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What is not immediately clear when reading this article is that the term "property" is used here to mean real estate, or land, property, and not (I believe) any other kind of property (like stocks, a business, a car, or an apple or pencil for that matter). I suggest that this be made clear from the outset.
-- Serge 01:31, 30 August 2005 (UTC)
Proudhon believed in the control of the means of production by the workers themselves, and as a believer in the labour theory of value opposed profit-making enterprises. He believed that society should be organised as a federation of workers assemblies. True, he believed that goods should be exchanged in a market, but this market would have little in common with the capitalist idea of the free market (for example, goods were to be exchanged at "cost value", not whatever price would create the greatest profit). Workers self-management and the idea of a society organised as a federation of workers' organisations is of course key to most conceptions of libertarian socialism. No-one would suggest that Proudhon was a libertarian socialist exactly, but it seems perfectly reasonable to include a link to libertarian socialism. I haven't restored the link to communism, but a case certainly could be made. Proudhon had a significant influence on Marx's early writings. Cadr 00:38, 3 September 2005 (UTC)
Is the sentence, "The former is considered illegitimate property, the latter legitimate property.", which occurs somewhere around the middle of the longest paragraph, mistyped? -- Denihilonihil 13:54, 2 October 2005 (UTC)
There has to be some kind of documented response to this absurd premise:
So when someone provides the capital to buy the equipment to run a diamond mine and pay wages to the miners, when a miner finds a diamond, the miner retains "a natural right of property in the diamond which he has produced"? And when that miner takes his rough diamond to a cutter, whom he pays a wage to cut the diamond, the cutter owns the resulting cut diamonds he produces? And when the cutter pays a jeweler to mount one of the cut diamonds in a gold ring, the resulting diamond ring produced by the jeweler belongs to the jeweler? In a system that worked according to this principle, why would anyone be motivated to do anything except steal? -- Serge 21:57, 29 June 2006 (UTC)
Continuing with the diamond-mine example:
The person who owns the minesite is much more clearly in the role of Proudhon's thief.
There isn't a "sexy" word for this concept, other than theft; if Proudhon had said "Property is usurpation!", he would probably have been closer to his own meaning, but far fewer people would likely have listened. His use of a word that is both more dramatic and more familiar (while not being entirely misleading) is probably one of the main reasons that the idea has endured. TooManyFingers ( talk) 05:04, 17 December 2019 (UTC)
These two quotes are completely contradictory:
Further explanation/clarification is needed. -- Serge 22:10, 29 June 2006 (UTC)
"Property is theft !" is a slogan which is coined much sooner than Proudhon's book. It is first used by Brissot. Direct quote from Marx : "But as Proudhon entangled the whole of these economic relations in the general legal concept of “property,” “la propriété,” he could not get beyond the answer which, in a similar work published before 1789, Brissot had already given in the same words: “La propriété’ c’est le vol.”
http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1865/letters/65_01_24.htm
I removed the following:
There is no misunderstanding involved. It is a fallacy as it sits. He may have been doing a play on words for rhetorical effect but the words still have meaning. If the student stole the pencil from the school he would be using it, but that could not convey rightful ownership. Steve 21:52, 28 February 2007 (UTC)
There are several reasons why that paragraph is wrong:
Steve 20:35, 5 March 2007 (UTC)
I've removed the non-NPOV from the wording so that it's now a claim of contradiction and added the obvious logical rules showing why stolen concept simply doesn't logically work here. A non-neutral point of view, even with an outside source, is not appropriate. If you want to make it non-neutral by removing the references to the claim rather than as a fact (which they aren't since they are full of logical problems, which are demonstrated in the claim), then I'll simply delete it in the future. If you want to claim that a response of clarification to the non-neutral critique is not valid for not being sourced, then you fail under not being neutral. I'd rather just delete the inanity, but I'd rather give you a chance to respond to the actual reasoning for keeping your illogical contribution in the talk page or even in the actual article. Freedom of objectivist religion, I say. -- SAW
The Branden complaint seems to center around a too-literal reading of the slogan, whereas the rest of Proudhon's argument seems to make the meaning clear. Surely there are other critiques that are more relevant to the substance of the argument. An anarchist one would be most relevant; I suggest that one be included. — vivacissamamente 12:25, 13 July 2007 (UTC)
I have again restored the material that Jemmy keeps deleting. His last deletion was not mentioned here on the Talk page yet in the Edit summary of his deletion he accuses me of not explaining MY actions on the talk page. I am not the one behaving in a disruptive fashion. One can go back into the history of this article and see mentions of the logical contradiction inherent in the phrase (I saw this as far back as April 2006 which is as far as I looked). There have been many editors over the years who have written to that effect -pointing out this obvious fact. The criticism section was established and arrived at over 7 months ago under a concensus. Jeremy acts as if this page were his private property, deletes valid, relevant, proportional, sourced material which has a history of concensus. He then accuses me of being disruptional for restoring it. -- Steve ( talk) 08:48, 18 July 2008 (UTC)
Once again Jemmy has deleted the criticism section along with the reference. In the edit summary, he accuses me of disruptive behavior and threatend to initiate Administrative actions against me. I welcome any chance to bring impartial third party expertise to this issue. I have not been disruptive. The section in question was put in the article long ago as part of a consensus. It is a valid, proportional, appropriate entry for the article and has referenced source material. The value and purpose of the section for an encyclopedia article of this kind has been made clear on this page. The constant removal is the disruption. The attacks on me are unwarranted. This is the second time in a row that Jemmy has done this without even a brief note on this discussion page. I invite anyone to look at WP:DISRUPT and see whose actions best fit Wikipedia's policy. -- Steve ( talk) 05:13, 23 July 2008 (UTC)
Please see Talk:What Is Property?
