Is Distributism utopian?

[carn]

Could we now be traveling in space? Could the heavens be more explored and the majesty of God be given greater glory?

Dont blame government for that.

Blame energy conservation, momentum conservation and causality for that. Of course without them thinking beings could probably not exist, so maybe blaming is not the best word.

 

[Cho]

Bolded… What a nightmare!

You said you read UHAE… didn’t you notice how the megarich of the time manipulated education? That was not government interference, that was directly from the owners of big businesses, to, again not the government but to professional associations.

When I was in college and very secular and sorta liberal, I remember how everyone complained about Senator Jesse Helms. They accused him of manipulation education in NC to supply the cotton industries with workers. Yeah, I know you look at that and see government interference, but I look at it and see big business instigation of government interference, or even more directly, big business interfering with schools.

And while you may see what the Gates foundation is contributing to education as charity, I wonder what’s behind it, and I wonder why they’re doing this particular thing? And I wonder precisely because I read Gatto’s book.

Yes. Those evil Big Businessmen FORCED Our Noble Leaders to point guns at people and force them to send their kids to school. Our Noble Leaders are completely innocent, the Evil Big Businessmen go to their offices and twist their arms and FORCE them to pass laws and send cops and agents after us. Hhmmmm. Government has armies, cops, secret intelligence outfits and Big Business forces them to do their will. How do they do that?? I will explain Gates. He is a limousine liberal and is in favor of pushing the Marxist agenda so beloved of the govskools. But he discovered his generous streak shortly after the DOJ targeted him and began pressing charges for his evil crime of providing his software to people who wanted it. It seems he made some ill considered remarks about being more important or powerful than the President and Clinton decided to disabuse him of his illusion. Supposedly Clinton commented after the legal scapegoating that he wondered what Gates thought “now” about how imporatnt he was. I have since wondered whose souffle Martha Stewart insulted to deserve HER comeuppance.
My point is that you see nothing wrong with the government force, you just blame it on evil Big Businessmen. You completely ignore the fact that the state either colluded with them and are just as guilty or were completely incompetent at protecting the interests of the people. Either way what good are they? They are simply goons selling thuggery. And Big Business is their best customer. If you read UHAE then you should understand that the schools are not designed to educate, they train in herd behaviors, dumb down, train in conformity, obedience, fear, strip away family instilled values and religions, and indoctrinate in state worship. This is proven FACT. So I’m not all broken up about anyone “interfering” with schools. The sooner they close, the better for the people and the country.

 

[David_Castlen]

i

everyone talks about the top 1% being job creators, and we argue whether they are in fact putting any real effort into job creation, but the other part of it is: why in heavens name SHOULD they get to monopolize opportunity?

**
Who said it is “the 1%”? Who is everyone? And what right do you or I have to demand they put in X percent of effort into job creation; or any at all for that matter?

To your question, “why in heaven’s name SHOULD they get to monopollize opportunity?” I do not understand what you mean by “get to”. I do know if X organization can produce something effeciently because a lot of capitol is needed - and it has that capitol - and they do it better at a lower cost than a small company, then we all benefit; albeit, others in society will start a propaganda program insulting these men calling them robbers (as in barrens) when in fact they have brought us goods and services at prices never before imagined. And before you can say “Social Justice” the unions are killing people and anarchy is booming. The winners: the propogandist. The biggest loosers: the poor and the suckers that followed them. Hey but their envy has been satisfied.

By the way, Jonatella, what gods would you suggest we hire to run a program to make sure businesses do not get too big and bad? And how are you going to insure that all are angles? These systems where the government gets involved have to have all knowing market and technology and human capital and be without any scuples. But they do not. The best way to insure that these factors are used is the free market. Are there problesm with it? YES! But dear Lord nothing absolutely nothing like socialism. And a free market system is not set up to steal, like Distributism.

I am remiss if I do not tell a story. When I was in college my first economics professor opened a discussion of tarriffs. I was sitting in class with shoes on that had holes in both feet. It was cold and wet. God bless my dad, the best dad in the world, but he would not give us money for school. Oh, was I in pain. When the professor brought us shoe imports as an example he had my undivided attention. He mentioned that shoes would be 40 to 60% less if imports were not imposed on us. His point had been for three weeks that anytime the government gets into anything, the poor suffer. This is especially true for education. What a shame.**

 

[Cho]

Sorry you mistook what i said for smear. Most people are in denial of reality in a lot of things and all people are in denial of reality regarding some things.

