Bluespark
Posted: July 8, 1999 @ 1:56pm
The previous thread was closed so I'm starting a new one.
I see people defending capitalism without pointing out its severe sociological flaws. Capitalism encourages people to exploit each other for their own benefit while providing the means to do so. Capitalism means spending your entire life making someone else richer while you eke out an existence.
Those who said people are too stupid to make communism work need to keep in mind that American society encourages intellectual absenteeism and conformity. While most entities will pay lip service to the importance of education and independence, at the core of this nation is the desperate need for our government to keep us under control. They keep us under the false impression that we need them, and thus avoid thinking for ourselves, and thus the masses seem to be "stupid." People are not innately stupid, nor are they innately intelligent. We are victims of a system that provides the greatest advantages to a very small minority of t he population. It's impossible to deny that those who place themselves in monopolistic positions didn't do so by their own cunning and intelligence--but allowing anything remotely resembling monopoly to exist is an offense to humanity. I can't know for certain if those in charge of any powerful corporation ever really consider that their decisions determine the fates of real people or not. Maybe they can tell themselves it's for a greater purpose, and sometimes it is. But capitalism is, at its core, a system that encourages exploiting anyone and anything to get what you want. People only think human nature is selfish because we've been conditioned into selfish beings ourselves. Like intelligence, selfishness and selflessness are not hardwired into us. Just like it's not hardwired into any of you that you're a democrat, republican, liberal, conservative, libertarian, communist, or whatever else you happen to be. These are side effects of the society we live in. Were you to grow up in an atmosphere of kindness and sharing and selflessness, you'd probably find the idea of exploitive self-interest alien, as well.
Capitalism is merely a symptom of a greater problem. We have all these high-minded ideals, but none of them will come to pass so long as this soul-sucking system remains in place. Think about it. How many of you will spend a good dozen years in school (being told what to think and say and do), a few more years in higher education (being told what to think and say and do), and then spending the next forty some years going to the same place every morning, getting paid to do something that's not especially interesting to you but that pays decently, all the while lining someone else's pockets, waiting until you can retire so you can find out that Social Security isn't going to cover your medications and you're going to have to choose between food and heart medicine. This is the system you live in and the system you support (and yes, the system I financially contribute to, as well). This is the system you defend.
Someone above said that capitalism expedited decision-making and resource distribution (basically). Is the implication here that speed equals effectiveness? Since when? Getting things done quickly doesn't mean squat when it comes to getting them done effectively. If it takes five years to construct a fair, equitable, and effective tax relief plan, then five years should be spent developing it. Since when was impatience considered a virtue?
Think about your precious freedom of speech. Look how it's being violated. Slander/libel laws? You can't say anything you want about a particular figure or company without being able to back it up. We can debate the ethics of lying until we're blue in the face, but the fact remains that this is a money-driven form of censorship. So is the Digital Millennium Copyright Act. And so is virtually every kind of restriction we have on our First Amendment rights. Nearly all of them are based on someone's bottom line. For as much as you value freedom of speech, you seem willing to turn a blind eye to the fact that your rights are being willfully infringed upon for the almighty dollar. Companies whose interests most definitely are not concurrent with those of the public majority are the puppeteers of our government. Without all their money, they'd have precisely as much power as we do--one person, one vote. It's impossible to condemn censorship while at the same time allow capitalistic control of your rights to continue (and even defend it.)
Capitalism is not the "best" system for anything. All it does is favor a select few over all others, resulting in low quality-of-life for virtually everyone. I'd not endorse any sort of entitlement-based society, but the present system is hideously oppressive. For examples of how the system is counterproductive and destructive, you need to look no further than the ridiculous lawsuit rates in the United States. Without money, people wouldn't be able to be greedy for it, would they? Greed would obviously transfer to other things, but that's not a given. Once again, it's not wise to assume that greed is a built-in feature of human nature any more than assuming selflessness is a part of our nature. We are products of our environment as much as we are products of genetics. Greed and selfishly-motivated behavior would not occur in a society which has never known them. At this point it's probably impossible to ever set up a truly communist (anarchist) "government" (which, by definition, is no government at all). People are too ingrained with their notions that capitalism is a good thing for almost everyone, when in fact they are defending a system which holds them back from achieving their potential and never hesitates to exploit them for the benefit of someone else.
