Abbie Hoffmnan [Hoffman] famously wrote a book titled Steal This Book. What greater compliment could an author hope for than to have his or her book stolen? Jeffrey Kessen, may his tribe increase, quotes from a recent FaceBook post by someone who, in 1983, stole my book, Kant's Theory of Mental Activity, from a library! That is infinitely better than a positive review.
This is disgusting but typical of lefties. Here is a guy who is all for socialism, but praises a jackass who steals a piece of public property.
But if there is no respect for public property now, why think there will be after the installation of socialism? Fools like Hoffman and Wolff think that after the glorious revolution 'bourgeois morality' with its stricture against theft will be superseded and we will all live in mutually supportive harmony. That's utopian nonsense, as if the Revolution will bring about a "fundamental transformation" of human nature. It is quasi-religious, idolatrous nonsense to boot as if the New Man will emerge with the secular socialist eschaton. U-topia is Nowheresville for the Nowhere Man.
Socialists have no appreciation of what is called in social science the tragedy of the commons:
The tragedy of the commons is a term used in social science to describe a situation in a shared-resource system where individual users acting independently according to their own self-interest behave contrary to the common good of all users by depleting or spoiling that resource through their collective action.
Private property is not only the foundation of individual liberty, it also helps insure that things get taken care of. And please note that if I maintain my property everyone around me benefits as well. This includes my house and my cars.
Thus my well-maintained private property redounds to the benefit of the public. It won't be my car that drops a muffler that hits Mike the motorcyclist in the face causing him to crash. It won't be my properly maintained house that causes your property values to decline.
Am I against public libraries? Of course not. I'm for public libraries and open stacks. I support them with the real estate tax I pay. A little socialism never hurt anybody. But if a thing is good, more is usually not better. Socialism is like whisky in this respect.
The trouble with leftists is that they undermine the very 'bourgeois morality' that needs to be practiced if socialism to any degree is to work in the first place.
We need more mockery and condemnation of leftists. Don't you agree?
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