You provided the proof yourself. “terrorizes people as did the Mongols” implies same methods and same extent and same justification (or lack thereof).

Just check out the cities Fallujah 2004 and Baghdad 1258.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_occupation_of_Fallujah

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Baghdad_(1258

Mind that:
“On February 10, Baghdad surrendered. The Mongols swept into the city on February 13 and began a week of massacre and destruction.”

What damage the US did in Fallujah was done during fighting. They stopped damaging or killing after the city was secure. During the fighting 6000 civilians died. The Mongols started killing 3 days after winning and killed 100000+ civilians. It is not the same.

Iraq was in a state of war with the US and was in violation of armistice conditions. Pakistan is either no sovereign nation - unable to stop attacks from Pakistan against Afghanistan - or is trying to wage a war without anyone noticing its interference, either case enough justification to attack targets inside Pakistan.
Iran declared war on the US in 1979, when taking control of US territory, no peace treaty since then, so the war continues.

Libya you are right, Jemen i do not know, there is nearly a civil war there with some forces trying to attack the US as well.

Having justification does not mean it is wise to act.

Where is this number from?

And it tells me that the “Lets be nice and fight wars.” approach of Bush and Obama(even worse) is wrong, either you are nice or you fight a war, trying both gives the bad results of both.

Besides, i do not think Paul wants to abolish the state, he seems to be in favor of a very limited state.

Uh, I’m not seeing the big distinction. Are you saying that because they US state did not kill as many as the Mongols in a certain location then there is no similarity? As far as the US state stopping the killing when the city “was secure”, the people who lived there might not have agreed that they were “secure”. Total War, war against women, children, homes, schools, war without even trying to justify it logically with Just War theory is barbarian. The question is, what right does the US state have to be in any of those countries attacking anyone? Iraq, Iran, Libya, Yemen, Pakistan, none of these countries attacked us. If you believe the official 9/11 story most of the hijackers were Saudi nationals. Your ludicrous spin on Iran is ridiculous. The CIA installed the Shah as a puppet, overthrowing their elected gov’t. And there is evidence that the US state also installed the Ayatollah. Stop being led by propaganda. Wall Street bankrolled both Hitler and Stalin, the elites pull strings and their lapdog media whips up support for war with lies to make the elites rich and little people die for them. You probably buy that nonsense about Seals killing Osama (whose remains were hurriedly and conveniently “buried at sea”) a few months ago. How UNsurprising that most of the Seals involved were killed off.
Ron Paul is a Constitutionalist, I never said he wanted to end the state, he wants to end the wars and the massive military presence across the globe, salvadge what is left of the economy and meet domestic obligations while reforming parts of the system. 71% of military campaign contributions go to Ron Paul, Google it. Those soldiers know a whole lot more about what is going on over there than we are hearing on the nightly news.

 

[Cho]

i find it notable that Americans have grown to look at government as this scary monster which is out of their control. They fail to realize its not because government exists (it always would), its because it no longer belongs/answers to them.

The state is not inevitable, it is merely a parasitic political class. People get wealth one of two ways: economic means by trading in the free market or by political means through theft. The state never belonged to the people. It is illogical to think so. From almost the very beginning the US state violated the Declaration dictum that just gov’t only rules through the consent of the people. Washington attacked the frontier whiskey makers because they objected to being targeted to pay for the revolutionary war bonds through a tax on whiskey. Since then history has been filled with instances where the state attacked the people who are supposedly their own state. No one would pay taxes if they weren’t threatened with death or jail…how is that being your own gov’t? How do you control a state politcal class that has a monopoly on aggression and violence? The US state NEVER “belonged” to “the people”. “We, the people” is a myth. What people, where? I assure you my views are a lot different than those in most leftist urban areas, yet I am supposedly in a borg that includes them. Why? So we waste time and resources bickering over who is going to tyrannize who (the Hegelian dialectic)while the state gradually chains us all through laws we demand be passed against “the other guy”.

The ultimately false dichotomy between between private and state helps keep the private owners of the state of affairs firmly in place.

