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a lot of you haven’t seen Chicken Run and it shows
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Aug 26, 2020 18:00
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THS posted:a lot of you haven’t seen Chicken Run and it shows
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Aug 26, 2020 18:01
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apropos to nothing posted:so you believe that the cows in an industrial farm have the capacity to resist their situation on a social basis? like they can engage in mass coordinated action against their owners? if so then lol if not then congrats we agree that animals are in fact not a class which is capable of class antagonism A lot of people can't do this either.
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Aug 26, 2020 18:02
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THS posted:a lot of you haven’t seen Chicken Run and it shows
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Aug 26, 2020 18:03
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apropos to nothing posted:so you believe that the cows in an industrial farm have the capacity to resist their situation on a social basis? like they can engage in mass coordinated action against their owners? if so then lol if not then congrats we agree that animals are in fact not a class which is capable of class antagonism I didn't say they were a class. I said that people extract labor from animals.
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Aug 26, 2020 18:05
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Doc Hawkins posted:A lot of people can't do this either. what group of workers can’t do this? not who is it difficult for but who is it literally inconceivable that they can? it is literally inconceivable for a group of cows to do something like go on strike or fight for better conditions. for any group of workers it may be easier or harder to do but they are capable of fighting for better conditions by withholding their labor power.
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Aug 26, 2020 18:06
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Lostconfused posted:I didn't say they were a class. I said that people extract labor from animals. ok yes physical labor is performed by animals but they do not have labor value extracted from their labor in the Marxist sense for the reasons I’m describing.
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Aug 26, 2020 18:08
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Doc Hawkins posted:A lot of people can't do this either. i would say that the key is that a lot of people CAN, hypothetically, do this, which is why there exists a labor market with formal rights and such - to make sure that most people DON’T, even though the possibility is there. you do technically sell your labor-power to your boss, in exchange for money or goods commensurate with its value. it’s a fair trade in formal liberal terms, and one you could TECHNICALLY elect not to make
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Aug 26, 2020 18:08
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Not Moo. Us.
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Aug 26, 2020 18:12
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apropos to nothing posted:ok yes physical labor is performed by animals but they do not have labor value extracted from their labor in the Marxist sense for the reasons I’m describing. I don't get it. They clearly produce something more valuable than what it takes to keep them alive. What do you call that difference other than surplus? You wouldn't be using animals for production if they did not produce commodities that are more valuable than ones they consume.
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Aug 26, 2020 18:13
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Homeless Friend posted:Not Moo. Us.
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Aug 26, 2020 18:15
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Homeless Friend posted:Not Moo. Us. Still With Hereford
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Aug 26, 2020 18:16
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Lostconfused posted:I don't get it. They clearly produce something more valuable than what it takes to keep them alive. What do you call that difference other than surplus? a capitalist might say the same thing about a spinning wheel or a river, though. like if you put a water wheel into a river and then attach an electric generator to that water wheel it might seem like the river is generating surplus value for you, unless you did a careful accounting separating the freely available natural resources and raw materials from the human effort that went into putting that entire setup together. the proposition being made here is that the effort of taming and piloting a workhorse is equivalent to the effort of running the generator
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Aug 26, 2020 18:25
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Lostconfused posted:I don't get it. They clearly produce something more valuable than what it takes to keep them alive. What do you call that difference other than surplus? all forms of capital also produce something more valuable than what it takes to keep them working. terms like surplus value and labor have different contexts in a Marxist sense than they do if you’re just referring to the physical act of laboring. animals as living creatures endure labor. however surplus value of whatever they are involved in producing is not a consequence of the physical actions the animal is forced to do just like it’s not a product of the physical actions of a machine or something, it’s a result of the human input into the process of the creation of the product or service. none of this is a statement about morality relating to the use of animals in production but just how marxists define surplus labor and labor value
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Aug 26, 2020 18:28
