Random Thoughts
Dec. 16th, 2009 09:00 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
aniccaSo Hollyoaks pulled a storyline about two girls bullying someone to death because Denise Bulger is a negligent parent who still hasn't come to terms with her getting her son killed 17 years after the event and needs to scream and shout and blame everyone she can think of for her son's misadventure in case anyone ever starts thinking about it and realises that Jamie Bulger would still be alive if it wasn't for his mother's willful neglect.
Obviously I don't watch Hollyoaks for the same reason I don't watch Blue Peter, but it does seem to do a reasonable job of addressing serious issues for an adolescent audience. Thank you, Denise, for denying anyone this may have helped the opportunity. Apparently being a high profile child abuser grants you the right to censor national media regardless of its content. Jamie Bulger was not bullied to death, he was left to die by a mother who didn't care. Not that Denise Bulger's shortcomings are in any way unique, an increasing number of parents are woefully inadequate with woefully inadequate children raised as a consequence. Anywhere else in the kingdom animalia such people would be food, and nothing more.
Contrast Denise Bulger with the Reverend Boxall, whose daughter actually was bullied to death, and whose public statements have been remarkable for their compassion towards her tormentors. Children bully each other constantly, it is unpleasant but it appears to be normal, for want of a better word. Whether it is natural or a product of society is an open question, but it is certainly commonplace. I would not care to speculate on the number of children considering suicide as a solution to being bullied beyond the observation that the number appears to be growing. Perhaps a popular television show could have offered them some solace or helped their bullies realise the gravity of their misconduct, but the opportunity is forfeit.
The one in the middle is generally the shortest and most glib. Cheques are to be phased out by 2018 if a suitable alternative exists. It won't, we don't need a suitable alternative because cheques do everything we need them to, this is a fucking stupid idea. We've had cheques for centuries because they work. But hey, money doesn't exist anyway so why piss about pretending it does, just accept that money is numbers in the collective imagination and let them be shuffled around by a computer operated by a retard.
A think tank with a meaningless name I've already forgotten has wasted a crapload of time and money discovering that cleaners and childminders add considerably more value per pound they are paid than bankers and accountants, who's value added is actually negative.
Well fucking duh.
We live in a very special kind of meritocracy, where merit is defined as your ability to exploit rather than your ability to contribute or produce. Those who produce do not reap the benefits of their production, because they do not own it. If a cleaner is adding ten times the value of his remuneration, then at the other end of the spectrum someone is getting those nine tenths for nothing other than his ownership of the cleaner's labour.
The most surprising thing about Das Kapital was that it had to be written, but as Marx himself observed, the value of labour is unclear in a slaveowning society, where labour is essentially free. Nobody asks what value the lawnmower adds, the lawnmower is the tool of the gardener. It is the gardener who adds value by using his lawnmower, as it is the slaveowner who adds value by using his slaves. It wasn't until the mechanism of labour ceased to be property that the value of labour became apparent. To quote a prominent American entrepreneur, "I don't want to own a yacht but I want to rent one from time to time; if it flies, fucks or floats, rent it!". Whether we are owned slaves or rented slaves, we are still slaves.
The cleaner is a major contributor to the creation of wealth. Sanitary conditions mean people are healthier and live longer, they can be more productive for longer. Like the Golgafrinchans, we are interdependent; teachers need doctors, cleaners and carpenters; doctors need carpenters, teachers and cleaners; cleaners need teachers, carpenters and doctors; and carpenters need cleaners, doctors and teachers. Ignoring the obvious question of who needs estate agents, management consultants and bankers, everyone needs everyone else. If we were all teachers, or all doctors, or all cleaners, or all carpenters, we would all be fucked.
So why is a doctor worth more than a teacher? or a teacher worth more than a carpenter? or a carpenter worth more than a cleaner? Because we are still barbarians.
Bollocks.
Obviously I don't watch Hollyoaks for the same reason I don't watch Blue Peter, but it does seem to do a reasonable job of addressing serious issues for an adolescent audience. Thank you, Denise, for denying anyone this may have helped the opportunity. Apparently being a high profile child abuser grants you the right to censor national media regardless of its content. Jamie Bulger was not bullied to death, he was left to die by a mother who didn't care. Not that Denise Bulger's shortcomings are in any way unique, an increasing number of parents are woefully inadequate with woefully inadequate children raised as a consequence. Anywhere else in the kingdom animalia such people would be food, and nothing more.
Contrast Denise Bulger with the Reverend Boxall, whose daughter actually was bullied to death, and whose public statements have been remarkable for their compassion towards her tormentors. Children bully each other constantly, it is unpleasant but it appears to be normal, for want of a better word. Whether it is natural or a product of society is an open question, but it is certainly commonplace. I would not care to speculate on the number of children considering suicide as a solution to being bullied beyond the observation that the number appears to be growing. Perhaps a popular television show could have offered them some solace or helped their bullies realise the gravity of their misconduct, but the opportunity is forfeit.
The one in the middle is generally the shortest and most glib. Cheques are to be phased out by 2018 if a suitable alternative exists. It won't, we don't need a suitable alternative because cheques do everything we need them to, this is a fucking stupid idea. We've had cheques for centuries because they work. But hey, money doesn't exist anyway so why piss about pretending it does, just accept that money is numbers in the collective imagination and let them be shuffled around by a computer operated by a retard.
A think tank with a meaningless name I've already forgotten has wasted a crapload of time and money discovering that cleaners and childminders add considerably more value per pound they are paid than bankers and accountants, who's value added is actually negative.
Well fucking duh.
We live in a very special kind of meritocracy, where merit is defined as your ability to exploit rather than your ability to contribute or produce. Those who produce do not reap the benefits of their production, because they do not own it. If a cleaner is adding ten times the value of his remuneration, then at the other end of the spectrum someone is getting those nine tenths for nothing other than his ownership of the cleaner's labour.
The most surprising thing about Das Kapital was that it had to be written, but as Marx himself observed, the value of labour is unclear in a slaveowning society, where labour is essentially free. Nobody asks what value the lawnmower adds, the lawnmower is the tool of the gardener. It is the gardener who adds value by using his lawnmower, as it is the slaveowner who adds value by using his slaves. It wasn't until the mechanism of labour ceased to be property that the value of labour became apparent. To quote a prominent American entrepreneur, "I don't want to own a yacht but I want to rent one from time to time; if it flies, fucks or floats, rent it!". Whether we are owned slaves or rented slaves, we are still slaves.
The cleaner is a major contributor to the creation of wealth. Sanitary conditions mean people are healthier and live longer, they can be more productive for longer. Like the Golgafrinchans, we are interdependent; teachers need doctors, cleaners and carpenters; doctors need carpenters, teachers and cleaners; cleaners need teachers, carpenters and doctors; and carpenters need cleaners, doctors and teachers. Ignoring the obvious question of who needs estate agents, management consultants and bankers, everyone needs everyone else. If we were all teachers, or all doctors, or all cleaners, or all carpenters, we would all be fucked.
So why is a doctor worth more than a teacher? or a teacher worth more than a carpenter? or a carpenter worth more than a cleaner? Because we are still barbarians.
Bollocks.
