"It is sheer tautology to say that crises are caused by the scarcity of effective consumption, or of effective consumers. The capitalist system does not know any other modes of consumption than effective ones, except that of paupers or of the swindler.
That commodities are unsaleable means only that no effective purchasers have been found for them, i.e., consumers (since commodities are bought in the final analysis for productive or individual consumption).
But if one were to attempt to give this tautology the semblance of a profounder justification by saying that the working-class receives too small a portion of its own product and the evil would be remedied as soon as it receives a larger share of it and its wages increase in consequence, one could only remark that crises are always prepared by precisely a period in which wages rise generally and the working-class actually gets a larger share of that part of the annual product which is intended for consumption. From the point of view of these advocates of sound and “simple” (!) common sense, such a period should rather remove the crisis.
It appears, then, that capitalist production comprises conditions independent of good or bad will, conditions which permit the working-class to enjoy that relative prosperity only momentarily, and at that always only as the harbinger of a coming crisis." -K. Marx, Capital Vol 2
It's so funny when people point at the exploitation and genocide going on in the global south to maintain the supply of commodities the first "critique" that will be thrown is that of optics that is "don't you think people don't want to hear about this??" and that of a vague notion of living standards of those in the global north might be at risk if we were to ever change this dynamic.
leaving maine tomorrow and even though every day here was jam packed with seeimg different parts of the area there's still so much i wish i could've seen.
this trip has made me feel so much more love for the vibrant life around us, so many critters and crawlies... i want to find the places near our home that i can love and protect
Even the best weapon
is an unhappy tool,
hateful to living things.
So the follower of the Way
stays away from it.
Weapons are unhappy tools,
not chosen by thoughtful people,
to be used only when there is no choice,
and with a calm, still mind,
without enjoyment.
To enjoy using weapons
is to enjoy killing people,
and to enjoy killing people
is to lose your share in the common good.
It is right that the murder of many people
be mourned and lamented.
It is right that a victor in war
be received with funeral ceremonies.
(Dào Dé Jīng 31, translated by Ursula K. Le Guin)
(day 8 of #anarchist orcas and cetacean facts✨)
did you know…
Masses of beluga whales will migrate/congregate in the same safe shallow waters to socialize, give birth, & take care of their young! These “beluga nurseries” are places of great social & ecological importance.
"Following is not at all the same thing as reproducing... Reproducing implies the permanence of a fixed point of view that is external to what is reproduced.
But following is something different from the ideal of reproduction. Not better, just different.
One is obliged to follow when one is in search of the 'singularities' of a matter, or rather of a material, and not out to discover a form."
"The search for laws consists in extracting constants, even if those constants are only relations between variables (equations). An invariable form for variables, a variable matter of the invariant: such is the foundation of the hylomorphic schema.
But for the... nomad science the relevant distinction is material-forces rather than matter-form. Here it is not a question of extracting constants from variables but of placing the variables themselves in a state of continuous variation."
I've been watching masks and other COVID precautions disappear from "leftist" spaces that claim to be addressing internalized abelism and capitalism and be fighting for the working class for months now.
This is actively pushing out people who are at higher risk of long (and short) term impacts from a covid 19 infection.
NEW VIDEO ESSAY! "Ben Burgis Can't Give Us an Argument" is now live on YouTube, wherein I cover Ben running interference for Ana Kasparian, ask some questions and make what I believe is an important point.
A wandering deer, building shrines along the way.