You see no difference between private citizens and the political class who rule them? Don’t pay taxes and watch what happens.

if the 2 biggest market NFL teams were allowed to buy as many players as they wanted, spend as much money as they wanted, become the dominant engine behind everyone’s opportunity, eventually the existence of the entire league would be in their hands, and thus they could set the rules. Of course, the league as a whole would suffer, eventually collapse, and bring down those 2 teams with them.

Huh?? You are equating politicians as players on sports teams?? I don’t believe they provide anything near that kind of usefulness but they are bought by elites so I can see the metaphor. What you would have is a rigged system. But the metaphor fails because no one puts a gun to anyones head and makes them attend sporting events. It’s pretty much voluntary and if it collapses no big whoop.

everyone talks about the top 1% being job creators, and we argue whether they are in fact putting any real effort into job creation, but the other part of it is: why in heavens name SHOULD they get to monopolize opportunity?

I haven’t heard that 1% thing. Most job creation is actually done by small businessmen and entrepreneurs. Over regulate them, over tax them and fewer do it, discourage savings so there is no capital for investment and there is less small business. But you seem to think opportunity is a zero sum game. It is not. Opportunity is only limited by the state creating laws stopping people from buying, selling, or protecting certain sectors/professions by licensing. Eliminate that and stand back for an explosion of people participating in the economy. Regulations are chains PREVENTING economic participation, they do not PROTECT you. Wealth is only a zero sum problem with socialism where there is little wealth creation and the state simply seizes and distributes what there is so that there are winners and losers. In free market capitalism, wealth is actually created, all the time. There are innovations, sector expansions, new industries, things we can’t even dream of existing. What one man makes does not necessarily deprive another man. Government CANNOT create jobs. It CAN’T. Government simply takes property from some people and gives it to others. Any “jobs” the state creates are make work to excuse wealth redistribution.

 

[Cho]

Anarchy is not synonymous with chaos? What’s the difference then?

Anarchy is the absence of a political state. It does not necessarily follow that the result would be chaos although the political class loves to equate the two.

 

[St_Francis]

…My point is that you see nothing wrong with the government force, you just blame it on evil Big Businessmen. You completely ignore the fact that the state either colluded with them and are just as guilty or were completely incompetent at protecting the interests of the people. Either way what good are they? They are simply goons selling thuggery. And Big Business is their best customer. If you read UHAE then you should understand that the schools are not designed to educate, they train in herd behaviors, dumb down, train in conformity, obedience, fear, strip away family instilled values and religions, and indoctrinate in state worship. This is proven FACT. So I’m not all broken up about anyone “interfering” with schools. The sooner they close, the better for the people and the country.

I have been reading about education for 35 years. I homeschool my children. I am against our current educational set-up.

But what I see is not big bad government throwing its weight around and being the only bad guy in the room. Not by a longshot.

What I see is *any *arge institution, be it government, business, or union, getting too big for its britches and throwing its weight around. ANY large institution.

And that can be the local business owner who is also on the Board of Directors of the local bank in a small town to the CEO of Transnational Corp and the Secretary of State, to the head of the National Alliance of Unions and the President.

You blame it all on the government, but I blame it on original sin or concupiscence. It exists in everyone, and everyone will take advantage of it if they can.

You think we’d be better off without a government–we would still end up with a government. The only problem is that if we do not acknowledge it exists, it will be uncontrollable and amoral. Might will make right.

You don’t have to go too far to see what would happen. Just check out DC in the 1980s when it was known as the Murder Capital of the world, and tell me how well free market anarchy worked there.

Tell me how well it’s working in Somalia.

Now, it is true that in a very small society with sufficient resources and no barbarians at the gate that they might be able to handle their affairs in a way that appears to occur without a formal government, but that is not the situation we face now.

When there is no government, there is a vacuum. When there is no coommonly-agreed upon morality, then morality devolves to Might makes Right. It may not happen right away, but it will happen.

Another point from UHAE: Gatto mentions that one year he came into the school and it seemed that a general agreement had been made to no longer discipline the students. That was,iirc, in 1968. Since then we have seen a terrible disintegration of life in the schools, with everything from apparently out-of-control bullying in some schools to school shootings, not to mention the general drinking and drugging that occurs.

