When I bring up ownership, I get somewhat different perspectives depending on whether I’m talking to capitalist-oriented or communist-oriented people, but the common denominator is a general lack of understanding as to what ownership is and what its purpose is (or more correctly, was). There is a general assumption of ownership, with the variation being collective vs. individual. I seek to open people’s eyes to the assumption itself. There are people who seek to declare property and ownership as “natural law,” an inherently fallacious endeavor, as natural law is not declared but discovered. It does not originate within us nor depend on our acknowledgment. And then there are people who seek to justify property as a solution to problems which are generally unrelated and even, in the case of theft, actually given life by ownership itself. Yet another approach is for the sentimental value. While I don’t consider sentiment to be fallacious, I also don’t find it to be a tool for problem-solving. I am pointing to a problem and approaching it scientifically to find a solution. If we arrive at irreversible collapse, something that is repeatedly being shown as our trajectory, including a recent study of complex system modeling funded by NASA, sentiment will serve as little more than part of the reason for our collapse. It won’t avert or alter anything. It just is. My point is to show cause-and-effect. When approaching ownership from a cause-and-effect perspective, it becomes very clear that any desirable effect ownership had from a social standpoint possibly held in the past, but has lapsed its utility, just as a hand-held calculator is comparatively obsolete to a laptop computer. Ownership is an obsolete approach, apart from whether we consider it collectively or individually, just as looking for a pin in a room with a blindfold is obsolete in comparison to using your eyes. I do not talk of “abolishing” ownership. I do not consider ownership to be “the devil.” I merely point out there is a far superior way for us to manage our society and that ownership is irrelevant for decision-making and problem-solving. I also point out that the complications and subjectivity inherent in ownership give rise to many of the problems that people decry. So, it’s not about mandating anything or supposing that it’s “wrong” or “right.” On the contrary, my problem would more accurately be that ownership is mandated through our social structures for survival, which is in itself a practice premised on the assumption that it has problem-solving capabilities. For me, it’s about showing the interconnection between causes and effects, pointing out the links, and making people aware of them. How else can we exercise our “free will” to choose, if we are not aware of as many choices or facts possible? And what’s more, it becomes far more difficult to finger-point and lay blame when you’re aware of just how much your own behaviors have a hand in an outcome as the potentially accused.
Posted on: Sun, 23 Mar 2014 19:15:10 +0000