Is there any way we can get rid of this? Right now, it looks absurd: the TOC follows the majority of the content. I added a section heading, "Background", after the first two paragraphs -- just to move the TOC up, where it makes more sense to be. Someone removed it. Fine by me, it was just a hack. But there has to be some way to get rid of the TOC? Anyone? — Jemmy t c 21:37, 17 July 2008 (UTC)
The material from Marx fits the section well. I restored the material from Branden since it gives added authority and a kind of balance. And because it is valid, appropriate, sourced material that should not have been removed. There is no requirement that a criticism be from the same historical period, particularly when it refers to the logical soundness of the phrase. Nor is the Marx quote any more relevant - both are references to the exact same phrase. I shifted to this new Talk page section since it is now clear that the criticism is about the phrase and not "Objectivist Critique". -- Steve ( talk) 18:52, 25 July 2008 (UTC)
Jemmy, do not modify my comments with bolding or by breaking them in half, or insert your comments into the middle of mine. They are my commments - don't jumble yours up in the middle of them!
You said that I "...have STILL not responded to [your] justification for reverting, from over a week ago." You accuse me of reverting for a week without responding - that is NOT true. Look at all of the comments with my signature, look at the dates! There was only one time that I did not put something in the talk page and that was because you had said nothing different in your talk page comment and I would have been repeating myself to make a comment. It is you that did not respond for three deletions in a row and on several of your discussion entries you have been down-right rude and engaged in character assasination. You said that I "...have shown a clear unwillingness to discuss the issue." That is a blatant lie - look at the items with my signature on this page in the last week - do words mean nothing to you? Do you think you can just say anything and it magically has merit no matter how far from the truth it is. Do I need to count the words of my replies, the column inches?
You say that that the stolen concept fallacy has nothing to do with text. Excuse me, but if the text is organized into words and they represent concepts, then it does. You say "it [Branden's point] supposes that there is a concept used (not a symbol)..." Jemmy, in your mental world it may seem natural to have words (symbols) that have no meaning and it may seem natural to you to then provide us a seemingly endless stream of interpretations of meanings, just after saying they don't have meaning.
You accuse one of the editors of bias because he used the word "notable" as an adjective in a context outside of the WP policy for article inclusion. There is no good faith in that kind of loose and mistaken accusation.
You are not trying to treat this article or Proudhon in a scholarly fashion - you are trying to censor valid criticism.
"Theft" does NOT pre-date "property" - it can't for the reasons already given in the criticism you are so desperate to censor. The phrase stands on its own - in an article named with the phrase - a phrase often used to attack the concept of ANY property as valid - and the criticism is valid.
You fail to grasp that Marx and Branden are pointing out a flaw that is fatal to that phrase carrying any meaning other than some sort of fuzzy poetical illusion. I have not deleted the material saying that Proudhon didn't mean for it to be taken literaly. I have let my entry be edited down in size. I have tried to work with people here and they have tried to work with me - except for you! That entry is a valid and relevant criticism. All of your origonal research rants about what you think it means or what you think others mean or why you think the criticisms don't apply are in your head or in your comments but they aren't encyclopedia material or within WP policy. Stop being disruptive. Stop pushing your irrational hatred of anything remotely related to Objectivism - it is a personal agenda. Leave valid, sourced material alone.
