I am not defending prostitution as an act of liberation?
Added parenthesis to clarify.
I was defending the abstract idea of someone having sex for reasons besides direct sexual attraction to their partner, not prostitution as we know or in any form our current definition would work with. Like, I don’t think prostitution would even be possible in a communist society, there wouldn’t be any goods or services to really bargain with if everything, including luxuries, was collectively owned
Even if it was possible, it would still imply a form of labor desertion (in other words, social parasitism) by performing and obtaining benefit from an act that brings no productivity to the worker’s state, not to mention that it is still an act of objectification. More on that text of Kollontai that I have linked before.
I mean, i think i agree with what you’re saying here, but in the context of communism specifically,
Wouldn’t communism not have a worker’s state anymore? Isn’t productivity kind of just a toxic hold over to be excised once the dictatorship of the proletariat is no longer necessary?
Also, what counts as production? Isn’t something produced just anything with a use-value? Isn’t sex technically a thing with a use-value? (Pleasure, or reproduction). Where’s the difference between it and, like, being a baker of sugary goods? Is this suggesting that people who specialize in making desserts should just stop doing that after we achieve socialism because it wouldn’t directly contribute to general production (and their products would disappear immediately after being consumed?)
Not defending prostitution under a communist or even socialist system, especially because i don’t think it’s possible, but I think it not being possible (or being somewhat coercive to the person doing it) would be the issue, not social parasitism (also, where’s the line between social parasitism and just being disabled? If someone can’t work, wouldn’t that mean that by this framework they deserve to either live without anything except bare necessities, or die from starvation?)
Wouldn’t communism not have a worker’s state anymore? Isn’t productivity kind of just a toxic hold over to be excised once the dictatorship of the proletariat is no longer necessary?
People still need to eat, drink and fulfill their other basic needs. “Productive” here does not mean to produce much of something with the least amount of resources possible, but to contribute to the fulfillment of society’s needs.
Also, what counts as production? Isn’t something produced just anything with a use-value? Isn’t sex technically a thing with a use-value?
No. The commodification of human relationships is one of the worst blights that exists in this world, and whoever aims to prolongue it is an enemy of socialism. As long as one sees human interactions as something to bbe bought and sold, they will be unable to understand what the liberation of the working people entails.
(also, where’s the line between social parasitism and just being disabled? If someone can’t work, wouldn’t that mean that by this framework they deserve to either live without anything except bare necessities, or die from starvation?)
From each according to their ability, to each according to their needs. You are comparing (in a frankly offensive manner) those who cannot work to those who are not willing to work.
The commodification of human relationships is one of the worst blights that exists in this world, and whoever aims to prolongue it is an enemy of socialism. As long as one sees human interactions as something to bbe bought and sold, they will be unable to understand what the liberation of the working people entails.
Shouldn’t this be argued for everything in general, not just human relations? Isn’t the damage capital does inherent to how it commodified everything, not just human relationships?
I think I agree with you based on that (and already agreed that it would be impossible to do prostitution and therefore flawed to even try under communism), but I don’t think your criticism is limited to just sex or human relationships, it implies that we should seriously consider the risks of having any kind of trade in our theoretical utopian communist society and I think that tracks.
From each according to their ability, to each according to their needs. You are comparing (in a frankly offensive manner) those who cannot work to those who are not willing to work.
Well, fair criticism, but in my experience the kind of people who are most often accused of not wanting to work tend to just be straight-up disabled people that can’t. My comparison was flawed, but I think my first reaction of disgust at the concept was warranted. Similar to how someone pointed out that removing the context from prostitution is silly, expecting me or anyone else to just ignore how similar concepts have been used to shit on disabled people is also silly. It’s not offensive to mention disabled people here, because what I’m talking about is their literal lived experience, being told they have to be productive to be valuable and then being blamed and gaslit when they tell others that they can’t. You can say that you’ll just listen to them when they protest but I honestly don’t believe you. Someone will ask “what stops a landlord from trying to reclaim their lifestyle by claiming they’re disabled?”, and then people will start casting doubt on disabled people’s experiences again, something that can only be avoided with a radical willingness to just let people not work.
The only consistent way we have right now to find out if someone mentally can’t do something, or is just choosing not to, is by pushing them to a breaking point, and I’ve seen too many people talk about how abusive that can be to even remotely want to fight for a society that keeps it around.
We should eliminate the impetus to work altogether. It’s toxic and shitty. If we have to force and coerce each other to do labor to survive as a species, I say we let ourselves die off. The void is better than torturing each other for the rest of time for no reason.
But that doesn’t have to be our future. Sure, we would need to remove reactionary elements and drastically reconstruct society, and that’s what a dictatorship of the proletariat is for. But, in my dream world (I understand this is absurd Utopianism, but bear with me), everyone would contribute to collective goals of their own free volition, because that’s what they naturally are inclined to do. There would be no need to coerce, or threaten, or even abandon anyone. Those who could work naturally would be inclined to work because there would be no systems or unfulfilled needs or contradictory goals stopping them (though personal goals would still exist, just encouraged to not be antisocial). And then, with no reactionary elements or notions of selfish grandeur or enlightenment through wealth in the heads of anyone, we would know that those who don’t want to work would actually just be the people who can’t, either because their brain won’t let them or because they’re phrasing having an unmet need badly.
In the meantime, I get the need for what is probably (in my view) a toxic level of discipline with a socialist state. We aren’t going to get rid of reactionaries by being nice to them. And I think the kind of people you refer to when you say that they don’t want to work, or social parasitism, only really exist as reaction. It is not a normal human inclination to just refuse to do anything for no reason. There has to be a system or condition to convince someone to do nothing helpful for anyone else, people get bored and will stumble their way into some level production otherwise. If we get rid of ideologically reactionary elements, the parasitic elements will wither. Trying to get rid of parasitic elements first is blindly shooting in the dark and we could end up with us shooting ourselves in the foot.
