Notices by NeonSnake (neonsnake@kolektiva.social), page 2

@hakan_geijer @CedarTea

This is where I think markets have utlility.

I'm not talking about "capitalist" markets here where a portion of the profit gets siphoned off to a middle-man or a rentier, I'm talking about exchange or trade (which exists outside of capitalism, and "always" has, even when it hasn't been the dominant part of the economy).

how much does Robert *really* want another axe? Enough to make a wheelchair (or to trade something to someone/some group who *can* make a wheelchair)? He might *say* he wants another axe, but until we see him trade something of value for it, we don't *definitely* know.

And how many wheelchairs do we need? Really? Well, if someone who needs one is willing to trade something *they* value, then we get a steer.

Markets are really good at revealing preferences that might otherwise be hidden.

@hakan_geijer @CedarTea

I think there's two different things going on

(this is a hugely personal view)

1) what does society look like in a *genuinely* post-state world

and honestly, I don't know. My sense is that it will be a mix of post-scarcity (apples) and scarcity (eg: nice clothes and/or technology)

As it so happens, by utter coincidence, I (genuinely) have an apple tree. You're more than welcome to my surplus.

On the other hand, I'd quite like to still be able to buy eye-glasses so that I can, y'know, see. And a mobility scooter, so that I can, y'know, get into town. Which may well involve scarce materials, and may well involve a sort of trade - what that trade looks like, I can't tell you because it's outside of our realms of imagination currently.

2) The other thing is that I don't believe that we will enter a "stateless society" in my lifetime.

What that means is that the person who does the unpleasant jobs (lets use the obvious one - garbage collection) will *still need to pay taxes in currency issued by their state*. This is very separate to the above point, I fully admit that.

Even if they are able to be self-sufficient in literally every other way (including having all other "stuff" provided to them under a mutual aid/communist system), they still need to have an income.

In which case, pay them more.

------------

I like to imagine a world beyond the state, but it's not my focus - mine is "what can we do next week?"

And next week, we're still going to need "money", no two ways about it.

(Other people are far better, and far more qualified, than I am at the "what happens after")

@hakan_geijer @CedarTea

ROFL agreed

There are many, many criticisms of a stateless society that irritate me to a greater or lesser degree, but right now, the "oh, but who will do the unpleasant jobs??" really just tells me that you've never had to unblock a sink/toilet/shower/whatever.

@CedarTea or - "who will do *my* unpleasant jobs for me if I don't threaten them with starvation?"

I dunno, mate, maybe just pay people a decent amount for doing unpleasant jobs and this problem goes away lmao

@CedarTea That's cool - lots of people do.

I'm *personally* agnostic on whether "wages/currency/some form of measurable exchange" will exist in a stateless society.

(I don't think it matters, and I would hope it didn't)

@CedarTea You can literally just give them an extra beer or something - like, if someone's done a unpleasant job and you give them something that's maybe "above" what is standard, that's still payment.

Doesn't have to be dollars or pounds, just a recognition that they've gone over and above in that particular time frame, and should be acknowledged.

@psychonot23 @hakan_geijer 💯

Because I like to cook, I watch a lot of cookery shows, including competitions (Masterchef, that kind of thing).

I also often get told "Oh, you should apply for one of those, you'd be great!"

Which, no. I wouldn't. I'm a very good home cook by the standards of most English blokes in their mid-forties. That's all and that's not a high bar 😂

Depending on who it is, I generally go with one of a couple of answers - if they're just looking to compliment me, I go with "Oh I'd really love to, but I wouldn't want to turn something I love into something stressful!!", or if it's someone I'm a bit more honest with, I'd say that I'm good, but I'm not *that good*.

Or, it's because I, like (I guess?) most people, have *enormous blind spots* in my cooking.

@hakan_geijer @HeavenlyPossum

There's a definite sense (speaking only for the UK atm) that whilst we're superior to the rest of the Europe, we're even more superioriorior to Eastern Europe.

I remember finding a colleague from Romania out on the smoking area the day after, crying, because she'd heard someone say "good, they can all fuck off back to Europe now".

Good old-fashioned "they're coming for our jobs/benefits" xenophobia - "I'm not racist, see, they're white! I just don't think we should let them all in willy-nilly!"

And...here we go, Brits!

