And yet there were things even worse. You would begin talking to some poor devil who had worked in one shop for the last thirty years, and had never been able to save a penny; who left home every morning at six o'clock, to go and tend a machine, and come back at night too tired to take his clothes off; who had never had a week's vacation in his life, had never traveled, never had an adventure, never learned anything, never hoped anything—and when you started to tell him about Socialism he would sniff and say, "I'm not interested in that—I'm an individualist!" And then he would go on to tell you that Socialism was "paternalism," and that if it ever had its way the world would stop progressing. It was enough to make a mule laugh, to hear arguments like that; and yet it was no laughing matter, as you found out—for how many millions of such poor deluded wretches there were, whose lives had been so stunted by capitalism that they no longer knew what freedom was! And they really thought that it was "individualism" for tens of thousands of them to herd together and obey the orders of a steel magnate, and produce hundreds of millions of dollars of wealth for him, and then let him give them libraries; while for them to take the industry, and run it to suit themselves, and build their own libraries—that would have been "Paternalism"!

— Upton Sinclair, The Jungle, 1906

Soviet Image Editing from 1987

"I did not come here to argue. I am here to tell you, if possible to convince you, and hopefully, to stop you, from pretentiously imposing yourselves on Mexicans."

It is quite possible that this hypocrisy is unconscious in most of you. Intellectually, you are ready to see that the motivations which could legitimate volunteer action overseas in 1963 cannot be invoked for the same action in 1968. "Mission-vacations" among poor Mexicans were "the thing" to do for well-off U.S. students earlier in this decade: sentimental concern for newly-discovered poverty south of the border combined with total blindness to much worse poverty at home justified such benevolent excursions. Intellectual insight into the difficulties of fruitful volunteer action had not sobered the spirit of Peace Corps Papal-and-Self-Styled Volunteers.

Ivan Illich tells off a group of CIASP volunteers at their annual convention

Charity vs Solidarity

On charity, mutual aid, and class struggle:

A definition of solidarity I’ve heard is that it’s about providing concrete support to an oppressed group so that they can more easily use their own power to change the conditions of their lives. As I understand it, solidarity is about working with people who are struggling for their own liberation in a way that means my future gets bound up with theirs.

On the other hand, charity is about me feeling good, assuaging guilt, feeling like I’m doing something about injustice but without actually threatening the status quo. Charity doesn’t really cost me anything, especially my self-image as being someone who’s down with the struggle and on the side of the oppressed. With charity I don’t have to acknowledge my privilege in a situation, and in the case of work in New Orleans, I don’t have to take responsibility for the fact that my family and I have materially benefited, historically and presently, from the racism that bludgeoned the south long before the hurricane. With charity, I don’t have to connect the dots between sudden catastrophes like Katrina, and the perhaps slower but very similar economic devastation happening in poor communities and communities of color, every day, right here, in my city. And most importantly, with charity, I don’t have risk that what I’m doing might truly transform society in such a way that white folks like me may not end up on top anymore, because charity actually reinforces existing relationships of power.

On Neoliberal Globalization

The poor complain; they always do,
But that's just idle chatter.
Our system brings rewards to all,
At least to all who matter.

- Canadian economist Gerald Helleiner

Animal Bedding Mixture

The internet is a wonderful thing:

An animal bedding mixture is disclosed herein. The animal bedding mixture includes a bedding material and a bedding material additive. Bedding material is preferably straw, sawdust, sand or recycled manure solids. The bedding material additive is preferably 60-99% by weight absorbent clay powder, 0.1 to 35% by weight chlorite salt, and 0.01-35% by weight sodium bisulfate or sodium percarbonate. The bedding material additive of the present disclosure is inert when dry and neither germicidal or acidic. However, when the additive is exposed to moisture, such as animal urine, the sodium bisulfate will acidify the liquid, causing the formation of hypochlorous acid and chlorine dioxide. Hypochlorous acid and chlorine dioxide are very powerful, broad spectrum germicides that have proven efficacy against E. coli, Staphylococcus aureus, and other micro-organisms commonly found in animal bedding.

An exchange with an anarcho-capitalist

Says an enlightened commentator:

Private property is dependent on the existence of the State.
Without a state, who is to say that fancy car of yours isn't MY fancy car? [sic; cars are actually personal property]
Why do you think the state even exists in the first place? Without capital, there is no reason for the state to exist.

Says the anarcho-capitalist

The lock on it, the car alarm that will go off and the bullet in my chamber all disagree with who's what is really who's.

Says me:
The anarcho-capitalist's point doesn't actually rebut the original argument. What if the other guy is holding the gun instead? Is he suggesting that possession of property simply boils down to whoever can marshal the most force in defending or taking it? If that's the case, all we have then is rule by warlords and a tyranny of the strong over the weak.

At some point people would need to agree to collectively defend and protect the notion of private (non-personal) property, which seems philosophically contradictory, to say nothing of the impracticality of a landlord asking his tenants to defend his exclusive ownership of their building (possibly with their own lives) while still paying rent and yet without granting them any actual ownership stake in exchange. I'd almost say that sounds like feudalism.

Ultimately, it comes down to the difference between personal and private property, where the latter is property used solely by people who don't own it (e.g., a factory or office), and the fruits from such use flow back to the owners. It's one thing to actually live in the building you own. It's another to extract money from people who need to use it (e.g., to live there) simply because you already possessed the wealth to buy it in the first place; i.e., to use capital as a wealth-yielding instrument in and of itself, requiring no actual labor on your part and no direct (personal) involvement with said asset. The former case constitutes personal property while the latter constitutes private property.

As one of the 95% who do not own for a living, which would risk your life for — your home, or your corporate employer's office park? This reasoning can show how the essence of capitalism is impossible without the centralized threat of violence, whether on the part of the state or private-sector enforcers.

Skinned and Gutted Dogfish + Aluminum Foil + Lemon Juice + Salt

Electrochemical reanimation!

Louis CK is brilliant

Gulf of Mexico: Oil Ocean Zone

Is the BP Gusher Unstoppable?

Outsourcing unit to be set up in Indian jail

An example of the great divergence between the theory and actual practice of neoliberalism; long live the free market:

(From BBC News).

No charge for a security viewer window!

High pressure concrete-filled blast doors:

The door is constructed with an envelope of 3/16 inch steel plate - but after you hang it in place, you fill it with concrete - no forms necessary - the skins are in place. This construction method keeps the door relatively light for installation - and once it is filled with cured concrete, it has a lot of dense mass between you and whatever fallout is outside your shelter. It also helps to prevent anyone from using a cutting torch to gain access through the door because concrete doesn't "burn."

The Free Market Solution

A city in California is now charging people $300 per call for 911 access.:

Tracy residents will now have to pay every time they call 9-1-1 for a medical emergency.

But there are a couple of options. Residents can pay a $48 voluntary fee for the year which allows them to call 9-1-1 as many times as necessary.

Or, there's the option of not signing up for the annual fee. Instead, they will be charged $300 if they make a call for help.

"A $300 fee and you don't even want to be thinking about that when somebody is in need of assistance," said Tracy resident Greg Bidlack.

Residents will soon receive the form in the mail where they'll be able to make their selection. No date has been set for when the charges will go into effect.

This is of course the inevitable free-market Libertarian answer to the question: “Why should I let those politicians spend my hard-earned tax money on services that overwhelmingly benefit poor people?”

It's the "pay only for what you use" model. Well, congratulations, free-marketeers, now you can rest easy knowing that the homeless will now be truly dying on the streets instead of wasting your hard-earned income.