I am not obliged to reply to every thing you say (some of which are barely intelligible). I have never failed to provide clear explanations of my actions and the reasons for them. I doubt that anyone else would think otherwise. -- Steve ( talk) 17:54, 26 July 2008 (UTC)
Branden's failure to even get "the phrase" correct has to reduce the notability of his remarks to nil. Libertatia ( talk) 05:52, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
You have still not responded to my comments of 21:19, 17 July 2008. Yes, you have indeed posted to this talk page -- but you did not respond to me regarding the deletion of this section. You really are confused about my motives: I am not trying to remove this material because it is critical, I am trying to remove it because it is embarrassing. I would like to be proud of the page, given the (admittedly small -- although not if you count this talk page crap) effort I've put into it.
Even now, you really aren't discussing the substance of my comments. You harp on my rudeness, accuse me of "ad hominem" (which is not what you think it is), etc., all the while failing to address the fact -- which really, I understand, you cannot address -- that this material is fringe crap, rather than serious scholarly content relevant to Proudhon. Objectivism is a little cult, you know? It doesn't belong on this page. You're just like one of those 911 truth guys. Think about all the poor suckers putting serious effort into documenting the 911 attacks, and then the 911 truth patrol comes around and fucks up their page. Of course they're going to be frustrated, even rude, but in that case there's enough of them to oust the quacks. In this case it's just me.
Anyway, I really have nothing to add to the comments I've posted, which you haven't substantially addressed. The administrators here are worthless -- they say it's a content dispute. There's really no dealing with quacks is there? You just have to outnumber them. Anyway maybe you could like do a google scholar search for "property is theft" -- I did it last night -- and see how the phrase is treated in the literature. In non-fringe publications, Proudhon is not interpreted obtusely as an easy way to defend property -- not because there aren't defenders of property, but because such an argument is in bad faith and would be embarrassing to make for a person who wants to look intelligent to intelligent people.
It's kind of ironic, the connection between the way Branden deliberately misinterprets Proudhon's phrase, and this particular discourse -- the way both cases say the same thing about discourses. If you're just trying to win, you always can, simply by not truly understanding the other guy -- not to say that anybody will bother to listen to you in turn.
This particular section is not intended to create a discussion. It is my own personal communication to you. I'd prefer you not immediately try to refute it, but just read it. (While you were reading it the first time, you may have been thinking up in your head ways to refute it. If so, would you please read it again, just as a personal favor to me?) If you'd like to discuss the deletion of the section, please respond to the substance of my comment on 21:19, 17 July 2008. — Jemmy t c 08:49, 27 July 2008 (UTC)
Right, this edit war stops here. Either we come to consensus on what should be in the article, pursue dispute resolution or disengage from this article. Anyone makes a tendentious reversion, I'm going to recommend they be blocked. Skomorokh 13:05, 27 July 2008 (UTC)
I've protected the article temporarily so that the dispute can be resolve somewhere else than in the article itself. The participants may wish to avail themselves of the dispute resolution options if they are unable to reach consensus here. — Coren (talk) 14:50, 27 July 2008 (UTC)
Should a section on the perceived literal contradiction of the phrase "property is theft!" be included in this article? See this diff for an example of such a section. Skomorokh 17:14, 28 July 2008 (UTC)
Briefly worded, but adequate, criticisms from both Marx and Branden are justified. Branden's material is better for explaining the fallacy, and the addition of Marx shows that the criticism extends beyond politics and economics and goes to the heart of meaning itself, in this particular phrase. That IS what the criticism is about. Having both helps demonstrate that the criticism isn't knee-jerk political reaction - having an equally brief counter-criticism rounds out the article such that every reader has the full picture instead of one POV or another - with nothing censored. -- Steve ( talk) 06:12, 29 July 2008 (UTC)
There is no very clear case for logical contradiction in What Is Property? Probably, there is no case at all. At the very beginning of the first chapter Proudhon defined the simple property that he criticized as one of a number of at least two forms, another of which is "possession." It is also necessary to consider that "contradiction" played a very specific role in Proudhon's philosophy, which should have been clear to Marx at the time of his criticism. It would be necessary to include material from "The System of Economic Contradictions" along with any criticisms, in order to be balanced and not badly mislead readers about the issues at stake. The waters get deep fast here, in a way that Wikipedia is notoriously bad at handling. Libertatia ( talk) 15:26, 30 July 2008 (UTC)
Yes it should be included. Presented diff is balanced and it gives to readers a better understanding of controversy behind the phrase. -- Vision Thing -- 16:35, 30 July 2008 (UTC)
