Ask Prof Wolff: Abortion Rights - An Anti-Capitalist Perspective

A Patron of Economic Update asks: "What is the connection between capitalism and the ability for rulers to control women's bodies and the quantity of laborers born (what the business world refers to as 'human capital')?"

This is Professor Richard Wolff's video response.

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“Marxism always was the critical shadow of capitalism. Their interactions changed them both. Now Marxism is once again stepping into the light as capitalism shakes from its own excesses and confronts decline.”

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[democracyatwrk]

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[pvaldez]

Thanks for all the "watercooler weapons, " Dr. Wolff! You give me the strength to not ever shy away from the term "Marxism!"

[michaelandrews]

You can't ban abortions you can only ban safe abortions.

[mjholiday]

Dr. Wolff's videos should be shown to every student in every classroom around the world. I wish he would do a video expressing his thoughts on WHY everyone is so COMPLICIT in accepting and escalating our horrid "reality, " that is, a global system that controls and directs all of our lives that is based on slavery. How is it that social media are not bursting at the seams with a constant outrage against this "reality?" How is it that the 99% have been so tolerant of such a system of slavery for so long? When will the global centers of political & economic "power" and the handful of corporations that control every aspect of our miserable lives (compared with what our lives COULD be) start looking like the presidential palace in Sri Lanka?

[Thesupidchannel]

While the intersection of banning abortion and capitalism is not well known, this knowledge is essential when advocating for reproductive rights as well as against all forms of the patriarchal order. In our capitalist economy, the abortion ban is not just a difference of opinion - the overturning of Roe v Wade is just one of many moves in the capitalist agenda playbook to accumulate labourers.

For capitalism to “thrive” it requires the emphasis of a two-gendered hierarchy, a gendered division of labor, along with forcing the birthing body into the service of capitalism. Furthermore, it characterizes “feminine” work as unproductive and valueless to avoid acknowledgement or compensation as it would threaten its system of profit, hierarchy and domination.

This overturning is a tool of oppression used to breed a vulnerable and suppressed population who are then pushed into the role as a wage laborer. Creating barriers to families and single parents who are pregnant and unable to access an abortion when needed not only possibly creates financial instability but can also create time poverty, especially for the mother. This ultimately reduces social mobility, where access to education and employment becomes harder to obtain due to a lack of money and time, on top of lost potential earnings. 

Moreover, in our current society, the race for profits, efficiency and endless growth ignores unpaid labor and focuses on GDP and other economic measures of growth and productivity; while ignoring the fact that household production is one of, if not the largest and most productive sector in the world.  And while the caregiving and domestic work many provide in the home today is still devalued, domestic and caregiving work outside the home in care sectors such as nursing, teaching, and child care, is also devalued, and that devaluation is extended to the men who also participate in these roles. Especially compared to sectors built on competition such as industry, politics and business.

In an alternative world caregiving and domestic labor and other types of productive roles, which produce and sustain the current and future generations, would be valued, recognized and supported by the government and society. Instead, we are still dealing with the tools of punishment and domination - cornerstones of the capitalist patriarchy. In reality, humans did not evolve because of competition, they evolved because of altruism and reciprocity.

In addition to the overturning of Roe v Wade, on this same day it has also been announced that the U.S. may overturn Griswold v. Connecticut (right for married couples to buy and use contraceptives / 1965), Lawrence v. Texas (right of same sex adults to engage in mutually consenting intimacy / 2003), and Obergefell v Hodges (right for same-sex couples to be married / 2015). While this is extremely concerning it is unfortunately not unexpected.

The main agenda being pumped out by the supreme court revolves around productivity. And no, not just the productivity of our labor, but of being “reproductively productive”. It seems that those in favour of overturning these rulings see same sex intimacy and sex with any form of contraceptive as unproductive to their efforts of accumulating labourers.

With all of this in mind, I firmly believe the ban on abortion is a poor and uninformed way to accumulate labor. While the reality is sadly that abortions will still occur, now just in unsafe conditions.

[allyson]

I think it’s simpler than this. Parents will accept worse conditions than child-free workers. They have more to lose and less likely to rock the boat. Then add the “benevolent” employers now offering to send workers to other states; what kind of strings will come with that?

[ProleDaddy]

As a communist, I ask that you drop the liberal talking points, such as gun control. We should all know what Marx said about arming the worker and all communists should agree that we need to defend ourselves from the violence of the capitalist class.

[jeffreywillstewart]

Great to have seen you on the Bitchuation Room last Sunday with John and Francesca. I love Prof Wolff. You are worthy of the name.

[eelkeaptroot]

Thanks doc! I figured it would also be in their interest cause in the long run it will likely result in more consumers to who they can then market their over-priced goods.

[daemeonation]

I am just gonna go out on a limb before this gets started and say the corporations need slaves so abortion is no good for them.

[eddieo]

The book "The Lorax" comes to mind...the Onceler, is the capitalist that destroyed the books entire world...

[stoneybologna]

The employers find the people that find comfort in their hierarchy rather than oppression.

[patrickmccormack]

"It is not so important what others thinks of you, but what you think of others." - Gore Vidal

[milesobrien]

It's always confusing to me when Prof Wolff differentiates between _capitalist_ employers and _some other system's_ employers. Make no mistake, whether it's a single employer or a committee of employers, the decision to hire or fire, what to produce and the potential successful marketing of that product, has to be made. *Profit* that dirty word to Socialists still has to be made. It's only _the distribution_ of those profits that _could be different_
Are we to presume that a company making a product that is unsuccessful in the marketplace will continue to operate? If workers are identified as _unsuitable_ or _surplus to needs_ are we to assume under a co-operative model that no layoffs will occur?
Anybody got an answer?

[thebigerns]

Bodily control of a person is slavery. Control where a body goes and what it does and when it does it, is engaging in slavery. When a slave voluntarily accepts the terms of their enslavement it still is slavery.

[mikerottier]

Control over women has everything to do with governing and power. When you control women, you can reward the obedient males with a job, and thus a wife, and children. If you are not an obedient male, you don't get either of these, because unfortunately women cooperate in this system: if you have no job, you will not have their children. There are exceptions of this rule, but they are rare. This applies to every culture, now and in the past. And yes, it's a very uncomfortable truth.

[isaacinternet]

Huge thumbs up. I’ve been thinking about this and you explained it perfectly

[MVR_]

wealth is also concentrated with the aged
so the political projection of power
bends towards elderly nostalgia of the past
regardless of whether that memory is accurate.

[scottyharp]

After "giving" raises to the Amazon workers in 2018 to $15/hr, based on a 40 hour work week, Jeff Bezos would make that employee's annual salary in...

11.5 seconds.

[md.muzahidulislamsamrat]

Israel should be added to a UN blacklist if its violence against Palestinian children is repeated this year, UN chief Antonio Guterres said on Monday.

In its annual Children and Armed Conflict report, the UN said Israeli forces killed 78 Palestinian children, maimed another 982 and detained 637 in 2021.

“I am shocked by the number of children killed and maimed by Israeli forces during hostilities, in air strikes on densely populated areas and through the use of live ammunition during law enforcement operations, ” the UN secretary-general said in the report.

"Should the situation repeat itself in 2022, without meaningful improvement, Israel should be listed, " he added.