The Stolen Property System (hereafter SPS) is that set of individuals and their interactions which locates, plans, facilitates, and its transfer to a new owner. Ideally this system will have six functioning modes: Research and planning mode—The determination of a demand for an item(s), its location, and how best it can be acquired. Extraction mode—The actual separation of property from its owner (the theft). Exchange mode—The transfer of the item from the extractor to the marketer (the person who will offer it for sale). Marketing mode—This includes transportation and storage, demand analysis (marketing information subsystem), packaging and advertising (any necessary modification in property prior to resale). Redistribution mode—The determination of where, when, and at what price the item will be resold. Evaluation model—The analysis of the feedback to the system as to its performance. In its simplest form, the SPS can consist of but a single individual as in the case of the thief peddling one’s own merchandise. In this situation, mode 3 would be combined with mode 2 into a single operation. At the uppermost level of complexity, the SPS can contain many individuals (the maximum number being indeterminate) as in the case of truck hijacking. In this situation, the planning mode (mode 1) alone will require either the accurate forecasting of the behaviors of shipper, dispatcher, and driver, or the enlistment of the assistance of one or all of these individuals. It is important to note that whether the SPS consists of one or a dozen individuals, all of its operations must be performed. #RandolphHarris 1 of 25

If this is not done by those within the system, then it will be undertaken by its clients or by others in the environment. An abridged version of the SPS, then, does not imply a functional curtailment, but rather a combining of functions into fewer operational steps. There is some evidence that the SPS in its simplest form does in fact occur. The low prices which fences were offering to addicts for stolen property were forcing addicts to sell the merchandise themselves. It is clear, however, that the nature of the SPS is such that it is most frequent manifestation consists of a division of labor between at least two individuals—the thief and the fence. A thief who steals merchandise is like bread without yeast, no good, just as essential elements in any accomplished act of thievery whenever merchandise is involved. This basic division of labor between the thief and fence occurs roughly at mode 3, with modes 1 and 2 generally allocated to the thief and modes 4 through 6 to the fence. The relationship between the thief and the fence in mode 3, though little studied, is essential. It is also precisely that interaction which the conventional view of thief fails to recognize and account for. The theoretical character of the relationship between thief and fence is best described by the mixed-motive bargaining situation. The thief is motivated to cooperate with the fence in order to divest oneself of the stolen property, yet at the same time, one is motivated to compete with the fence in achieving the best price for the merchandise. #RandolphHarris 2 of 25

The fence is in a similar situation. By the very nature of one’s role, one is in the market for stolen property (hence one will want to cooperate with the thief) and yet one’s profit margin depends upon how well one can compete with the thief for a favorable price on the goods. The pressures to cooperate are perhaps greater for the thief, since the consequences of failing to reach an agreement are likely to be more significant for one; id est, the possibility of being caught with the goods in hand. If a deal is not consummated, the fence runs no risk, particularly in the short run. The consequences of protracted bargaining situations may, however, result in sharply deceasing one’s sources of supply as one gains the reputation of being an unfair bargainer. Dealing between thief and fence, as with all commercial dealings, are strengthened by consistency and reliability. Therefore, although fence and thief are motivated to compete with each other regarding the exchange value of stolen property, the clear bis for both is toward the establishment of cooperation. The thief-fence relationship is not unique in this respect. If mixed-motive bargainers are to reach agreement, cooperative interests must be strong enough to overcome competitive interests. The SPS is clearly able to foster the kind of cooperation necessary in the exchange mode (mode 3) to keep a continual supply of stolen goods flowing toward the fence. #RandolphHarris 3 of 25

However, were the exchange of goods the only dimension be of little analytical value. In effect it would make it difficult to sustain the concept of the SPS as a total, integrated system, for the SPS could be regarded instead as the face-ff of two stolen property mechanisms, one belonging to the thief and one to the fence. The relationship between thief and fence at mode 3, while essential, does not move us much beyond the individualistic tendencies of the conventional view of theft. If we are to appreciate instead the organizational quality of property theft crimes, it is necessary to explore further the interaction patterns of fences and thieves in other parts of the SPS. In confining our attention to the thief-fence interaction at mode 3 (exchange) in the SPS, we stipulated that the system’s division of labor allocated modes 1 and 2 to the thief and modes 4 through 6 to the fence. This is, of course, the most elementary form of that relationship, and while useful in elucidating some dimensions of the thief-fence interaction, it tends to shroud some of the more complex and more insightful relationships existing between these two individuals. In order to understand more complex thief-fence relationships and to achieve a greater appreciation for the role of the criminal receiver, two important axioms regarding the SPS must be introduced: The effectiveness of the SPS does not require a single and specific division of labor to obtain. That is, no particular allocation of the activities in the system is essential to its successful functioning. #RandolphHarris 4 of 25

