The whole world is your property, says the romantic and cynic Novalis: you own everything.
The state will own everything, says the NWO-evangelist Klaus Schwab. You own nothing . You will rent everything.
You own what you have a legal claim to, most say:
- Prodhoun says that, claiming to know your needs and calling you a thief, if your property exceeds your needs, then your property would become theft.
- The anarcho-capitalists say that, just like all citizens, they just want to privatize the police, to protect your rightful property. Stefan Blankertz, a well-known German anarcho-capitalist says clearly: The right to private property protects the weak, the powerful otherwise simply take what they want.
- The socialists say you own what you have worked for (by the sweat of your brow, they are stewards of the right based on Paul’s invention of original sin) and only that is your rightful property.
The Cynics: “No Rights, just Mights”
We see it like Novalis: I own everything. You own everything.
You can take anything you want if you have the power to do so.
Property is theft, we also say, and encourage you to become a robber. Because “one should only steal where one cannot rob” also says Nietzsche.
Everyone has become poor through work. Imagine a God as a bargain hunter who wants to make an exchange as cheap as possible, rubbing his hands with a grin afterwards. What is more pathetic?
Diogenes Logic: Everything belongs to the gods. The gods are our friends. Friends share everything. So everything belongs to us.
Understanding this cynical philosophy encountered difficulties even in ancient times. There were already the rights holders and the work fetishists who accused the cynics of not working.
Jesus tells about this conflict in his story of Martha and Mary. Martha complains that Mary listens to him and makes beautiful eyes, while she, Martha, does all the work. Jesus does not give Martha the right. Your sister Mary has chosen the better part, he says to Martha. Presumably Martha continued to toil after that, just a little more grumpy than before. Where would we go if everyone were like the cynics, the mob already complained in ancient times.
Only the ruler said: “If I didn’t have to be Alexander, I would want to be like you. So not work, but take, cheekily beg like a robber. The rich have always known how to rob and nobody envies Martha, the early bird. Early bird catches the worm. We then eat the bird. A beggar in Germany earns three times as much per hour as a worker. Why should he be grumpy?
Eudaimonia: no scruples, no envy, no jealousy
Those who do not read on now may think cynics are greedy opportunists, always on the hunt for more. But our knowledge that everything is already our property is, on the contrary, to calm the greed.
Diogenes, who in the last paragraph sets up the logic that everything belongs to us as friends of the gods, also says:
“It is divine to need nothing, and godlike to need little.”
You own everything. But you need little.
You know the feeling of having bought an expensive gimmick, like the latest iPhone. For two days you’re thrilled. Then you’ re no longer particularly interested in it. It becomes an everyday object. It is no different with a luxurious penthouse, a boat and even a helicopter or Lear jet. After a short time, it is no longer special. It becomes an everyday object. It is no different with the luxurious penthouse, with a boat and even with a helicopter or Lear jet. After a short time, it’s nothing special.
This feeling that your property is something taken for granted, that doesn’t excite you much, you can already create if you see everything as attainable and self-evident for you, as your property, even if you haven’t taken it yet. If I think now of my last BMW or my cooking knife, then my cooking knife is more valuable to me. I love taking care of it, sharpening it, using it, oiling it after use (because it’s made of non-stainless steel). The less you own, the more valuable those few things become to you. I wouldn’t want to be without my chef’s knife. I could. I love it without being dependent on it.
The Stoics also understood
And so Stoics recommend: Do not say your wife, your child, your house. Say: a wife, a child, a house. For infinity is your property. If your child dies, say to yourself, only one child has died out of an infinite number of children who are yours, who are your property. If your wife leaves you, then only a woman has gone, who was only lent to you — and now we are even with Schwab — and whom you have now given back. Also your child was only lent to you, also your life only something which was lent to you and which you can and will give back again gladly and gratefully. But you are not a have-not, not a destitute, not poor, because everything is your property. Everything you know and also everything you are yet to know. Nothing belongs to the state. But everything belongs to you.
Property from the Stoic Perspective
Stoics come to almost the same conclusion with a different approach. They say your property is only that which cannot be taken from you. Your house, your children, your health, etc. are not your property. To have “the greatest power over yourself, to become your own property” is for Seneca an invaluable asset that grants inner freedom. Self-determination is the only property for Stoics. Like us cynics, Stoics are concerned with independence from things as the way to achieve eudaimonía.
At the core of both directions is the focus on parrhesia, knowing, telling and living the truth about ourselves: the will to might.