LeGuin’s goodness is one of the undeniable facts of the universe.
marcussays
I read The Dispossessed as a teenager in the early 70s. I learned that the sole purpose of government is the welfare of its people.
anarchobyronsays
PZ, I’ve been e-mailing you hoping you’d move further left and embrace socialism over capitalism. You’re right about gender, race, god, and equality, now why not class?
Marcus, that is NOT the point of The Dispossessed.
marcussays
@ Never said it was the point, just something I learned.
Right but then you learned the wrong message from that book, since 1) it’s about anarchism and 2) the human condition and political problems one would encounter even in a stateless society. If anything it’s made clear that government IS NOT for the welfare of the citizens. That’s now how power works, and LeGuinn knows that.
anarchobyron
1. Please, as a socialist, don’t email people with your unsolicited opinion. People will not embrace socialism because somebody kept mailing them. On the contrary, who’d like to associate with people who keep cluttering your inbox
2. As somebody with a background in the science of literary interpretation, please, don’t walk around telling people what “the message of the book” is. Read “Death of the Author”. Because it makes you look obnoxious and lacking the necessary education to have a discussion about literature.
anarchobyronsays
My e-mail was also to thank PZ for breaking with the new atheists, among other things. So that was not the entirety of the context. I often e-mail fellow academics and thank them for their work.
If you’ve read The Dispossessed it’s readily clear that the case is not being made that government is for the welfare of the people. I’m aware good art can leave the viewer with many interpretations (for instance I finished Mulholland Drive for the third time last night, and it’s clear there’s always more to take away upon each viewing), but there are certainly things that should not be, and were never intended to be, taken away from a work of art – literary or otherwise. To say The Dispossessed is in anyway suggesting government is for the welfare of the people, would be like saying Grapes of Wrath is arguing Ron Paul Libertarianism. The message is just not there.
I’m sorry I upset you.
Anders Kehletsays
In all my years of fantasy reading I have somehow missed Le Guin. I’ll have to remedy that. :)
anarchobyronsays
And one can disagree with Barthes. There’s no need to start with the ad hominems… As a matter of fact to provoke an ad hominem attack (“you lack the education”) is contra Barthes!
That’s not an ad hominem
How do I provoke an ad hominem?
Of course you can disagree with Barthes. With Derrida, Foucault, Said, etc. You can happily disagree with the last 50 years of literary theory, critism and cultural studies. But I don’t have to take you serious.
chigau (違う)says
I don’t usually have popcorn for breakfast.
anarchobyronsays
I never intended to start an inter scuffle this morning. Enjoy the rest of your day Giliell.
Again, PZ, keep up the great work. You’re certainly moving atheist-humanism in the right direction!
Sorry to spoil your fun, chigau, but I’m off now anyway. But enjoy the popcorn (and leave me some)
Athywren; Kitty Wranglersays
I….
Admission time.
I have never read anything by Ursula LeGuin. I think I might change that, though. If that speech is anything to go by, I have a feeling that her books might have relevant motifs to help inspire my own writing.
That message, though, “we live in capitalism,” etc. That’s a remarkably reassuring message. Sometimes I lose hope, and even sight of hope. But yeah, I’m sure people once thought that nations without kings were unthinkable, yet here we are. Maybe a positive change can come regarding economics, as it did for governance.
chigau (違う)says
Shucks.
Now I’ll have no excuse to delay the snow-shovelling.
Rob Grigjanissays
A clear autumn day, and words from Le Guin. Thank you, Universe.
anarchobyronsays
Athywren, The Dispossessed is a GREAT place to start with LeGuin.
marcussays
anarchobyron You’re kind of argumentative and bossy.
Thanks Giliell, you said it better than I was going to (which was going to be something along the lines of a polite invitation to fuck off). :)
Becca Stareyessays
The Dispossessed reminded me a lot of my experiences in science fiction and fantasy fandom; even without a government, you can still have humans being humans, which includes using their influence to play politics and support their POV.
anarchobyronsays
I apologize to you too Marcus for coming across bossy, argument, and deserving to fuck off.
LeGuin is an anarchist, who is writing a book about anarchosyndaclism, i.e., organizing society without a state. This society is in many ways superior to the state-communist (e.g., China and USSR) and capitalist states (e.g., American) the main character goes to the ‘earth’ planet to discuss scientific research with. The state entities are in a constant state of war and conflict, avarice and property related greed. Their sense of community is inherently corrosive. If anything, the societies with governments are portrayed negatively and not for the benefit of the people. The anarchist society is portrayed as for the benefit of the people and that one is stateless.
marcussays
anarchobyron @ 21 It’s been many years since I read The Dispossessed and I don’t necessarily disagree with your analysis of the book. My take-away was that a social organization’s (whether “government” or not) best purpose is to provide for the common welfare while protecting the liberty and free-expression of its constituents. Perhaps a “government” could never do this. You say “anarchy” Chomsky says “socialist-libertarianism”.
Amphioxsays
Regarding death of the author, I recall the story of that time when Ray Bradbury actually attended a lecture at a university about his book Fahrenheit 451, when he actually stood up and told the lecturer that what he was saying wasn’t the message he, the author, intended to convey I the book, and the response was flatly that, with all due respect, the author’s opinion carried no greater weight regarding the meaning of a work of literature than that of any other reader.
One should never be dogmatic about what any work of literature “means”, because aside from deliberate propaganda, all of the mean multiple things, simultaneously.
I think hard times are coming when we will be wanting the voices of writers who can see alternatives to how we live now and can see through our fear-stricken society and its obsessive technologies to other ways of being, and even imagine some real grounds for hope. We will need writers who can remember freedom. Poets, visionaries—the realists of a larger reality.
Right now, I think we need writers who know the difference between the production of a market commodity and the practice of an art. Developing written material to suit sales strategies in order to maximize corporate profit and advertising revenue is not quite the same thing as responsible book publishing or authorship. (Thank you, brave applauders.)
Yet I see sales departments given control over editorial; I see my own publishers in a silly panic of ignorance and greed, charging public libraries for an ebook six or seven times more than they charge customers. We just saw a profiteer try to punish a publisher for disobedience and writers threatened by corporate fatwa, and I see a lot of us, the producers who write the books, and make the books, accepting this. Letting commodity profiteers sell us like deodorant, and tell us what to publish and what to write. (Well, I love you too, darling.)
Books, you know, they’re not just commodities. The profit motive often is in conflict with the aims of art. We live in capitalism. Its power seems inescapable. So did the divine right of kings. Any human power can be resisted and changed by human beings. Resistance and change often begin in art, and very often in our art—the art of words.
anarchobyronsays
Right, Chomsky’s socialist-libertarianism is an expression of anarchism, and in particular anarcho-syndaclism, which is what the main character lives in/under in The Dispossessed. The libertarian portion means limited to not state apparatus (i.e., an institution that can compel by a monopoly of force). The socialist part means workers co-ownership of the means of production. But again, ownership not backed by force, like a Starbucks is.
Chomsky, LeGuin, and some forms of Marxism (obviously not all), are overlapping philosophies, even if the language is often nuanced and different (Chomsky recognizes this in his excellent book On Anarchism).
The fear is that we cannot live in a society that really is for the benefit of all, when there is an implicit threat of force behind any command, division, management, request, etc. And that is by the definition what the state does.
Nerd of Redhead, Dances OM Trollssays
Yawn, heard all anarchobyron’s bullshit back in the radicalization of campus days. Boring then, boring now.
chigau (違う)says
And the anarchist society in The Dispossesed is entirely free of corruption and individuals who act only for themselves.
Right?
The Mellow Monkeysays
anarchobyron @ 21, I’m very sympathetic to anarcho-socialism and you’re annoying the fuck out of me. I cannot imagine how obnoxious you must be to those who aren’t already inclined to agree with you. Lecturing people on how their own, personal insights they had while reading something are wrong isn’t going to convince anyone of anything except that you’re a sanctimonious jerk.
Who the author is and what the author thinks is one aspect of literary criticism (and it can be important when dealing with the conflict between dominant groups and minority groups, but is quite often rightfully ignored when it’s irrelevant). How readers interpret literature and how it influenced them is another, far greater aspect, one that you cannot shout into non-existence. There’s no ultimate objective viewpoint when it comes to reading experiences.
anarchobyronsays
nerd, at no point have I argued that you ought to be a socialist, I’m just expressing the sentiments of LeGuin, and also now Chomsky. If you think these two people are spouting radical boring bullshit, that’s perfectly fine, but an argument as to why would be a better way to express that, than a curt dismissal. But it is worth keeping in mind LeGuin’s point, the person who first said the king has no divine right, is just as radical – and probably sounds as boring and bullshit riddled – as the anti-capitalist.
Chigau, no the anarchist society still has many problems, dealing with forms of coercion, social pressure, inauthentic adaptation, etc. But they don’t derive from the force of a government, or a government that has the interest of the people.
It really is a fantastic novel.
anarchobyronsays
“How readers interpret literature and how it influenced them is another, far greater aspect, one that you cannot shout into non-existence. There’s no ultimate objective viewpoint when it comes to reading experiences.”
Sure, but there are still shades of right or wrong. Or at least, I’m not a postmodernist about these sorts of things. There really are better and worse art objects (Lynch over Michael Bay), and better and worse ways to delve into the meaning of a work of art.
If you want to be entirely subjectivist that’s fine. But I would guess that as some point in time you would disagree with someone about SOME art analysis. For instance, the Venus of Willendorf is deeply anti-christian and pro fascist work of propaganda, meant to evoke feelings of love for the motherland. And if you find yourself trying to articulate reasons that one view is less good than another, you’ve given up on pure subjectivism.
Anyway this was my first set of posts on PZ’s blog. Clearly I’m not welcome, and the greeting has been overtly hostile to what I thought was a potentially healthy and amicable disagreement over a novel. So I again apologize, and most likely won’t return.
