tv madoka portrays social democracy and is cringe
movie madoka portrays stalinism and is based
sadly you gotta watch the tv madoka for the film madoka
ComradeRat
joined 5 years ago
Assimilation of the Roman variety (i.e., the main language isn't forced on anyone, but all the popular media and good-paying jobs require it) go brrrrrrrrr.
Economic penetration and entwinement with Anglo empire has sociocultural ramifications (homogenization of social and economic structures to resemble Yankland).
Similar process shrunk a lotta the native languages in the east/north of the USSR, despite state efforts to prevent that.
Class society, capitalism, empire all lead to such homogenization, historically with a large state or market comes homogeneity.
Given enough time I imagine the global north nations would fully anglofy, with the english language turning into a language family (similar to latin turning into the romance languages)
glassmaking
Yeah such situations where even one worker missing causes the operation to stop is very related to the reserve army of labour, especially in "so-called unskilled" jobs (using marx's definition of "jobs which don't require lengthy apprenticeship), where if labour is lacking it is (sometimes literally) snatched up from the street. In more skilled jobs (which still have 'apprenticeships' but less lengthy; the trainee period is the modern apprenticeship) such as convenience-store clerk, capital has to pay and maintain labourers in excess of what is needed on average daily in case of firings, noshows, illnesses, etc. Capital of course vehemently resents needing to pay such "idlers" and aims to render them "redundant" by increasing penalties on noshows, forcing the ill to come to work, etc.
theory and practice
Thinking of Mao is apt and interesting, though this is more in the realm of practical Maoism (abolishing distinction between physical and mental labour) than theoretical, as science makes extensive use of practice. The big thing here however is the separation of theory from practice. The businessman theorizing about how to organize labour more efficiently doesn't have to contort his body, speed his motions. He may not even see the results of his theories other than in spreadsheets showing "efficiency up, costs down"
Similarly, the scientist developing a new machine doesn't have to worry about his fingers being cut off, about inhaling toxic fumes or mindnumbingly repeating the same task every thirty seconds. The more complicated, large, powerful the machine becomes (i.e., the greater the portion of capital that is constant capital), the more the working process (its character, its speed, its danger, its product, etcetc) of the worker is dictated to them by the machine designed by and for the "middle class".
There's more of a complete separation of theory from practice in whitecollar jobs from what I've heard though, hence all the "team-building" excercises, lengthy meetings and repeated silver bullets that "will totally fix education forever frfr" (all of which are ofc creators of makework jobs for the degree-holding class).
schools
This is a neat topic for Marx. I am not 100% sure, but next week or the week after we should see some mentions of the conditions of schooling in the factory schools. I imagine as the global north reproletarianizes more fully, the conditions in our schools will more closely resemble the ideal (i.e. Victorian) capitalist school systems. On a only slightly related note, standard/'equal' universal education is probably one of the two things Marx would tear the USSR, China, etc, apart on (he comes out strongly against universal education in critique of the gotha program).
robotic arms
Yeah this is a perfect example of the thinking that gave us the steam horse locamotive @Sasuke@hexbear.net posted the picture of. Such arms are the starting point for creating more and more specific machines ofc
I'm disappointed it has wheels. We coulda had steampunk mecha
Yeah, I've seen many complain about the repetitiveness of Capital, but all my pedagogical training and research (and personal experience) suggests repetition is just the best way to learn stuff. Marx seems very intentional with his repetitions, so I think he's aware.
Marx isn't praising productivity, especially not in the manufacture-division-of-labour.
Sections two and three describe manufacture, and sections four and five are harshly critical or condemnatory of it both in itself and as it exists under capitalism. This critique begins in section three, towards the end, when Marx talks about unskilled labour and the separation of activities which are rich in content from those which are tedious.
Section four has quotes like e.g.
This is not the place, however, for us to show how division of labour seizes upon, not only the economic, but every other sphere of society, and everywhere lays the foundation for that specialization, that development in a man of one single faculty at the expense of all others, which already caused Adam Ferguson, the master of Adam Smith, to exclaim: 'We make a nation of Helots, and have no free citizens'.
Where Marx 1. quotes a bougie economist for extra authority on the division of labour sucking and 2. says that this (i.e. Capital) is not the place to discuss this in general. (For such discussion, see e.g. Contribution to the Critique of Hegel's Philosophy of Law).
Section 5 is even more openly condemnatory e.g.
[Manufacture] converts the worker into a crippled monstrousity by furthering his particular skill in a forcing-house, through the suppression of a whole world of productive drives and inclinations, just as in the states of La Plata they butcher a whole beast for the sake of his hide or his tallow
P486-88 (Penguin Fowkes translation) also shows how, while the political economists view the social division of labour "as a means of producing more commodities with a given quanitity of labour, and consequently of cheapening commodities and accelerating the accumulation of capital". He contrasts this view with that of the few modern economists who don't fetishise exchange value, profit, etc, (as well as the ancients) where 1. division of labour allows people to do stuff they like and are good at and 2. without at least some division of labour nothing can be done.