Doesn't it concern anyone that Branden's demonstration of the "fallacy" depends on attributing to Proudhon a somewhat different statement than he actually made? Right now the article barely treats the meaning of Proudhon's phrase, or its use in his subsequent works. There are entirely uncontroversial facts, including the two definitions of property (as including possession and as only including domain) in What is Property?, which should certainly be included if the interpretations of Marx and Branden are to be included. There is simply no question that Branden and Marx depend on interpretations of the phrase to base their arguments, and if we treat them as if they do not, they we have engaged in interpretation. The NPOV position is that Proudhon's meaning is not absolutely clear, that he defined both property and possession in either complex or multiple ways, and if we wish to add that there are those who have treated the phrase as an example of logical contradiction, readers can understand quite easily why that is so. Libertatia ( talk) 18:19, 31 July 2008 (UTC)
As the editor who opened this RfC, did not participate in it, and favoured the inclusion of the disputed material, I think it's appropriate for me to close this RfC as no consensus for inclusion. Future discussions notwithstanding, the material should not be re-added. the skomorokh 09:59, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
RfC Question: Should a section on the perceived literal contradiction of the phrase "property is theft!" be included in this article? Responding in Favor: DAGwyn, EmbraceParadox, Steve, Vision Thing - Count = 4 Responding against: Liberatia, Skomorokh(?) - Count = 1 or 2 Clearly, the criticism section should be included. -- Steve ( talk) 22:57, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
Side comment I'm not participating in this RfC (i.e. you can go ahead and discount my opinion), but I would like to raise the issue of scope. We should decide whether this article is about the phrase "property is theft" in all its noteworthy uses and interpretations, or just about the phrase as Proudhon used and intended it. I would prefer the former; the non-Proudhonian material could be separated more forcefully than in the disputed version, i.e. instead of having a section on the "literal contradiction" of what Proudhon said ("no no no, this misunderstands Proudhon entirely"), we could have a section, late in the article, that said "The term has been noted outside the field of Proudhon scholarship by X, Y and Z in regards x, y, z". Thoughts? Skomorokh 11:00, 1 August 2008 (UTC)
Looking at "the phrase" with the words in reverse order, it's relatively easy to respond with "No, theft is not property, because a thief has no legitimate right to what was stolen".
Proudhon, as far as I can tell, argues that thieves are not the only illegitimate possessors; that there are also entire categories of what is ordinarily thought of as legitimately-owned property that Proudhon viewed as ILlegitimately-owned.
Two time-worn sayings seem to reach a confluence here:
"Possession is nine-tenths of the law"; "The law is an ass". TooManyFingers ( talk) 05:32, 17 December 2019 (UTC)
Whatever your answer to the question (please, don't supply it), if the question has any meaning then the phrase "property is theft" does not contradict itself -- because it supplies an answer; viz., "no."
I really don't want to have this debate. But I think it might be best -- or anyway the only way to resolve the dispute -- if this point were made very clear to all.
I would also like to emphasize two more points:
Vision Thing, would you check No Gods, No Masters, which I don't have here, to see whether the passage you added came from the System or from Confessions d'un révolutionnaire. Proudhon is referring to the System, and if I recall correctly the phrase "Property is liberty" appears first there (at least in the book-length texts.) Otherwise, that's a good start to clarifying. Libertatia ( talk) 19:39, 19 August 2008 (UTC)
It seems to me that if, we simply fleshed out the history of Proudhon's use of the term, we would include enough potential logical contradictions to satisfy those dead set on seeing them, as well as clarify Proudhon's actual positions. As it is, the article doesn't do much. Minimally, it would be good to mention the works in which the phrase was featured and then at least these instances: 1) his 1842 explanation to the court of assize, where he said he wanted to universalize property-robbery; 2) Solution of the Social Problem, where he defined theft as "non-reciprocity" and added that "communism is theft;" 3) the System of Economic Contradictions, where he lays out explicitly the economic contradictions relating to property; 4) something from Theory of Property. Most of this could be easily furnished from the "Selected Writings" anthology. Libertatia ( talk) 06:28, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
I'm sorry if this is mentioned in the discussion already & I didn't see it (there's so much) but I was wondering if anyone ever mentioned that with private property & all the fences the owners have to put up, like in wilderness areas, the fences prevent wild animals like deer & bears with babies from reaching food & water sources, so fences should be taken down? Stars4change ( talk) 05:25, 26 February 2009 (UTC) 69.228.86.161 ( talk) 05:24, 26 February 2009 (UTC)
I've protected the article for a week, again, as things have devolved anew into edit warring. Please settle down and agree on a consensus on the talk page about the final wording (and not basic principles you can then quibble over). Further warring may lead to blocks. — Coren (talk) 23:16, 11 November 2008 (UTC)
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What is not immediately clear when reading this article is that the term "property" is used here to mean real estate, or land, property, and not (I believe) any other kind of property (like stocks, a business, a car, or an apple or pencil for that matter). I suggest that this be made clear from the outset.