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e: never mind
indigi fucked around with this message at 18:32 on Aug 26, 2020 |
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Aug 26, 2020 18:29
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apropos to nothing posted:what group of workers can’t do this? not who is it difficult for but who is it literally inconceivable that they can? it is literally inconceivable for a group of cows to do something like go on strike or fight for better conditions. for any group of workers it may be easier or harder to do but they are capable of fighting for better conditions by withholding their labor power. if you're arguing about what's conceivable, then you're talking about perfectly spherical workers in a vacuum. that's a mistake which i assume you don't make in your actual organizing, but it doesn't even draw the line you think it does: what if they don't have a common language, or any language? what if the labor being extracted is the production of their own meat? you're correctly presuming the personhood of an abstract worker, but personhood is socially constructed: anyone we don't consider a person, we can't consider a worker. this is sometimes applied to humans. e: sp Doc Hawkins fucked around with this message at 18:33 on Aug 26, 2020 |
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Aug 26, 2020 18:30
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indigi posted:yeah but one thing is alive and would prefer to be doing different things, while the other isn’t that's not what makes the difference here. for example, iirc marx would say that a government employee doesn't produce surplus value either, because of the social relations surrounding their work and the specific place in which it plugs into the overall supply chain and command-and-control infrastructure of capitalist society
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Aug 26, 2020 18:31
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Ferrinus posted:that's not what makes the difference here. for example, iirc marx would say that a government employee doesn't produce surplus value either, because of the social relations surrounding their work and the specific place in which it plugs into the overall supply chain and command-and-control infrastructure of capitalist society yeah I realized that soon after I made the post
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Aug 26, 2020 18:32
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this is fun but i want to take a moment to say the real labor issue of animal cruelty is the trauma of workers paid to commit it
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Aug 26, 2020 18:33
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Ferrinus posted:that's not what makes the difference here. for example, iirc marx would say that a government employee doesn't produce surplus value either, because of the social relations surrounding their work and the specific place in which it plugs into the overall supply chain and command-and-control infrastructure of capitalist society This sounds absolutely ridiculous. How does he manage to draw any sort of distinction that makes sense?
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Aug 26, 2020 18:37
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Lostconfused posted:This sounds absolutely ridiculous. How does he manage to draw any sort of distinction that makes sense? weren't you the guy telling people to read capital like a page ago at most? regardless, it's because the function of the government is to create and maintain an environment in which capitalist profits can be realized, not to generate those profits themselves. if you're sitting in a department of labor office processing unemployment claims, or sitting in a military base piloting a drone, you aren't creating commodities which will be sold for a greater exchange value than your labor was bought for. you're just foaming the runway for other people to do that, and you're doing it at a socialized, public cost rather than as part of the cost of doing business for a private capitalist there's definitely a conversation to be had here about the full extent of the supply chain and, specifically, the labor of social reproduction rather than production - a government worker can probably be likened to, say, the janitor who cleans a factory floor every night so that production can continue the following morning, although that janitor is on a private payroll while the government worker is not, and they might also be likened to a stay at home spouse who regenerates their employed spouse's physical and psychological health from day to day so that the employee can continue to sell it to a boss, even though again that househusband or housewife is not technically part of the market. but many draw the distinction, marx among them, and the important takeaway here is that the distinction is drawn on the basis of capitalist balance sheets and not on the basis of personhood or rights or small-v value or whatever
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Aug 26, 2020 18:46
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Ferrinus posted:weren't you the guy telling people to read capital like a page ago at most? Ferrinus posted:but many draw the distinction, marx among them, and the important takeaway here is that the distinction is drawn on the basis of capitalist balance sheets and not on the basis of personhood or rights or small-v value or whatever
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Aug 26, 2020 18:57
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Lostconfused posted:That was me. No I didn't read all of it. I guess Marx contradicts himself a lot from the sound of things. okay but commodities are only important to marx's accountancy insofar as they make their way to a capitalist market and get involved in exchange. for instance, here's something else that marx would say is of no value: a river. uncop mentioned an even more extreme example earlier in the thread: breathable air (for now...!)
