@Erimitus Said 
Eagle: The question should not be "how do we make the rich less rich?" the question should be "how do we make the poor less poor?"
Erimitus: The question should not be "how do we make the rich less rich?" the question should be "how do we make the poor less poor?" (I read this somewhere)
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Given: Wealth (the assets of a community) is not equally distributed
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There is wealth
Wealth (in this context) is the total assets of a community
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There is suffering
Suffering (in this context) is hardship caused by a lack of basic needs.
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There are basic needs
Basic needs (in this context) are food, shelter and clothing.
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There are the rich
The rich (in this context) members of a community who have excessive assets (i.e., more than basic needs)
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There are the poor
The poor (in this context) are the members of a community who do not have basic needs)
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Eagle: Why should the rich stop being rich?
Erimitus: I would like to drop the ‘maybe’ and add a qualifier.
Premise: The rich should stop being rich [at the expense of the poor].
We agree.
Quote:
Erimitus: Now you want me to support the assertion and I cannot. I can think of no reason why unproductive member of society should not be allowed to die in the street. The more there is of something the less that thing is worth. And there are a whole lot of humans. And the worthless should be allowed to die. In fact the humane thing would be to put the inferior humans in camps and systematically exterminate them.
I can support it.
The rich should not get richer off the backs of the poor (in this case I mean by exploiting their poverty and intentionally keeping them poor) for the same reason that the poor should not get rich by stealing from the rich. Because it is immoral to gain selfish increase at the expense of someone else's effort or misery or by taking things that do not belong to you. It all...everything...goes back to the immorality of theft. And yes, there are plenty of cases when the rich have stolen from the poor to become richer. Not necessarily through theft of tangible things, but through the exploitation of poverty and the intrinsic product of their efforts. "Company towns" that existed in this very country are a prime example.
At least to me (and I think to most), life trumps the value of property, making these things immoral and also making it immoral to exterminate someone for being poor. It's also one of the primary reasons slavery is incorrect.
Quote:
Eagle: If a person earns a certain amount, is it immoral for that person to go ahead and earn more?
Erimitus: (my apologies to Hamlet)
There is nothing that is either moral or immoral that thinking does not make it so. I you believe it is immoral then it is immoral. The masters and slaves have different moral codes. There is no reason to prohibit a worker (or exploiter of workers) to earn as much as they can. They can be allowed to work themselves to death if they want to.
Eagle: if he has more than he needs and someone else has less than he needs, it's immoral for him to let that wealth sit unused while someone else could use it.
Erimitus: From the point of view of those who do not have basic needs it would be immoral
Eagle: …taking wealth that belongs to someone else is also immoral.
Erimitus: yes. Private property… The workers should be encouraged to believe that they have property rights. When they believe that they work harder.
Agreed.
Quote:
Eagle: if there were no poor people, would it be okay then for some people to be rich?
Erimitus: The theory is that all people should be rich (i.e., have basic needs met); after that there I can think of no reason why some of the rich should not be allowed to be richer even if they do so by exploiting other rich, even to the point where they have more than they ever possibly use. There is a point where it no longer a matter of wealth it is a matter of power. It is good to be king. If I was king of the world the first thing I would do is give everyone the rest of the day off.
At the next vacancy for God, if I am elected,
I shall forgive last the delicately wounded who,
having been slugged no harder than anyone else,
never got up again, neither to fight back,
nor to finger their jaws in painful admiration.
They who are wholly broken, and they in whom mercy is understanding,
I shall embrace at once and lead to pillows in heaven.
But they who are the meek by trade, baiting the best of their betters with
extortions of a mock-helplessness,
I shall take last to love, and never wholly.
Let them all into Heaven- I abolish Hell-
but let it be read over them as they enter:
"Beware the calculations of the meek; who gambled nothing,
gave nothing, and could never receive enough."
Quote:
Eagle: Where is the line between "poor" and "not poor?"
Erimitus: The poor do not have their basic needs met. The non-poor do have their basic needs met.
Erimitus: There may be a point where there are so many poor that they revolt and guillotine the rich. It has happened before. That might be a good reason to eliminate the poor. It might be more cost effective to feed them than exterminate them.
Eagle: If a person cannot work to provide for themselves, that person should receive charity and help from others who can provide.
Erimitus: I don’t know; what good are they if they cannot work?
Eagle: If a person, however, is capable of working to provide for himself and does not do so by choice, why should he not have an unequal portion of wealth compared to someone who can work and does so?
Erimitus: No reason I can think of. Those who do not work (for any reason) are useless to society as a whole and the masters in particular. It is important to have the workers believe they are free and that there is justice. At one time the workers were encouraged to believe that they will get their reward after they die in a place called heaven. Many do not believe that anymore.
Erimitus: and so ends my attempt at reductio ad absurdum. I have to stop reading so much Nietzsche.
Anyone who reads Nietzsche should at some point stop reading it so much. I've reached that point more than a couple times myself.
But I do know my Nietzsche and he'd have a lot to say about all of this. His predictions for the way things would go socially went first exactly in the direction he thought they would, and then violently away from the direction he hoped they would. | 
October 18, 2017 @ 01:38:14 pm
Moderator
work...? 
