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Vikings earned their broadly spread genetics in much the same way, complete moral depravity and means. Just because something is stolen doesn’t make it unearned, and just because something is earned doesn’t entitle possession. Theft begets reprisal.

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1 point

Labor theory of value as applied to all human activity.

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Just examples to illustrate that earning, deserving, rightfully belonging, etc. aren’t necessarily the right words to use in this context, but I guess it could be seen as vaguely communist in the right light. More sociological than political, though. Tax the rich, jail the physically and sexually belligerent.

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it’s not a communist sentiment at all. labor theory of value is predicated on socially necessary labor not just doing any old thing.

what youre doing with those statements though is pretty disingenuous. the idea of earning comes from labor (it’s literally the germanic to english word for a laborer and their pay) and has always meant that the subject of the verb deserves the object.

you could argue that the raiding parties believed they had earned their spoils, but in a human culture that generally doesn’t hold that belief, saying it without that qualifier implies assent to the ancient raiding parties belief.

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