Why G.A. Cohen Would Have Hated Venmo

Stefan and Ben discuss Venmo, the commercialization of everyday life, and the differences between a Socialist and a Capitalist Camping trip
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[@MrPsaunders]

Britain already has a society based on a camping trip. It's just a shame the camping trip is, 'Carry On Camping' 1969

[@robertcarpenter8077]

The 'History of Camping' is quite interesting. Its originates with the wealthy bourgeoise owing to the prosperity generated by the industrial revolution. On the East Coast there were the Vagabonds, a group of rich elites which included Henry Ford, Thomas Edison, John Burroughs, and Harvey S. Firestone - who were wont to take up residence in the forests of the Adirondacks. On the West Coast you had the Bohemian Club, another set of rich elites, wont to take up residence in the Redwood grottos north of San Francisco one of which became known as Bohemian Grove. It was the publicity given to the 'glamping' of rich elites which inspired an interest in camping among the middle class. And as for the apparent communal treatment of property, it is an easy matter for the rich to put on an approving air toward communal property relations while comfortably ensconced in the great outdoors for a brief interlude, a feat rather more difficult for the middle class to pull off, and one quite impossible for the poor.

[@serversurfer6169]

Steel-manning isn’t difficult or strange. It just means interpreting your interlocutors as charitably as possible. 🤷‍♂️

[@robertcarpenter8077]

It seems to me that with socialism - with the question of communal property - the problem is that of analyzing why it works at the level of the family and how the extended, matrilineal family such as that of Mosuo might make it possible to further extend socialism along that axis. Is it not likely that an extended family numbering in the hundreds would approximate the distribution of wealth in the larger society ? Suppose each such family had one member who was say in the 'one percent'. In theory such a family would have the means to provide for its most needy on its own. No vast authoritarian state bureaucracy is necessary to strip assets from one group for the benefit of another. It would be an interesting topic for research to study how well family size and extended family ties correlate with anarcho capitalism and vice versa: To what extent does the family tend to break down the more the state pushes for total equality by way of redistribution ?