{"id":249897,"date":"2024-01-17T12:31:15","date_gmt":"2024-01-17T12:31:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.worldsocialism.org\/spgb\/?page_id=249897"},"modified":"2024-02-07T11:48:41","modified_gmt":"2024-02-07T11:48:41","slug":"human-nature-2","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/www.worldsocialism.org\/spgb\/introduction\/human-nature-2\/","title":{"rendered":"Human nature"},"content":{"rendered":"

What is human nature?<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

We\u2019re often told that socialism is impossible because human beings are naturally violent, selfish, lazy and uncooperative.<\/p>\n

If that were true, it would mean that we\u2019re all built to stop in bed all day. But then we\u2019d get hungry. We\u2019d have to go out and beat someone until they gave us food, something to wear and so on. No other way to get stuff because we\u2019re lazy. At some later date, we go out again and batter someone else until they agree to make us a new bed because we\u2019ve worn out the old one.<\/p>\n

Except we\u2019re ALL lazy so there\u2019d be nobody to do the work needed to provide the food and the bed and other necessities.<\/p>\n

OK, it\u2019s a daft example, but no dafter than claiming that \u2018human nature\u2019 condemns us to living under the \u2018selfish\u2019 rule of capitalism forever.<\/p>\n

Does it exist at all?<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

Truth is, whenever anyone mentions human nature, they usually end up talking about behaviour, and behaviour seen through a very distorted lens of media sensationalism.<\/p>\n

We\u2019re not na\u00efve, we know people can be horrible. But when circumstances allow or require \u2013 and this is the case most of the time \u2013 we act reasonably towards others and help them in all sorts of ways, even putting ourselves at risk sometimes. That\u2019s what we do because we are social beings. And this happens despite our growing up in a society that promotes dog-eat-dog competition and so-called individualism.<\/p>\n

Increasingly, science is showing us that we as a species could never have been as successful as we are without cooperation \u2013 the truth of survival of the friendliest is fast taking over from the myth of survival of the fittest.<\/p>\n

Capitalism is man-made \u2013 it\u2019s up to us now to unmake it<\/strong><\/p>\n

Read more about the SPGB\u00a0\u27a1\ufe0f<\/a><\/p>\n

\n⬅️ List of articles<\/a><\/p>\n

\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

What is human nature? We\u2019re often told that socialism is impossible because human beings are naturally violent, selfish, lazy and uncooperative. If that were true, it would mean that we\u2019re all built to stop in bed all day. But then we\u2019d get hungry. We\u2019d have to go out and beat someone until they gave us … <\/p>\n

Read more “Human nature”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2680,"featured_media":0,"parent":249837,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_bbp_topic_count":0,"_bbp_reply_count":0,"_bbp_total_topic_count":0,"_bbp_total_reply_count":0,"_bbp_voice_count":0,"_bbp_anonymous_reply_count":0,"_bbp_topic_count_hidden":0,"_bbp_reply_count_hidden":0,"_bbp_forum_subforum_count":0,"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-249897","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.worldsocialism.org\/spgb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/249897","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.worldsocialism.org\/spgb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.worldsocialism.org\/spgb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.worldsocialism.org\/spgb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2680"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.worldsocialism.org\/spgb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=249897"}],"version-history":[{"count":8,"href":"https:\/\/www.worldsocialism.org\/spgb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/249897\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":250373,"href":"https:\/\/www.worldsocialism.org\/spgb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/249897\/revisions\/250373"}],"up":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.worldsocialism.org\/spgb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/249837"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.worldsocialism.org\/spgb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=249897"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}