From wikipedia:

Contrary to popular conception, there is no evidence that societies relied only on barter before using money for trade.[73] Instead, non-monetary societies operated primarily along the principles of gift economics, and in more complex economies, on debt.[74][75][76] When barter occurred, it was usually between strangers or would-be enemies.[77]

  • @TootSweet
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    5 months ago

    I’m not terribly sure what your response has to do with my comment in particular. I’m not sure why you responded to me and not the OP. I guess just because that first line of my comment agreed with OP?

    Whatever the case, do you have a significant other? Kids? Parents? Is your relationship with any of them as transactional as what you’re describing?

    “Happy 18th birthday, Jimmy. I wanted to let you know that the total cost for services rendered in the course of your raising comes to,” *hands Jimmy an invoice, “$227,261.63. Would you like to pay that in a lump sum or do you need to discuss a payment plan?”

    It’s understandable if you’ve spent your whole life in capitalism to not really be able to think outside of that particular box, but I recommend looking into it. I can’t say I’m terribly well-read on the subject, but I think a book worth reading on the subject is Charles Eisenstein’s Sacred Economics (which is available to read for free online.) If you want something a little more hard-core, there’s Kropotkin’s “The Conquest of Bread”. Both of those will probably speak pretty well to the question of whether a gift economy can coexist with things like modern technology. (Spoiler: Those works definitely argue it can.)

    • atro_city
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      35 months ago

      I’m not terribly sure what your response has to do with my comment in particular.

      Yup. Capitalism is built on a foundation of lies.

      Whatever the case, do you have a significant other? Kids? Parents? Is your relationship with any of them as transactional as what you’re describing?

      You may be surprised to know that not everybody grows up in a nice family. You further be surprised to find out that some parents have children so that they can be taken care of later in life - I take care of you, you take care of me. There are children paying rent to their parents right this moment.

      The further away the relationship, the more quid pro quo comes into play. The fact that there are some people who do not require some kind of compensation (love, hugs, material good, money, …) for some actions, doesn’t mean that won’t require it for others. People can have unconditional love for another person and still demand payment or compensation from another.

      • @TootSweet
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        35 months ago

        I’m not terribly sure what your response has to do with my comment in particular.

        Yup. Capitalism is built on a foundation of lies.

        This thread is specifically about one of the lies in question. And I gave another example. You don’t seem to be arguing that those lies aren’t indeed lies, so if I’m understanding your arguments correctly, what you’re trying to get at is that neither “barter was a thing before money” and “homesteading is a thing that actually happens/happened” are “foundational” to pro-capitalist thought and “the foundation” of capitalist ideology is instead something along the lines that “quid pro quo and keeping score are human nature and money is just an abstraction thereof”. Yes?

        I’m saying that I find the existence of counterexamples (as well as the whole “gift economies were the norm before money” thing, and that capitalism has existed for a great minority of the time anatomically-modern humans have been around) a compelling reason to be skeptical of that stance.