Labor shouldn’t be a painful process that human beings need to draw straws to fulfill. It is a natural aspect of our psychology. We can only imagine the idea of people willfully refusing to work out of “laziness” in a society where everyone works jobs that do no good and take disproportionate amounts of effort and time.
Added parenthesis to clarify.
Even if it was possible, it would still imply a form of labor desertion (in other words, social parasitism) by performing and obtaining benefit from an act that brings no productivity to the worker’s state, not to mention that it is still an act of objectification. More on that text of Kollontai that I have linked before.
I mean, i think i agree with what you’re saying here, but in the context of communism specifically,
Wouldn’t communism not have a worker’s state anymore? Isn’t productivity kind of just a toxic hold over to be excised once the dictatorship of the proletariat is no longer necessary?
Also, what counts as production? Isn’t something produced just anything with a use-value? Isn’t sex technically a thing with a use-value? (Pleasure, or reproduction). Where’s the difference between it and, like, being a baker of sugary goods? Is this suggesting that people who specialize in making desserts should just stop doing that after we achieve socialism because it wouldn’t directly contribute to general production (and their products would disappear immediately after being consumed?)
Not defending prostitution under a communist or even socialist system, especially because i don’t think it’s possible, but I think it not being possible (or being somewhat coercive to the person doing it) would be the issue, not social parasitism (also, where’s the line between social parasitism and just being disabled? If someone can’t work, wouldn’t that mean that by this framework they deserve to either live without anything except bare necessities, or die from starvation?)
Are you seriously comparing prostitution to being disabled?
People still need to eat, drink and fulfill their other basic needs. “Productive” here does not mean to produce much of something with the least amount of resources possible, but to contribute to the fulfillment of society’s needs.
No. The commodification of human relationships is one of the worst blights that exists in this world, and whoever aims to prolongue it is an enemy of socialism. As long as one sees human interactions as something to bbe bought and sold, they will be unable to understand what the liberation of the working people entails.
From each according to their ability, to each according to their needs. You are comparing (in a frankly offensive manner) those who cannot work to those who are not willing to work.
Shouldn’t this be argued for everything in general, not just human relations? Isn’t the damage capital does inherent to how it commodified everything, not just human relationships?
I think I agree with you based on that (and already agreed that it would be impossible to do prostitution and therefore flawed to even try under communism), but I don’t think your criticism is limited to just sex or human relationships, it implies that we should seriously consider the risks of having any kind of trade in our theoretical utopian communist society and I think that tracks.
Well, fair criticism, but in my experience the kind of people who are most often accused of not wanting to work tend to just be straight-up disabled people that can’t. My comparison was flawed, but I think my first reaction of disgust at the concept was warranted. Similar to how someone pointed out that removing the context from prostitution is silly, expecting me or anyone else to just ignore how similar concepts have been used to shit on disabled people is also silly. It’s not offensive to mention disabled people here, because what I’m talking about is their literal lived experience, being told they have to be productive to be valuable and then being blamed and gaslit when they tell others that they can’t. You can say that you’ll just listen to them when they protest but I honestly don’t believe you. Someone will ask “what stops a landlord from trying to reclaim their lifestyle by claiming they’re disabled?”, and then people will start casting doubt on disabled people’s experiences again, something that can only be avoided with a radical willingness to just let people not work.
The only consistent way we have right now to find out if someone mentally can’t do something, or is just choosing not to, is by pushing them to a breaking point, and I’ve seen too many people talk about how abusive that can be to even remotely want to fight for a society that keeps it around.
We should eliminate the impetus to work altogether. It’s toxic and shitty. If we have to force and coerce each other to do labor to survive as a species, I say we let ourselves die off. The void is better than torturing each other for the rest of time for no reason.
But that doesn’t have to be our future. Sure, we would need to remove reactionary elements and drastically reconstruct society, and that’s what a dictatorship of the proletariat is for. But, in my dream world (I understand this is absurd Utopianism, but bear with me), everyone would contribute to collective goals of their own free volition, because that’s what they naturally are inclined to do. There would be no need to coerce, or threaten, or even abandon anyone. Those who could work naturally would be inclined to work because there would be no systems or unfulfilled needs or contradictory goals stopping them (though personal goals would still exist, just encouraged to not be antisocial). And then, with no reactionary elements or notions of selfish grandeur or enlightenment through wealth in the heads of anyone, we would know that those who don’t want to work would actually just be the people who can’t, either because their brain won’t let them or because they’re phrasing having an unmet need badly.
In the meantime, I get the need for what is probably (in my view) a toxic level of discipline with a socialist state. We aren’t going to get rid of reactionaries by being nice to them. And I think the kind of people you refer to when you say that they don’t want to work, or social parasitism, only really exist as reaction. It is not a normal human inclination to just refuse to do anything for no reason. There has to be a system or condition to convince someone to do nothing helpful for anyone else, people get bored and will stumble their way into some level production otherwise. If we get rid of ideologically reactionary elements, the parasitic elements will wither. Trying to get rid of parasitic elements first is blindly shooting in the dark and we could end up with us shooting ourselves in the foot.
Labor shouldn’t be a painful process that human beings need to draw straws to fulfill. It is a natural aspect of our psychology. We can only imagine the idea of people willfully refusing to work out of “laziness” in a society where everyone works jobs that do no good and take disproportionate amounts of effort and time.