Stoller:
This is where you go wrong. To promise 'voluntary work' or to expect it is utterly utopian. As this debate board AMPLY DEMONSTRATES, some people will 'voluntarily' do ALL the skilled work and 'voluntarily' leave all the shit work for someone else.: Yeah right Barry. i really appreciate that after having called for some form of corvee, I'm now branded as a devious shirker.
You're jumping in here, Nikhil. I only said that the MAJORITY of people on this debate board would 'volunteer' to perform only skilled jobs. I shall be careful to have your exception hightlighted in each statement from now on...
: Frankly, I wouldn't WANT to be a brain surgeon. I would probably do a lousy job and accidentally kill a few patients. So who would really be served by teaching me to be a brain surgeon at massive expense? No one.
Please refer to this post.
: Volunteer labor is something whose potential cannot be overestimated.
Good point. But, conversely, to say that ALL labor will be voluntary is pie-in-the-sky. That has been my point regarding RD.
: How much free time are you going to allow, Barry? I hope you're not planning to go beyond teh 40 hour workweek.
That would be up to society as a whole. See this post.
Stoller:
No, my misinformed friend, the SOCIAL DIVISION OF LABOR is what's anti-humanistic.
RD:
Why? Socially divided labour still retains the fullness of human engagement with life-activity, a professional porter - such as worked at our college halls - is a multi-facetted and skilled task, that engages mind and spirit, particularly if the subject is willing To rotate jobs is to replicate the fractioning of the human spirit of productive division of labour. Not everyone can be a doctor.
Stoller:
Arguing against detail divison in the shop to argue FOR the 'productive' social division of labor is opportunism and elitism, RD. I'm ashamed of you. Under the axiom 'not everyone can be a doctor' falls the understanding that MANY PEOPLE become (only) housewives, janitors, cashiers, etc., etc. You entertain the notion that someone will be a 'career' porter (like at your college) because portering is a 'multi-facetted and skilled task.' That is reprehensible! Please stop calling yourself a Marxist in public!
: Here's a flat-out question. CAN everyone be a doctor? Does everyone WANT to? SHOULD everyone? WHO would be helped by making everyone a part-time brain surgeon?
Again: Please seethis post.
And, while we're at it, let's examine RD's statement again:
Socially divided labour still retains the fullness of human engagement with life-activity, a professional porter - such as worked at our college halls - is a multi-facetted and skilled task, that engages mind and spirit, particularly if the subject is willing To rotate jobs is to replicate the fractioning of the human spirit of productive division of labour. Not everyone can be a doctor.
Jees, Nikhil, EVERY procapitalist says this sort of shit!
: So the CP isn't communist now?
No, they are communist. But---defending the social division of labor---they are ALSO hierarchal. And THAT is what I repudiate.
