Where does class division come from?

[The2ndWheel]

In the reality that we've constructed for ourselves over the last few thousand years, the ups and downs, good times and bad, do you think we can ever eliminate the notion of class? Is fixing whatever causes it the only way to solve the problem that so many have been fighting over for so long?

[The Backlash Cometh]

1. No. You can't eliminate it.

The best I've seen it handled is in a latin American country where the classes are so interwoven by blood that there is a coventional wisdom "PC" about each class's responsibility. The lower classes provide cheap labor, and the upper class has a noblesse oblige, helping out their poor family members where they can.

I have no hope that we can deal with it here. I even read a conservative think-tank opinion that stated that, in order to get a small group of students to excel above the others, you have to give them the feeling that they are superior. I wish I had kept the reference.

[Democrats_win]

2. Slavery.

[The Anti-Neo Con]

It comes naturally from Capitalism.

Class division is just one of those natural functions of capitalism, and as long as you have a capitalist system, class division cannot be eliminated. The only way to eliminate class division is to have a pure communist economic system.

[Finder]

5. Classes existed before capitalism as we know it...

and Communism has its own classes as well in practice so far.

[Tigermoose]

6. Power becomes the class distinction in Communism.

Those who make the decisions are the aristocrats.

[Kickoutthejams23]

8. Class has nothing to do with capitalism

It is much older than Capitalism and was quite prevalent and severe in Communist countries.

[Tigermoose]

3. Class distinctions are inevitable...

those who acquire money and power begin to see the people they use as "tools" and abstract ideas. Thus, a class conflict arises between those in power, and those that are being used as impersonal objects (aka tools). The human mind seems to be built upon conceptual metaphors that build from physical and biological reality up through abstractions that are "useful" for accomplishing tasks and desires. Thus, those with power will "use" those without, and those without must resist this and reassert their individual identity in order to prevent their own slavery.

Currently, the "lower" classes are in shackles because they see themselves in the terms imposed upon them by those in power. The media, government, etc speak of people as abstract identities in their reports, and these abstractions dominate conversation about politics and people. We are "consumers," "voters," "labor," etc. We need to promote the individual and not the abstraction imposed upon us by those in power.

[Finder]

4. I think it is human nature...

and democracy is the best way to secure the rights of all classes.

[kentuck]

7. The present Democratic Party seems to think so....

that we can eliminate it. Because they refuse to talk about it...

[Sir Jeffrey]

9. Class division is in our blood...

we evolved from primates.

Even as hunter-gatherers the small groups had the best hunters, the caretakers, and so forth. It functioned as a meritocracy (the best for a job). However, after the "best" had their time in the limelight, they were destined to lose to the younger, faster, better, smarter generation.

After the transition from hunter-gatherering to farming, land and wealth became something you could store up for the future and your children. Meritocracy had to be defeated by those with the power and authority at that time. People in power do not give up their position willingly.

Every form of government since that transition is, to varying degrees, designed to maintain the rights of the privileged lords and wealthy elites at the expense of the masses. Representative government is the latest form.

Fixing the notion of class is probably impossible. Every society is destined to have an unfair division of labor, uneven levels of competency, limited resources, and vast amounts of wealth consolidated in a few hands.

[The Deacon]

10. Actually,

The idea that "status" among primates is a meritocracy is a Victorian idea which modern research has debunked - often the dominate ("alpha") male is chimpaneze groups is very bad at securing food, he simply happens to be either the mate of the highest statys female or the male offspring of a hogh status female. Status in chimp society (and we share 98% of our genes with chimps) is based upon social interaction & is a combination of intimidating those you can and bribing those you can't intimidate. Human society is much the same.

[Finder]

11. Bonobos blew that theory out of the water...lol n/t