The functional integrity of the SPS is not distributed by a nonsequential performance of its mode. What this means is that although we have set down the logical progression of activities in the SPS in modes 1 through 6, this does not imply that they must be performed in that order. These axioms emphasize at least two origins of variety in the SPS, and it is this variety which makes the system both interesting and analytically complex. Division of Labor—We will begin our deeper analysis into the SPS by looking more closely at the questions raised by the first axiom. It should be noted here that although this axiom states that varying division-of-labor arrangements are possible in the SPS, it does not suggest that they are all equally likely. The division of labor between thief and fence in the planning of a theft. To begin, it should be noted that the fence, as the buyer of the thief’s produce, always has some implicit influence over the planning of a theft through one’s power to reward. Thus those items for which the fence is willing to pay more will be more often sought by the thief and this will, of course, affect one’s choice of target. The fence’s patterns of reward mediation therefore becomes the “Invisible Hand” guiding the thief toward the selection of what property he will steal. This “guidance” is felt not only by the person on drugs but also by the professional thief. #RandolphHarris 5 of 25

ITEM 1: (interview with Greg, professional burglar) “I stole a beautiful pair of Imperial jade earrings one time and couldn’t get rid of them. This just isn’t a colored gem city (diamonds are biggest here) so a lot of fences won’t touch things like rubies and saffires [sic], et cetera. Only Mr. A handled that sort of stuff. Until I got connected with him, there was no percentage in taking colored gems.” ITEM 3: (from statement of Joe, a semi-skilled burglar, to district attorney) “We could only get scrap prices from fences for stuff like silverware and tea sets, et cetera, so D (other burglar) said we were better off to steal the metals themselves. That’s when we started working the warehouses and rail yards.” A thief’s selection of targets and items for theft is similarly influenced by the number of fences one knows and the degree of specialization in which they engage. Thus in item 1 Greg’s acquaintance with Mr. A accrued to him rewards for property that had previously been unsalable. A burglar who only knows fences who handle TVs and clothing is likely to limit his thefts to those items. The fence’s “Invisible Hand” in mode 1, however, is not nearly always so invisible. Witnesses the follow police activity report entries: ITEM 4: (from police activity report) “Info that M (who fences from his auction house) is now selling insurance. What he does is visit older people who have money and antiques around then fingers them for burglaries. Stuff all comes to him. ITEM 6: (police activity report) “Info that Greg’s gang (prof. burglars) is fencing stuff through X who work for a detective agency and gives the burglars floor plans and inform on security devices. #RandolphHarris 6 of 25

In these items, we see the fence who, by virtue of his business or occupation, is in a position to know individual who possess valuable property, the nature of that property, or something about their movements. By sharing this information with thieves, he becomes the engineer, the prime mover, of the theft. Implied in most of these arrangements, of course, is the agreement that he will receive the property once it has been stolen. The increased role of the fence as “set-up man” in mode 1 also increases his power vis a vis the thief since his control over valuable theft information has an impact upon the thief’s livelihood and future. The thief who needs this information must be willing to accept completely the fence’s terms. If he does not come to terms, the fence with complete knowledge of who committed the theft, is in an excellent position to “set-up” the thief as well. This is why some professional thieves prefer to rely on their own research and planning rather than risking an indenture (however brief) to the receiver. The division of labor between fence and thief in the extraction mode. Labor sharing between fence and thief in the actual theft can take two forms. The fence can actually participate in the theft or one can offer technical advice on its commission. The former arrangement is extremely unlikely situation in the SPS. ITEM 8: (interview with Greg, a professional thief) “I know the fence’s job is a lot more lucrative and a lot safer (than that of the thief) because he never actually steals anything himself. But it just isn’t as exciting.” #RandolphHarris 7 of 25