-- Serge 01:31, 30 August 2005 (UTC)
Proudhon believed in the control of the means of production by the workers themselves, and as a believer in the labour theory of value opposed profit-making enterprises. He believed that society should be organised as a federation of workers assemblies. True, he believed that goods should be exchanged in a market, but this market would have little in common with the capitalist idea of the free market (for example, goods were to be exchanged at "cost value", not whatever price would create the greatest profit). Workers self-management and the idea of a society organised as a federation of workers' organisations is of course key to most conceptions of libertarian socialism. No-one would suggest that Proudhon was a libertarian socialist exactly, but it seems perfectly reasonable to include a link to libertarian socialism. I haven't restored the link to communism, but a case certainly could be made. Proudhon had a significant influence on Marx's early writings. Cadr 00:38, 3 September 2005 (UTC)
Is the sentence, "The former is considered illegitimate property, the latter legitimate property.", which occurs somewhere around the middle of the longest paragraph, mistyped? -- Denihilonihil 13:54, 2 October 2005 (UTC)
There has to be some kind of documented response to this absurd premise:
So when someone provides the capital to buy the equipment to run a diamond mine and pay wages to the miners, when a miner finds a diamond, the miner retains "a natural right of property in the diamond which he has produced"? And when that miner takes his rough diamond to a cutter, whom he pays a wage to cut the diamond, the cutter owns the resulting cut diamonds he produces? And when the cutter pays a jeweler to mount one of the cut diamonds in a gold ring, the resulting diamond ring produced by the jeweler belongs to the jeweler? In a system that worked according to this principle, why would anyone be motivated to do anything except steal? -- Serge 21:57, 29 June 2006 (UTC)
Continuing with the diamond-mine example:
The person who owns the minesite is much more clearly in the role of Proudhon's thief.
There isn't a "sexy" word for this concept, other than theft; if Proudhon had said "Property is usurpation!", he would probably have been closer to his own meaning, but far fewer people would likely have listened. His use of a word that is both more dramatic and more familiar (while not being entirely misleading) is probably one of the main reasons that the idea has endured. TooManyFingers ( talk) 05:04, 17 December 2019 (UTC)
These two quotes are completely contradictory:
Further explanation/clarification is needed. -- Serge 22:10, 29 June 2006 (UTC)
"Property is theft !" is a slogan which is coined much sooner than Proudhon's book. It is first used by Brissot. Direct quote from Marx : "But as Proudhon entangled the whole of these economic relations in the general legal concept of “property,” “la propriété,” he could not get beyond the answer which, in a similar work published before 1789, Brissot had already given in the same words: “La propriété’ c’est le vol.”
http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1865/letters/65_01_24.htm
I removed the following:
There is no misunderstanding involved. It is a fallacy as it sits. He may have been doing a play on words for rhetorical effect but the words still have meaning. If the student stole the pencil from the school he would be using it, but that could not convey rightful ownership. Steve 21:52, 28 February 2007 (UTC)
There are several reasons why that paragraph is wrong:
Steve 20:35, 5 March 2007 (UTC)
I've removed the non-NPOV from the wording so that it's now a claim of contradiction and added the obvious logical rules showing why stolen concept simply doesn't logically work here. A non-neutral point of view, even with an outside source, is not appropriate. If you want to make it non-neutral by removing the references to the claim rather than as a fact (which they aren't since they are full of logical problems, which are demonstrated in the claim), then I'll simply delete it in the future. If you want to claim that a response of clarification to the non-neutral critique is not valid for not being sourced, then you fail under not being neutral. I'd rather just delete the inanity, but I'd rather give you a chance to respond to the actual reasoning for keeping your illogical contribution in the talk page or even in the actual article. Freedom of objectivist religion, I say. -- SAW
The Branden complaint seems to center around a too-literal reading of the slogan, whereas the rest of Proudhon's argument seems to make the meaning clear. Surely there are other critiques that are more relevant to the substance of the argument. An anarchist one would be most relevant; I suggest that one be included. — vivacissamamente 12:25, 13 July 2007 (UTC)
I have again restored the material that Jemmy keeps deleting. His last deletion was not mentioned here on the Talk page yet in the Edit summary of his deletion he accuses me of not explaining MY actions on the talk page. I am not the one behaving in a disruptive fashion. One can go back into the history of this article and see mentions of the logical contradiction inherent in the phrase (I saw this as far back as April 2006 which is as far as I looked). There have been many editors over the years who have written to that effect -pointing out this obvious fact. The criticism section was established and arrived at over 7 months ago under a concensus. Jeremy acts as if this page were his private property, deletes valid, relevant, proportional, sourced material which has a history of concensus. He then accuses me of being disruptional for restoring it. -- Steve ( talk) 08:48, 18 July 2008 (UTC)
Once again Jemmy has deleted the criticism section along with the reference. In the edit summary, he accuses me of disruptive behavior and threatend to initiate Administrative actions against me. I welcome any chance to bring impartial third party expertise to this issue. I have not been disruptive. The section in question was put in the article long ago as part of a consensus. It is a valid, proportional, appropriate entry for the article and has referenced source material. The value and purpose of the section for an encyclopedia article of this kind has been made clear on this page. The constant removal is the disruption. The attacks on me are unwarranted. This is the second time in a row that Jemmy has done this without even a brief note on this discussion page. I invite anyone to look at WP:DISRUPT and see whose actions best fit Wikipedia's policy. -- Steve ( talk) 05:13, 23 July 2008 (UTC)
Please see Talk:What Is Property?
