@HeavenlyPossum@kolektiva.social avatar

HeavenlyPossum

@HeavenlyPossum@kolektiva.social

Anarchist, communist, opossum. But then, I repeat myself.

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HeavenlyPossum, to random
@HeavenlyPossum@kolektiva.social avatar

This is an incredibly common and incredibly stupid take on wealth: that people today have so much more “stuff” than people in the past, so we—even the poorest among us—are richer than ancient kings and titans of industry.

1/9

https://twitter.com/cafreiman/status/1635430623958401024

HeavenlyPossum,
@HeavenlyPossum@kolektiva.social avatar

It’s worth asking: what is wealth?

I “have” right now the clothes that I’m wearing and the phone in my hand and that’s about it. I “own” much more than that, of course, but it’s somewhere else and, theoretically, anyone could just take it and walk away with it.

They don’t because my “ownership” is really a series of social agreements that I should have certain exclusive rights to use and exclude others from certain things; if someone disagrees, I have reasonable certainty I can call on the coercive state to enforce my claims.

People who have “wealth” have lots of these social claims—that is, they can compel lots of people, many of them very far away, to obey those property claims.

2/9

HeavenlyPossum,
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John Rockefeller, mentioned in the original tweet, was not wealthy because he had a lot of “stuff.” We are not richer than him because we have access to amenities like TikTok that he lacked. He was wealthy because he had social power. At his peak, Rockefeller’s personal wealth represented something like 2% of US GDP—that is, Rockefeller could command about 1/50th of all thr resources in circulation in America.

He used that wealth to control the daily lives of his workers. He endowed organizations that continue to pursue his goals after his death. He used his wealth to help create an educational system designed to churn out obedient workers to suit his economic interests. He helped fund Prohibition, shaping the daily consumption patterns of millions of people. He bought access to coercive power he used to murder workers who disobeyed him:

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ludlow_Massacre

4/9

HeavenlyPossum,
@HeavenlyPossum@kolektiva.social avatar

But the wealthy have more than just “stuff.” They often own vast quantities of money, often in the form of balance sheets, which they can use to compel people to bring them new things or labor for them. Sometimes, they use that money to buy assets like housing or businesses that give the wealthy yet another claim to the labor of others, the people who must work to earn revenue to pay their landlords and bosses.

Wealth, then, is not a measure of stuff. It is a measure of social power over others, mediated through ownership and prices.

3/9

HeavenlyPossum,
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If we recognize wealth as social power, then we should also recognize poverty not as a material deprivation, but rather as a state of being subject to someone else’s social control.

Yes, today’s poor have access to things like cell phones and viagra. No, this does not make them richer than medieval kings who, despite lacking these amenities, never worried about their next meal, or whether saying the wrong thing could cost them their job and thus their wages and thus their ability to access food and shelter.

To be poor is not to be materially deprived, but rather precarious. To be poor is to be subject to the whims and demands of the wealthy.

5/9

HeavenlyPossum, to random
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A thread of threads.

HeavenlyPossum,
@HeavenlyPossum@kolektiva.social avatar

A survey of some examples of capitalist sabotage, through destruction of production, of various economic sectors:

https://kolektiva.social/@HeavenlyPossum/110016647196184689

HeavenlyPossum,
@HeavenlyPossum@kolektiva.social avatar

A survey of some evidence that, contrary to neoclassical models, capitalists collude with each other to raise prices all the time.

https://kolektiva.social/@HeavenlyPossum/110043470022118892

HeavenlyPossum,
@HeavenlyPossum@kolektiva.social avatar

A discussion about the nature of wealth and poverty, and why the poor of today are not “richer” than ancient kings and historical titans of industry.

https://kolektiva.social/@HeavenlyPossum/110043938013023300

HeavenlyPossum,
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A brief look at capitalism’s role in social crises:

https://kolektiva.social/@HeavenlyPossum/110049919037734672

HeavenlyPossum,
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An investigation into money, credit, and the social role of landlords:

https://kolektiva.social/@HeavenlyPossum/110108848618951452

HeavenlyPossum, to random
@HeavenlyPossum@kolektiva.social avatar

The proliferation of networks canceling movies and tv shows—already finished, with audiences eager to see and pay for them—because it’s more profitable to take the tax write off is yet another example of the obscene inefficiency and waste of capitalism.

Capitalism incentivizes the efficient pursuit of profit, not efficiency in the abstract. When that means destroying production, capitalists will destroy production.

RD4Anarchy, to random
@RD4Anarchy@kolektiva.social avatar

I'm retired, a bit early due to covid-19 and the desire to protect myself and especially my older partner. We are both still doing what we can to avoid catching this insidious virus even once.

Most of my life I've been apolitical, but while coming from various perspectives over the years I've always been intuitively anti-capitalist and highly critical of the US. I tended generally toward progressive, unconventional, and counter-culture in most contexts but lacked any solid political consciousness or analysis. I was a worker all my life, most of it in the natural food industry (which I felt relatively good about), mostly at retail level. I never wanted to be anyone's boss so I was never a manager and never climbed the corporate ladder. In the later years I was fortunate to have a position that was not involved with sales but rather with protecting and informing customers (internal auditing for weights & measures compliance) which I also felt relatively good about but it certainly wasn't lucrative, lol.

I only became seriously concerned with politics during Bernie Sanders' first presidential campaign when I got a fleeting glimpse of supposed possibility for real change. I began to explore socialist thought and thought of myself as a demsoc. I was focused on electoral reform at the time, thinking that was the problem. I shared info with friends, family and co-workers about various projects to reform electoral politics and I started an account on Twitter (@RD4Democracy, now deleted) in 2017 to have someplace to direct them to for more info and updates.

Fortunately there I found some very helpful voices along with all the noise, but I didn't immediately understand how to differentiate between it all so I was still following some garbage accounts for a while. Nevertheless my political thought evolved rapidly and I found myself following more and more anarchists and starting to understand anarchist thought. I realized I needed to better understand private property and learned about that. I read Graeber's "Debt" and got an understanding of money. I did some research to better understand what capital is and developed an idea of it as a sort of "god" or artificial intelligence with capitalism as its religion.

One of the helpful voices I want to specifically appreciate and recommend is @HeavenlyPossum. With the help of HP and others I was able to successfully navigate the crossroads that many self-described socialists never seem to reach at all and where too many others take the wrong fork into the tankie world.

The pandemic and then the Russian invasion of Ukraine were extremely clarifying events that helped me finally see the nature of that fork in the road, as well as shining an intense light on all the shit accounts I was following and providing an opportunity for others I followed to show or decide their true colors. It has been very sad sometimes while very illuminating.

And now here we are. I felt it important to participate in a non-corporate, decentralized and open source social project like this and the timing seemed significant. Let's see what we can do.

HeavenlyPossum,
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@RD4Anarchy

I’m glad to have been a part of your journey

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