I said above "Marx has praised the division of labour as increasing productivity (especially in Ch.14 Section 2)."
You also said:
This is an important passage for understanding what Marxism would look like. Here Marx talks about the planned economy.
Capitalists do accept the 'planned economy', so long as it's within the walls of a factory. ... So Marx wants to bring that increased productivity to the economy as a whole by bringing the same sort of rational planning into the economy as there is in the factory.
Which is the part i disagreed with
Moses said: 'Thou shalt not muzzle the ox when he treadeth out the corn' [Deutoronomy 25:4]. But the Christian philanthropists of Germany fastened a wooden board round the necks of the serfs, whom they used as a motor power for grinding, in order to prevent them from putting flour into their mouths with their hands.
Marx's footnotes are amazing (footnote 4 of ch15 is another good one)
Yes, but Marx feels much more ambivalent on manufacture and division of labour and factories general than this.
Marx is not saying "factory organisation good" here; he is saying "the bourgeois admit factory organization is shit when it applies to them but pretend its great when it applies to the workers."
Socialism will ofc have to seize onto existing(machine) manufacture just as capitalism originally seized onto handicraft, but eventually socialism will need to move beyond this factory-like division of labour and it is hence not something to be idealised or uncritically praised.
This is not a passage where Marx is outlining what crude communism will look like; this is a passage where he is calling out bourgeoisie ideologue hypocrisy.
Imo ch10 is absolutely essential, because its where Marx details his understanding of class struggle and the bourgeois state, through the story. Ch15 is similarly essential because its Marx's complete detailing of machines, their origin current state and possible futures. Ch10 and ch15 are two of the most important parts of the entire book, because they're where Marx makes Capital more than an abstract theoretical text. Ch10 isn't just a repitition of the first 9 chapters; it is an expansion, a fleshing out where we see the varying ways all the abstract laws actually apply (and conflict with each other).
It's a fun chapter 
Honestly, very very important theoretically and historically in the same way ch10 is imo.
So the Gotha Programme said: "The German Workers' party demands as the intellectual and ethical basis of the state: 1. Universal and equal elementary education by the state. Universal compulsory school attendance. Free instruction."
Marx says:
So his first issue is with both universally-equal and universal-elementary education.
Marx opposes universally-equal education because the present day society, unequal capitalist society, is unequal. The early stages of socialism / lower communism have to recognize this reality, recognize that perhaps peasants and wage-workers have different needs ("why do i need to learn X when I will likely stay a farmer?") / abilities (hard to focus on abstract math when hungry) from the well-fed urban middle class, that access to teachers and instructions and supplies (etcetc) is very different from rural village to rural village. Equal education is either a falsehood or a reduction to universal elementary education.
Marx opposes universal elementary school because the elementary schools of the lower classes are shit, both today and in Marx's time. It's hard to comprehend from our modern viewpoint, but the "20-30 kids in a classroom one teacher who's had maybe 4 years of rushed training" model of education is 1. recent, 2. horrible, 3. still miles better than the elementary education of Marx's day. He would rather keep the current (i.e. unequal) education system and improve the elementary schooling as the material conditions of the workers, peasants, etc, improve.
Marx is also notably against free university and ambivalent on compulsory attendance and free elementary:
For Marx, free education is a way of the upper classes using general taxes to pay for the education of their managerial class, their scientists, their bureaucrats, their writers and artists, etc. Today we see for example university admission and graduation rates as well as who gets employed in their field varying by class, as nepotism is rampant in both, and inequality in terms of resources (housing, food, tutoring, etc) is still at play.
Instead of this universal education, Marx says:
I.e. "teach the children actually useful productive skills instead of abstract liberal education created by/for elites jerking off how good elite culture is".
Marx also equally opposes state and church influence on schools:
He's fine with the state setting general guidelines, but otherwise he wants the government out of the schools, doesn't want e.g. teachers to be state officials.
Marx's stance on schools makes more sense when one knows that Marx opposes the abolition of child labour (my emphasis):
Rather than separating the parent-workers (still working 12 hour days and losing hands without pension) from their children, sending them into the hands of the state educators to be given a liberal education about how good liberalism is, Marx would see the conditions of working improved enough that it's not horrible that children are working with their parents, because in working with their parents they gain a real education in what they're most likely to be doing their entire life, a real education in what society is like. As above, Marx would like to see this supplemented with technical schools (theoretical and practical), but I get the sense Marx has little faith in liberal education (elementary or otherwise) as a result of his own experience and his daughters' experiences with it.