Kyle Zimmer, the C.E.O. and president of the organization First Book, who was honored with the Literarian Award for her work on child literacy, told the crowd that “low-income kids are excluded from the power of books.” Woodson, who won for “Brown Girl Dreaming,” her memoir in verse of growing up African-American in the nineteen-sixties and seventies, said, “It’s so important that we talk to our old people before they become ancestors, and get their stories.” Glück, who took home the poetry prize for her collection “Faithful and Virtuous Night,” thanked her fellow-poets for inspiring “envy that in time became gratitude.” Osnos—who was up against his New Yorker colleagues John Lahr and Roz Chast in the nonfiction category—acknowledged the courage of the Chinese subjects he wrote about in “Age of Ambition,” who shared their stories despite the fact that “they live in a place where it’s very dangerous to be honest, and to be vulnerable.” And the Marine Corps veteran Phil Klay, who won the fiction award for “Redeployment,” his début collection of short stories, about serving in Iraq, described the book as his way of thinking through the difficult questions that confronted him when his service ended.
But it was Ursula K. Le Guin, accepting the Medal for Distinguished Contribution to American Letters early in the evening, who gave the definitive remarks of the ceremony, gliding through the genre debate and the Amazon-Hachette debacle on her way to explaining the crucial role that literature must play in our society. Petite, her silver hair shining, Le Guin shrugged and grinned when Neil Gaiman placed the medal around her neck. She said that she wanted to share the honor with her fellow-fantasy and sci-fi writers, who have for so long watched “the beautiful awards,” like the one she’d just received, go to the “so-called realists.”
chigau (違う)says
anarchobyron
Nothing you said was amicable.
You were preaching.
Have a nice day.
Nerd of Redhead, Dances OM Trollssays
I’m just expressing the sentiments of LeGuin, and also now Chomsky.
Nope, your are preaching. Just as the radicals did years ago. You mention Chomsky, and that is one idjit to ignore. Don’t like being told you are boring, stop being boring by fading into the bandwidth.
The Mellow Monkeysays
anarchobyron @ 30
Clearly I’m not welcome, and the greeting has been overtly hostile to what I thought was a potentially healthy and amicable disagreement over a novel.
anarchobyron @ 3
Marcus, that is NOT the point of The Dispossessed.
(Note that marcus never said that it was the point; it was just something they learned while reading it.)
anarchobyron @ 6
Right but then you learned the wrong message from that book
Saying “you’re wrong! that’s not the point!” at people about what they got out of a book–who are not even claiming that this was what the author intended, just that it’s something they learned–is not a healthy and amicable disagreement over a novel. It’s an unnecessary derail of the conversation.
anarchobyron @ 30
And if you find yourself trying to articulate reasons that one view is less good than another, you’ve given up on pure subjectivism.
Sigh. No one is arguing for pure subjectivism. Some literary criticism is more insightful and valuable than others, because of its good reasoning and sound arguments. “You’re wrong, because the author is an anarchist” is not one of those.
Beatrice, an amateur cynic looking for a happy thoughtsays
@3
>PZ, I’ve been e-mailing you hoping you’d move further left and embrace socialism over capitalism. You’re right about
>gender, race, god, and equality, now why not class?
I’ve been reading Pharyngula since back when it was on ScienceBlogs (or whatever that host was called), though I only very rarely comment, but I’ve always been under the impression PZ was on the socialist side of things. I know my final abandonment of my libertarian upbringing and movement towards a socialist outlook was partly inspired by writing on Pharyngula–it would be somewhat embarrassing to learn that I’d been projecting this whole time…
illdoittomorrowsays
Seconding Beatrice in thanking you for the transcript, Pteryxx.
diana6815says
I agree so hard with LeGuin. Fiction, but especially sci-fi/fantasy, is where we can make the *impossible* possible. Many ways of viewing the world and acting in the world are only deemed impossible because huge swaths of the population are skeptical. Fiction is a place where we can explore these seeming impossibilities and demonstrate that some are not in fact impossible after all.
The beauty of sci-fi is you can use it to comment on the society in which you live without doing it obviously enough that you’ll be shouted down.
I also agree that the profit motive has had undue influence in certain areas of life (writing and education, just to name a couple). Here freedom, creativity, and uniqueness are essential and depending on what aspect you’re talking about that can be hard to measure the quality of in terms of sales/productivity, quantify, package, and/or mass produce (that’s assuming mass producing is desired).
Nick Gottssays
Hmm,
anarchobyron did come across as rather bossy originally, but I’d say the responses to him have been an order of magnitude bossier.
As somebody with a background in the science of literary interpretation, please, don’t walk around telling people what “the message of the book” is. Read “Death of the Author”. – Giliell@7
I learned from “Death of the Author” that the author’s opinion is final and conclusive on every point ;-)
odinsays
There’s an inherent problem with using the term “socialist” in any political debate between USians and others, and that is that the word is used over there in ways that are simply not compatible with the way it’s understood most everywhere else. This is probably in no small part because the entirety of mainstream (read: party) politics in the US involves issues that are inter-factional debates within right-wing parties in much of Europe. (That’s certainly the case where I live.) And from that perspective, the spectre of expressed opinion in the US skews very heavily towards the right with strong propertarians being quite visible and seen as the ‘opposite numbers’ of, frankly, lukewarm social-democrats.
Azuma Hazukisays
If “socialism” in any form is ever going to work we’ll need a true economy of plenty rather than an economy of scarcity, at least as far as water, food, power, and shelter go. I think the “basic income” is the first step, and it may also be as far as we need to go into socialism.
The fear i have about it is that some people will end up being a permanent underclass in a way even more insidious and inescapable than at present, that being, a completely unthinking as well as underprivileged class. What happens when no one need put forth any effort at all to survive? Will they stop learning too?
If we’re going to pull this off, we need to make sure education is in the same paradigm-of-plenty category as basic physical needs.
I really enjoy her writing. She’s one of the few writers I know who can write a phrase that makes me put the book down for a moment, to savor the beauty of her words. She’s also correct about much sci-fi and fantasy being market-driven crap. I treasure writers who are economical with their words. I think authors who write like they are being paid by the word are being tediously verbose, and I don’t read them.
I don’t know much about her politics. I do think that Marxism, Libertarianism, and Anarchism deny one truth about humans – we are selfish and greedy. In the real world, they just can’t work.
Rob Grigjanissays
Azuma Hazuki @41:
What happens when no one need put forth any effort at all to survive? Will they stop learning too?
She [Prof Evelyn Forget] said her research suggests that people appear to live healthier lives when they don’t have to worry about poverty.
“Hospitalizations for mental health issues were down significantly,” she said, adding that teenagers stayed in school longer as a result of the initiative.
What happens when no one need put forth any effort at all to survive? Will they stop learning too?
They will be able to devote their thoughts and energies to something beyond mere survival? Such as, I dunno, thriving? Coming up with solutions to problems? Expressing creativity?
Francisco Bacopasays
The 1979 film version of The Lathe of Heaven is available on YouTube. I highly recommend it.
If I’m not mistaken, the Swiss are about to embark on a guaranteed minimum income experiment as well. The law was up for a referendum vote and it passed. Not sure when it goes into effect though.
Nerd of Redhead, Dances OM Trollssays
The rethug supporters are deadly afraid of anybody taking “advantage” of the system.
And in doing so, imply all POC/immigrants are taking advantage of “their money”. Never mind a majority of those on welfare are white. Also funny is how the very fundamentalist churches know how to sign up for welfare, and what is needed for each program, and coach their members who need assistance, as long as their members are white. After all, “they” deserve it…
*blech*
unclefrogysays
the “so called realists” are very often every bit as made up out of fantasy as stories about elves and dragons and magic kids.
One of the things I like about her writing is the degree of reality she adheres to. She is not preaching and solves the problem of the story in a very human way without resorting to simple force but instead an incite that changes the perception of reality that is at the root of the problem and makes the solution almost unfold by itself.
I did not like her remark about it being at the end of her career very much. I recognize the truth of the statement but would rather it not be so.
uncle frogy
unclefrogysays
well I failed right there alright I got the wrong insight from the writing.
uncle frogy
Tethyssays
What happens when no one need put forth any effort at all to survive? Will they stop learning too?
I remember reading a novel that had a society that provided basic needs such as food, clothing, and shelter to all citizens. It was a 80’s book, (possibly) by Sherri Teppar? Grass or maybe The Gate to Women’s Country? All government was done by strict consensus. You could have fancier living quarters and food, goods, and entertainments if you put forth effort to do so. It was a secondary theme of much of the book, the small ways that being free to pursue your own interests without fear of starvation and death resulted in a healthier society. Humans have big brains that require a lot of stimulation, and they are inherently social animals. I think most of them would choose to spend their lives doing “productive” activities quite contentedly, especially if acquiring the necessary education for some professions was also considered a publicly supported social investment.
NitricAcidsays
Are many fans of LeGuin familiar with Candace Jane Dorsey? I found her novels “Black Wine” and “Blue” to be similar in theme to LeGuin’s works, but she was a local author, and I’m not sure how widely known she is.
unclefrogysays
I suspect the real fear of a guaranteed income is the fear of how will we get the real crap jobs/work done unless we have people who are not forced by the basic needs to survive take any amount to live in at least poverty to do them.
uncle frogy
catloversays
P.Z. —
Thank you for posting that excellent quote!
Le Guin herself said, in 2008, in a Q & A after reading several passages from “A Wizard of Earthsea”, that reading is the most personal of the arts — that it happens within the reader, and that her novels have no particular message(s) at all. She said she just writes stories, and the meaning of them is up to the reader.
She said — starting around 42:35 in the video — about “the message of the book”, which is “the idea that a story is merely a vehicle for a sermon, and if not, is is merely trivial entertainment. ……Some of this is unwittingly taught in schools. Children are asked, “What is the message of the story you just read?”…..A story can mean a lot without having any identifiable message at all. ..The less explicit its meanings are the more powerful they may be……..It’s got a thousand messages for a thousand different people……The real message of imaginative fiction is that we can be other people…… No other art empowers us in quite that way….. We make the book as we read it…..That’s what is so particularly cool about reading. That’s my message.”
chigau (違う)says
NitricAcid
I remember Candace.