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-68126880

@HeavenlyPossum With everything else going on, I'd *almost* forgotten about Brexit and that it's only now, 8 years after the vote, that some of the measures are coming into force.

@HeavenlyPossum And a bunch of self-styled "lexiteers" screaming at me that I was the real racist for voting Remain because the EU favoured migration from other "white countries"

@passenger @magitweeter @violetmadder @RD4Anarchy @HeavenlyPossum @AdrianRiskin @whatzaname @ciggysmokebringer @gnutelephony @ThatWeltschmerz @FrenchPanda @glitzersachen

I'm with Passenger here - the bloke's not a fascist.

He's (likely) been brought up all his life to believe that only 2 possible economic systems can exist -

1) Capitalism (which is equated with "free markets and free choice)

2) Communism (which is equated with USSR/North Korea style authoritarianism)

Whilst "we" know that that's not true, if your entire education is telling you one thing, it's difficult to break out of that, and let's be fair, we've probably not done a great job here (I very much include myself in this) as we feel we're banging our heads against a brick wall (his hostility to new ideas hasn't helped either).

But I'm not going to call him a fascist - he's simply a fairly standard fella - probably doing "okay" under capitalism, espousing views produced by standard education, and has never had to question them.

@johnbrowntypebeats

FWIW - in the UK, "libertarianism "now has largely the same meaning as it does in the US.

*VERY ROUGHLY*, up until maybe 2005 (? maybe earlier?) I would have been able to say (in the UK) that I was a libertarian, and it be understood that I was anti-government in the sense that I hated their interference with people's personal lives:

Some examples, but not limited to, Clause 28 (the anti-LGBT laws) or the Criminal Justice and Public Order Act 1994 (the "repetitive beats" law)

It *wouldn't* have implied that I was against refugees, the NHS, unemployment benefits, or any of the stuff that it implies now.

I gave up on calling myself a libertarian some time ago, so as not to confuse people on my principles, and just went with anarchist, even though that in itself causes some issues. Frankly, I'd prefer people think I'm putting bricks through Starbucks' windows than think that I'm against disability benefits.

@glitzersachen @passenger @magitweeter @violetmadder @RD4Anarchy @HeavenlyPossum @AdrianRiskin @whatzaname @ciggysmokebringer @gnutelephony @ThatWeltschmerz @FrenchPanda

@HeavenlyPossum @RD4Anarchy @ThatWeltschmerz @gnutelephony @violetmadder @FrenchPanda @glitzersachen @AdrianRiskin @magitweeter @ciggysmokebringer @johnbrowntypebeats @passenger @whatzaname lol

How to utterly misunderstand the substance of a book: a masterclass

@HeavenlyPossum @passenger @whatzaname @FrenchPanda @magitweeter @RD4Anarchy @ThatWeltschmerz @gnutelephony @violetmadder @johnbrowntypebeats @AdrianRiskin @ciggysmokebringer @glitzersachen that's pretty much how I was feeling the other day, about that Alex chap, that he'd been backed into a corner. A shame.

(I'd actually forgotten his whole "strong man/weak man" schtick until you reminded me, mind)

@MakBerberovic Do you have a point to make re. guilt-tripping people who are suffering under Biden, or do you expect them to swallow it for the "greater good"?

Occasional reminder to my now slightly reduced "following" list.

There are people who *absolutely will not vote for Trump*, but will not vote for Biden either given his record on Israel/Palestine, abortion, unions and other issues, and may indeed have been directly harmed by his policies.

If you attempt to guilt-trip them in anyway, or tell them to get over themselves, grow up and vote Biden because otherwise "it's as good as a vote for Trump", you get an immediate unfollow. Same if you boost that shit into my timeline.

"Hey mister talk radio for once we agree,
That we can't afford no liberals in times like these,
On our feet or on our backs and they're on their knees,
No, we can't afford no liberals in times like these"

@Psybernetic @AlexanderKingsbury @HeavenlyPossum @gerrymcgovern @RD4Anarchy @gnutelephony @whatzaname

Yeah, conceded.

Cooking the books etc wasn't at all what I had in mind.

(I sometimes used to encourage my staff to each try different initiatives, and whichever one did the best ended up being the one we put resources/time into. It wasn't a "cut-throat" style of thing, though)