Is there any way we can get rid of this? Right now, it looks absurd: the TOC follows the majority of the content. I added a section heading, "Background", after the first two paragraphs -- just to move the TOC up, where it makes more sense to be. Someone removed it. Fine by me, it was just a hack. But there has to be some way to get rid of the TOC? Anyone? — Jemmy t c 21:37, 17 July 2008 (UTC)
The material from Marx fits the section well. I restored the material from Branden since it gives added authority and a kind of balance. And because it is valid, appropriate, sourced material that should not have been removed. There is no requirement that a criticism be from the same historical period, particularly when it refers to the logical soundness of the phrase. Nor is the Marx quote any more relevant - both are references to the exact same phrase. I shifted to this new Talk page section since it is now clear that the criticism is about the phrase and not "Objectivist Critique". -- Steve ( talk) 18:52, 25 July 2008 (UTC)
Jemmy, do not modify my comments with bolding or by breaking them in half, or insert your comments into the middle of mine. They are my commments - don't jumble yours up in the middle of them!
You said that I "...have STILL not responded to [your] justification for reverting, from over a week ago." You accuse me of reverting for a week without responding - that is NOT true. Look at all of the comments with my signature, look at the dates! There was only one time that I did not put something in the talk page and that was because you had said nothing different in your talk page comment and I would have been repeating myself to make a comment. It is you that did not respond for three deletions in a row and on several of your discussion entries you have been down-right rude and engaged in character assasination. You said that I "...have shown a clear unwillingness to discuss the issue." That is a blatant lie - look at the items with my signature on this page in the last week - do words mean nothing to you? Do you think you can just say anything and it magically has merit no matter how far from the truth it is. Do I need to count the words of my replies, the column inches?
You say that that the stolen concept fallacy has nothing to do with text. Excuse me, but if the text is organized into words and they represent concepts, then it does. You say "it [Branden's point] supposes that there is a concept used (not a symbol)..." Jemmy, in your mental world it may seem natural to have words (symbols) that have no meaning and it may seem natural to you to then provide us a seemingly endless stream of interpretations of meanings, just after saying they don't have meaning.
You accuse one of the editors of bias because he used the word "notable" as an adjective in a context outside of the WP policy for article inclusion. There is no good faith in that kind of loose and mistaken accusation.
You are not trying to treat this article or Proudhon in a scholarly fashion - you are trying to censor valid criticism.
"Theft" does NOT pre-date "property" - it can't for the reasons already given in the criticism you are so desperate to censor. The phrase stands on its own - in an article named with the phrase - a phrase often used to attack the concept of ANY property as valid - and the criticism is valid.
You fail to grasp that Marx and Branden are pointing out a flaw that is fatal to that phrase carrying any meaning other than some sort of fuzzy poetical illusion. I have not deleted the material saying that Proudhon didn't mean for it to be taken literaly. I have let my entry be edited down in size. I have tried to work with people here and they have tried to work with me - except for you! That entry is a valid and relevant criticism. All of your origonal research rants about what you think it means or what you think others mean or why you think the criticisms don't apply are in your head or in your comments but they aren't encyclopedia material or within WP policy. Stop being disruptive. Stop pushing your irrational hatred of anything remotely related to Objectivism - it is a personal agenda. Leave valid, sourced material alone.