But I’m from her locality.
I suspect the real fear of a guaranteed income is the fear of how will we get the real crap jobs/work done unless we have people who are not forced by the basic needs to survive take any amount to live in at least poverty to do them.
I’ve thought about that before, and I always think that it would suddenly become the case that (rather than further burdening those who have little choice) unpleasant jobs would need to be paid in proportion to motivate someone to do it.
The problem with utopian ideals.. Ok, just “this” ideal is that some things “need” to be done, and many of them are things no one wants to do, if given an option. Socialist systems tend to just assume that everyone will work together to do them anyway. Capitalism presumes that you pay someone enough to be willing to trade more freedom to do the things they want, for the time spent doing the crap work.
So, where are the problems in either of these? Simple:
In the first case, almost no one is going to want to do them, since they have so many other things they could be doing. Well, at least until it becomes so necessary to do so that they have no choice left, then they will do as little as possible. How do I know this? Well, aside from the fact that attempts at socialism around the world have invariably ended with some form of, “You will take this job, because the state needs the work done!”, there is the fact that I, personally, sure as hell wouldn’t do some things, if I wasn’t going to get in some form of trouble, or be hassled for it. I don’t know anyone, at all, that doesn’t have this attitude on some level, and there is always more necessary work than there *ever* is the other kind.
The second one, of course, has a completely different problem – motivation. Ironically, money isn’t sufficient reward. Autonomy, mastery, and purpose are necessary, except, if its a necessary thing to be done, you don’t often have a lot of autonomy, its not something requiring a lot of mastery, and purpose.. maybe can be given, but not so much if its a job that you think literally any idiot could do, but you are stuck with. What more often happens instead is that money becomes a prime motivator, yet, when costs rise, its also the primary thing that gets cut, so much so that you are trading free time, freedom in how you do your job, any possibility of mastering a skill **and** purpose, for… not enough money to even achieve any of these things when/if you have any time at home (which, if your job is shitty enough, and you need more than one, you may not have any of either).
In short, its not the presumed trade being made that is necessarily the problem, its the fact that, having robbed you of all the motivations that actually motivate anyone, profit ends up demanding, from those that own, and thus have autonomy, believe they are masterful, and are convinced that they have some grandiose purpose in the world, that they also rob their workers of money, along with everything else.
The result, in both cases, is that those doing “necessary” work don’t have choice, don’t have freedom, are not allowed to gain real mastery, or skill, in anything that interests them, and, invariably, they are replaceable cogs. I.e., they serve no purpose that cannot be simply replaced with someone identical.
That this sort of anarchic socialism implies as lack of force.. is naive. Physical, maybe. Economic, possibly. Social, though? But some sort of “force” is still implied, in that some things *must* be done, for things to keep working, and without some way to make sure people do them….
It think its telling that they can describe, in clear, and precise detail the function of “failing” societies, but, when confronted with the need to show how theirs works, the results is either vague, or unbelievable, and ignores basic problems, like what actually motivates people to do anything, or why. Its simply assumed that it will work, and is described as doing so, while the alternative, which holds the true center stage, the “failed” societies, are described in great detail.
No, the solution is not going to be what so many would like to think it is. Money “can” be a motive, as long as it grants some of the rest, but not, no matter how much you pay, if, in the end, gaining it robs you of all the other motivators. Not enough money, again, robs you of all those other motivators. Even necessary work would be done, if recognized as something needed, to do the rest, but not if its a replaceable job, which any low paid slob can do, and doing it, again, results if that person losing everything else, to get it done. There needs to be balance. Anarchism tends to just assume it will balance itself, without anyone thinking about how to do that.
Interestingly, this came up today on another blog I sometimes read – on motivation, and how totally defective much of our world is, due to flat out ignoring, or failing, to understand human nature, at all.
Just having read your first point, I can’t see how this is a problem. People are already being forced to do unpleasant work…but a society with good welfare has two added bonuses: they get to live comfortably, and other people who would have been poor without having those jobs also get to live comfortably.
NitricAcidsays
*Waves to Chigau*
I don’t live there anymore, but I have fond memories of that part of Edmonton.
rqsays
The message in books can be a very individual thing. For instance, Hemingway insisted that The Old Man and the Sea was a story about a man catching a large fish in the sea. In English class, however, it was all about the analogy to Christ and the myth of Sisyphus. Hm.
I’ve always enjoyed LeGuin’s books simply because they make me think, not for any underlying politics in them, or the rightness or wrongness of the opinions she expresses within.
And I really need to watch Lathe of Heaven, because that book was awesome. But my long-standing favourite by her is The Left Hand of Darkness. That one, for me, beats out all others. Couldn’t say why, though.
unclefrogysays
in some quarters there seems to along with the distaste for some kinds of work/jobs is a negative judgment of those who do them.
Those who do them seem to derive more often a negative status. The hotel maid is not an honored profession neither are any of the other cleaner jobs fit only for the marginal segments of our population. Why is that?
uncle frogy
FossilFishy (NOBODY, and proud of it!)says
I remember Ms. Dorsey too, I sold books to her a couple of times. She was very nice and had a sense if humour about finding her books for sale second hand. /pointless anecdote
Georgia Samsays
IMHO, the divine right of kings is still alive & well, just living under another name. Since monarchy went out of fashion, free-market fanatics have reassigned that divine right to corporate executives & managers. Their ideology holds that captains of industry are entitled to run their companies as monarchies (or oligarchies) in which neither employees nor clients have any rights, and with which governments may not interfere in any way.
Just having read your first point, I can’t see how this is a problem. People are already being forced to do unpleasant work…but a society with good welfare has two added bonuses: they get to live comfortably, and other people who would have been poor without having those jobs also get to live comfortably.
Your missing my point. While many works sort of “assume” that these basic needs are met, they don’t give the mechanisms by which they where achieved, save in the most vague sense possible – i.e., they just “are”. I have no problem with the idea that you can build a system in which such a thing happens. What I don’t see is how you get there without someone in charge of making sure they actually do happen, or how you avoid, more importantly, something that does this from expanding upward, into other matters, where it shouldn’t, as those in charge seek more power. Some of that will be because, having made sure you have clothing, food, shelter, etc., you then need environmental protection, which means protection from outside entities that would dump their waste on your land, or actions by the same that have indirect impacts. Its the whole, “No nation exists in a vacuum.”, problem. You can’t isolate yourself without costs, some of which being that you cannot, then, stop others from doing things that harm you. You can’t try to strong arm, and expand either, because, then they have even more reason to cause you problems. But, even internally, its one thing to say X person needs shelter, but to have to trade that off with, for example, someone else not gaining space for their work, without there being consequences.
The core problem is building the supposed “fully equal” economy, without scarcity, which then, naturally gives rise to near infinite choices. Even Star Trek had to basically cheat, inventing food replicators, and safe clean, and not, usually, dangerous, infinite energy sources. I am sure there are still issues with land use in their world, except, heck, just use your warp drive and find an asteroid or an uninhabited planet, and.. problem solved. lol
Some inequity is sort of going to exist. We can remove it from the baseline, but only if there are controls in place to make sure its fair. But, place such controls, and some people are going to decide that fair isn’t, either to other people’s detriment, or their own, or their friends, gain. Corruption can, and will, happen. And yet, the assumption made is always, “Our system is, as far as the story is concerned, without corruption, but, just look at all these other people we are contrasting it to!” So.. why is it without corruption? How was this really achieved? What where the growing pains that it took to get there? How does just shrugging off all rules supposed to achieve it?
I love roleplaying. But.. I know the difference between pretending the world would work with, in the case of my roleplay, vampires, werewolves, and so on, in it, and the reality that, if such things ever inexplicably showed up in the real world, it would be nearly as “simple” as it is in the game. And, any halfway decent author can see the problems that **would** almost certainly arise, even if they can’t predict the absolute outcome. So, where is the literary analysis of the real world mess that leads from here, to there, with these grand ideals? How much of both current reality, and even human nature, do they actually ignore?
Put simply, this stuff was, for me, the Atlas Shrugged of my childhood. I was tempted by the idea of a purely balanced economy, without scarcities. Then… I thought about the problem of how, or even if, that is at all plausible. Now.. I think what is achievable is one that is equal on the bottom, but still allowed some level of unequal at the top, instead of what we have – unequal all the way, getting more and more so, the closer to the top a person is. That, is achievable, I think. What, if anything, beyond that is.. will require either an abandonment of huge swaths of what we are capable of today, which won’t work, because a thing created can be recreated, and who, in such an “equal” society is going to tell someone they can’t reinvent it? Or, major technological breakthroughs, on the scale of stuff from Star Trek.
And, the irony is, its the loss of technology, and a reduction to a simpler state, that will take state force to not only achieve, but maintain, lest someone, as I said, “reinvent” the things we abandoned.
Tethyssays
unclefrogy
The hotel maid is not an honored profession neither are any of the other cleaner jobs fit only for the marginal segments of our population. Why is that?
You are the person who just stated that cleaning up is a task fit only for “marginal” people. Why is that? Cleaning is an essential activity, especially considering how messy humans are. Marginalized? Hmmmmmm, gee I wonder why?
The Left Hand of Darkness is the one of hers that I particularly liked most.
Still haven’t read a lot though. (Used book stores have so little LeGuin. I think people tend to hand on to her.)
That this sort of anarchic socialism implies as lack of force.. is naive. Physical, maybe. Economic, possibly. Social, though? But some sort of “force” is still implied, in that some things *must* be done, for things to keep working, and without some way to make sure people do them….
Agreed. Just a while ago I was pointing this out in another thread…
chigau (違う)says
I have never understood why anyone would make a career of cleaning other peoples teeth.
But I definitely appreciate them.
