Since I made the original post, I have had comments from readers indicating that they were not grasping exactly what it was that I was trying to say, sometimes asking "What's wrong with sharing?". Therefore, I expatiate here in a bit more detail.
Philosopher Ayn Rand tells us that there are 2 kinds of people in the world, the producers and the looters.
Producers sustain themselves (and society) by using their minds and their talents to create objects that they consider that they themselves own, and that they themselves expect to trade for things that others creators have produced - a voluntary value for value exchange if you will. Their creating is not limited to creating things such as a new metal alloy used for railway track, or creating software for manipulation of data, but also includes business systems and organizational structures for efficient production and administration of the products that flow from their creations or the creations of others.
As an example of a value for value exchange, consider two neighbors, Farmer A and Rancher B. Farmer A grows grain, and Rancher B raises and fattens cattle for sale. Farmer A wants beef, but raises none of his own, while Rancher B, wants grain but grows none of his own. It is easy to see that Farmer A and Rancher B will be induced out of self interest (ooooo scary words for a collectivist), to strike a value for value exchange. Farmer A trading some grain for cattle- Rancher B trading some cattle for grain. Both, with each doing what they do best (Farming or Ranching), end up having their self interested needs satisfied by this voluntary exchange, and this then results in a net increase in value of the Farmer-Rancher system - product trades hands and the immediate surplus (extra value) is that we have 2 satisfied parties.
This is not the only value that is created, for there is an additional increase in value that arises because if such exchange had not happened, the Rancher would have to become a less efficient Rancher/Farmer, and the Farmer would have to become a Farmer/Rancher, and indeed the chances of either one of them being able to create as much product is greatly lessened, for why should the framer raise grain beyond his family's, needs and why would the rancher raise beef beyond his if there is nobody with which to trade. Thus it is then that by voluntary exchange there is the creation of an immediate surplus of value, and the creation of a secondary value (to society as a whole) - [think a place where you can go to trade your lumber for some beef and some bread].
An important point here is that the exchange is NOT a zero-sum game where for one to win, another has to lose. Value trades hands, AND in doing so MORE value is created. THIS is the touchstone of the free market and of voluntary exchange - that someone "winning" does NOT mean that another party has lost and that surplus and societial value is created in the exchange. Again, in the ideal capitalist world there is NO loser; BOTH parties come out winners; and value is added to society.
Keep all this in mind then, next time you hear about how some greedy industrialist is exploiting the poor worker, and consider the true meaning of the word "exploit" which is "to put to productive use", and additionally consider in this sense then, that the capitalist is exploited by his capital - his capital, always searching to be used has used the industrialist as a conduit to create that which did not exist before. Further consider that it can just as easily be said is the poor worker that is exploiting the industrialist. Worker wants money - worker withholds his labor unless in exchange he gets the capital of the industrialist, and indeed, the laborer in a sense takes advantage of that capitalist in even asking to be paid for his days work. In summary then a capitalist thinks in terms of "What's mine is mine, What's yours is yours. Let's trade some of what's mine for some of what's yours."
This then brings us to the looters. Think collectivists. These are the people that do not create on their own, but live as parasites off of the backs of the creators and producers and indeed try to find ways in which they can take the grain of Farmer A without exchanging any of their cattle. (Think "What's mine is mine , What's yours is mine too, and I am justified in taking it because you have more than I do.)
Keep in mind now that parasites end up killing their hosts and in the truest sense of the word looters are indeed pariscites, for their philosophy of feeding off the fruits of the creators will indeed eventually kill the host. Witness what happened in the Soviet Union where the collectivist mentality that consumed that country resulted in a flight of creators from that country and outright "going underground" of those that could create but could not leave. It was just such "social justice" as we saw in the Soviet Union that exactly resulted in people standing in breadlines - and such collectivist mentality that resulted in the extinction of the Jamestown Colony in the Americas.
In summary then, the creed of the creators/producers is individualism, free exchange, and property rights, and they use the means of capital ($) to achieve their ends which are the production of objects of wealth such as TV's automobiles, jets, computers, etc. , and the conversion of their creations into another object which represents the most refined state of value - money - and which represents the work that they have already done.