I am not obliged to reply to every thing you say (some of which are barely intelligible). I have never failed to provide clear explanations of my actions and the reasons for them. I doubt that anyone else would think otherwise. -- Steve ( talk) 17:54, 26 July 2008 (UTC)
Branden's failure to even get "the phrase" correct has to reduce the notability of his remarks to nil. Libertatia ( talk) 05:52, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
You have still not responded to my comments of 21:19, 17 July 2008. Yes, you have indeed posted to this talk page -- but you did not respond to me regarding the deletion of this section. You really are confused about my motives: I am not trying to remove this material because it is critical, I am trying to remove it because it is embarrassing. I would like to be proud of the page, given the (admittedly small -- although not if you count this talk page crap) effort I've put into it.
Even now, you really aren't discussing the substance of my comments. You harp on my rudeness, accuse me of "ad hominem" (which is not what you think it is), etc., all the while failing to address the fact -- which really, I understand, you cannot address -- that this material is fringe crap, rather than serious scholarly content relevant to Proudhon. Objectivism is a little cult, you know? It doesn't belong on this page. You're just like one of those 911 truth guys. Think about all the poor suckers putting serious effort into documenting the 911 attacks, and then the 911 truth patrol comes around and fucks up their page. Of course they're going to be frustrated, even rude, but in that case there's enough of them to oust the quacks. In this case it's just me.
Anyway, I really have nothing to add to the comments I've posted, which you haven't substantially addressed. The administrators here are worthless -- they say it's a content dispute. There's really no dealing with quacks is there? You just have to outnumber them. Anyway maybe you could like do a google scholar search for "property is theft" -- I did it last night -- and see how the phrase is treated in the literature. In non-fringe publications, Proudhon is not interpreted obtusely as an easy way to defend property -- not because there aren't defenders of property, but because such an argument is in bad faith and would be embarrassing to make for a person who wants to look intelligent to intelligent people.
It's kind of ironic, the connection between the way Branden deliberately misinterprets Proudhon's phrase, and this particular discourse -- the way both cases say the same thing about discourses. If you're just trying to win, you always can, simply by not truly understanding the other guy -- not to say that anybody will bother to listen to you in turn.
This particular section is not intended to create a discussion. It is my own personal communication to you. I'd prefer you not immediately try to refute it, but just read it. (While you were reading it the first time, you may have been thinking up in your head ways to refute it. If so, would you please read it again, just as a personal favor to me?) If you'd like to discuss the deletion of the section, please respond to the substance of my comment on 21:19, 17 July 2008. — Jemmy t c 08:49, 27 July 2008 (UTC)
Right, this edit war stops here. Either we come to consensus on what should be in the article, pursue dispute resolution or disengage from this article. Anyone makes a tendentious reversion, I'm going to recommend they be blocked. Skomorokh 13:05, 27 July 2008 (UTC)
I've protected the article temporarily so that the dispute can be resolve somewhere else than in the article itself. The participants may wish to avail themselves of the dispute resolution options if they are unable to reach consensus here. — Coren (talk) 14:50, 27 July 2008 (UTC)
Should a section on the perceived literal contradiction of the phrase "property is theft!" be included in this article? See this diff for an example of such a section. Skomorokh 17:14, 28 July 2008 (UTC)
Briefly worded, but adequate, criticisms from both Marx and Branden are justified. Branden's material is better for explaining the fallacy, and the addition of Marx shows that the criticism extends beyond politics and economics and goes to the heart of meaning itself, in this particular phrase. That IS what the criticism is about. Having both helps demonstrate that the criticism isn't knee-jerk political reaction - having an equally brief counter-criticism rounds out the article such that every reader has the full picture instead of one POV or another - with nothing censored. -- Steve ( talk) 06:12, 29 July 2008 (UTC)
There is no very clear case for logical contradiction in What Is Property? Probably, there is no case at all. At the very beginning of the first chapter Proudhon defined the simple property that he criticized as one of a number of at least two forms, another of which is "possession." It is also necessary to consider that "contradiction" played a very specific role in Proudhon's philosophy, which should have been clear to Marx at the time of his criticism. It would be necessary to include material from "The System of Economic Contradictions" along with any criticisms, in order to be balanced and not badly mislead readers about the issues at stake. The waters get deep fast here, in a way that Wikipedia is notoriously bad at handling. Libertatia ( talk) 15:26, 30 July 2008 (UTC)
Yes it should be included. Presented diff is balanced and it gives to readers a better understanding of controversy behind the phrase. -- Vision Thing -- 16:35, 30 July 2008 (UTC)
