of labor is the driving force of our productive capacity. That, in turn, will require those who perform tasks across the productive process. Some of those tasks are organizational; others are skilled; some require academic theorizing and experimentation. The thing that we’re seeking to remove, however, is the corceon from the system, where someone is compelled to work a job that they are not interested in or fit to perform. How that is organized is one that follows the material conditions of the community. That organization could support “business owners” given that those businesses are not exploitative to workers. However, if the community is well enough organized, there would be no need for an individual to “own” the “business”. Take for example, trash collection. This is a service that is obviously needed, but does it require someone to “own” the “business” of picking up trash and transporting it to landfills or processing centers? Not likely. Trash management is something that was for a long time a service provided for the community by the municipality, county, or state, province, or “regional government.” The more you begin to ask these questions of different sectors of every day life, the more you might find that you do not need a “business owner”.

    But again, that really depends on the material conditions. All things are interconnected, and so those conditions are often contingent on external conditions as well. Global material conditions will need to be shifted as well, before we might see more and more of our everyday lives be transformed into communal ownership rather than private ownership by a “business owner”.


  • Work will always be required. The problem however is that work is a coercion under the current system. You work to live, to provide for yourself the requirements for life: food, shelter, and medical care. We do this dispite the fact that our level of technological achievement could provide all those things with very minimal effort. Once you can be provided with these basic fundamental needs with no strings attached, the earnings you do make can go even farther since your not spending as much one food, medical, or shelter. But it goes beyond just these basic needs. As communal creatures we have it in us to reorder society around the well being of people as opposed to the current order: the maitainance of profit and endless growth. This persuite of growth has left the means of life in control of the few, which in turn gives them control over how you get to live. Anyone who thinks that no one will work in the future is foolish. Instead the goal is for work to be a persuite of enrichment for the whole of the community both local and global, to produce such a surplus that those who do not have the ability to work are not coerced into doing so, and those that can will work to ensure we all live dignified and enriched lives.







  • Trump administration launches portal to initiate tariff refunds

    Hello and welcome to the US politics live blog.

    The Trump administration is expected to launch a refund system for businesses that paid tariffs later struck down by the supreme court. It is the first step in paying back $166bn in tariffs after justices ruled the Trump administration was overstepping its constitutional powers.

    Importers and their brokers will be able to begin claiming refunds through an online portal beginning at 8am ET, according to US Customs and Border Protection (CBP), the agency administering the system.

    It’s the first step in a complicated process that also might eventually lead to refunds for consumers who were billed for some or all of the tariffs on products shipped to them from outside the United States.

    Companies must list the goods on which tariffs were levied. If CBP approves a claim, it will take 60-90 days for a refund to be issued, the agency said. CBP said in court filings that over 330,000 importers paid a total of about $166bn on more than 53m shipments.

    More than 3,000 businesses, including FedEx and Costco, have sued the Trump administration to get refunds, the New York Times reports. FedEx has suggested customers could be in line for refunds for overpaid tariffs while Costco has said it may pass on refunds in lower prices for consumers.


    The URL loaded to the top of the live blog which isn’t the story linked. I’ve copied the content into this comment.



  • I mean, there has been a lot of consolidation of the music industry. There isn’t the same kind of music apparatus like there was when those songs were written. Plus, there have been some good protest songs recently. On May 6th, 2024 Macklemore put out Hinds Hall, then in September he put out Hinds Hall 2, then 11 months ago he put out Fucked Up. He’s also not signed to a label, so maybe that’s why. Famously, groups like Bob Vylan and Kneecap have taken a lot of heat for their positions. Vylan was dropped from their label, I believe they were facing charges. Kneecap was facing terrorism charges which were eventually dropped. Sure, this isn’t explicitly ICE related, but these struggles are all connected.

    Radio is basically dead, most of the US and Canadian radio stations are corporate owned. As of 2021 only 80ish US stations were independent, and 13 Canadian stations were independent. The idea that a corporate owned radio station would play a “protest” song in 2026 seems unrealistic. Plus, most people are getting their music through corporate algorithms via services like Spotify or YT Music. Maybe there is some really great protest songs, but I have a feeling they don’t get the same kind of traction in the algorithms as other forms of music.


  • “I got older and became a communist”

    +2

    “I’m a vegetable growing, psychedelics taking socialist these days. After the war, I’ve pretty much stopped believing in any of the patriotic nonsense that got me there in the first place, and am a firm believer that the best thing a person can do is help their neighbors and live a loving life. Still got the guns though. I don’t trust the fascists to act politely.”

    +2

    “I’m not a communist. I’m not a socialist. I own a small business. I’m a Marine Corps veteran.”

    -2-2-2nope

    CNN: “Mr. Planter, are you a… communist?”

    Planter:

    Edit:

    “I can honestly say that that is me just being an a**hole on the Internet,” Platner told CNN this week. “I have an immense amount of friends who are police officers. They’re not all bastards because they’re literally buddies of mine.”

    All my homies are good apples; we all hate bad apples.

    In another since-removed post from 2020, Platner responded to a thread titled “White people aren’t as racist or stupid as Trump thinks” by writing, “Living in white rural America, I’m afraid to tell you they actually are.”

    When asked about the comment, Platner said he didn’t recall the specific exchange, but suggested it reflected an argument he was having online at the time.

    “I’m also a White guy and I don’t think I’m a racist,” he said. “I don’t believe that. I’m sure I was just angry on the Internet about the state of things back then.”

    wonder-who-thats-for

    In another post in 2010, Platner took aim at musician Ted Nugent, a conservative activist.

    “As a combat veteran, that m*therf**ker makes me want to puke when he spews his warmongering macho bullshit. Suck a d*ck, Ted.”

    “To be fair,” Platner told CNN. “I’m not really regretful of that one.”

    picard-troll


  • At present, British Communists very often find it hard even to approach the masses, and even to get a hearing from them. If I come out as a Communist and call upon them to vote for Henderson and against Lloyd George, they will certainly give me a hearing. And I shall be able to explain in a popular manner, not only why the Soviets are better than a parliament and why the dictatorship of the proletariat is better than the dictatorship of Churchill (disguised with the signboard of bourgeois “democracy”), but also that, with my vote, I want to support Henderson in the same way as the rope supports a hanged man—that the impending establishment of a government of the Hendersons will prove that I am right, will bring the masses over to my side, and will hasten the political death of the Hendersons and the Snowdens just as was the case with their kindred spirits in Russia and Germany.

    ~ V.I Lenin