Matthew's Journal

I think the way that, in practice, lettings contracts are largely exploitative of the tenant, whereas they have a surface veneer of mutuality is a result of the greater iniquity in society.

You cannot have a fair contract between someone who is relying upon a contract for shelter and someone who's relying on it for something less fundamental (in the Maslow sense) in a situation where there's a cartel on shelter, or inelastic supply; any more than you can have a fair contract between someone who has all the food and someone who is hungry.

I must say that I'm a little amazed that you feel that a letting agency, whose principal purpose seems to be to dehumanize the interactions between landlords and tenants and generally perpetuate injustices, would be affected by moral arguments, or that these people who have some residual contractual obligations over you, is a politic place to start in dealing with housing injustices, beyond any material gain.

I'm sure that many of the people who work there, if not all of them, are trapped in a cycle of work, debt, and so on, and are victims of the injustice as much as you are. It's a kind of institutional immorality, rather than a personal one.

It seems a little like titling at windmills to me, though I suppose it's an honourable end, all other things being equal.