A Modest Proposal: Fattening up the Proles

[Timothy C. May]

At 2:57 AM 1/17/96, tallpaul wrote:

>--
>tallpaul
>
>"To understand the probable outcome of the Libertarian vision, see any
>cyberpunk B movie wherein thousands of diseased, desparate and starving
>families sit around on ratty old couches on the streets watching television
>while rich megalomaniacs appropriate their body parts for their personal
>physical immortality."
>     R. U. Sirius
>     _The Real Cyberpunk Fakebook_


The absurdity of this point is obvious to anyone with a brain. Why would we
want the donors to be "diseased" and "starving"?  It is imperative that
donors be healthy and non-anorexic (we used to use the phrase "fattened
up," but this is no longer au courant).

To keep the proles reasonably healthy, the plutocrats are encouraging the
current wave of exercise videos, ThighMasters, Buns of Steel, etc. And lots
of beer, as the Kobe beef quakers have shown.

Other than this, R. U. has it about right, I think.

(Ironically, I brought up the new book, "The Winner Take All Society," at
the last Cypherpunks meeting. No time to discuss it here, but it confirms
my strong belief that we are heading for a economy in which a shrinking
fraction of workers have really valuable things to contribute, and a
growing fraction of the population does not. I had not recalled the
authors, but Strick had a battery-powered laptop and Metricom wireless
modem, and ran an Alta Vista search from where he was sitting: ROBERT FRANK
& PHILIP COOK, The Winner-Take-All Society, New York: The Free Press.)

This may shock some of the newcomers here, who haven't heard this, or who
haven't deduced it from our posts, but many of us are elitists. Or, more
precisely, we are for people looking out for Number One, with the
expectation that many other people simply won't make it.

Think of it as evolution in action.

--Tim May


We got computers, we're tapping phone lines, we know that that ain't allowed.
---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:----
Timothy C. May              | Crypto Anarchy: encryption, digital money,
tcmay at got.net  408-728-0152 | anonymous networks, digital pseudonyms, zero
W.A.S.T.E.: Corralitos, CA  | knowledge, reputations, information markets,
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"National borders aren't even speed bumps on the information superhighway."