Thoughts: The Ebb and Flow

kohenari:

Over at the Bleeding Heart Libertarian blog, which I’ve been reading regularly since it burst onto the scene a few weeks ago, Fernando Tesón offers the following insight:

It is prima facie wrong to live off the productive efforts of others. That is, other things being equal, being productive is a virtue, while being unproductive while enjoying what others produce is a vice. Let us call this person a social parasite. The fact that a political arrangement encourages people to be social parasites counts against that arrangement. Notice that I say “counts against”: that fact does not necessarily condemn the political arrangement, because there may be countervailing reasons to tolerate social parasitism (such as alleviating poverty.) The best-known social parasite is the rent seeker. The rent seeker gains, not from market transactions, but from political (i.e. coercive) redistribution of resources in his favor. He is a social parasite. One difference between libertarians and progressives may be that progressives usually do not take social parasitism seriously enough when proposing political arrangements, whereas libertarians usually do.

I don’t want to base an entire blog post around a quibble with language … but this one seems pretty obvious. If a lot of people are critical of libertarianism because of a perception that libertarians are a bunch of cold-blooded, market-driven hypocrites who are able to espouse this philosophical position because of their own often-unacknowledged privilege, then someone writing for a blog that wants to challenge that perception might want to use a different term than “parasite” for those who receive charity or who benefit from social safety nets.

I think there are probably a lot of choices that Tesón had at his disposal and so I think it’s telling that he went with “parasite.” The list of positive portrayals of parasites is unsurprisingly short, as the common suggestion with regard to parasites is that they be done away with. But, if we proceed under Tesón’s assumption that some people are parasites while others are virtuous, hard-working contributors to society, the question we then must confront is how ought we to do away with parasitism?

On that score, Tesón doesn’t actually have much to say. I suspect he wouldn’t be fond of the suggestion that parasitism is the necessary consequence of the capitalist system he favors. But it almost surely is. In a market-driven economy, not everyone will be a winner; some will, of necessity, fall to the bottom of the socio-economic ladder. The idea from which Tesón proceeds — that those at the bottom are completely unproductive leeches who are fat and happy with their parasitic lot in life — seems like the sort of fiction that can only exist in a philosopher’s mind.

What’s more, I’m sure that Tesón would bristle at the allegation that he and his ilk — university professors (and I’m included here, incidentally) — ought to be considered as parasitic in our society; the amount of productive labor that he actually does for our society, when compared against his salary, would probably boggle the mind of the average social parasite who is so morally objectionable to Tesón. We professional philosophers read books, write papers, and discuss ideas all day … and we’re paid relatively handsomely to do it; in addition, we enjoy all the benefits of the advanced industrialized society in which we live (and that we did nothing whatsoever to build or maintain). Could this society continue to function after a dramatic reduction in political theory professors or even — gasp! — law professors? I suspect so. Why, then, are we maintained in such numbers and why are we remunerated so well? And how can we morally allow ourselves to derive all of the benefits that we do, given our own recognition that we’re not really all that necessary to the proper health and functioning of our society?

My argument is — and long has been — that we ought to thank our lucky stars for our own good fortune and for the hard work of others that allows us to do the work that we do. What’s more, it seems to me — given this recognition of my current good fortune and the possibility that bad fortune might befall me (and others) — that what our society chooses to do with, to, or for those at the bottom ought to be the yardstick for measuring our humanity. I don’t say this simply because I fear that I might end up on the bottom myself; I also say it because I recognize that those at the top manage to get ahead (and continue to pull even farther ahead) in no small part due to the actions of those toiling at the bottom.

Given that, it seems to me that Tesón makes a real mistake when he claims that progressives don’t think seriously enough about social parasitism; indeed, I would argue that it’s only progressives who are thinking about these parasites enough … which is why progressives fought for and now fight to defend a system with safety nets. Libertarians, I would say, haven’t thought nearly enough about some of the causes of parasitism — like bad luck, the vagaries of the market, accidents of birth, and even the principles of capitalism itself — or they would never advocate for the removal of safety nets or allow for the sort of open scorn they heap on people who are reduced to the unhappy circumstances of parasitism.

Great post.  A problem I often with libertarianism is illustrated and to a degree combated above.  Brilliant.

colortheworld:

I’m a terrible philosopher and by no means a theologian, but there has been one thought rolling around in my head for a few months, and I’m not sure where to take it other than this:

I think, that when practiced humbly and in it’s most true form, Christianity is a truly culturally restorative…

One of the things that has been the benefit of going to a Christian University (one on a very short list of benefits) has been grappling with different philosophies from a Christian worldview.  I am currently taking a class on Postmodern Philosophy, which is one of the most recent developments in philosophy.  One famous philosopher of the postmodern persuasion named Jean-Francois Lyotard stated that “postmodernism is incredulity towards meta-narratives.”  

Oftentimes, the Church creates its own meta-narrative that oppresses and formulates its own “truth” that it holds up as the truth of Christ.  We create judgmental meta-narratives.  We create power structures that exclude rather than include.  But true Christianity is a meta-narrative that seems more inclusive than any in history.  Christ never turned anyone away, but shocked his culture by including prostitutes, tax collectors, and the lowest of the low.  He included, and set up a meta-narrative, a story, that we can all be included in.  Instead of one that the Church uses to exclude.

I really liked where you were going with your thoughts, and I thought of adding some of own. :)  Grappling with theology and philosophy has kind of become my thing, so I thought maybe I could add something of worth.

abudai:

ausetkmt answered your question:Serious question for the anti-NFZ peeps: What do you think should be done instead?

Arm the People well - with everything they need to take control of the situation. let civil war be civil war between Libyans.

Thank you! I’ve expressed my objections to…

And yet people continue to call it “civil war.”  I hate that.  It is not a civil war in so much as it is a revolution!  Viva la revolucion de Libya!

I just wrote a post about the recently announced involvement in Libya.  I wanted to look at it from a variety of sides and see what some of the problems various people have with the situation.

I fully support international cooperation that will help the Libyan rebels! But the question is, what do you think?