 

[Cho]

But what I see is not big bad government throwing its weight around and being the only bad guy in the room. Not by a longshot.
What I see is *any *arge institution, be it government, business, or union, getting too big for its britches and throwing its weight around. ANY large institution.<<<<<

Large institutions?? George Soros is not a large institution, yet her does a lot of that, The Kochs, the Rockefellers. You balme bigness but it is only a symptom. You think most of these outfits could get or stay that big without the help of the state protecting them and bailing them out?

And that can be the local business owner who is also on the Board of Directors of the local bank in a small town to the CEO of Transnational Corp and the Secretary of State, to the head of the National Alliance of Unions and the President.
You blame it all on the government, but I blame it on original sin or concupiscence. It exists in everyone, and everyone will take advantage of it if they can.<<<

BINGO!! And ESPECIALLY those given a monopoly on aggression and violence. The state will attract the worst people for that reason.

You think we’d be better off without a government–we would still end up with a government. The only problem is that if we do not acknowledge it exists, it will be uncontrollable and amoral. Might will make right.<<<<

LOL! Don’t look now but we passed that point some time ago.

You don’t have to go too far to see what would happen. Just check out DC in the 1980s when it was known as the Murder Capital of the world, and tell me how well free market anarchy worked there.<<<<

Yes. It is such a free market in DC that you can’t own a handgun. Sorry, the chaos of dysfunctional statism is NOT market anarchy.

Tell me how well it’s working in Somalia.<<<<<

From what I understand it was starting to go well when other states intervened.

Now, it is true that in a very small society with sufficient resources and no barbarians at the gate that they might be able to handle their affairs in a way that appears to occur without a formal government, but that is not the situation we face now. <<<<

Which is why there were 13 sovereign states at one time that worked pretty well. Forcing a geographic area the size of the US into one central state will not sustain. The areas and people are too diverse.

When there is no government, there is a vacuum. When there is no coommonly-agreed upon morality, then morality devolves to Might makes Right. It may not happen right away, but it will happen.<<<

It has already happened. It is why people are taxed out of their homes, people forced to associate with those they’d prefer to avoid, some people reveiving preferential treatment and some always tyrannized.

Another point from UHAE: Gatto mentions that one year he came into the school and it seemed that a general agreement had been made to no longer discipline the students. That was,iirc, in 1968. Since then we have seen a terrible disintegration of life in the schools, with everything from apparently out-of-control bullying in some schools to school shootings, not to mention the general drinking and drugging that occurs.<<<<<

The schools are training ground for herd behavior. They ENCOURAGE gangs, cliques, groups who “follow the leader”. The lack of discipline is caused by many things but the largest factor is the breakup of the family. Half the country has no father, the father is the traditional source of family discipline. This has been done deliberately to weaken the people and their resources, to de-civilize them and “animalize” them.
Thank you for homeschooling your children.

 

[St_Francis]

But what I see is not big bad government throwing its weight around and being the only bad guy in the room. Not by a longshot.
What I see is *any *arge institution, be it government, business, or union, getting too big for its britches and throwing its weight around. ANY large institution.<<<<<

Cho, I think we agree on the problem (ta da!!!)

I have no idea how you think to implement your solution: without government, there will be no jurisdictions…

I definitely see greatly increased subsidiarity as a large part of the solution. The idea of the federal government telling us what and when and how to teach oir children is just one example.

Thank you for homeschooling your children.

I feel blessed that we were able to. I have met many people whose circumstances didn’t allow them to, altho that was what they wanted.

 

[Cho]

I have no idea how you think to implement your solution: without government, there will be no jurisdictions…<<<<<

That’s the thing. You do not “implement”, you stop “implementing”. You just stop pushing people to live as you think they should, stop looting them to pay for the things YOU value. You persuade by example, are vigilant for proposed schemes to transfer wealth or destroy the concept of private property via property taxes…even for the poor or for the children. Ends do not justify means. Can you imagine how much money gov’t schooling saved and transferred to Big Business by training people to be job seekers, home owners, consumers, under compulsion and the lie that they were being educated? Ron Paul is a statist, but he would remove layers of bureaucracy and tyranny, use the military for defense, not offense. A definite improvement. But he is the only candidate who is not CFR, not a New World Order man, and that is why the MSM hates him. He is one of us.