Even though, then, the fence’s participation in the theft’s commission is highly unlikely, there is some evidence that he can assist in the offense in ways other than setting it up. He can, for example, instruct the thief as to techniques to use in avoiding suspicion and apprehension. ITEM 10: (police activity report) “…words is that X tells burglars to sit on stuff till they call in and only to come to the store during regular hours.” Little evidence could be found of a more active role taken by the fence in the extraction mode. Instead his involvement here appears limited to giving of advice or admonition to the thief. It is probably fair to say, therefore, that a division of labor in the SPS which allocates mode 2 to the fence is a highly unlikely arrangement and for all intents and purposes can be eliminated from consideration. The division of labor between fence and thief in the marketing mode. It is probably necessary to restate the activities which occur in the marketing mode of the SPS since it covers three general areas: an analysis of demand in the stolen property economy (a marketing information subsystem); activities related to the transportation and storage of property; and finally, activities related to packaging and promotion (the modification necessary in the preparation of stolen property for resale). As can be imagined, mode 4 is an extremely complex and comprehensive component of the SPS. This is in general the fence’s milieu; and it is because of one’s skills in organizing and coordinating the various activities in this mode that one can command a lion’s share of the rewards which the SPS has to offer. #RandolphHarris 8 of 25

The quality of the demand analysis conducted by the fence will depend upon one’s individual business acumen. If one distributes stolen property through one’s own retail outlet, one must anticipate the future demands of one’s customers and determine what one needs to buy from one’s “suppliers.” Similarly, one must decide what mix of stolen versus legitimate property one wants to maintain; this again will affect one’s buying habits. One will also need to analyze the market one serves to discover the different segments it contains and the varying tastes that one should satisfy in one’s product line. If the fence does not sell directly to the public but instead to other middlemen or to retail establishments, one’s demand analysis will follow the same general pattern as above but will depend as well upon the quality of the contracts one makes in the legitimate market place and the guidance they can provide. The fence, then, faces many of the same dilemmas as any legitimate marketer. There is no one formula for success, only the expertise which past success and failure teaches. (An accommodation to the difficulties in demand forecasting and analysis used in both legitimate and illegitimate market places will be discussed below when the nonsequential functions of the SPS is considered.) There is little question, however, that the demand analysis function is an all-fence activity. The other two activity areas in mode 4, though directed by the fence, can be shared with the thief. This is particularly true of the transportation and storage function where the evidence suggests that often an equal responsibility obtains. #RandolphHarris 9 of 25

Consider the case in which the fence employs a “drop” where property is to be abandoned by the thief. The former pays for the storage facility while the latter must be responsible for transportation. ITEM 11: (police activity report) “…what happens is that burglars are told to take the stolen property to a drop at _____ St. and stash it in the garage until X (fence) can be called. He comes to the drop and if property is worth buying he opens his store for burglars to deliver it that night. Most of the stolen property is kept in a back room of the store and guarded by the police dog (kept mostly for protection against the police). The “drop” is only one technique which the fence uses to facilitate the safe transportation and storage of stolen property while at the same time insuring against one’s being found in “possession” of it. The rental of warehouse facilities serves a similar purpose. It is clear that the storage function is the role responsibility of the fence since the thief has at this point relinquished control over the property to one. Similarly, any further transportation that may be required is also the fence’s concern. Some fences pursue occupations in the trucking and storage industries which are tremendous assets to their illegal business endeavors. Two individuals in the data base, for example, jointly own three moving and storage firms, with a dozen vans and numerous warehouses. #RandolphHarris 10 of 25

Two  of their legitimate business did a gross in 1969 of $96,000 and police will not attempt to estimate their profits from criminal receiving. These individuals also appear to provide transportation facilities for other fences in the city. Witness the following note from police files: ITEM 15: (police activity report) “…suspicious activity at ______ Avenue re: building being used as a warehouse for storage of stolen TVs and hi fis (foreign mfg.)—Detectives observed male get out of car and use key to gain entrance—car registered to Mr. C. who is suspected of being a fence. To add to suspicions, when TVs were moved across state to the present location at above-mentioned warehouse, the mover was X owner of ____ Moving and Storage (fencing outlet). We all know that it is illegal to steal something that belongs to someone else, and doing so can expose a person to significant criminal penalties. However, it is equally illegal to take possession of, or deal in, property that has been stolen. The California Penal Code section that deals with the receipt of stolen property is section 496, which contains a fairly broad definition of the crime and encompasses more than simply receiving (id est, taking possession of) property that has been stolen. If one either receives or buys property that has been stolen, or has been obtained by means of extortion, a person violates Penal Code section 496. If a personal conceals (id est, hides) assists in concealing, sells, assists in selling, withholds or assists in withholding any property that has been stolen, the law is also violated. A violation of Penal Code section 496 can be either a misdemeanor or a felony. #RandolphHarris 11 of 25