I also appreciate hotel cleaning staff, always thank them and tip them (where possible).
Rob Grigjanissays
rq @60:
That one, for me, beats out all others. Couldn’t say why, though.
For me, I think it was the growing relationship between Genly Ai and Estraven. Haven’t read it in ages, but I remember being quite moved by the development of their mutual trust. Two people from very different cultures slowly coming to recognize their common decency and humanity. Maybe I’m misremembering. Should read it again.
rqsays
Rob Grigjanis
That, and the ending. I know the ending broke me a little bit.
Rob Grigjanissays
rq Yeah, I don’t often weep at the end of novels, but that one…
odinsays
For those arguing the impossibility of socialism (and/or other “too perfect” systems):
What are the grounds you will accept for oppressing other people? Because what you are arguing is, fundamentally, that society cannot function without some people being oppressed to the benefit of others.
Well, maybe that’s true, but I’m sure as hell not going to let that stop me from trying to figure out ways to eliminate the oppression that I see. To borrow a quote, I am an anarchist not because anarchy is the final goal, but because there is no such thing as a final goal.
chigau (違う)says
I read Darkness and Dispossessed and Forest about once a year.
Fuck the present.
I like the past.
brettsays
@Odin
What are the grounds you will accept for oppressing other people? Because what you are arguing is, fundamentally, that society cannot function without some people being oppressed to the benefit of others.
Barring the creation of super-intelligent, selflessly serving robots, you’re going to have hierarchies (and the resulting inequality in distribution of goods and services) in any complex system beyond a few dozen to few hundred people – it just becomes too difficult to manage with direct democracy or “everybody participates in every decision” set-ups. That’s the same thing under socialism as it would be under capitalism, except under socialism economic power is much more concentrated and tied to political power than it is under capitalism. At least capitalism has the churn of markets and creative destruction to tear down rich elites and raise up new ones, and the fragmentation of economic power among companies and individuals.
unclefrogysays
Tethys @ 65
If we take pay as a sign of respect and prestige awarded to workers I would have to say hotel cleaning staff and domestic cleaning staff regardless what some individuals may feel are not given the same deference nor the pay levels of say carpenters or plumbers. Those who do that work do not come from the middle classes. It is not a job that would support a middle class life style.
some of the more exclusive hotels may pay quite well but the independent motel down the road I am pretty sure is not one of them nor is the majority in the industry. I am not advocating that but on the face of it what would you call it. I am pretty sure there are many jobs with low status that could be used as an example I picked one off the top of my head you might be able to suggest a better. I was just responding to what I perceive is the fear of the guaranteed income and jobs that not many want or are not willing to pay for.
uncle frogy
I learned from “Death of the Author” that the author’s opinion is final and conclusive on every point ;-)
In which case you can, of course, substantiate that opinion with parts from the text.
Because we didn’t get rid of the “because” in literary theory and cultural studies ;)
odinsays
brett @ 75
“Socialism” is not a synonym for “state-run economy”. Capitalism is a strong inhibiting factor on the power of the market to restructure economies. There is no need for “everybody to participate in every decision” for effective democracy, and in fact such a scheme would almost certainly be even more oppressive than the structure we have today.
I fear arguing these points in more depth would be going fairly far off the rails for this thread, but if it can be done without annoying everyone else no end I’m game. :)
What are the grounds you will accept for oppressing other people? Because what you are arguing is, fundamentally, that society cannot function without some people being oppressed to the benefit of others.
Oh, sure.. If you define every single bloody things from, “You agreed to do this job, and then went back on it, so there needs to be consequences for that.”, to, “Don’t touch the stove, its hot and you will burn yourself!”, as “oppression”, then you have us pegged perfectly. Otherwise, who the @#%$@% is talking about oppression being “necessary”?
David Marjanovićsays
The more I hear of her, the more I love her
That’s weird.
I often e-mail fellow academics and thank them for their work.
Ew.
The more extroverted colleagues probably appreciate your e-mails. The rest, I am certain, do not.
The fear i have about it is that some people will end up being a permanent underclass in a way even more insidious and inescapable than at present, that being, a completely unthinking as well as underprivileged class. What happens when no one need put forth any effort at all to survive? Will they stop learning too?
o_O
If we’re going to pull this off, we need to make sure education is in the same paradigm-of-plenty category as basic physical needs.
…I’m really surprised this doesn’t go without saying. Education up to and including university is free in several European countries, and nearly so (by comparison to the US) in the others.
If I’m not mistaken, the Swiss are about to embark on a guaranteed minimum income experiment as well. The law was up for a referendum vote and it passed. Not sure when it goes into effect though.
The referendum will probably be in 2016, says one of the supporter websites. So far there’s only been a people’s initiative, which gathered enough signatures (a year ago) to force the parliament to consider the idea; following a detailed report, the debate in parliament should be beginning around now, followed by a referendum 2 to 3 years later, says another one of the supporter websites.
Wikipedia says the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians have instituted a guaranteed income from the proceeds of their casino. Iran and Macau have somewhat similar schemes, but they seem to pay well below the existence minimum, just like Alaska’s oil fund.
I fear arguing these points in more depth would be going fairly far off the rails for this thread, but if it can be done without annoying everyone else no end I’m game. :)
There’s always the Thunderdome. :-)
David Marjanovićsays
*facepalm*
That’s embarrassing.
Let me try again.
The more I hear of her, the more I love her
Me too!
I often e-mail fellow academics and thank them for their work.
Ew.
That’s weird.
The more extroverted colleagues probably appreciate your e-mails. The rest, I am certain, do not.
chigau (違う)says
David Marjanović
I’m glad you corrected that ’cause, boyohboy was I ever gonna yell at you.
Markita Lynda—threadruptsays
Le Guin is really excellent at inventing a kind of anthropology of alien cultures and other peoples. Look at the stories in Changing Planes; and if you like them, read Alway Coming Home. It describes a gentle, almost tribal culture that is much different from ours. In the background is a darker, industrial society, which presumably supplies technology as needed. It’s an interesting contrast.
odinsays
Kagehi @ 79
If you define every single bloody things from, “You agreed to do this job, and then went back on it, so there needs to be consequences for that.”, to, “Don’t touch the stove, its hot and you will burn yourself!”, as “oppression”, then you have us pegged perfectly.
Except you argued, fairly explicitly, that there were things that needed to be done, which people would not willingly agree to.
otramesays
I have to me three on Darkness. I was fascinated by the premise, watched with awe as the premise was examined with intelligence and compassion, and at first didn’t notice how deeply I had fallen into the story until I found myself literally crying at the end.
brettsays
@Odin
“Socialism” is not a synonym for “state-run economy”. Capitalism is a strong inhibiting factor on the power of the market to restructure economies. There is no need for “everybody to participate in every decision” for effective democracy, and in fact such a scheme would almost certainly be even more oppressive than the structure we have today.
Most of the variants I’ve seen either try and push the decision-making down to more localized levels of state governance, or they essentially keep capitalism but with a state-owned financial sector* and different firm structures (such as worker cooperatives versus the traditional bureaucratic firm hierarchy). I think you’re still going to end up with inequalities in both beyond a certain community size, especially since we’ve seen bureaucracies of specialists arising over and over again for specialized work in democratic regimes (such as the US and Europe with their civil services).
* I honestly don’t see the charm of this in some of the market socialist proposals out there. If you’re going to keep a market, why would you want to centralize control of investment funds? Especially since there are cooperative banks and other forms of non-profit finance in existence today to model off of.
Zimmerlesays
The only thing that disappointed me about reading Le Guin is her anti-immortality rubbish in the later Earthsea books.
I’ve never had a reason to regret reading her writing in total, though. Great author, great messages. Some of the statements by her characters were incredibly uplifting for me.
Zimmerlesays
Look at the stories in Changing Planes
Gods, Changing Planes was beautiful. Too brief, too disconnected, but I loved every bit of it.
mildlymagnificentsays
But my long-standing favourite by her is The Left Hand of Darkness. That one, for me, beats out all others.
The Word for World is Forest is pretty good, but I think that Darkness beats them all. And that includes The Dispossessed.
Arren ›‹ neverboundsays
@ Zimmerle
“Rubbish”? That seems hyperbolic at best. To me her treatment of the paradox of eternal life reads as a necessary and tasteful counterpoint to Tolkien’s exaltation of immortality.
David Marjanovićsays
boyohboy was I ever gonna yell at you.
:-)
unclefrogysays
Zimmerle
I find it a little odd to hear that anti-immortality is disappointing rubbish on a blog populated by atheists.
In what way is it rubbish?
uncle frogy
smrndasays
I find the freak-out about how the ‘unpleasant’ jobs will get done unless the proles are in danger of starvation to be a pretty weak point. Plenty of shitty jobs are only shitty because 1. they don’t pay well 2. have shitty hours 3. involve being treated shitty by employers and often the public. The solution is to force these jobs to be *less shitty.*
I’m a software engineer and I don’t think it’s unreasonable for me to work 40 hours a week. My work isn’t so shitty, and I’m not subject to daily insults and humiliations. However, a trade-off for doing a shitty job which has few intrinsic rewards should be a shorter work week and better pay. This would require some degree of intervention and regulation, and it would cut into the bottom line of shareholders, but their opinions just need to count less.
Something that would have to be acknowledged was how much of the lives of proles are just that they get treated worse. Professionals are assumed to be working nicely and independently without the same level of monitoring.
I find the freak-out about how the ‘unpleasant’ jobs will get done unless the proles are in danger of starvation to be a pretty weak point. Plenty of shitty jobs are only shitty because 1. they don’t pay well 2. have shitty hours 3. involve being treated shitty by employers and often the public. The solution is to force these jobs to be *less shitty.*
Yep. If you ask people who do “shitty jobs”, they usually complain about the working conditions, not the job itself. Heck, everybody who goes into nursing knows that the job comes with wiping shit off adult arses at 3 am. And the people who go into nursing are hardly those who have no other options. What gets them is not the shit at 3am. What gets them is the other three people who are calling for their help when they’re the only person on a station.