I definitely see greatly increased subsidiarity as a large part of the solution. The idea of the federal government telling us what and when and how to teach oir children is just one example. <<<

I agree. Subsidiarity and broad based property ownership are desirable. But property owners are independent and do not need the state. They have their own resources. How to achieve that is where we disagree. History has shown humans are not competent to do it even if they were morally fit to do it. Allowing people liberty and educating ourselves so we recognize traps like the dialectic and the Delphi process, other psy-ops used against us. They have very sophisticated techniques and they have a passion for ruling and gaining power over others. Statism is a lie and nothing more than legalized crime, a legalized mafia that appeals to the worst in humanity. The state has dumbed down generations of people, people now so identify with the state that they cannot conceive of not being subject to them. In spite of constant examples all the time that they do not protect us, do not respect us, view our labor and property as theirs and seize it whenever they wish people cling to the myth that the state is “us” and that “we” rule ourselves. Just because they haven’t targeted you doesn’t mean you are free or that you are protected. Look at Bill Gates, Martha Stewart, people who have created real wealth, provided products that people want and need and they are thrown in jail or hounded on the flimsiest pretexts.

 

[tomarin]

Anarchy is the absence of a political state. It does not necessarily follow that the result would be chaos although the political class loves to equate the two.

Who enforces the rule of law in this stateless society? How does it not devolve into the strong preying on the weak?

Before the advent of the modern state, many people lived lives that were untroubled by the decisions of any political class, because whatever state there was was very feeble in its powers. At the same time I’m not sure there was much of what we moderns would consider the rule of law. If someone wronged you I suppose you could take it up with a local lord, or take matters into your own hands. However if the party who wronged you had a larger or more powerful family than yours, you were probably just inviting retribution. It was the Hatfields versus the McCoys all the time, and I’m not sure many people would like to return to that.

 

[carn]

As far as the US state stopping the killing when the city “was secure”, the people who lived there might not have agreed that they were “secure”. Total War, war against women, children, homes, schools, war without even trying to justify it logically with Just War theory is barbarian.

You avoid the point, the US stopped killing when the city more or less had surrendered, the Mongols started killing at that point. That is a vast difference.

And how can you call what the US does total war?
Didn’t you read? Of some 200000 inhabitants of Fallufah 6000 were killed. That is not total war. The last time the US fought total war was WW2, there they wiped out entire cities with tens of thousands of dead civilians on single days.

Whatever you believe about government spin, why can’t you notice the difference in war between US in WW2 and today?
The brits in WW2 build a miniature model of Berlin to test, how they could set it aflame although it had many stone buildings.

If you believe the official 9/11 story most of the hijackers were Saudi nationals. Your ludicrous spin on Iran is ridiculous. The CIA installed the Shah as a puppet, overthrowing their elected gov’t. And there is evidence that the US state also installed the Ayatollah. Stop being led by propaganda. Wall Street bankrolled both Hitler and Stalin, the elites pull strings and their lapdog media whips up support for war with lies to make the elites rich and little people die for them. You probably buy that nonsense about Seals killing Osama (whose remains were hurriedly and conveniently “buried at sea”) a few months ago. How UNsurprising that most of the Seals involved were killed off.

At least we can agree that we have a different perception of reality and that at least one contains serious errors, so at least from my point of view you are wrong about much what happens. (And i am wrong from your point of view.)

How do you know the seals are dead?
If i would be the one responsible for them i would do everything in my power to make everyone think they are dead. Not too aide some conspiration faking Bin Ladens death, but to protect them.

 

[JRRTFAN]

Alright, then will you tell us 1. what it is and, 2. how it DOES NOT force people to give up their property?

God bless Chesterton and Fr. Brown. But if Chesterton told me to take money from my neighbor I am going to think twice. BTW, I don not think I would have become a Catholic if not for his book Orthodoxy; nor do I think I will be a socialist just because he was or even St. Francis was. Neither Chesterton, Theresa of Avila nor Theresa deLesuix were infallable; come to think of it, neither is the Pope unless it is a matter of faith and morals and under specific circumstances.

Please tell us how Distributism will not take from others?