Were our economy completely unregulated, the situation might be vastly different. But it's not and it isn't. We are at the mercy of a system that does its best to make you think and act a certain way. Only those strong enough (and fortunate enough) to escape the system's brainwashing (that you must fit into one "norm" or another) really get to a point where they can change things. By that point, though, they tend to be manipulators of the system rather than proponents of changing it. Those at the top intend to stay there. Who in their right mind wants to give up being top dog? Those who think the way I do never get to this lofty position because we don't exploit others for our own gain, we don't place getting more money above all other pursuits, and we don't like sacrificing our dignity to a soulless system that exists only to perpetuate itself.
Sai
Posted: July 8, 1999 @ 2:35pm
I love you BS but I went back and edited your post to take out all the equivocating, backing down, disclaimers, etc. If you're going to be right, just be right, and don't apologize for it.
smartlittlebrother
Posted: July 8, 1999 @ 4:16pm
Sai, though i applaud your motives, i would rather that you had left Blue's post in it's entirety, and followed it with a rebuttal of any bits you didn't agree to.
Alas, poor Blue, ignorance was bliss, eh.
Sai
Posted: July 8, 1999 @ 4:27pm
Okay, good point. But it hurt my eyes to look at. I know that's no excuse.
dietpepsiofchaos
Posted: July 8, 1999 @ 5:44pm
I agree with a fair amount of what you say, but I don't think you know what communism is.
the underlying argument is on the right track but you need to get your terms straight, and get a grip on the nature of the relationship between government in the US and capitalist economics.
for example: do you think there should be a free market for anything?
advice: anarchy is stupid...avoid the notion. there will always be a hierarchy...no matter what (like all group living animals). anarchy just means that those people more willing to kill will make the "rules".
MarilynHanson
Posted: July 8, 1999 @ 5:52pm
...capitalism is, at its core, a system that encourages exploiting anyone and anything to get what you want. People only think human nature is selfish because we've been conditioned into selfish beings ourselves... Were you to grow up in an atmosphere of kindness and sharing and selflessness, you'd probably find the idea of exploitive self-interest alien, as well.
Once again, it's not wise to assume that greed is a built-in feature of human nature any more than assuming selflessness is a part of our nature. We are products of our environment as much as we are products of genetics. Greed and selfishly-motivated behavior would not occur in a society which has never known them... We are at the mercy of a system that does its best to make you think and act a certain way.
So you suggest replacing one form of brainwashing with another, then?
jenny
Posted: July 8, 1999 @ 6:18pm
i'm drunk i'm drunk i'm drunk i'm drunk i'm drunk i'm drunk i'm drunk i'm drunk i'm drunk i'm drunk i'm drunk i'm drunk i'm drunk i'm drunk i'm drunk i'm drunk i'm drunk i'm drunk i'm drunk i'm drunk i'm drunk i'm drunk i'm drunk i'm drunk i'm drunk i'm drunk i'm drunk i'm drunk i'm drunk i'm drunk i'm drunk i'm drunk i'm drunk i'm drunk i'm drunk i'm drunk i'm drunk i'm drunk i'm drunk i'm drunk i'm drunk i'm drunk i'm drunk i'm drunk i'm drunk i'm drunk i'm drunk i'm drunk i'm drunk i'm drunk i'm drunk i'm drunk i'm drunk i'm drunk i'm drunk i'm drunk i'm drunk i'm drunk i'm drunk i'm drunk i'm drunk i'm drunk i'm drunk i'm drunk i'm drunk i'm drunk i'm drunk i'm drunk i'm drunk i'm drunk i'm drunk i'm drunk i'm drunk i'm drunk i'm drunk i'm drunk i'm drunk i'm drunk i'm drunk i'm drunk i'm drunk i'm drunk i'm drunk i'm drunk i'm drunk i'm drunk i'm drunk i'm drunk i'm drunk i'm drunk i'm drunk i'm drunk i'm drunk i'm drunk i'm drunk i'm drunk i'm drunk i'm drunk i'm drunk i'm drunk i'm drunk i'm drunk i'm drunk i'm drunk i'm drunk i'm drunk i'm drunk i'm drunk i'm drunk i'm drunk i'm drunk i'm drunk i'm drunk i'm drunk i'm drunk i'm drunk i'm drunk i'm drunk i'm drunk i'm drunk i thought that was probably the only thing i could bother to say that could do this topic justice. edit me, and die, sai.