I’m working hard for that godsdamn teacher’s degree and many people tell me that they’d rather clean toilets than become a teacher, yet it’s not economic necessity and not being qualified to clean toilets that drives me to college.
Would being a trash collector still suck if you
-didn’t have to do it running all the time
-only had to do it 3 days a week with 4 days for pursuing your interests?
opposablethumbssays
I find the freak-out about how the ‘unpleasant’ jobs will get done unless the proles are in danger of starvation to be a pretty weak point. Plenty of shitty jobs are only shitty because 1. they don’t pay well 2. have shitty hours 3. involve being treated shitty by employers and often the public. The solution is to force these jobs to be *less shitty.*
This. And also, what Giliell responded.
This would require some degree of intervention and regulation, and it would cut into the bottom line of shareholders, but their opinions just need to count less.
Yes. Those currently raking it in on the backs of others would undoubtedly object, but the concept of a trade-off between the shittiness of a job and better rewards – especially being able to live well while doing the shitty job for less time – seems to me to be crucial. We all get one life, so the one easily countable, measurable “currency” that is equally precious to all of us is time.
lpetrichsays
Not just the Divine Right of Kings, but monarchy in general. For nearly all of humanity’s recorded history, most nations much larger than a city-state were ruled by monarchs. The Roman Republic was an exception for a while, but it got afflicted with civil war and it turned into a monarchy, the Roman Empire. Some monarchies have shown great longevity, even if they had not been very continuous while they existed. The champions are likely the Pharaonic and Chinese monarchies, at about 3000 years, and some European monarchies have lasted over a millennium.
But over the last few centuries, and especially over the last century, that has changed dramatically. Many monarchies have fallen, and many of the survivors have been neutered into purely ceremonial monarchies that are de facto republics. I could go into detail about what happened, but what’s more important is why it happened, and I have been unable to find anything on that.
I think that the United Sates had led the way, by being the first “big” nation to become a republic in a long time. It succeeded well enough to become an example for Latin Americans, who mostly founded republics when they became independent. In Europe, however, the French Revolution was a bad example of republicanism, and during the shifted 19th cy., 1814 – 1914, European nation builders were sure to include monarchs in their new nations. WWI was a turning point for Europe. Though President Woodrow Wilson declared that the US was “too proud to fight” in that war, he later decided that it was necessary to fight in that war “to make the world safe for democracy”. He demanded — and got — the resignation of Germany’s Kaiser. Austria’s monarch fled, and Russia’s and Ottoman Turkey’s ones were overthrown. The nations that emerged or re-emerged in Europe after that was were all republics. Later, Italy’s and Greece’s monarchies were abolished, while Spain’s one was restored.
Britain liked monarchies in the Middle East and North Africa, but most decolonizing nations became independent as republics, and some MENA monarchies were later overthrown.
We’ve also seen some monarchies emerge, like Papa Doc and Baby Doc in Haiti, Hafez and Bashar Assad in Syria, and most notably, the Kim family in North Korea. Muammar Khadafy and Saddam Hussein wanted to be succeeded by their sons, but that was not to be.
Why do monarchies get started? Some students of political systems propose that it’s from the “crown prince problem”, a designated successor who gets too eager. If a nation has a strong succession mechanism independent of the leader’s family, then that problem won’t happen. That’s what’s the case in democracies and also most one-party states like Communist ones. North Korea’s Communist monarchy is rather unusual. But without a strong succession mechanism, the safest choice for successor is the leader’s son or sometimes daughter. Thus, hereditary succession and monarchy.
Dark Jaguarsays
At least with monarchy, there’s a clear target and a clear method to achieving the goal. “Money” is as hard a moving target as terrorism though… Who do you overthrow to defeat it, exactly? Ben Bernanke? Heck, what exactly am I, personally, supposed to do? All I really can do is complain on the internet, and I do, but I know that’s not enough.
LeGuin’s goodness is one of the undeniable facts of the universe.
I read The Dispossessed as a teenager in the early 70s. I learned that the sole purpose of government is the welfare of its people.
PZ, I’ve been e-mailing you hoping you’d move further left and embrace socialism over capitalism. You’re right about gender, race, god, and equality, now why not class?
Marcus, that is NOT the point of The Dispossessed.
@ Never said it was the point, just something I learned.
The more I hear of her, the more I love her
Right but then you learned the wrong message from that book, since 1) it’s about anarchism and 2) the human condition and political problems one would encounter even in a stateless society. If anything it’s made clear that government IS NOT for the welfare of the citizens. That’s now how power works, and LeGuinn knows that.
anarchobyron
1. Please, as a socialist, don’t email people with your unsolicited opinion. People will not embrace socialism because somebody kept mailing them. On the contrary, who’d like to associate with people who keep cluttering your inbox
2. As somebody with a background in the science of literary interpretation, please, don’t walk around telling people what “the message of the book” is. Read “Death of the Author”. Because it makes you look obnoxious and lacking the necessary education to have a discussion about literature.
My e-mail was also to thank PZ for breaking with the new atheists, among other things. So that was not the entirety of the context. I often e-mail fellow academics and thank them for their work.
If you’ve read The Dispossessed it’s readily clear that the case is not being made that government is for the welfare of the people. I’m aware good art can leave the viewer with many interpretations (for instance I finished Mulholland Drive for the third time last night, and it’s clear there’s always more to take away upon each viewing), but there are certainly things that should not be, and were never intended to be, taken away from a work of art – literary or otherwise. To say The Dispossessed is in anyway suggesting government is for the welfare of the people, would be like saying Grapes of Wrath is arguing Ron Paul Libertarianism. The message is just not there.
I’m sorry I upset you.
In all my years of fantasy reading I have somehow missed Le Guin. I’ll have to remedy that. :)
And one can disagree with Barthes. There’s no need to start with the ad hominems… As a matter of fact to provoke an ad hominem attack (“you lack the education”) is contra Barthes!
I’m not upset
That’s not an ad hominem
How do I provoke an ad hominem?
Of course you can disagree with Barthes. With Derrida, Foucault, Said, etc. You can happily disagree with the last 50 years of literary theory, critism and cultural studies. But I don’t have to take you serious.
I don’t usually have popcorn for breakfast.
I never intended to start an inter scuffle this morning. Enjoy the rest of your day Giliell.
Again, PZ, keep up the great work. You’re certainly moving atheist-humanism in the right direction!
Sorry to spoil your fun, chigau, but I’m off now anyway. But enjoy the popcorn (and leave me some)
I….
Admission time.
I have never read anything by Ursula LeGuin. I think I might change that, though. If that speech is anything to go by, I have a feeling that her books might have relevant motifs to help inspire my own writing.
That message, though, “we live in capitalism,” etc. That’s a remarkably reassuring message. Sometimes I lose hope, and even sight of hope. But yeah, I’m sure people once thought that nations without kings were unthinkable, yet here we are. Maybe a positive change can come regarding economics, as it did for governance.
Shucks.
Now I’ll have no excuse to delay the snow-shovelling.
A clear autumn day, and words from Le Guin. Thank you, Universe.
Athywren, The Dispossessed is a GREAT place to start with LeGuin.
anarchobyron You’re kind of argumentative and bossy.
Thanks Giliell, you said it better than I was going to (which was going to be something along the lines of a polite invitation to fuck off). :)
The Dispossessed reminded me a lot of my experiences in science fiction and fantasy fandom; even without a government, you can still have humans being humans, which includes using their influence to play politics and support their POV.
I apologize to you too Marcus for coming across bossy, argument, and deserving to fuck off.
LeGuin is an anarchist, who is writing a book about anarchosyndaclism, i.e., organizing society without a state. This society is in many ways superior to the state-communist (e.g., China and USSR) and capitalist states (e.g., American) the main character goes to the ‘earth’ planet to discuss scientific research with. The state entities are in a constant state of war and conflict, avarice and property related greed. Their sense of community is inherently corrosive. If anything, the societies with governments are portrayed negatively and not for the benefit of the people. The anarchist society is portrayed as for the benefit of the people and that one is stateless.
anarchobyron @ 21 It’s been many years since I read The Dispossessed and I don’t necessarily disagree with your analysis of the book. My take-away was that a social organization’s (whether “government” or not) best purpose is to provide for the common welfare while protecting the liberty and free-expression of its constituents. Perhaps a “government” could never do this. You say “anarchy” Chomsky says “socialist-libertarianism”.
Regarding death of the author, I recall the story of that time when Ray Bradbury actually attended a lecture at a university about his book Fahrenheit 451, when he actually stood up and told the lecturer that what he was saying wasn’t the message he, the author, intended to convey I the book, and the response was flatly that, with all due respect, the author’s opinion carried no greater weight regarding the meaning of a work of literature than that of any other reader.
One should never be dogmatic about what any work of literature “means”, because aside from deliberate propaganda, all of the mean multiple things, simultaneously.
For a more poetic expression of this:
http://www.poetryfoundation.org/poem/178477
Transcript of LeGuin’s speech via DailyKos. The bits in parentheses are remarks to the audience.
Right, Chomsky’s socialist-libertarianism is an expression of anarchism, and in particular anarcho-syndaclism, which is what the main character lives in/under in The Dispossessed. The libertarian portion means limited to not state apparatus (i.e., an institution that can compel by a monopoly of force). The socialist part means workers co-ownership of the means of production. But again, ownership not backed by force, like a Starbucks is.
Chomsky, LeGuin, and some forms of Marxism (obviously not all), are overlapping philosophies, even if the language is often nuanced and different (Chomsky recognizes this in his excellent book On Anarchism).
The fear is that we cannot live in a society that really is for the benefit of all, when there is an implicit threat of force behind any command, division, management, request, etc. And that is by the definition what the state does.
Yawn, heard all anarchobyron’s bullshit back in the radicalization of campus days. Boring then, boring now.