A second pillars in the cathedral of socialist theory was central planning. Instead of allowing the “chaos” of the marketplace to determine the economy, intelligent top-down planning would be able to concentrate resources on key sectors, and accelerate technological development. However, central planning depended on knowledge, and as early as the 1920s the Austrian economist Ludwig von Mises identified its lack of knowledge or, as he termed it, its “calculation problem,” as the Achilles heel of socialism. How many shoes and what sizes should a factory in Irkutsk make? How many left-handed screws or grades of paper? What prince-relationships should be set between carburetors and cucumbers? How many rubles, zlotys, or yuan should be invested in each of tens of thousands of different lines and levels of production? To answer such questions, even in the simples smokestack economy, requires more knowledge than central planners can collect or analyze, especially when managers, afraid of trouble, routinely lie to them about actual production. Thus, warehouses filled up with unwanted shoes. Shortages and a vast, shadowy black market became chronic features of most socialist economies. Generations of earnest socialist planners wrestled desperately with this knowledge problem. They demanded ever more data and got ever more lies. They beefed up the bureaucracy. Lacking the supply-and-demand signals generated by a competitive market, they tried measuring the economy in terms of labor hours, or counting things in terms of kind, rather than money. Later they tried econometric modeling and input-output analysis. #RandolphHarris 12 of 25

Nothing worked. The more information they had, the more complex and disorganized the economy grew. Fully three quarters of a century after the Russian Revolution the real symbol of the U.S.S.R. was not the hammer and sickle, but the consumer queue. Today, all across the socialist and ex-socialist spectrum there is a race to introduce marker economies, either wholly, as in Poland, or timidly within a planned regimen, as in the Soviet Union. It is now almost universally recognized by socialist reformers that allowing supply and demand to determine prices (at least within certain ranges) provides what the central plan could not—price signals indicating what is or is not needed and wanted in the economy. However, overlooked in the discussion among economists over the need for these signals is the fundamental change in the communication pathways they imply, and the tremendous power shifts that changes in communication systems bring. The most important difference between centrally planned economies and market-driven economies is that, in the first, information flows vertically, whereas in the market, much more information flows horizontally and diagonally in the system, with buyers and sellers exchanging information at every level. This change does not merely threaten top bureaucrats in the planning ministries and in management, but millions upon millions of mini-bureaucrats whose sole source of power depends on their control of information fed up the reporting channel. #RandolphHarris 13 of 25

The incapacity of the central planning system to cope with high levels of information thus set limits on the economic complexity necessary for growth. The new wealth-creation methods require so much knowledge, so much information and communication, that they are totally out of reach of centrally planned economies. The rise of the super-symbolic economy thus collies with a second foundation of socialist orthodoxy. The third crashing pillars of socialism was its overweening emphasis on hardware—its total concentration on smokestack industry and its derogation of both agriculture and mind-work. In the years after the 1917 revolution, the Soviets lacked capital to build all the steel mills, dams, and auto plants they needed. Soviet leaders seized on the theory “socialist primitive accumulation” formulated by the economist E.A. Preobrazhensky. This theory held that the necessary capital could be squeezed out of the peasants by forcing their standard of living down to an emaciating minimum and skimming off their surpluses. These would then be used to capitalize heavy industry and subsidize the workers. Nikolai Bukharin, a Bolshevik leader who paid for his prescience with his life, correctly predicted that this strategy would merely guarantee agricultural collapse. Worse yet, this policy led to the murderous oppression of the peasantry by Stalin, since it was only by means of extreme force that such a program could be imposed. Millions died of starvation or persecution. #RandolphHarris 14 of 25