Socialism means that the government owns the means of production. Distributism finds that repugnant. What distributism means is that society is structured in such a way that persons can own, and earn thorough their own work, the funds necessary to build their own means of support. It has nothing to do with siezure of property. It supports the local shoe store rather than the big box store. In 1910 when some guy wanted to be a blacksmith the government did not sieze somebody else’s anvil so that the guy could set up shop. So why do you guys think that it did? It didn’t, pure and simple. Take that argument off the table it’s ludicrous.

Whare are you guys coming from? Have you any sense that money can be saved, and with that accumulation, small business can be started and then those supported by government hands off? Where do you get this siezure mentality? I’ll say it again, I think a lot of posters here don’t know what the concept is.

 

[frankpearson]

Good! Someone who knows about Distributionism! Can YOU explain HOW the Distributionists propose to distribute property, by whom, to whom , etc??

There are a variety of ways that land and capital can become distributed. Some would advocate working toward regulation that limit the size of private ownership of capital and land, perhaps discouraging it through taxation or something. There are others, like in the Mondragon example, that just set up distributist regions within a country.

I have never heard a distributist say there should be a revolution, or property should be confiscated. The most likely scenario is that people would be elected to government office who support widely diffused or distributed property as opposed to concentrated property, they would work to oppose monopolistic practices in the market and lessen regulation on smaller individuals starting business.

 

[frankpearson]

Good! Someone who knows about Distributionism! Can YOU explain HOW the Distributionists propose to distribute property, by whom, to whom , etc??

The biggest problem we are having here, and it is really a travesty, is about the name “distributism”. The word “distributism” is not talking about an action of distributing something. It is a word meant to describe the market,

“capital and land in the market has a status of wide distribution” (like in statistics)

as opposed to

“capital and land should be distributed from all of the this class to another”

The word is just being misunderstood and it is very unfortunate.

 

[David_Castlen]

Socialism means that the government owns the means of production. Distributism finds that repugnant. What distributism means is that society is structured in such a way that persons can own, and earn thorough their own work, the funds necessary to build their own means of support.

Well, who can be against that. I fear there is a Socialist in Free Market clothing. Paint it up as you will. So help me, I can be wrong?

It has nothing to do with siezure of property.

So if WalMart had all the retail business in town, due to its low cost and superior products, a Distributist society would not take action against Wal Mart?

It supports the local shoe store rather than the big box store.
There we go, there is the key word!!! “supports”. What right does a governemtn have to support a business; especially over another business!!! Let’s say that the big business provided a lower cost better product, would the local ineffecient store get support from my (confiscated) tax dollars!!!

In 1910 when some guy wanted to be a blacksmith the government did not sieze somebody else’s anvil so that the guy could set up shop. So why do you guys think that it did?

Well, let’s say it was the giant Blacksmith & Tool and Die International B&TDI. What then? And let’s say I was in the horse and buggy business and my cost were killing me for metal formation for my buggies. Then I discovered B&TDI was coming to town with cost at 40% less and better services? Would a Distributist society keep BTTDI out?

It didn’t, pure and simple. Take that argument off the table it’s ludicrous.

I will if you can answer the above scenario clearly.

Whare are you guys coming from?

"]I am coming from the proposition that it is a sin to steal, it is a sin to make a man do what he does not want, that it is a sin to kill. I am coming from one who knows that a society was explode if it is has a free market. I am coming from one who has proof of it; and proof that all all all every every time the government gets into my church’s business of charity it fails miserably and makes the poor poorer and the immoral more immoral. I am coming from the side that wants to see the poor being less poor or not at all. I am coming from one who wants to see people get a good education. I am coming from the Catholic Church. I am coming from one who intreprets teaching of the church that are directed at owners of business to act justly BUT DOES NOT TELL US TO SET UP LAWS TO ENFORCE MORALITY OR THE RECOMMENDATIONS OF THE CHURCH’S TEACHINGS

Have you any sense that money can be saved, and with that accumulation, small business can be started and then those supported by government hands off?