And the anarchist society in The Dispossesed is entirely free of corruption and individuals who act only for themselves.
Right?
anarchobyron @ 21, I’m very sympathetic to anarcho-socialism and you’re annoying the fuck out of me. I cannot imagine how obnoxious you must be to those who aren’t already inclined to agree with you. Lecturing people on how their own, personal insights they had while reading something are wrong isn’t going to convince anyone of anything except that you’re a sanctimonious jerk.
Who the author is and what the author thinks is one aspect of literary criticism (and it can be important when dealing with the conflict between dominant groups and minority groups, but is quite often rightfully ignored when it’s irrelevant). How readers interpret literature and how it influenced them is another, far greater aspect, one that you cannot shout into non-existence. There’s no ultimate objective viewpoint when it comes to reading experiences.
nerd, at no point have I argued that you ought to be a socialist, I’m just expressing the sentiments of LeGuin, and also now Chomsky. If you think these two people are spouting radical boring bullshit, that’s perfectly fine, but an argument as to why would be a better way to express that, than a curt dismissal. But it is worth keeping in mind LeGuin’s point, the person who first said the king has no divine right, is just as radical – and probably sounds as boring and bullshit riddled – as the anti-capitalist.
Chigau, no the anarchist society still has many problems, dealing with forms of coercion, social pressure, inauthentic adaptation, etc. But they don’t derive from the force of a government, or a government that has the interest of the people.
It really is a fantastic novel.
“How readers interpret literature and how it influenced them is another, far greater aspect, one that you cannot shout into non-existence. There’s no ultimate objective viewpoint when it comes to reading experiences.”
Sure, but there are still shades of right or wrong. Or at least, I’m not a postmodernist about these sorts of things. There really are better and worse art objects (Lynch over Michael Bay), and better and worse ways to delve into the meaning of a work of art.
If you want to be entirely subjectivist that’s fine. But I would guess that as some point in time you would disagree with someone about SOME art analysis. For instance, the Venus of Willendorf is deeply anti-christian and pro fascist work of propaganda, meant to evoke feelings of love for the motherland. And if you find yourself trying to articulate reasons that one view is less good than another, you’ve given up on pure subjectivism.
Anyway this was my first set of posts on PZ’s blog. Clearly I’m not welcome, and the greeting has been overtly hostile to what I thought was a potentially healthy and amicable disagreement over a novel. So I again apologize, and most likely won’t return.
Context and more from the New Yorker:
anarchobyron
Nothing you said was amicable.
You were preaching.
Have a nice day.
Nope, your are preaching. Just as the radicals did years ago. You mention Chomsky, and that is one idjit to ignore. Don’t like being told you are boring, stop being boring by fading into the bandwidth.
anarchobyron @ 30
anarchobyron @ 3
(Note that marcus never said that it was the point; it was just something they learned while reading it.)
anarchobyron @ 6
Saying “you’re wrong! that’s not the point!” at people about what they got out of a book–who are not even claiming that this was what the author intended, just that it’s something they learned–is not a healthy and amicable disagreement over a novel. It’s an unnecessary derail of the conversation.
anarchobyron @ 30
Sigh. No one is arguing for pure subjectivism. Some literary criticism is more insightful and valuable than others, because of its good reasoning and sound arguments. “You’re wrong, because the author is an anarchist” is not one of those.
Thank you for the transcript, Pteryxx
@3
>PZ, I’ve been e-mailing you hoping you’d move further left and embrace socialism over capitalism. You’re right about
>gender, race, god, and equality, now why not class?
I’ve been reading Pharyngula since back when it was on ScienceBlogs (or whatever that host was called), though I only very rarely comment, but I’ve always been under the impression PZ was on the socialist side of things. I know my final abandonment of my libertarian upbringing and movement towards a socialist outlook was partly inspired by writing on Pharyngula–it would be somewhat embarrassing to learn that I’d been projecting this whole time…
Seconding Beatrice in thanking you for the transcript, Pteryxx.
I agree so hard with LeGuin. Fiction, but especially sci-fi/fantasy, is where we can make the *impossible* possible. Many ways of viewing the world and acting in the world are only deemed impossible because huge swaths of the population are skeptical. Fiction is a place where we can explore these seeming impossibilities and demonstrate that some are not in fact impossible after all.
The beauty of sci-fi is you can use it to comment on the society in which you live without doing it obviously enough that you’ll be shouted down.
I also agree that the profit motive has had undue influence in certain areas of life (writing and education, just to name a couple). Here freedom, creativity, and uniqueness are essential and depending on what aspect you’re talking about that can be hard to measure the quality of in terms of sales/productivity, quantify, package, and/or mass produce (that’s assuming mass producing is desired).
Hmm,
anarchobyron did come across as rather bossy originally, but I’d say the responses to him have been an order of magnitude bossier.
I learned from “Death of the Author” that the author’s opinion is final and conclusive on every point ;-)
There’s an inherent problem with using the term “socialist” in any political debate between USians and others, and that is that the word is used over there in ways that are simply not compatible with the way it’s understood most everywhere else. This is probably in no small part because the entirety of mainstream (read: party) politics in the US involves issues that are inter-factional debates within right-wing parties in much of Europe. (That’s certainly the case where I live.) And from that perspective, the spectre of expressed opinion in the US skews very heavily towards the right with strong propertarians being quite visible and seen as the ‘opposite numbers’ of, frankly, lukewarm social-democrats.
If “socialism” in any form is ever going to work we’ll need a true economy of plenty rather than an economy of scarcity, at least as far as water, food, power, and shelter go. I think the “basic income” is the first step, and it may also be as far as we need to go into socialism.
The fear i have about it is that some people will end up being a permanent underclass in a way even more insidious and inescapable than at present, that being, a completely unthinking as well as underprivileged class. What happens when no one need put forth any effort at all to survive? Will they stop learning too?
If we’re going to pull this off, we need to make sure education is in the same paradigm-of-plenty category as basic physical needs.
Here’s one of LeGuin’s short stories, for folks who’d like to read her fiction – http://www-rohan.sdsu.edu/faculty/dunnweb/rprnts.omelas.pdf
I really enjoy her writing. She’s one of the few writers I know who can write a phrase that makes me put the book down for a moment, to savor the beauty of her words. She’s also correct about much sci-fi and fantasy being market-driven crap. I treasure writers who are economical with their words. I think authors who write like they are being paid by the word are being tediously verbose, and I don’t read them.
I don’t know much about her politics. I do think that Marxism, Libertarianism, and Anarchism deny one truth about humans – we are selfish and greedy. In the real world, they just can’t work.
Azuma Hazuki @41:
An experiment run in Manitoba in the 70s suggests that may not be much of a concern.
I highly recommend listening to this talk by Canadian Senator Hugh Segal on fighting poverty.
@41:
They will be able to devote their thoughts and energies to something beyond mere survival? Such as, I dunno, thriving? Coming up with solutions to problems? Expressing creativity?
The 1979 film version of The Lathe of Heaven is available on YouTube. I highly recommend it.
If I’m not mistaken, the Swiss are about to embark on a guaranteed minimum income experiment as well. The law was up for a referendum vote and it passed. Not sure when it goes into effect though.
The rethug supporters are deadly afraid of anybody taking “advantage” of the system.
And in doing so, imply all POC/immigrants are taking advantage of “their money”. Never mind a majority of those on welfare are white. Also funny is how the very fundamentalist churches know how to sign up for welfare, and what is needed for each program, and coach their members who need assistance, as long as their members are white. After all, “they” deserve it…
*blech*
the “so called realists” are very often every bit as made up out of fantasy as stories about elves and dragons and magic kids.
One of the things I like about her writing is the degree of reality she adheres to. She is not preaching and solves the problem of the story in a very human way without resorting to simple force but instead an incite that changes the perception of reality that is at the root of the problem and makes the solution almost unfold by itself.
I did not like her remark about it being at the end of her career very much. I recognize the truth of the statement but would rather it not be so.
uncle frogy
well I failed right there alright I got the wrong insight from the writing.
uncle frogy
I remember reading a novel that had a society that provided basic needs such as food, clothing, and shelter to all citizens. It was a 80’s book, (possibly) by Sherri Teppar? Grass or maybe The Gate to Women’s Country? All government was done by strict consensus. You could have fancier living quarters and food, goods, and entertainments if you put forth effort to do so. It was a secondary theme of much of the book, the small ways that being free to pursue your own interests without fear of starvation and death resulted in a healthier society. Humans have big brains that require a lot of stimulation, and they are inherently social animals. I think most of them would choose to spend their lives doing “productive” activities quite contentedly, especially if acquiring the necessary education for some professions was also considered a publicly supported social investment.
Are many fans of LeGuin familiar with Candace Jane Dorsey? I found her novels “Black Wine” and “Blue” to be similar in theme to LeGuin’s works, but she was a local author, and I’m not sure how widely known she is.
I suspect the real fear of a guaranteed income is the fear of how will we get the real crap jobs/work done unless we have people who are not forced by the basic needs to survive take any amount to live in at least poverty to do them.
uncle frogy
P.Z. —
Thank you for posting that excellent quote!
Le Guin herself said, in 2008, in a Q & A after reading several passages from “A Wizard of Earthsea”, that reading is the most personal of the arts — that it happens within the reader, and that her novels have no particular message(s) at all. She said she just writes stories, and the meaning of them is up to the reader.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i6KrU84CPKE
She said — starting around 42:35 in the video — about “the message of the book”, which is “the idea that a story is merely a vehicle for a sermon, and if not, is is merely trivial entertainment. ……Some of this is unwittingly taught in schools. Children are asked, “What is the message of the story you just read?”…..A story can mean a lot without having any identifiable message at all. ..The less explicit its meanings are the more powerful they may be……..It’s got a thousand messages for a thousand different people……The real message of imaginative fiction is that we can be other people…… No other art empowers us in quite that way….. We make the book as we read it…..That’s what is so particularly cool about reading. That’s my message.”