As a result of this “industry bias,” as the Chinese call it today, agriculture has been a disaster area for virtually all socialist economies and still is. Put differently, the socialist countries pursued a Second Wave strategy at the expense of their First Wave people. However, socialists also frequently denigrated the services and white-collar work. It was not pure coincidence that when the Soviets demanded “socialist realism” in the arts, the walls were soon covered with murals of beefy workers straining muscles in steel mills and factories. Because the goal of socialism everywhere was to industrialize as rapidly as possible, it was muscle-labor that was glorified. Mind-work was for nonproductive wimps. This widespread attitude went hand in hand with the tremendous concentration on production rather than consumption, on capital goods rather than consumer goods. While some Marxists, notably Antonio Gramsci, challenged this view, and Mao Tse-tung at times insisted that ideological purity could overcome material handicaps, the fundamental thrust of Marxist regimes was to overrate material production and undervalue products of the mind. Mainline Marxists typically held the materialist view that ideas, information, art, culture, law, theories, and the other intangible products of the mind were merely part of a “superstructure” which hovered, as it were, over the economic “base” of society. While there was, admittedly, a certain feedback between the two, it was the base the determined the superstructure, rather than the reverse. Those who argued otherwise were condemned as “idealists”—at times a decidedly dangerous label to wear. #RandolphHarris 15 of 25

Mr. Marx, in arguing the primacy of the material base, stood Mr. Hegel on his head. The great irony of history today is that the new system of wealth creation, in turn, is standing Mr. Marx on his. Or more accurately, laying Mr. Marx and Mr. Hegel both on their sides. For Marxists, hardware was always more important than software; the computer revolution now teaches us that the opposite is true. If anything, it is knowledge that drives the economy, not the economy that drives knowledge. Societies, however, are not machines and they are not computers. They cannot be reduced so simply into hardware and software, base and superstructure. A more apt model would picture them as consisting of many more elements all connected in immensely complex and continually changing feedback loops. As their complexity raises, knowledge becomes more central to both their economic and ecological survival. The rise of a new economy whose primary raw materials is, in fact, soft and intangible found World socialism totally unprepared. Socialism’s collision with the future was fatal. If orthodox socialism is ready for what Mr. Lenin called the “dustbin of history,” however, this does not mean that the magnificent dream that bred it are also dead. The desire to create a World in which affluence, peace, and social justice prevail is at least as noble and widely share as ever. Such a World cannot rise, however, on old foundations. The most important revolution on the planet today is the rise of a new Third Wave civilization with its radical new system of wealth creation. Any movement that has not yet grasped this fact is condemned to relive its failures. Any state that makes knowledge a captive freezes its citizens in a nightmare past. #RandolphHarris 16 of 25

China’s foreign exchange reserves rose in March of 2023, as the dollars fell against other major currencies. China’s foreign exchange reserves—the World’s largest—rose USD $51 billion to USD $3.184 trillion. This tremendous amount stems from the status of the country’s balance of payments. Maintaining a huge foreign trade surplus and, consequently, a current account surplus, it also has a comfortable and usually quite substantial surplus in the capital and financial account, as foreigners invest in China much more than the Chinese overseas (in most countries the current balance and the capital and financial account balance have opposite signs, which means that the current account surplus is somewhat offset by the capital account deficit or vice versa). Unprecedented growth of China’s foreign reserves has two major implications for the West and for the whole World. The most important one is Beijing’s position as the largest foreign creditor of the American government. China holds about 14 percent of all U.S.A. Treasury Bonds. Whether one likes it or not, it gives the Chinese government a strong leverage to push its interest on a wide range of economic, political, and security issues. Currently, China’s role as a creditor is becoming increasingly noticeable on the European continent as well, and will apparently increase further as public debt problems in a growing number of the EU countries are becoming critical. #RandolphHarris 17 of 25

The second implication is China’s ability to pursue foreign acquisitions and other strategic overseas investment in a buy-whatever-the-price fashion. In other words, the Chinese buy foreign assets they consider important even when their prices reach the levels that would be prohibitive for a private Western investor. While Western governments can black transactions of this kind in their own countries, and they often do, they can do little to prevent China from using its foreign reserves as a tool to boost its political and economic clout in the Third World. On the other hand, soaring foreign reserves are posing challenges for China itself. The central bank governor Yi Gang is clearly saying that foreign reserves have exceeded the reasonable level and are becoming difficult to manage. The World’s largest sovereign wealth fund (SWF) as of December 2022 was China Investment Corporation (CIC), managing assets reaching around USD $1.35 trillion. In 2006, the CIC was established to manage a very small portion of the total: USD $200 billion. However, it is often noted that, overall, the reserves could be managed in a much more efficient manner and bring higher returns. The yields from U.S.A. Treasury bonds are very low. Some other investments, like the one into Merrill Lynch, ended in a substantial loss. Next, also on the negative aide, a dramatic increase of foreign reserves is accompanied by rising inflationary pressure. #RandolphHarris 18 of 25