Doesn't it concern anyone that Branden's demonstration of the "fallacy" depends on attributing to Proudhon a somewhat different statement than he actually made? Right now the article barely treats the meaning of Proudhon's phrase, or its use in his subsequent works. There are entirely uncontroversial facts, including the two definitions of property (as including possession and as only including domain) in What is Property?, which should certainly be included if the interpretations of Marx and Branden are to be included. There is simply no question that Branden and Marx depend on interpretations of the phrase to base their arguments, and if we treat them as if they do not, they we have engaged in interpretation. The NPOV position is that Proudhon's meaning is not absolutely clear, that he defined both property and possession in either complex or multiple ways, and if we wish to add that there are those who have treated the phrase as an example of logical contradiction, readers can understand quite easily why that is so. Libertatia ( talk) 18:19, 31 July 2008 (UTC)
As the editor who opened this RfC, did not participate in it, and favoured the inclusion of the disputed material, I think it's appropriate for me to close this RfC as no consensus for inclusion. Future discussions notwithstanding, the material should not be re-added. the skomorokh 09:59, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
RfC Question: Should a section on the perceived literal contradiction of the phrase "property is theft!" be included in this article? Responding in Favor: DAGwyn, EmbraceParadox, Steve, Vision Thing - Count = 4 Responding against: Liberatia, Skomorokh(?) - Count = 1 or 2 Clearly, the criticism section should be included. -- Steve ( talk) 22:57, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
Side comment I'm not participating in this RfC (i.e. you can go ahead and discount my opinion), but I would like to raise the issue of scope. We should decide whether this article is about the phrase "property is theft" in all its noteworthy uses and interpretations, or just about the phrase as Proudhon used and intended it. I would prefer the former; the non-Proudhonian material could be separated more forcefully than in the disputed version, i.e. instead of having a section on the "literal contradiction" of what Proudhon said ("no no no, this misunderstands Proudhon entirely"), we could have a section, late in the article, that said "The term has been noted outside the field of Proudhon scholarship by X, Y and Z in regards x, y, z". Thoughts? Skomorokh 11:00, 1 August 2008 (UTC)
Looking at "the phrase" with the words in reverse order, it's relatively easy to respond with "No, theft is not property, because a thief has no legitimate right to what was stolen".
Proudhon, as far as I can tell, argues that thieves are not the only illegitimate possessors; that there are also entire categories of what is ordinarily thought of as legitimately-owned property that Proudhon viewed as ILlegitimately-owned.
Two time-worn sayings seem to reach a confluence here:
"Possession is nine-tenths of the law"; "The law is an ass". TooManyFingers ( talk) 05:32, 17 December 2019 (UTC)
Whatever your answer to the question (please, don't supply it), if the question has any meaning then the phrase "property is theft" does not contradict itself -- because it supplies an answer; viz., "no."
I really don't want to have this debate. But I think it might be best -- or anyway the only way to resolve the dispute -- if this point were made very clear to all.
I would also like to emphasize two more points:
Vision Thing, would you check No Gods, No Masters, which I don't have here, to see whether the passage you added came from the System or from Confessions d'un révolutionnaire. Proudhon is referring to the System, and if I recall correctly the phrase "Property is liberty" appears first there (at least in the book-length texts.) Otherwise, that's a good start to clarifying. Libertatia ( talk) 19:39, 19 August 2008 (UTC)
It seems to me that if, we simply fleshed out the history of Proudhon's use of the term, we would include enough potential logical contradictions to satisfy those dead set on seeing them, as well as clarify Proudhon's actual positions. As it is, the article doesn't do much. Minimally, it would be good to mention the works in which the phrase was featured and then at least these instances: 1) his 1842 explanation to the court of assize, where he said he wanted to universalize property-robbery; 2) Solution of the Social Problem, where he defined theft as "non-reciprocity" and added that "communism is theft;" 3) the System of Economic Contradictions, where he lays out explicitly the economic contradictions relating to property; 4) something from Theory of Property. Most of this could be easily furnished from the "Selected Writings" anthology. Libertatia ( talk) 06:28, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
I'm sorry if this is mentioned in the discussion already & I didn't see it (there's so much) but I was wondering if anyone ever mentioned that with private property & all the fences the owners have to put up, like in wilderness areas, the fences prevent wild animals like deer & bears with babies from reaching food & water sources, so fences should be taken down? Stars4change ( talk) 05:25, 26 February 2009 (UTC) 69.228.86.161 ( talk) 05:24, 26 February 2009 (UTC)
I've protected the article for a week, again, as things have devolved anew into edit warring. Please settle down and agree on a consensus on the talk page about the final wording (and not basic principles you can then quibble over). Further warring may lead to blocks. — Coren (talk) 23:16, 11 November 2008 (UTC)