NitricAcid
I remember Candace.
But I’m from her locality.
@52, unclefrogy
I’ve thought about that before, and I always think that it would suddenly become the case that (rather than further burdening those who have little choice) unpleasant jobs would need to be paid in proportion to motivate someone to do it.
*And in economic competition to that solution would be other solutions: like automation, which makes no person have to endure the unpleasantness.
The problem with utopian ideals.. Ok, just “this” ideal is that some things “need” to be done, and many of them are things no one wants to do, if given an option. Socialist systems tend to just assume that everyone will work together to do them anyway. Capitalism presumes that you pay someone enough to be willing to trade more freedom to do the things they want, for the time spent doing the crap work.
So, where are the problems in either of these? Simple:
In the first case, almost no one is going to want to do them, since they have so many other things they could be doing. Well, at least until it becomes so necessary to do so that they have no choice left, then they will do as little as possible. How do I know this? Well, aside from the fact that attempts at socialism around the world have invariably ended with some form of, “You will take this job, because the state needs the work done!”, there is the fact that I, personally, sure as hell wouldn’t do some things, if I wasn’t going to get in some form of trouble, or be hassled for it. I don’t know anyone, at all, that doesn’t have this attitude on some level, and there is always more necessary work than there *ever* is the other kind.
The second one, of course, has a completely different problem – motivation. Ironically, money isn’t sufficient reward. Autonomy, mastery, and purpose are necessary, except, if its a necessary thing to be done, you don’t often have a lot of autonomy, its not something requiring a lot of mastery, and purpose.. maybe can be given, but not so much if its a job that you think literally any idiot could do, but you are stuck with. What more often happens instead is that money becomes a prime motivator, yet, when costs rise, its also the primary thing that gets cut, so much so that you are trading free time, freedom in how you do your job, any possibility of mastering a skill **and** purpose, for… not enough money to even achieve any of these things when/if you have any time at home (which, if your job is shitty enough, and you need more than one, you may not have any of either).
In short, its not the presumed trade being made that is necessarily the problem, its the fact that, having robbed you of all the motivations that actually motivate anyone, profit ends up demanding, from those that own, and thus have autonomy, believe they are masterful, and are convinced that they have some grandiose purpose in the world, that they also rob their workers of money, along with everything else.
The result, in both cases, is that those doing “necessary” work don’t have choice, don’t have freedom, are not allowed to gain real mastery, or skill, in anything that interests them, and, invariably, they are replaceable cogs. I.e., they serve no purpose that cannot be simply replaced with someone identical.
That this sort of anarchic socialism implies as lack of force.. is naive. Physical, maybe. Economic, possibly. Social, though? But some sort of “force” is still implied, in that some things *must* be done, for things to keep working, and without some way to make sure people do them….
It think its telling that they can describe, in clear, and precise detail the function of “failing” societies, but, when confronted with the need to show how theirs works, the results is either vague, or unbelievable, and ignores basic problems, like what actually motivates people to do anything, or why. Its simply assumed that it will work, and is described as doing so, while the alternative, which holds the true center stage, the “failed” societies, are described in great detail.
No, the solution is not going to be what so many would like to think it is. Money “can” be a motive, as long as it grants some of the rest, but not, no matter how much you pay, if, in the end, gaining it robs you of all the other motivators. Not enough money, again, robs you of all those other motivators. Even necessary work would be done, if recognized as something needed, to do the rest, but not if its a replaceable job, which any low paid slob can do, and doing it, again, results if that person losing everything else, to get it done. There needs to be balance. Anarchism tends to just assume it will balance itself, without anyone thinking about how to do that.
Interestingly, this came up today on another blog I sometimes read – on motivation, and how totally defective much of our world is, due to flat out ignoring, or failing, to understand human nature, at all.
http://youarenotsosmart.com/2014/11/24/yanss-037-drive-motivation-and-crowd-control-with-daniel-pink/
@57, Kagehi
Just having read your first point, I can’t see how this is a problem. People are already being forced to do unpleasant work…but a society with good welfare has two added bonuses: they get to live comfortably, and other people who would have been poor without having those jobs also get to live comfortably.
*Waves to Chigau*
I don’t live there anymore, but I have fond memories of that part of Edmonton.
The message in books can be a very individual thing. For instance, Hemingway insisted that The Old Man and the Sea was a story about a man catching a large fish in the sea. In English class, however, it was all about the analogy to Christ and the myth of Sisyphus. Hm.
I’ve always enjoyed LeGuin’s books simply because they make me think, not for any underlying politics in them, or the rightness or wrongness of the opinions she expresses within.
And I really need to watch Lathe of Heaven, because that book was awesome. But my long-standing favourite by her is The Left Hand of Darkness. That one, for me, beats out all others. Couldn’t say why, though.
in some quarters there seems to along with the distaste for some kinds of work/jobs is a negative judgment of those who do them.
Those who do them seem to derive more often a negative status. The hotel maid is not an honored profession neither are any of the other cleaner jobs fit only for the marginal segments of our population. Why is that?
uncle frogy
I remember Ms. Dorsey too, I sold books to her a couple of times. She was very nice and had a sense if humour about finding her books for sale second hand. /pointless anecdote
IMHO, the divine right of kings is still alive & well, just living under another name. Since monarchy went out of fashion, free-market fanatics have reassigned that divine right to corporate executives & managers. Their ideology holds that captains of industry are entitled to run their companies as monarchies (or oligarchies) in which neither employees nor clients have any rights, and with which governments may not interfere in any way.
Your missing my point. While many works sort of “assume” that these basic needs are met, they don’t give the mechanisms by which they where achieved, save in the most vague sense possible – i.e., they just “are”. I have no problem with the idea that you can build a system in which such a thing happens. What I don’t see is how you get there without someone in charge of making sure they actually do happen, or how you avoid, more importantly, something that does this from expanding upward, into other matters, where it shouldn’t, as those in charge seek more power. Some of that will be because, having made sure you have clothing, food, shelter, etc., you then need environmental protection, which means protection from outside entities that would dump their waste on your land, or actions by the same that have indirect impacts. Its the whole, “No nation exists in a vacuum.”, problem. You can’t isolate yourself without costs, some of which being that you cannot, then, stop others from doing things that harm you. You can’t try to strong arm, and expand either, because, then they have even more reason to cause you problems. But, even internally, its one thing to say X person needs shelter, but to have to trade that off with, for example, someone else not gaining space for their work, without there being consequences.
The core problem is building the supposed “fully equal” economy, without scarcity, which then, naturally gives rise to near infinite choices. Even Star Trek had to basically cheat, inventing food replicators, and safe clean, and not, usually, dangerous, infinite energy sources. I am sure there are still issues with land use in their world, except, heck, just use your warp drive and find an asteroid or an uninhabited planet, and.. problem solved. lol
Some inequity is sort of going to exist. We can remove it from the baseline, but only if there are controls in place to make sure its fair. But, place such controls, and some people are going to decide that fair isn’t, either to other people’s detriment, or their own, or their friends, gain. Corruption can, and will, happen. And yet, the assumption made is always, “Our system is, as far as the story is concerned, without corruption, but, just look at all these other people we are contrasting it to!” So.. why is it without corruption? How was this really achieved? What where the growing pains that it took to get there? How does just shrugging off all rules supposed to achieve it?
I love roleplaying. But.. I know the difference between pretending the world would work with, in the case of my roleplay, vampires, werewolves, and so on, in it, and the reality that, if such things ever inexplicably showed up in the real world, it would be nearly as “simple” as it is in the game. And, any halfway decent author can see the problems that **would** almost certainly arise, even if they can’t predict the absolute outcome. So, where is the literary analysis of the real world mess that leads from here, to there, with these grand ideals? How much of both current reality, and even human nature, do they actually ignore?
Put simply, this stuff was, for me, the Atlas Shrugged of my childhood. I was tempted by the idea of a purely balanced economy, without scarcities. Then… I thought about the problem of how, or even if, that is at all plausible. Now.. I think what is achievable is one that is equal on the bottom, but still allowed some level of unequal at the top, instead of what we have – unequal all the way, getting more and more so, the closer to the top a person is. That, is achievable, I think. What, if anything, beyond that is.. will require either an abandonment of huge swaths of what we are capable of today, which won’t work, because a thing created can be recreated, and who, in such an “equal” society is going to tell someone they can’t reinvent it? Or, major technological breakthroughs, on the scale of stuff from Star Trek.
And, the irony is, its the loss of technology, and a reduction to a simpler state, that will take state force to not only achieve, but maintain, lest someone, as I said, “reinvent” the things we abandoned.
unclefrogy
You are the person who just stated that cleaning up is a task fit only for “marginal” people. Why is that? Cleaning is an essential activity, especially considering how messy humans are. Marginalized? Hmmmmmm, gee I wonder why?
The Left Hand of Darkness is the one of hers that I particularly liked most.
Still haven’t read a lot though. (Used book stores have so little LeGuin. I think people tend to hand on to her.)
er, hang on to…
Agreed. Just a while ago I was pointing this out in another thread…
I have never understood why anyone would make a career of cleaning other peoples teeth.
But I definitely appreciate them.
I also appreciate hotel cleaning staff, always thank them and tip them (where possible).
rq @60:
For me, I think it was the growing relationship between Genly Ai and Estraven. Haven’t read it in ages, but I remember being quite moved by the development of their mutual trust. Two people from very different cultures slowly coming to recognize their common decency and humanity. Maybe I’m misremembering. Should read it again.
Rob Grigjanis
That, and the ending. I know the ending broke me a little bit.
rq Yeah, I don’t often weep at the end of novels, but that one…
For those arguing the impossibility of socialism (and/or other “too perfect” systems):
What are the grounds you will accept for oppressing other people? Because what you are arguing is, fundamentally, that society cannot function without some people being oppressed to the benefit of others.
