From: Platt Holden (pholden@sc.rr.com)
Date: Sat Oct 15 2005 - 14:24:08 BST
Arlo:
> Before I go further into this, I want to put back upfront my original
> question. If "the point of a book like [ZMM]" was not profit (either
> financial or symbolic), and yet writing it "seemed to have a higher quality
> than not writing it", what was the nature of that quality?
I think you have to ask Pirsig. Remember that the "nature of quality" for
each person is influenced by his life experiences.
> We are told every day, in endless repetition, that "money" is the Great
> Motivator. That without the profit-motive, culture would end, people
> wouldn't labor, the whole world would fall apart. And yet the profit-motive
> played no part in Pirsig's decision to author and publish ZMM. So, what
> did? And, more importantly, why aren't we foregrounding THAT motive as a
> greater motive than financial profit?
"Foregrounding?" That's a new one on me. Did you invent it?
> [Arlo]
> Like I said in other posts, yes, it brought with it great leaps in quantity
> of production, but at a cost, and that cost was the core of the low quality
> Pirsig gets at in ZMM. In all the examples of Quality (as related to labor)
> Pirsig always describes a "connection to the whole" in process, whereas
> Fordian production removes the individual from the whole. This is a bit of
> precursor to what I'm working on for a later time, but start with this:
> "The real ugliness lies in the relationship between the people who produce
> the technology and the things they produce, which results in a similar
> relationship between the people who use the technology and the things they
> use."
The brush I use to paint with I'm sure was assembly line manufactured, yet
it's quality to me couldn't be any higher. The point? Methinks Pirsig paints
with too broad a brush in the statements you quote. One's job, after all, is
not the end all and be all of life's quality. Nor do I believe mass
production automatically results in low quality products, my paint brush,
Dell computer and Panasonic TV being examples of reliable, quality goods.
.
> [Platt]
> Walmart provides goods from all over the world at low prices, benefiting
> millions who, by their free choice as consumers, have made the Walton
> family wealthy and deservedly so. I don't know how much money I've saved by
> shopping at Walmart, but just the other day I bought a pound of hamburger
> there for $1 cheaper than at the local food market. Of course, the money I
> saved will be either spent or invested elsewhere to benefit other
> employers.
>
> [Arlo]
> Which proves only the short-sightedness and need for immediate small
> rewards rather than a long-term view of benefits, and a delaying of small,
> immediate gratification for eventual, larger rewards. You call this
> healthy?
Until you can trace all the long-term benefits of the dollar I saved in
one place and spent in another I think your point is unconvincing. Freedom
to buy hamburger from whoever I want is healthy don't you think?.
> What Walmart does is funnel capital out of local communities, turn people
> who would otherwise be your entrepreneurs and small business owners into
> retail clerks and cashiers.
Why do you consider retail clerks and cashiers of lesser value than
entrepreneurs and small business owners?
> I'd say that a community with a dozen small
> locally-owned small businesses creates a better situation for more than one
> Walmart and minimum wage income. Not to mention that those same people who
> would otherwise own and operate their own small shops, and have meaningful
> labor therein, are reduced to meaningless activity that creates great
> wealth for others (the Walton family) while reducing themselves to wage
> slaves.
Most "small shops" go out of business within a few years whether there's a
Walmart in the vicinity or not. As for "wage slaves," if you've ever tried
to run a business you know what hard work for little pay really is.
> So, yes, Walmart can sell at lower costs because it can buy at quantity
> discounts. But your little $1 savings just turned your local butcher (a
> rewarding, viable employment) into a minimum wage deli-clerk at Walmart.
> Again you reveal that for you the only Quality is financial capital. That
> $1 in your pocket is more important than a community with meaningful, real
> employment for everyone. Not me, I avoid those box-stores like the plague.
> I would rather pay more money to someone locally than watch all that money
> go off to Sam Walton while everyone around me turns into retail clerks.
As said above, what's quality for you isn't necessarily quality for me.
Personally I know some high quality retail clerks who have been extremely
helpful to me. Hardly "meaningless activity" as you describe it.
> [Platt]
> Well now there you go. I don't think Eminem and Larry Flynt enriched
> culture, but then I don't think any purveyors of sex and rock and roll
> enrich culture. But, you'll recall the great debate we had about rock and
> roll that many here considered high quality while to me it represented a
> throwback to primitive jungle rituals. From this I reach three conclusions:
> 1) biological quality is a constant threat to cultural evolution, 2)
> there's no accounting for taste, and 3) if we want a free society, the
> consumer must remain king.
>
> [Arlo]
> Good, that was the only point I was trying to make. That success in the
> market, that selling millions of products, doesn't make for enriching the
> culture.
As I said, I don't think they enrich the culture, but I'm not the sole
arbiter of who enriches the culture and who doesn't.
> Indeed, market success can occur even when someone is de-riching
> culture, yes? You seemed to imply earlier that the combined "value
> judgement" of consumers was an indicator of whether or not someone enriched
> the culture. Glad to see you deny this.
Again, my opinion only. You seem to suggest we'd be better off if your
opinion and mine were somehow the rule.
> So, let me ask you, are you saying that all those people who buy Eminem and
> Larry Flynt's products are "stupid peons"? Why do you think they see these
> products as having "high value"? Is it because they are incapable of the
> high level of thought that you are? I'm not asking this simply to be
> sarcastic, I'm asking this because everytime I challenge the "consumer's
> decision" (whether in the market or in politics), you counter that I am
> accusing everyone of being a "stupid peon", unable to make decisions for
> themselves. Is that what you are saying about all the millions of people
> who buy Eminem's CDs and Larry Flynt's magazines?
Yes, I think they are stupid peons. But, unlike you who would like to
change people to be motivated by something other than profits or spend
their money on more "worthwhile" things, I'm for free markets, free
elections and free choices where individual decisions are given free
reign, unrestricted by those like you or me who think we "know better."
All I ask is that those who are free to make poor decisions be left alone
to suffer and learn from the consequences.
In case you haven't noticed, freedom to me is the holy grail from which
all my opinions flow. Pirsig convinced me I was on the right track when he
described the essence of DQ: "It's only perceived good is freedom."
Platt
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