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A Victoria man has gone two decades without money
81–90 of 390 posts
Re: A Victoria man has gone two decades without money
#82He wants everyone to suddenly stop using money. If that happened, who would wash the dishes? Many communes have failed over this exact issue. They go on for several years with several people, usually women, making the sacrifice and doing what needs to be done. But eventually, the people who do the dishes get fed up and stop, or leave. And then the whole thing collapses. The alternative is for the leaders to have some…
Societies can work without money, or without using them that often, there used to be many self-sufficient peasant communities (villages and even entire mountain valleys) that used to manage just fine without actually using (much) money. Of course that modernity and the industrial revolution put a stop to that but it can be done.
Re: A Victoria man has gone two decades without money
#83I’m not sure living in the city off handouts, charity, and free tax payer provided facilities exactly promotes his no money philosophy. His life relies on the things he despises, if the economic collapse he predicts comes he will be among the first to starve to death. Go into the wild and grow/hunt food or trade some skill - the post money society doesn’t need philosopher poets scavenging cigarettes from trash cans
Haha, I was expecting a story about living off grid, not this.
In my home country we actually still have people living off their land and animals, off hand dug wells and cut down trees, using no money.
That's rather extreme, though, most villages have electricity at least.
Re: A Victoria man has gone two decades without money
#84I don't see how taking from everyone and giving very little in return is moral. If everyone did this we'd all live in a far worse world. This is basically the antithesis of my own moral code to give more than I receive. I relate to him in that I value money very little as a medium to facilitate my own happiness, but I still want to make a lot of it so I can give more. He seems sweet though. I think I would get on wit…
> I don't see how taking from everyone and giving very little in return is moral. If everyone did this we'd all live in a far worse world.
We have a large upper class that does exactly this and not only do many people seem not to mind, they find membership of this class aspirational. It’s how capital income works and what capitalism is built on.
Re: A Victoria man has gone two decades without money
#85A clever bum, for sure.
"Johnston’s feelings about money are inextricably bound up in his certainty that refusing to spend it is the only moral way to live."
It's ok for others to spend on his behalf, though. It sounds like he is applying an effective story to a nicely vulnerable population of marks.
While his philosophy is BS, I cynically admire his hustle.
Re: A Victoria man has gone two decades without money
#86He wants everyone to suddenly stop using money. If that happened, who would wash the dishes? Many communes have failed over this exact issue. They go on for several years with several people, usually women, making the sacrifice and doing what needs to be done. But eventually, the people who do the dishes get fed up and stop, or leave. And then the whole thing collapses. The alternative is for the leaders to have some…
> They go on for several years with several people, usually women, making the sacrifice and doing what needs to be done. While I agree with most of what's said above, the proposition about "usually women, making the sacrifice" is dubious at best, if not untrue. In any society or commune few will lead - the rest will be workers or followers. These will be both men and women, and they will both suffer from necessary sa…
I’ve never lived in or studied commune living but do you or the GP have nonfiction sources? I’m hesitant to take either of your claims as truth without them given my own lack of knowledge. Thank you!
Re: A Victoria man has gone two decades without money
#87Earlier quoted context omitted.
>They go on for several years with several people... making the sacrifice and doing what needs to be done. That sounds like modern retail workers who have spouses to supplement earnings to house & feed themselves.
Yeah. With money, there are lots of problems such as this too. I agree that money is evil. But I think a system with money is slightly less evil than a system with no money.
> I agree that money is evil. But I think a system with money is slightly less evil than a system with no money.
Sounds quite not-evil to me.
Re: A Victoria man has gone two decades without money
#88Earlier quoted context omitted.
Haven't you ever done your own dishes? I use something so that it gets dirty, so I'll wash it off. The jobs "no one wants to do" is usually work people are happy to do for themselves or occasionally their friends and family. The idea that "no one wants to do them" embeds the presumption that you spend eight hours a day doing just that. Of course no one wants to do that!
> Haven't you ever done your own dishes? I use something so that it gets dirty, so I'll wash it off. Dishes is just one example. You may wash your own dishes, but did you buy those dishes from someone who was selling them as their job? Do you grow all of your own food? Do you also sew your own clothes? Build your own shelter? Engineer your own transportation and manufacture your own iPhone? The truth is that a societ…
In the case of a small community, it can be left to volunteers (optionally offer them a meal/beer) or simply rotation so everyone does the unwanted jobs. It's a fair system and people will do it.
Re: A Victoria man has gone two decades without money
#89He wants everyone to suddenly stop using money. If that happened, who would wash the dishes? Many communes have failed over this exact issue. They go on for several years with several people, usually women, making the sacrifice and doing what needs to be done. But eventually, the people who do the dishes get fed up and stop, or leave. And then the whole thing collapses. The alternative is for the leaders to have some…
Before money people traded favors. You help me butcher my cow, I help you rebuild your house (which was more work then the cow), so maybe later on your brother helps fix my plow knowing he'll eventually get something in return, and now I am trading favors with you and your brother, etc. This bonded people. It would have been insulting to say "here are two chickens for your lamb, we are now even, I owe you nothing eve…
It’s amazing how money actually came to be:
Re: A Victoria man has gone two decades without money
#90I admire his resolve, though it's not something I'd like to take to the extreme. Spending more time with people who have less money (e.g. CouchSurfing -> BeWelcome, hitchhiking, dumpster diving) has been an immensely rewarding experience. Last week, I heard a message about investment, which said that the 3 ways to store wealth are stocks in companies, bonds in governments, and property (owned by banks or rich people)…
> [Company] making it their policy to help people get visas (shouldn't that be a government choice?) Of course it's the government choice to grant the visa or not. It's the company choice as to how much support (financial, HR/legal advice, other) to extend to their employees [and their household].
> stocks in companies, bonds in governments
Being pedantic, but governments aren't the only entities which issue bonds. Private bonds exist as well.