The reason is that, basically, the foreign currency accumulating in the People’s Bank of China is exchanged for the national currency, which is injected into the national economy. It amplifies inflationary trends and elevates the risk of an asset bubble. (Inflationary pressures are significantly increasing also due to soaring global prices for food, fuel, and mineral resources, and the legacy of China’s USD $5.3 trillion COVID stimulus, which is 29 percent of its USD $18.1trillion economy as of 2023). There is a risk of a chain reaction of the increase of foreign reserves, growing liquidity injections into the economy, rising inflation, monetary policy tightening, and the rising of economic growth rates. To sterilize dollars, the central bank makes the country’s major banks turn over their foreign exchange in return for its interest-bearing securities. The scale of such sterilization may exceed $15 billion a week. It helps to contain inflationary trends, but locks up capital, as this money cannot be lent or invested. To tackle the excessive liquidity injection problem, China needs much larger outflows of capital. The Chinese have to invest much more overseas. It could also open new business opportunities for domestic companies, financial institutions, and individual investors. The Chinese government has introduced some policy measures supporting outbound investment, but they are still too weak and fragmentary, while restrictions are still strong. Also, it is often argued tht it is not relevant for China, as a developing country, to export much capital. #RandolphHarris 19 of 25

In our view, for China with its exceptionally large foreign exchange reserves this is not necessarily the case. However, it cannot be denied that the key issue is whether or not these reserves can be used more actively and efficiently for the country’s own development. Though some attempts in this direction have been made, the situation remains unclear. For instance, the Finance Ministry bought $106 billion of foreign currency from the central bank and used it for the recapitalization of the Big Four banks and the Development Bank of China. However, it turned out to be only an accounting detour, as, after all, the central bank repurchased the foreign exchange involved. In the new development, the CIC has announced plans to invest the foreign exchange it manages into the shares of Chinese companies listed overseas in order to boost technologically intensive industries. Nevertheless, it would be safe to say that the accumulation of such huge foreign reserves by a country where many regions are still underdeveloped and a lot of people live below poverty level loos somewhat unnatural. Basically, countries with large foreign reserves are in the best position to become major international donors. However, China is a developing country itself. Thus, logically, it looks relevant to utilize part of its reserves, which after all manifest the state’s wealth, for official development assistance to its own provinces, villages, and townships to build infrastructure and houses for the poor, protect environment, improve livelihood, and so on. The problem lies in the monetary field: You cannot use accumulated foreign currencies directly for investing in projects at home. #RandolphHarris 20 of 25

However, if they came from overseas (and, actually, it still gets some development funding from the World Bank, the Asian Development Bank, and so on) apparently, Beijing would not turndown proposals about development assistance for the purposes mentioned. Today there cannot be too many proposals of this kind because China itself has a lot of foreign reserves for “domestic official development assistance” for imports of the equipment, materials, services, and so on needed to launch development and livelihood improvement projects in the country’s less-developed regions. This could ease the financial burden of provincial administrations whose debts are beginning to cause concern, and also contribute to balancing the trade between China and its Western counterparts in a way that is beneficial for both sides. After all, it is quite simple: The West has a lot of things to sell to China that could make the life of the Chinese people, in China, especially the poor people, better, and the Chinese government has the money to buy them. Only political will and a bit of creativity and imagination are needed to make it a win-win game. When it comes to raising a family, parents often face a difficult problem punishing their children for bad behavior. Children have an uncanny sense that the parents’ threat to punish may not be credible. They recognize that the punishment may hurt the parents as much as the children (although for very different reasons). The standard parental dodge to this inconsistency is that the punishment is for the children’s own good. How can parents do a better job at making their threat to punish bad behavior credible? #RandolphHarris 21 of 25

