- ........................ _ _ .. ... ·-·-··--······--·-·-··-·········-··- .. - ~··-· WILL COMMUNIST ANARCHISM WORK? Would not epidemics sweep our city but for the street and gutter clcanel'I ? Surely, the men who keep our town clean and sarutary arc real benefactors, more vital to our health and welfare than the :family physician. From the viewpoint of social usefulness the street cleaner is the professional colleague of the doctor : the latter treats us when we are ill, but the former helps us keep well. Yet the physician is looked up to and respected, while the street cleaner is slighted. Why ? Is it because the street cleaner's work is dirty ? But the surgeon often has much " dirtier " jobs to perform. Then why is the street cleaner scorned. Because he earns little. In our perverse civilisation things are valued according to money. standards. Persons doing the most useful work are lowest in the social scale when their employment is ill paid. Should something happen, however, that would ~":use the street cleaner. to get I oo dollars a day, while the phys1c1an earns 50, the " dirty " street cleaner would immediately rise in estimation and social station, and from the "filthy labourer" he would become the much-sought man of good income. · You see that it is pay, remuneration, the wage scale, not worth or merit, that to-day-under our system of profit-determines the value of work as well as the " worth " of a man. A sensible society-under Anarchist conditions-would have, entirely different standards of judging such matters. People will then be appreciated according to their willingness to be socially useful. Can you perceive what great changes such a new attitude would produce ? Every one yearns for the respect and admiration of his fellow men : it is a tonic we cannot live without. Even in prison I have. se~n how the clever pickpocket or safe blower longs for the appreciation o_fhis friends and how hard he tries to earn their good estimate_of him. The opinions of our circle rule our behaviour. The social ~tmosphere to a profound degree determines our values an_d~>Urattitude. Your personal experience will tell you how true this 1s, and therefore you will not be surpr_isedwhen I say that in an An~rchist society it will be ~he most useful and difficult toil that m_enwill seek rather than the lighter job. If you consider this, you will have no more fear of laziness or shirking. But the hardest and most onerous task could be made easier and :leaner than is the case to-day. The capitalist employer does not _are to spend money, if he can help it, to make the toil of his employees pleasanter and brighter. He will introduce improvements only when he hopes to gain larger profits thereby, but he will not go to extra expense out of purely hui:nanitarian reasons. Though here 33 B bllotecc1G ro B13'1CO
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