British Socialism: An Examination of Its Doctrines, Policy, Aims and Practical ProposalsBarker, J. Ellis
History
British Socialism: An Examination of Its Doctrines, Policy, Aims and Practical Proposals
Barker, J. Ellis
Socialism; Socialism -- Great Britain
"Q. Is there any difference in the teachings at Socialist Sunday
schools and other Sunday schools? A. Yes.--Q. What is taught in
Christian schools? A. Christian morals and capitalist teachings.--Q.
What is meant by the term 'employing men for profit'? A. Capitalists,
when they pay wages, make the workers produce three or four times the
amount they pay them. The extra which the men produce over their wages
is called profit.--Q. What evidence is there that the workers earn a
great amount and get very little? A. The national amount of wealth
produced every year is two thousand millions and the amount paid out
in wages is only five hundred millions, showing that the poor are poor
because they are robbed.--Q. Who creates all wealth? A. The working
class.--Q. Who creates all poverty? A. Our capitalist society.--Q. Who
are the workers? A. Men who work for wages.--Q. What class of men get
into Parliament? A. The capitalist and aristocratic class?--Q. How is
that? A. Because the workers are opposed by men interested in keeping
them poor.--Q. How many children are there in London who go to school
insufficiently fed and clothed? A. It is stated as many as 100,000; a
number equal to the population of a small county.--Q. To what class do
these poor starving children belong? A. The working class.--Q. Is it
not the working class which creates all wealth? A. Yes.--Q. Do the
rich trouble about the poor children of London who are ill-fed and
clothed? A. No.--Q. What is a pauper? A. One who lives upon others,
while being able to work?--Q. Are the rich class able to work? A. Yes;
because they are well cared for when young and grow up strong?--Q. Do
they work? A. No; they consider it menial and beneath them.--Q. Then
they are paupers? A. Yes.--Q. Do the rich and their children live at
the expense of those who work? A. Yes.--Q. What does machinery enable
the workers to do? A. To produce wealth quicker.--Q. Do the workers
benefit by machinery? A. No. On the contrary. It generally reduces
their wages and throws them out of work.--Q. Why is that? A. Because
the machinery is controlled by the capitalist class.--Q. What is a
wage-slave? A. A person who works for a wage and gives all he earns to
a capitalist.--Q. What proportion does a wage-slave receive of what he
earns? A. On the average about a fourth. The slave and serf always had
food, clothing, and shelter. The wage-slave, when he is out of work,
must now starve or go into the workhouse and be made miserable, or
commit suicide.--Q. What is the remedy for wage-slavery? A.
Socialism.--Q. Who pays the rent? A. Father and mother.--Q. Who
demands the rent? A. The landlord.--Q. Can you say how much the
landlord takes from the wages of father, generally for rent? A. Yes; a
fourth.--Q. That is sheer robbery, is it not? A. Yes; but working men
cannot help it.--Q. Why is that? A. Because the landlord class have a
monopoly of land and houses, and workmen have no land and are too poor
to build for themselves."[1027]
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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