this is richard wolff from democracy at
work responding to another ask
prof wolf question from our patreon
community this question comes from
heater and heater asks
whether in marxism there have been
attempts to understand
to theorize what happens to people who
cannot sell their labor power their
ability to work
and therefore resort to selling their
bodies
or their body parts literally
skin teeth and hair but of course the
major one
that heater has in mind and mentions in
the question
is prostitution selling if not your body
literally
will then access sexual
access to your body and to sexual
services performed by your body
well the short answer is marx did not
write
about that specifically
but many marxists since marx have
written about these topics there is a
literature
all about the kinds of questions
that people who got interested in
marxism and his critique of capitalism
wanted to develop if you like the
marxian
analytical framework so it could
shed some light on these other uh
phenomena from a critical perspective
so i'm going to share with you a few of
the kinds of
insights that have been generated in a
sizable and now growing marxist
literature
about those questions
well let's begin by noting with marx
that one of the distinguishing
characteristics of capitalism
is that they it makes as a system
labor itself becomes a commodity
you buy the effort the labor
effort of a person how a person
uses his or her mind and body
under your supervision as a capitalist
is something you buy so the capitalist
the employer
buys your capacity to work
does not literally buy your body but
buys the capacity of your body and
indeed your mind as well to do work
so the capitalist has you come at a
certain time
to a certain place to work on certain
raw materials that the employer provides
using tools equipment and machines that
the employer provides
and you're to do the work that the
employer directs you to do
for the eight hours of the day or
however many hours you work
and at the end of the day in capitalism
you go home
but the employer gets the fruit of your
labor
he already had your employer did
ownership of the tools equipment and raw
materials
he already had ownership of your labor
time
your capacity to work over whatever the
length of the working day was
but at the end of the working day the
capitalist gets something else
the fruits of your labor
what you can produce tools
equipment being used on raw materials
by you generate a product
this is remarkable because you know
in slavery and in feudalism the work
capacity of a person was not bought and
sold
as a commodity there was no wage labor
market in slavery the body was
literally owned by the masters
the masters were few the slaves were
many
the masters owned the slaves
and they could tell them what to do but
they didn't buy
the mental and physical capability of
the worker
and they didn't in feudalism either
there the serf lived on the land
as his or her parents had and had a
network of obligations to the lord
that were sanctified in the church but
the lord didn't buy
and sell labor power of the serfs there
was
nothing like what we call a labor market
there were no wages paid none of that
capitalism is the commodity system par
excellence it commodifies
human effort the use of our brains and
muscles
to do things becomes a capacity
we sell to other people
this idea of course spreads
it doesn't stop at the border of the
goods and services we
normally think of it's always only a
matter of time
before markets develop in all of the
goods and services
that weren't initially understood
to be part of the economic system so yes
you can think of labor as cooking or
cleaning
or making something in a factory
but it isn't a large stretch and it
hasn't been
for capitalism to begin to think of
other things that weren't that kind
of commodifiable effort
like sex sexual activity
sexual servicing sexual interactions
so of course it would sooner or later
occur
either to an employer or an employee
to produce and market sexual
services and indeed
enterprising entrepreneurs have always
done that
as far back as we know in the history of
capitalism
sooner or later in that part of town
where that kind of activity happens you
will discover and that is true
to this moment you will discover
enterprising men and women
who hire others
human beings to provide sexual services
to a public customer
they charge for that they pay a salary
to those who supply the sexual services
and they keep the profits or surplus for
themselves
that would be capitalism
engaging in sexual
service production for a profit
of course it doesn't have to be
organized that way
prostitution just like everything else
doesn't have to be organized
in a capitalist way instead of the
capitalist producing and selling sexual
services
performed by hired workers
a person can become a self-employed
provider of sexual services just like a
lawyer
can either function as an individual
doing legal services
for money or hire himself or hire
herself
out to a legal firm an enterprise
where they're paid a salary doctors are
the same
architects are the same all kinds of
people
can move from being an employee in a
capitalist
output outfit to being
self-employed and that goes for
everybody who sells body parts skin
hair teeth anybody who sells
sexual services and so on
the fundamental idea i think most
marxists have come up with is that
capitalism makes it
easy for lots of people to think about
doing this to see the profit
that can be gleaned here and to push
against the traditional laws
the religious prohibitions that have
made these kinds of activities among
others
something you're supposed to keep
outside
of the economic realm
and i'm reminded in closing of that
famous story of the
midas king midas who was so enamored of
gold
like capitalists are of profit that he
got carried away when he discovered he
had a special touch
that convert everything to gold and so
he
took advantage of getting that skill
and then touched his daughter who
stopped being a living breathing person
and became a solid gold person
who was no longer the human being he
loved and needed
the notion of that is having to do with
capitalism's
abuse of sexuality in advertising
in production in every conceivable way
should not escape anyone's notice
this is richard wolff for democracy
at work