Not a metaphor
Shoes work marvelously because our feet lack the callouses that one would develop by not wearing them.
Mull on that for a moment.
And then think about the state.
Category: Zoulapia
Short and Sweet.
A new pirate's haven
A new hub for piracy-related articles and news has been created on Reddit. Join us.
Short notice. I’ve recently been made a mod of the Piracy subreddit and I’m trying to improve on it as well as to get it to be a bit more active. If you like all things Piracy, from “unauthorized” file sharing to High Sea Swashbuckling to the Flying Spaghetti Monster, then join us and submit any article of relevance.
A Resolution
Who would have thunk it?
To my surprise, I find that I have a New Year’s resolution. I resolve to spend one hour per day doing something creative (blogging, designing etc) as opposed to spending all my time mostly gaming. Or it may be the insomnia speaking. We shall see.
Regular blogging will commence soon as well.
Oh look, once again science confirms Anarchism
As Anthropologists study emergent human behaviour, they discover what Anarchists have been saying for the last 100 years.
Who would have thunk it eh? Once again, actual empirical research points out that humans are primarily co-operative rather than competitive and the hard primitivism assumptions of Hobbes (and favourite excuse of Clergy and Statists for their authority) get even less realistic.
Ah, if only we had a society that was organized with such knowledge in mind rather than the harmful assumption that humans need to be protected from each other. If only…
Quote of the Day: Inequality of Wages
Francois Tremblay makes a very accurate quote on why wages should be always equal.
Saying that inequality of capacities must lead to inequality of wages would only make sense if all work was the same, in which case the person with lower capacities should be paid more (for having to do a work more difficult than he can actually do) and the person with higher capacities should be paid less (for having to expand less effort for the same work). But in reality, the variety of work to be done is as great as the variety of capacities that exist in people’s natures. Since people can always find some work that suits them, or is at least proportional to their capacities, inequality of capacities coupled with a proportional inequality of work leads us back to equality of wages.
Succinctly said.
Francois has written an excellent short series of articles on the necessity of equality in society which make a solid case for what I always say in that you cannot have liberty without equality. Make sure you read part 1 and part 2 as well.
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Quote of the Day: Scientific Boobytrap
The Archdruid figures out why economics fails and gives us an interesting quote
There’s a boobytrap hidden inside the scientific method. The fact that you can get some fraction of nature to behave in a certain way under arbitrary conditions in the artificial setting of a laboratory does not mean that nature behaves that way left to herself. If all you want to know is what you can force a given fraction of nature to do, this is well and good, but if you want to understand how the world works, the fact that you can often force nature to conform to your theory is not exactly helpful.
And this is exactly the boobytrap that economics dive into head first. In fact it’s even worse than that since economics is not even interested in setting up artificial conditions at all. Rather, they are content to think of fantastical, often impossible examples of societies and then simply build an economic theory from that.
Quote of the day: MRAs
What MRAs really are
Men suffer, O how they suffer, at the hands of subhuman conniving bitches who seek world domination through insane women-are-human propaganda and the misguided attempt to claim their own internal organs as private property. The MRA imagines that women’s interests control and abuse him in an ever more feminized world; he erroneously sees himself as a battered victim of women’s agency, rather than what he actually is: a moron.
Ayeap. Pretty much the experience I’ve had from here.
Quote of the Day: The "Free Market" Recipe
Kevin Carson adequately explains how the “free market” of vulgar-libertarians really works.
The time-honored “free market” recipe, among the ruling classes, goes like this: 1) rob the producing classes of their traditional property rights in the land, and turn them into tenants at-will of the plutocracy; 2) through coercive controls on the population, like the Combination Laws and Law of Settlement, make it impossible for the producing classes to bargain effectively in the wage market; 3) when the process is complete, talk a lot about how great the free market works, and justify the existing concentration of capital ownership as a result of the superior efficiency of those who came out on top.
So yeah, I’ve been reading his vulgar-libertarianism watch series which is excellent as a general rule, but I just couldn’t avoid quoting this particular part.
Go and read the rest of the pwnage.
Quote of the Day: Gender Equality
A Quote about Equality between genders and how twisted it is in the eyes of sexists
The first is that true gender equality is actually perceived as inequality. A group that is made up of 50% women is perceived as being mostly women. A situation that is perfectly equal between men and women is perceived as being biased in favor of women.
And if you don’t believe me, you’ve never been a married woman who kept her family name. I have had students hold that up as proof of my “sexism.” My own brother told me that he could never marry a woman who kept her name because “everyone would know who ruled that relationship.” Perfect equality – my husband keeps his name and I keep mine – is held as a statement of superiority on my part.
Ayeap. This is what the shrill cries of males about “feminazis” are all about.
Quote of the Day: Criticism of Capitalism
A redditor points out a classic fallacy people make against anti-capitalists.
If someone criticizes capitalism and is rich, they’re accused of being “hypocritical” in some way, “limousine socialists,” elitists, etc.
If someone criticizes capitalism and is not rich, they’re accused of simply being envious, justifying their personal failure, resentful, etc.
It’s very convenient that, no matter who you are, you’re automatically discredited by who you are. That way, we never have to address anyone’s ideas.
Accurate. It is sad that most people are so eager to jump to ad hominem attacks rather than address the issues. Of course such tactics are not restricted only against anti-capitalists so every party should beware of falling into this easy fallacy.