A.R. Moxon: I'd invite you to recognize how often labor-saving devices actually remove from increasing numbers of human beings the ability to make a living from their labor, so that people with more than they can ever use can have even more more-than-they-can-ever-use.

Last week an image went viral online. It was generated by a computer from the classic movie 12 Angry Men. It added no value, and it was being used for no good reason. It's a perfect encapsulation of where our dominant cultural narrative has brought us. www.the-reframe.com/the-human-pr...

The Human Problemwww.the-reframe.com Appreciating the artists who matter to you, and why you should. Paying human artists in the age of A.I. slop, if you can, and why you should.

It's my belief that things that provide positive value to humans are good, and that those who make good things should be compensated for it. I also believe that people should have access to good things whether or not they can pay. It's the reason I love libraries, for example.

This strikes me as an appropriate way to organize society, provided that we believe society is meant to benefit humans rather than money, and that humans—being inherent generators of value and of limitless potential value—deserve the fruits of society even if they can't pay.

But I think we all know that our society is organized around different beliefs, a core one being that the purpose of society is to benefit money rather than humans. If you doubt this, I'd invite you to observe all the ways that, for example, libraries are under attack these days.

I'd invite you to recognize how often labor-saving devices actually remove from increasing numbers of human beings the ability to make a living from their labor, so that people with more than they can ever use can have even more more-than-they-can-ever-use.

Another core belief in our dominant societal narrative seems to involve treating human beings as a cost rather than a value, and still another seems to be that human costs should be eliminated, often at a social expense greater than the cost.

I suppose this might be expected in a country founded in human slavery, but it seems to me an inappropriate and unsustainable way to organize a society, and I write rather extensively about why in The Reframe.

The Reframe is a weekly newsletter. People subscribe to it, even though they don't have to. It's totally free for everybody, because I don't want anybody who enjoys my writing but can't afford to pay for it to have to stop enjoying my writing. www.the-reframe.com

The Reframewww.the-reframe.com Free Weekly Essays on Politics and Fiction from author A.R. Moxon. Pay-What-You-Want support model.

It's also free because I believe that you change society by modeling your personal beliefs and hoping other people will join their similar personal beliefs with your personal beliefs to create a collective belief—which is when a belief can really get cooking, belief-wise.

So, I make sure The Reframe remains free, and in so doing I extend my trust to everybody. My faith is that if readers find enough value in my work to pay for it and can afford to pay, then they will, and if they do not find value, or cannot afford to pay, they will not.

And look: hundreds of people pay. Some pay a little bit every month. Some pay rather a lot every year. I'm very glad and grateful for all of it, because it means that the trust I extended has been honored. A curious and wonderful thing.

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