this post was submitted on 26 Apr 2024
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Lefty Memes
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what do you want to learn? How revolutions work and their stumbling blocks? How different societies have or might manage land? how we got here?
I want to learn how you would go from your current system, wherever you are in the world, to one without landlords. I'll cut the bullshit and just openly say that I don't think you've thought it through.
There are about a million pieces in the middle that are missing, and I promise you that none of them are pretty.
If there was a step by step plan with 100% certainty people would just do that obviously, but that's a ridiculous standard to have.
There are many approaches to try and soften things: from political agitation for heavy taxes on multiple properties and inheritance taxes to rent caps and so on. Ultimately though, as is currently the case, the landed class will use violence the moment they feel sufficiently threatened and any movement that wants to succeed will need to be prepared to meet that.
Like you can and will be killed or gaoled forever if you resist being homeless sufficiently hard because a piece of paper says that someone has exclusive rights to land they're not personally using. All the rights we currently enjoy were won through sacrifice. Unionists were killed for sick leave and holidays, people were killed for voting rights, people were killed to be openly gay etc. Dismantling these tools of oppression and violence will involve violence, it is naive to think otherwise but we don't need to go there before offering peaceful redistribution.
I understand and absolutely agree with everything you've said, but I'm not asking for 100% certainty. I'm asking for A plan, no matter how absurd it is.
Every successful revolution in the history of the world has had an endgame. I'm not sure I see yours.
So at this stage where I live is very far from any sort of organised resistance to capitalism. Rebuilding foundational institutions of mutual aid and working class organisation such as food coops and unions is more productive than trying to march in the street for abolishing landlords. One activist was recently in the news for organising squatting which I think is rad, and he handled himself masterfully when dropped into a neoliberal shark tank on TV.
There are many laws that favour landlords: such as negative gearing, capital gains tax discounting, and absolutely fucked renters rights. Attacking these politically helps to build a movement and aids real people now. One political party is pushing for major increases in public housing, assisting them undermines the strength landlords have by reducing their power over homelessness.
I don't have a plan for Australia to ban landlords because that's far in the future, groundwork needs establishing first and that takes the form of spreading ideas, seeking consensus, aiding political allies, and participating in local coops and so on to build solidarity and class consciousness.
The end goal is imho a society organised around mutual aid, collective ownership of the means of production, and abolishing private ownership (not personal btw, your toothbrush is safe). There are any number of utopian visions for what that might look like but we have so much to do from now till then that overly fixating on a specific codified system is a waste of time. First people need to believe another way is possible and be empowered to build it.
Sure. Increase property taxes by 400% if the owner does not list the home as their primary residence. This frees up the small homes. If it doesn’t work, keep fucking increasing it.
Implement immediate federal rent controls to tie increases to inflation. Establish a federal rent oversight agency where landlords must file appeals to prove their property value increased or prove they added value to the residence to increase rent beyond inflation.
The crux of this issue is that it requires leftists to be in government. I vote for every leftist on my ballot, local state or federal. And only the leftists.
This doesn’t do anything about the fact that capital has spent the last 80 years violently suppressing global leftism which has left the US with two parties: right-wing extremist, and outright fascist.
See, pretty simple when you don’t act all cute “just asking questions” full well knowing you’re a bad faith actor and will simply handwave away any concrete evidence put forth.
Except you don’t give a shit. Nothing was going to change your mind at all. Yeah sure you “agree” with all that.
Pretty goddamn funny how you ghouls always come in pretending to agree and just seeking one more info on tired old topics that have been addressed thousands of times already.
Here’s a tip, leftists don’t act like that. It’s pretty obvious when you do it.
Eh, the SocDems would probably point to Vienna's social housing as something that's going well and try to do something similar. But you'd need socialists in government to build a duck ton of housing, and fund repairs adequately. Some places that's not too ridiculous of an idea, others would be nearly impossible.