So, next time you want are tempted to utter "that person is rich and he doesn't do anything for a living", consider that the person of which you complain has already done the "work", and also consider that his money is not buried in the garden, but is placed in institutions where it is used to create the very business that is paying your paycheck. Also, the next time you hear a collectivist say that it was the workers that built the country, respond to him by telling him that it was not workers but money (capital) aggregated by the capitalists, that built the country, and ask him what kind of job those exploited workers would have if capital was not available beforehand.
Looters on the other hand, a.k.a. communists, socialists, social justiceists, community organizerists, collectivists in the Randian sense, do not sustain themselves by creating and adding value, but attempt to sustain themselves thru taking, by force if necessary, goods that have been produced by the creators, either by taking the goods themselves, or by forcing the transfer of some form of the possessor's wealth to themselves, without trading anything of equal value in return.
With all this as background,and returning now to kindergarten, I think we all can see in our mind's eye, the kindergarten playground where little Johnnie is quietly playing with his monster truck in the sandbox. Along comes Billy, who on seeing that monster truck, wants to play with it. Now, keeping in mind that these are two little tykes, whose minds have yet to be molded, and whose minds are in such a state that everything they are exposed to is an original molding experience, it is easy to see that little Billy will, because he has not yet been taught property rights, go over and try to grab that truck from Johnnie's hands and himself start playing with it.
I think it is also easy to see in the mind's eye, and, critically important, being mindful of the fact that Johnnie himself has not been taught property rights, that little Johnnie will protest little Billy trying to take his truck. Indeed, the fact that Johnnie protests is an indication that the natural human understandings of right and wrong have a connection to property, for here we have a 4 year old, having been taught nothing about property, having an innate sense that what is his is HIS and not the other guys - so much so that he resists the forceful taking of his property by another.
Continuing with the playground scene, in now steps a mother who, in soothing tone, tells little Johnnie that he is being "selfish" and should "share" his toys with others - eventually coaxing him to give up his property.
Consider now what lesson(s) is being taught to little Johnnie. What he has just been taught is that another person's "need" lays a moral claim on him to fulfill that need, and that the word "share" means that the way to obtain what one wants is to go grab it from somebody else and when that other person objects, to call it "sharing". He has also learned that he can leverage his chances of getting what he wants at the expense of another by inveighing against that person as being "selfish".
Consider now what Billy, this little proto-communist, has learned. He has learned the first lesson of communism - of the collective - that his need or desire to possess that of another lays a moral claim on others to fulfill it, and like Johnnie, who had the idea right in the first place that your need does not create any requirement for me to give, but was re-educated on the playground, both now have become community organizers who march around proclaiming how all the producers of the world are supposed to give up, for free, the fruits of their production to those that did not produce it, and who march into the halls of Congress to grasp the levers controlling the machinery of government so as to effect their ends of "redistributive change".
Think now if the lessons had been different. That instead of teaching Billy (and body-snatching Johnnie) that "need" of one lays a moral claim on the property of another, and that selfishness on the part of the possessor of property is something bad, and that possessors are supposed to share; that, instead of these teachings, that Billy had been told, Johnnie's truck is Johnnie's property, not yours, and Johnnie does not have to share his toys with you. Suppose further that Billy was taught, then and there on the playground, that is wrong for him to try to take by force the property of another, and that just because he wants that truck does not mean that Johnnie is supposed to give it to him. Suppose further that he had been told that if you want that truck, then you need to find something that Johnnie wants (like that cupcake you have in your hand), and see if you can trade your "stuff" for his "stuff" - and that Johnnie is under no obligation to consummate the transaction if he does not want to.
Do we think that Billy, unless he was a "bad seed", would grow up to be a communist or a collectivist? Do we think that Johnnie, would grow up thinking that another's need becomes his requirement to provide? I think not. No, I think that both would grow up to be producers, capitalists, traders of value for value, writers of conservative blogs- persons who would espouse the view that "What's mine is Mine; What's yours is Yours ...and, most important of all ... What's Mine is Not Yours - regardless of how much better a place/use you think you can find for my money than I can."
Thus it is that the first word that the future communist learns in kindergarten is S-H-A-R-E, while the first word the capitalist learns is T-R-A-D-E.
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