At 10:02 PM 10/21/01 -0700, someone with the password to declan@well.com wrote:
I'm actually surprised to see Steve launch into a critique of laissez-faire capitalism here on cypherpunks, of all places. One can admit that globalization has ill effects (mostly, bricks through windows of Starbucks thrown by bored, upper-middle-class, college-age protesters), certainly.
Without people using black bloc tactics, activists would have received no press coverage... Not to mention the benefit to be gained by having a radical faction around to make your moderates look more, well, moderate - a technique as old as the American Revolution, and quite effective for Ghadi and King. But no - for many CACL types, those using black bloc tactics were just bored, upper-middle-class, college-age, uninformed dumbshits pointlessly throwing rocks through starbucks windows - an image similar in accuracy to that of the bored, upper-middle-class, insularly utopian randroid masturbating to "Guns & Ammo". I'm constantly amazed by the misplaced animosity many CACL types display towards the left-anarchist crowd. I think Bruce Sterling said (in Holy Fire) "Fanatics always hate and fear their own dissidents far more then they loathe the bourgeoisie. By this ye shall know them." I wince at fanaticism, whatever its source, but I wince most at the shortsightedness of CACL types who, in their self-righteousness, scorn those who could easily be their closest allies. From everything I've seen (and I've seen a lot), they agree on decentralization [1], agree on encryption, agree on "victimless crimes", agree on weapons possession [2], agree on intellectual property, and agree on individual private property [3].
But when responding to claims that factory workers in poorer countries are only being paid $2/hour or whatnot, it makes sense to ask: Is this worse than their other alternatives, like mud huts in villages?
Who said it was? Have you seen anybody protesting against the opportunity that world markets can bring to poor people the world over? Or have you seen lots of people protesting secrecy-cloaked treaties designed to entrench government-supported monopolies? Make no mistake - that's what the WTO, the FTAA, and their ilk are all about. They are not about free markets; not about competition at all - they are about increasing the scope in which current multinational monopolies and duopolies (which, for the most part, would not exist without constant government support) can sell things. That is not the free-market way. For once and for all: Laissez-faire capitalism does not imply the existence of corporate entities! The left anarchists I know want to keep the means of production and distribution privately (or cooperatively) owned, and keep the free market of goods, services, and ideas... But they want to drop the notion of state-sanctioned corporate entities with their own rights, privileges, and liabilities distinct from those of their members. What's so bad about that? -- Luthor //Remembering is copying and copying is THEFT [1] They don't like either corporate or state centralization of power, but neither do you, right? Right...? AFIAK, Left-anarchists and CACL types oppose corporate and governmental centralization of power - it's just that the left-anarchists focus on corporate power, and CACL types focus on government power... And corporations can't exist without the state. [2] Who was it who said "Weapons embody power, and I prefer to see power in the hands of the people" - was it John Galt? John Locke? John Lott? Oh wait, it was Naomi Klein! Doh! (Chomsky disagrees with her, though, and I'd love to talk to him about that - I don't think he's thought it through) [3] All the left anarchists I know think they own their shoes, as you own yours. However, they question the utility of the corporate legal construction, and many (most? all?) deem corporate property (like intellectual property) a dangerous, shortsighted fiction whose time has come and gone.