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Aug 26, 2020 18:59
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Surplus value is only relevant to the source of capitalist profits, commodities which are produced under different ways of production like a government service at cost (or subsidised) or a workers co-op are still commodities and have use values and in many cases will have exchange values. Edit: Sorry if they're making a commodity it has to have an exchange value! It's the enlightened capitalist argument for government services that says a lot of social reproduction necessities performed by non-capitalist entities allow greater exploitation for remaining capitalists as the social reproduction of labour is cheaper and so the wages of the workforce paid by the capitalist is lower while the market price of the commodity they make is the same so they get more profits. namesake fucked around with this message at 19:12 on Aug 26, 2020 |
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Aug 26, 2020 19:05
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Ferrinus posted:okay but commodities are only important to marx's accountancy insofar as they make their way to a capitalist market and get involved in exchange. for instance, here's something else that marx would say is of no value: a river. uncop mentioned an even more extreme example earlier in the thread: breathable air (for now...!) Yes but a river has a value, it's just not producing surplus value. It would require human labor input for it to start producing surplus value. If absolutely nothing else changes in the environment. Breathing air is an act of subsistence. You are consuming your own labor when you breathe. Air it self still has value, you are spending labor to consume it. Fully realizing the value of it and your labor.
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Aug 26, 2020 19:09
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Lostconfused posted:You need to read Capital again. Whoa accurately called out for bullshitting, this feels like a first even if it isn’t! I suppose I must.
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Aug 26, 2020 19:11
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Lostconfused posted:Yes but a river has a value, it's just not producing surplus value. It would require human labor input for it to start producing surplus value. If absolutely nothing else changes in the environment. a river does not have value. it has use-value, and it can have a price, but it is of no value. same goes for unworked land, sunshine, and indeed for air. to have a value, air would need to be unavailable for consumption unless some special labor was performed to acquire and process it. i guess you can pretend the physical act of drawing down your diaphragm and expanding your lungs is that labor, but then i can counter your assertion by pointing out a difference between "raw" air (it's outside your body) and "processed" air (it's oxygen in your bloodstream). raw air is valueless. however, it has a very important and irreplaceable use-value, which is distinct from its value. remember, these are technical terms
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Aug 26, 2020 19:12
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Fair enough, I just don't understand it then. His explanation of commodities is far too confusing and it doesn't make sense to me. The animal thing though is still word play trying to dodge the nature of the matter.
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Aug 26, 2020 19:26
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someone should write Capital For Dummies with a lot of pictures and illustrations
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Aug 26, 2020 19:30
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Lostconfused posted:Fair enough, I just don't understand it then. His explanation of commodities is far too confusing and it doesn't make sense to me. i tried to do a writeup of use-value vs. exchange value vs. value here, you might find it helpful depending on how clear i was able to be https://forums.somethingawful.com/showthread.php?noseen=0&threadid=3760900&pagenumber=969&perpage=40#post505923649 otherwise, i just want to assure you that the claim that animals don't generate surplus value has nothing to do with questions of animal personhood, animal cruelty, etc. i could see myself being brought around to the notion that animal slaves (as well as human slaves, and hell even govt employees or w/e) DO generate surplus value in marxist terms, but the fact that i don't believe it right now has nothing to do with being morally okay with slavery based on the slave's ability to do arithmetic
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Aug 26, 2020 19:30
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indigi posted:someone should write Capital For Dummies with a lot of pictures and illustrations i actually suspect i would be good at this, i did a little presentation on basically ch. 1-6 for my local org that was received pretty well and i'm a tutor who does a lot of on the spot drawings in the course of my daily work. but also, who's got the time
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Aug 26, 2020 19:31
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Lostconfused posted:Fair enough, I just don't understand it then. His explanation of commodities is far too confusing and it doesn't make sense to me. its not trying to dodge the nature of the matter. its describing class and social relations and how those antagonisms shape and change society. if I cede the point that animals produce surplus value then does that make them laborers, does that mean youre going to go and try to unionize them and lead them in industrial strike action or militant class struggle?
