“Property is theft!” ~ EA
‘I wonder who this ship belongs to anyway,’ said Arthur.
‘Me,’ said Zaphod.
‘No. Who it really belongs to.’
‘Really me,’ insisted Zaphod. ‘Look, property is theft, right? Therefore theft is property. Therefore this ship is mine, okay?’
Just a few days ago I was re-reading the Restaurant at the end of the universe, and was going to try and look up this quote before reading the comments. I’ve really got to get around to reading the rest of the books by Douglas Adams, as I loved his hitchhiker’s guide to the Galaxy series.
If I were asked to answer the following question: What is slavery? and I should answer in one word, It is murder!, my meaning would be understood at once. No extended argument would be required to show that the power to remove a man’s mind, will, and personality, is the power of life and death, and that it makes a man a slave. It is murder. Why, then, to this other question: What is property? may I not likewise answer, It is robbery!, without the certainty of being misunderstood; the second proposition being no other than a transformation of the first?
Pierre-Joseph Proudhon, What Is Property?