Sai
Posted: July 8, 1999 @ 10:22pm
Perish the thought, Jenny. Being drunk is no laughing matter. (Although yes, I'm laughing.)
Zel
Posted: July 9, 1999 @ 1:08am
advice: anarchy is stupid...avoid the notion. there will always be a hierarchy...no matter what (like all group living animals). anarchy just means that those people more willing to kill will make the "rules".
No no no, that's chaos. I hate that most people don't understand what anarchy is. Drives me batty constantly repeating myself.
It's smaller government than even republicans can come up with. So small, in fact, you probably wouldn't call them government at all, thus: no government. Which is what anarchy means.
Now. The way it works is by having meetings in small groups like neighborhoods weekly or maybe even daily. You talk about everything all the time and nobody is in charge more than the guy next to him.
I realize that it would take 1,000 Gandhis and a phew sheep but it would be worth a try. It's only humanity.
Sai
Posted: July 9, 1999 @ 7:32am
Governance is an interesting question, in that the overwhelming majority of those partaking in either governing or being governed are exiles with pathetic makeshift systems immitating the ones back home that might actually have worked. But that isn't even the interesting portion of it.
What's really interesting is that what actually MATTERS is disposable, useless, and on worse days even THREATENING to this overwhelming majority. The only good-or-bad a government can have, so long as it is populated by machines, is how effectively it delays the destruction of things that have worth.
It's on that basis that I hereby condemn both Capitalism and Communism, sister economies bent on invading the lives of those with hope of becoming something better, allowing no peace and caging everyone alike, even animals.
None of what I just said was fully accurate. A more complete sermon would be useless to those of you who don't understand these things as it is.
dietpepsiofchaos
Posted: July 9, 1999 @ 11:16am
alright, I'll bite. heh
classical anarchists like proudhon were against all forms of heirarchy. smaller governments were not acceptable...but this is where the notion breaks down. you must have organization of some sort. what I'm saying is not chaos (though I think anarchists play word games when distinguishing chaos from loose cooperation without enforcement of cheater prevention)...what I'm suggesting is that hierachical structure is inherent to human social groups so any system that denounces this is doomed to failure.
what you're talking about...your neighborhood groups and such, is not pure anarchy because the people who have power in those groups would wield power in a hierarchy... (I'm assuming these groups will make decisions that will affect others who aren't at the "meeting").
anarchists are also against all economic inequalities, which I like in principle, but is silly in practice. now, we could just go with marx and argue that the current capitalist system will necessarily slide into rebellion, and in a way, anarchy as proposed by these old original guys...but a new hierarchy will necessarily emerge. it has to...because our minds are designed to reason about groups like that. we can't help it. all primates have hierarchy. ask ferdenand.
smartlittlebrother
Posted: July 9, 1999 @ 3:59pm
well, in New Zealand, the government (ie, the people) used to own the electricity generation and supply facilities, the telephone exchanges and lines, and the hospitals. These basic and vital services were cheap and freely available to all citizens.
Then, in a fit of quick-buckery, the govt sold all of the above to private, and in many cases foreign, individuals. In the first quarter-year of private operation, the phone company alone sucked FOUR HUNDRED MILLION (NZ) DOLLARS out of the people of NZ, and they've continued to bleed us white ever since.
One may drink free, safe water, from any tap in the country. Now they're talking of selling the water company for chrissake! What will happen the day the Corporation decides it doesn't want to sell me water anymore? I'll tell you what'll happen, i'll bust into their corporate mansions and drink their capitalist profiteering pig BLOOD! Grrrrrrrrrrrrrrr. Double Grrr and Grr some more...
Zel
Posted: July 9, 1999 @ 6:41pm
I'm assuming these groups will make decisions that will affect others who aren't at the meeting
No no, somehow you would never be able to miss meetings. Missing meetings would not be an option. There would be no hierarchy.
Bluespark
Posted: July 12, 1999 @ 9:20pm
I just came here to say that the guy I work for says the future is basically space communism with ultra powerful aliens. He would kill me if he knew I posted this.