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Aug 26, 2020 19:43
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It's not even about animal rights. I just feel like that reality is a bit more complicated than that, so the labor model of value gets that part slightly wrong. I am not even saying it would be a useful distinction for the theory to have. The thing about marxism that appeals to me is the materialsm aspect and it's ability to describe our world, so that's the specific nature of debate that interests me.apropos to nothing posted:its not trying to dodge the nature of the matter. its describing class and social relations and how those antagonisms shape and change society. if I cede the point that animals produce surplus value then does that make them laborers, does that mean youre going to go and try to unionize them and lead them in industrial strike action or militant class struggle? It makes sense within his limited model of material reality, but he is obviously not completely right on some of these aspects. Lostconfused fucked around with this message at 19:47 on Aug 26, 2020 |
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Aug 26, 2020 19:43
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ok good luck organizing the farm animals. theres a pretty dense theoretical guide to how to actually go about this called "Click, Clack, Moo" that you might find valuable in that regard. solidarity comrade
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Aug 26, 2020 19:50
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indigi posted:someone should write Capital For Dummies with a lot of pictures and illustrations picture books about socialism for children using child-friendly imagery that is also respectful of their intelligence would probably be really good tbh.
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Aug 26, 2020 19:51
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a great hero once said, society is three swords swipes away from total chaos
Homeless Friend fucked around with this message at 20:15 on Aug 26, 2020 |
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Aug 26, 2020 19:54
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Lostconfused posted:If it's possible sure. Marx makes the argument about peasants being completely useless. Because they fall outside of his model of capital commodity reproduction. does he? there's definitely spirited debate among socialists following marx as to the importance and utility of organizing the peasantry but i don't remember marx dismissing them out of hand or even claiming they produce no surplus value. in fact i recall marx using peasant or corvee labor as an example of a time in which the difference between value that goes to you and value that goes to your boss was much MORE clear and obvious to see than in the modern era, because you'd literally devote X days of work to your lord and Y days of work to your family whereas for a factory work or whatever it's way more mixed together and obscure
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Aug 26, 2020 19:54
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apropos to nothing posted:ok good luck organizing the farm animals. theres a pretty dense theoretical guide to how to actually go about this called "Click, Clack, Moo" that you might find valuable in that regard. solidarity comrade lol I bought that book for my nephew Lightning Knight posted:picture books about socialism for children using child-friendly imagery that is also respectful of their intelligence would probably be really good tbh. sure but I meant for me
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Aug 26, 2020 19:59
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Ferrinus posted:does he? there's definitely spirited debate among socialists following marx as to the importance and utility of organizing the peasantry but i don't remember marx dismissing them out of hand or even claiming they produce no surplus value. in fact i recall marx using peasant or corvee labor as an example of a time in which the difference between value that goes to you and value that goes to your boss was much MORE clear and obvious to see than in the modern era, because you'd literally devote X days of work to your lord and Y days of work to your family whereas for a factory work or whatever it's way more mixed together and obscure I was more referring to him being dismissive of a the peasant class as lacking in revolutionary potential. otherwise quote:A thing can be a use value, without having value. This is the case whenever its utility to man is not due to labour. Such are air, virgin soil, natural meadows, &c. A thing can be useful, and the product of human labour, without being a commodity. Whoever directly satisfies his wants with the produce of his own labour, creates, indeed, use values, but not commodities. In order to produce the latter, he must not only produce use values, but use values for others, social use values. (And not only for others, without more. The mediaeval peasant produced quit-rent-corn for his feudal lord and tithe-corn for his parson. But neither the quit-rent-corn nor the tithe-corn became commodities by reason of the fact that they had been produced for others. To become a commodity a product must be transferred to another, whom it will serve as a use value, by means of an exchange.)[12] Lastly nothing can have value, without being an object of utility. If the thing is useless, so is the labour contained in it; the labour does not count as labour, and therefore creates no value. So peasants produce a surplus for their lords, but it's not a commodity so it has no surplus value or again I am just misreading this passage. The distinction is somewhat lost on me.
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Aug 26, 2020 20:00
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indigi posted:someone should write Capital For Dummies with a lot of pictures and illustrations https://www.haymarketbooks.org/books/501-marx-s-capital-illustrated
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Aug 26, 2020 20:03
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