With two parents and one child, we have a three-person game. Teamwork can help the parents make an honest threat to punish a misbehaving child. Say the son misbehaves, and the father is scheduled to carry out the punishment. If the son attempts to rescue himself by pointing out the “irrationality” of his father’s actions, the father can respond that he would, given the choice, prefer not to punish his son. However, were he to fail in carrying out the punishment, that would be breaking an agreement with his wife. Breaking tht agreement would be worse than the cost of punishing the child. Thus the threat to punish is made credible. Even single parents can play this game, but the argument gets much more convoluted, as the punishment agreement must be made with the child. Once again, say the son misbehaves, and his father is scheduled to carry out the punishment. If the son attempts to rescue himself by pointing out the “irrationality” of his father’s actions, the father can respond that he would, given the choice, prefer not to punish his son. However, were he to fail in carrying out the punishment, then this would be a misdeed on his part, a misdeed for which he should be punished. Thus, he is punishing his son only to prevent getting punished himself. #RandolphHarris 22 of 25

However, who is there to punish the father? It is the son! The son replies that were his father to forgive him, he too would forgive his father and not punish his father for failing to punish him. The father responds that were his son to fail to punish him for being lenient, this would be the second punishable offense done by the son in the same day! And so on and so forth do they keep each other honest. This may seem a little farfetched, but no less convoluted than most arguments used to justify punishing kids who misbehave. People have to come to understand that they cannot be indifferent to human feeling, hour after hour, day by people. One must be made to understand the importance of commitment and involvement, otherwise they will not be able to define and describe responsibility when they are totally unaware of what it means to be within the guts and heart of oneself and within the organic life of others. What arouses the son to brace himself against his father was that father’s total response, his unequivocal stand, his full reaction to the absence of vivid life, his shocking display of an intensity of feeling. Nearly all the communications that they had were aimed at clarifying past conversations and promoting future understanding and agreements. However, what the father was missing was just what he had been wrestling to capture himself—a commitment to the unknow, a willingness to discover what must be from unknown sources of life within and without. What was lacking was immediacy, depth, intensity, and a willingness to let go of old biases and to enter uncertainly into a process of rebirth. #RandolphHarris 23 of 25

What was required was an internalization of a value like Thoreau’s: “Every part of nature teaches that the passing away of one life is the making room for another.” In essence, let go of old attitude, both father and son, learn to communicate and respect your elders to make for a more harmonious bond. These is a fundamental principle involved in the freeing power of truth from the deceptions of offenders. DELIEVERENCE FROM BELIEVING LIES MUST BE BY BELIEVING TRUTH. Nothing can remove a lie but truth. When you know the truth, the truth shall make you free. That is applicable to every aspect of truth, as well as the special truth referred to by the ultimate concern. In the very first stage of becoming self-actualized, the unenlightened must know the truth of the soul to be saved. If one needs freedom, one must seek the higher path. The three steps to elevate the mind in apprehending truth: perception of truth by the understand. Perception of truth for use, and personal application. Perception of truth for teaching, and passing on to others. Truth apparently not grasped may lie passive in the mind, and then in the hour of one’s need suddenly emerge into experience, and thus by experience become clear to the mind in which it has been lying formant. It is only by continual application and assimilation of truth into experience, however, that it becomes sufficiently clarified in one’s mind that it may be taught to others. All righteous people greatly need to eagerly seek truth for their progressive liberation from the offenders’ many lies; for knowledge of truth alone can give victory over the deceiver. #RandolphHarris 24 of 25

If, however, a hearer of truth should resist, it or revel against it, that unattended-to truth can well be left to the care of the soul and heart’s truth. Even in the case of resistance to truth it has at least reached the mind, and at any time may fructify into experience. There are three attitudes of mind with regard any item of knowledge: Assuming you know the matter already. Being neutral toward it; admitting “I do not know.” Being certain of its accuracy. This is instanced in the life of the self-actualized. When we know and have true knowledge, we are self-actualized. This is the element in the experience of present actuality. Another element, mora demand, is best approached via the notion of the “clean-unclean.” It is only under criticism of corruption that the unclean is separated from the self-actualized and receives the meaning immoral. Before that, the unclean designated something fiendish, something which produced taboos and numinous awe. Self-actualized work on the expulsion of the unclean from the sacred and the identification of the sacredness with the morally clean, so that cleanliness become sacredness…the tremendum becomes fear of the law and of judgment; the fascinosum becomes pride of self-control and repression. The emphasis is upon the self-actualizes as the clean (the morally good). #RandolphHarris 25 of 25

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