When money is saved capital can be accumulated to purchase the means of producation. Some means of production require a very large investment and hence savings are very important. Some products require a lot of capital and time. BTW, one of the most important topics not covered even by Cho, here in this discussion, is the time factor that is required to invest and be successful in a business. Government involvement puts a major hamper on the time factor and creates excessive pressures on producers to produce and hire employees. One can only wait so long for his money to be returned before he will have to shut down the business and lay off his employees

Where do you get this siezure mentality? I’ll say it again, I think a lot of posters here don’t know what the concept is.

Please answer the above scenerio and it will clarify if or if not Distributism isn’t a form of siezure - maybe the worse form - because it is sold so piteously. Please please with all my heart i am asking you to answer the above scenario ?

 

[St_Francis]

*That’s the thing. You do not “implement”, you stop “implementing”. You just stop pushing people to live as you think they should, stop looting them to pay for the things YOU value.

You criticize the distributists because they do not seem to have a plan for getting from here to there, yet your plan does not seem to consist of much. What do you think, that the government will wither away?

And it is quite clear just from our conversation that you and I have very different values. If you promote your values, and I promote mine, then nothing is really going to happen.*

You persuade by example, are vigilant for proposed schemes to transfer wealth or destroy the concept of private property via property taxes…even for the poor or for the children.

OK, people have been doing this for a century, and yet all that has happened is that by your standards, things have gotten worse.

Ends do not justify means. Can you imagine how much money gov’t schooling saved and transferred to *Big Business by training people to be job seekers, home owners, consumers, under compulsion and the lie that they were being educated?

I agree with you about education, but at the same time, I think that you go too far in your thinking. The fact that it is wrong of the government to force a business-inspired propagandistic education on our children does not mean that it is wrong for the government to tax, which you call stealing, even to use some of that money to help people who really need help.

I see the problem here as what someone else mentioned, a lack of control by the people (real human beings, not the legal persons known as corporations) over the government. And this is something which has developed since the Constitution was signed.

Ron Paul is a statist, but he would remove layers of bureaucracy and tyranny,…

Whatever I am or end up being, my desire is for a situation in which the things I see as having too much power are scaled back to a human level. I see a major problem as being the lack of subsidiarity caused by power-mongering–our main difference is that I see a necessity for a balance of powers rather than the eradication of what I see as only one source of the problem, and which you see as the sole source of the problems.

*I agree. Subsidiarity and broad based property ownership are desirable.

I see what you are saying and I agree.

But property owners are independent and do not need the state.

This is where your thinking just for me shatters into little pieces.*

To me, the “state” is to be like an umpire. It is supposed to take care of things which need to be taken care of on a corporate level: so that instead of each individual in a community separately hiring a road-building crew to build and maintain roads, or even having each and every property-owner having a tollbooth to get people to pay for the use of the road (imagine that in your suburban subdivision!), the whole thing is taken care of by the community working together as a whole.

And the umpire-state regulates things like property boundaries. If my neighbor and I differ as to where the boundary is, then what are we going to do? Duke it out? Build fences? No, we should be able to have an independently maintained record to clarify and settle each claim.*

But should the local government be so independent of us that they can do this or that that we do not like? Should one or two people in the area have so much power in the structure that they get their way to the detriment of the rest? No–and this is where the mediating structures of guilds and other organizations such as churches (which are currently forbidden to involve themselves in politics) can come in and lend a balancing weight.

So to me the idea that just because someone owns property they become independent and not in need of the state is inaccurate.

They have their own resources.

Property owners have their own resources… but do they have sufficient resources? Not necessarily. I own property, but do not have sufficient resources to be an island apart from those around me.

How to achieve that is where we disagree. History has shown humans are not competent to do it even if they were morally fit to do it.

Now this is where I am not even sure of what you mean. Humans are not competent to do what? Govern? There have been many good “governors,” including some saints. The problem is that just in every other field of endeavor, there are bad apples.

But then without government, the bad apples have nothing holding them back. And see, you were saying that those who don’t agree with you think all our neighbors will begin to murder and pillage without the government, but no, this is not what we think. What we think is that everything will be a mess; the bad apples will do whatever they can get away with, people will be on their own to deal with it, and either a tyranny of the bad will ensue or the Hatfields and the McCoys.

Yes, I know you all think that everyone will have insurance to cover the costs if someone robs you and what have you, but if the insurance fails? Or if a father’s daughter is raped? No, you cannot think that people are inadequate to govern and then assume they are adequate to live with no government! It is a conundrum, but this solution is totally illogical!