Well, maybe that’s true, but I’m sure as hell not going to let that stop me from trying to figure out ways to eliminate the oppression that I see. To borrow a quote, I am an anarchist not because anarchy is the final goal, but because there is no such thing as a final goal.
I read Darkness and Dispossessed and Forest about once a year.
Fuck the present.
I like the past.
@Odin
Barring the creation of super-intelligent, selflessly serving robots, you’re going to have hierarchies (and the resulting inequality in distribution of goods and services) in any complex system beyond a few dozen to few hundred people – it just becomes too difficult to manage with direct democracy or “everybody participates in every decision” set-ups. That’s the same thing under socialism as it would be under capitalism, except under socialism economic power is much more concentrated and tied to political power than it is under capitalism. At least capitalism has the churn of markets and creative destruction to tear down rich elites and raise up new ones, and the fragmentation of economic power among companies and individuals.
Tethys @ 65
If we take pay as a sign of respect and prestige awarded to workers I would have to say hotel cleaning staff and domestic cleaning staff regardless what some individuals may feel are not given the same deference nor the pay levels of say carpenters or plumbers. Those who do that work do not come from the middle classes. It is not a job that would support a middle class life style.
some of the more exclusive hotels may pay quite well but the independent motel down the road I am pretty sure is not one of them nor is the majority in the industry. I am not advocating that but on the face of it what would you call it. I am pretty sure there are many jobs with low status that could be used as an example I picked one off the top of my head you might be able to suggest a better. I was just responding to what I perceive is the fear of the guaranteed income and jobs that not many want or are not willing to pay for.
uncle frogy
Nick Gotts
In which case you can, of course, substantiate that opinion with parts from the text.
Because we didn’t get rid of the “because” in literary theory and cultural studies ;)
brett @ 75
“Socialism” is not a synonym for “state-run economy”. Capitalism is a strong inhibiting factor on the power of the market to restructure economies. There is no need for “everybody to participate in every decision” for effective democracy, and in fact such a scheme would almost certainly be even more oppressive than the structure we have today.
I fear arguing these points in more depth would be going fairly far off the rails for this thread, but if it can be done without annoying everyone else no end I’m game. :)
Oh, sure.. If you define every single bloody things from, “You agreed to do this job, and then went back on it, so there needs to be consequences for that.”, to, “Don’t touch the stove, its hot and you will burn yourself!”, as “oppression”, then you have us pegged perfectly. Otherwise, who the @#%$@% is talking about oppression being “necessary”?
That’s weird.
Ew.
The more extroverted colleagues probably appreciate your e-mails. The rest, I am certain, do not.
o_O
…I’m really surprised this doesn’t go without saying. Education up to and including university is free in several European countries, and nearly so (by comparison to the US) in the others.
The referendum will probably be in 2016, says one of the supporter websites. So far there’s only been a people’s initiative, which gathered enough signatures (a year ago) to force the parliament to consider the idea; following a detailed report, the debate in parliament should be beginning around now, followed by a referendum 2 to 3 years later, says another one of the supporter websites.
Wikipedia says the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians have instituted a guaranteed income from the proceeds of their casino. Iran and Macau have somewhat similar schemes, but they seem to pay well below the existence minimum, just like Alaska’s oil fund.
There’s always the Thunderdome. :-)
*facepalm*
That’s embarrassing.
Let me try again.
Me too!
Ew.
That’s weird.
The more extroverted colleagues probably appreciate your e-mails. The rest, I am certain, do not.
David Marjanović
I’m glad you corrected that ’cause, boyohboy was I ever gonna yell at you.
Le Guin is really excellent at inventing a kind of anthropology of alien cultures and other peoples. Look at the stories in Changing Planes; and if you like them, read Alway Coming Home. It describes a gentle, almost tribal culture that is much different from ours. In the background is a darker, industrial society, which presumably supplies technology as needed. It’s an interesting contrast.
Kagehi @ 79
Except you argued, fairly explicitly, that there were things that needed to be done, which people would not willingly agree to.
I have to me three on Darkness. I was fascinated by the premise, watched with awe as the premise was examined with intelligence and compassion, and at first didn’t notice how deeply I had fallen into the story until I found myself literally crying at the end.
@Odin
Most of the variants I’ve seen either try and push the decision-making down to more localized levels of state governance, or they essentially keep capitalism but with a state-owned financial sector* and different firm structures (such as worker cooperatives versus the traditional bureaucratic firm hierarchy). I think you’re still going to end up with inequalities in both beyond a certain community size, especially since we’ve seen bureaucracies of specialists arising over and over again for specialized work in democratic regimes (such as the US and Europe with their civil services).
* I honestly don’t see the charm of this in some of the market socialist proposals out there. If you’re going to keep a market, why would you want to centralize control of investment funds? Especially since there are cooperative banks and other forms of non-profit finance in existence today to model off of.
The only thing that disappointed me about reading Le Guin is her anti-immortality rubbish in the later Earthsea books.
I’ve never had a reason to regret reading her writing in total, though. Great author, great messages. Some of the statements by her characters were incredibly uplifting for me.
Gods, Changing Planes was beautiful. Too brief, too disconnected, but I loved every bit of it.
The Word for World is Forest is pretty good, but I think that Darkness beats them all. And that includes The Dispossessed.
@ Zimmerle
“Rubbish”? That seems hyperbolic at best. To me her treatment of the paradox of eternal life reads as a necessary and tasteful counterpoint to Tolkien’s exaltation of immortality.
:-)
Zimmerle
I find it a little odd to hear that anti-immortality is disappointing rubbish on a blog populated by atheists.
In what way is it rubbish?
uncle frogy
I find the freak-out about how the ‘unpleasant’ jobs will get done unless the proles are in danger of starvation to be a pretty weak point. Plenty of shitty jobs are only shitty because 1. they don’t pay well 2. have shitty hours 3. involve being treated shitty by employers and often the public. The solution is to force these jobs to be *less shitty.*
I’m a software engineer and I don’t think it’s unreasonable for me to work 40 hours a week. My work isn’t so shitty, and I’m not subject to daily insults and humiliations. However, a trade-off for doing a shitty job which has few intrinsic rewards should be a shorter work week and better pay. This would require some degree of intervention and regulation, and it would cut into the bottom line of shareholders, but their opinions just need to count less.
Something that would have to be acknowledged was how much of the lives of proles are just that they get treated worse. Professionals are assumed to be working nicely and independently without the same level of monitoring.
Yep. If you ask people who do “shitty jobs”, they usually complain about the working conditions, not the job itself. Heck, everybody who goes into nursing knows that the job comes with wiping shit off adult arses at 3 am. And the people who go into nursing are hardly those who have no other options. What gets them is not the shit at 3am. What gets them is the other three people who are calling for their help when they’re the only person on a station.
I’m working hard for that godsdamn teacher’s degree and many people tell me that they’d rather clean toilets than become a teacher, yet it’s not economic necessity and not being qualified to clean toilets that drives me to college.
Would being a trash collector still suck if you
-didn’t have to do it running all the time
-only had to do it 3 days a week with 4 days for pursuing your interests?
This. And also, what Giliell responded.
Yes. Those currently raking it in on the backs of others would undoubtedly object, but the concept of a trade-off between the shittiness of a job and better rewards – especially being able to live well while doing the shitty job for less time – seems to me to be crucial. We all get one life, so the one easily countable, measurable “currency” that is equally precious to all of us is time.
Not just the Divine Right of Kings, but monarchy in general. For nearly all of humanity’s recorded history, most nations much larger than a city-state were ruled by monarchs. The Roman Republic was an exception for a while, but it got afflicted with civil war and it turned into a monarchy, the Roman Empire. Some monarchies have shown great longevity, even if they had not been very continuous while they existed. The champions are likely the Pharaonic and Chinese monarchies, at about 3000 years, and some European monarchies have lasted over a millennium.
But over the last few centuries, and especially over the last century, that has changed dramatically. Many monarchies have fallen, and many of the survivors have been neutered into purely ceremonial monarchies that are de facto republics. I could go into detail about what happened, but what’s more important is why it happened, and I have been unable to find anything on that.
I think that the United Sates had led the way, by being the first “big” nation to become a republic in a long time. It succeeded well enough to become an example for Latin Americans, who mostly founded republics when they became independent. In Europe, however, the French Revolution was a bad example of republicanism, and during the shifted 19th cy., 1814 – 1914, European nation builders were sure to include monarchs in their new nations. WWI was a turning point for Europe. Though President Woodrow Wilson declared that the US was “too proud to fight” in that war, he later decided that it was necessary to fight in that war “to make the world safe for democracy”. He demanded — and got — the resignation of Germany’s Kaiser. Austria’s monarch fled, and Russia’s and Ottoman Turkey’s ones were overthrown. The nations that emerged or re-emerged in Europe after that was were all republics. Later, Italy’s and Greece’s monarchies were abolished, while Spain’s one was restored.
Britain liked monarchies in the Middle East and North Africa, but most decolonizing nations became independent as republics, and some MENA monarchies were later overthrown.
We’ve also seen some monarchies emerge, like Papa Doc and Baby Doc in Haiti, Hafez and Bashar Assad in Syria, and most notably, the Kim family in North Korea. Muammar Khadafy and Saddam Hussein wanted to be succeeded by their sons, but that was not to be.
Why do monarchies get started? Some students of political systems propose that it’s from the “crown prince problem”, a designated successor who gets too eager. If a nation has a strong succession mechanism independent of the leader’s family, then that problem won’t happen. That’s what’s the case in democracies and also most one-party states like Communist ones. North Korea’s Communist monarchy is rather unusual. But without a strong succession mechanism, the safest choice for successor is the leader’s son or sometimes daughter. Thus, hereditary succession and monarchy.
At least with monarchy, there’s a clear target and a clear method to achieving the goal. “Money” is as hard a moving target as terrorism though… Who do you overthrow to defeat it, exactly? Ben Bernanke? Heck, what exactly am I, personally, supposed to do? All I really can do is complain on the internet, and I do, but I know that’s not enough.