Continued below…

 

[St_Francis]

…continued from above

*Allowing people liberty and educating ourselves so we recognize traps like the dialectic and the Delphi process, other psy-ops used against us. They have very sophisticated techniques and they have a passion for ruling and gaining power over others.

I see two problems here. One is that there will be some people who want to maintain the current system, either because they benefit or hope to benefit from it or because they believe that it is all right. It seems ironic that people who want people to live as they please would try to force people to abandon the form they choose.

The other is that you are putting things as black and white, either/or. Either we have the intrinsic evil of government, or we have the intrisic good of no government.

I cannot see it that way. I see that we need some government–the Church teaches that human nature requires government–and I see that when people do not have government, government develops anyway. Government develops even among people who consciously eschew government. As soon as a group of people decide to pool their resources to get some road built in their neighborhood and form a committee to investigate it, government has started.

…In spite of constant examples all the time that they do not protect us, do not respect us, **view our labor and property as theirs and seize it whenever they wish **

I would say that the bolded part is ETA: NOT (oops!) entirely true. Not everyone in the government is totally socialistic.

But what I reallly want to mention is that protection is not precisely what government promises: they would not actually be able to do that without giving everyone something like the Secret Service.

If I say my neighbor wants to kill me, even if I provide quite a lot of evidence, the police can do nothing to him until he performs some sort of act, which unfortunately may be killing me. Why? Because the police are not there to protect us.

Their purpose is to deter crime by the prompt investigation and punishment of crime. So, my neighbor is less likely to kill me because he believes that the police will come after him and put him in prison.

people cling to the myth that the state is “us” and that “we” rule ourselves.

I agree that our self-government has gone astray, but I think that many of the reasons for that lie outside the government.

Just because they haven’t targeted you doesn’t mean you are free or that you are protected. Look at Bill Gates, Martha Stewart, people who have created real wealth, provided products that people want and need and they are thrown in jail or hounded on the flimsiest pretexts.

??? I can think of so many people who have created wealth, provided products that people were advertised into wanting, competitivized into needing, who were not thrown in jail or hounded that your examples are kind of silly.

I mean, if you want good examples, go to the raw milk problems!

 

[JRRTFAN]

Please answer the above scenerio and it will clarify if or if not Distributism isn’t a form of siezure - maybe the worse form - because it is sold so piteously. Please please with all my heart i am asking you to answer the above scenario ?

I don’t know what you’ve done with all these quotes. I do know you know less about Distributism than you know about the dark side of the moon based on your personal visit there.

The Distributist would not, as you postulate, favor the big box retailer due to product or service (if you think you get service in a big box then you deserve that level of service) The Distributist would say: We’re perfectly willing to compete on product, price and service but government, PLEASE DON’T GIVE TAX INCENTIVES TO THE BIG BOX STORE TO UNDERCUT US!

Do you think a level playing field is fair, Mr. Castien? Or do you prefer the big box, subsidized store? I suggest you visit WIKIPEDIA and search Distributism, and read the papal encyclicals linked there while you’re at it. This vapid defense of Capitalism (which you mean as free enterprise, but is not not Capitalism has become) is bizarre in view of AIG, GM, Chrysler and the banks, Capitalism means those entitites FAILED. Your version of Capitalism means the taxpayer saved them. You think Capitalism means you can have your own business, in fact, that is Distributism. What I mean is that you need to think a little deeper and READ. No offense. Just do a little research. And it wouldn’t hurt Cho either.

 

[frankpearson]

I updated the video I made and made it shorter and more concise… Hopefully it is clear to anybody who wants to know what distributism is:

youtube.com/watch?v=a7xNmEAqPrk

I want to encourage people who believe distributism is the answer to make more clear and concise videos that talk to people from all religions and political backgrounds. It is just deplorable that there is as little as there is out there. We need more involvement and more activity for the message!

I personally believe in forwarding distributism by three methods,

1. working for the philosophy in the current political sphere
2. aid and consider starting distributive businesses
3. yell from the hilltops

one more thing… anybody who wants to listen to belloc’s book, “The Servile State” to understand some of the foundation of the philosophy it is available on my youtube page:

youtube.com/watch?v=firDHyWtD6E