Why socialism FAILS
Offline Quite simply, it disregards the ostensible fact that I owe nothing to any of you except the modicum of respect that I would have you give to me, as a non-criminal human being. ("you" and "me", in this case, refers to the 1st and 2nd parties of any social interaction imaginable)
The only socialist utopia in the World right now is Cuba. A lot of people try to move out of that place for some reason... 
“A meritocratic society is one in which inequalities of wealth and social position solely reflect the unequal distribution of merit or skills amongst human beings, or are based upon factors beyond human control, for example luck or chance. Such a society is socially just because individuals are judged not by their gender, the colour of their skin or their religion, but according to their talents and willingness to work, or on what Martin Luther King called 'the content of their character'. By extension, social equality is unjust because it treats unequal individuals equally.” "Political Ideologies" by Andrew Heywood (2003)
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Kapkaos only desire with this discussion is to create a 500+ post topic, under his name
Here's my contribution to the collective good of the forum - (((RRS))).
"Experiments are the only means of knowledge at our disposal. The rest is poetry, imagination." Max Planck
What about everything you use and depend on for a civilized life.
For an example, take a regular shirt. It takes thousands of people to make a shirt, from the people growing the materials for the fabric and the dyes, to the people making the trucks to move the shirts, to the people making the shirts out of the cloth and the people making the machines to sew the shirt. That's just ONE of the many things we have and require in our daily lives. Now, in a capitalist system, we just pay the monetary price, and we get the product. But our capitalist system doesn't take most of the social or environmental costs into account. So in many ways, by just paying the monetary cost without accounting for or helping out with the other costs, we DO end up owing the other people on our planet quite a bit.
Now I am not tooting the horn of ANY socialist state by any means, as I would consider myself a "stateless socialist" or more correctly an Anarcho-Syndicalist. So I do understand the criticisms of the authoritarian nature of most socialist states, but I would consider it more a problem with the hierarchical nature of the state structure, and not a direct result of a social system based on mutual support and solidarity.
We rely on so many people around us all the time, to deny our dependence on others and pretend that we don't owe anything to anyone else in the broader human society is just selfish.
I think that this quote from Mikhail Bakunin sums up my thoughts on the subject perfectly:
"Freedom without Socialism is privilege and injustice, but socialism without freedom is slavery and brutality"
"This may shock you, but not everything in the bible is true." The only true statement ever to be uttered by Jean Chauvinism, sociopathic emotional terrorist.
"A Boss in Heaven is the best excuse for a boss on earth, therefore If God did exist, he would have to be abolished." Mikhail Bakunin
"The means in which you take,
dictate the ends in which you find yourself."
"Strange women lying in ponds distributing swords is no basis for a system of government! Supreme leadership derives from a mandate from the masses, not from some farcical aquatic ceremony!"
No Gods, No Masters!
Awww. Shame.
I once engaged in debate concerning the merits of socialism... until I figured out the mindset of those who denigrate the concept.
Atheist Books, purchases on Amazon support the Rational Response Squad server, which houses Celebrity Atheists.
Communism - can't work
Socialism - in the purest economic sense - can't work
Capitalism - not a place we would want to live. For eye witness accounts of the effects of a "free market" society, see any Charles Dickens book, many novels of the late 19th - early 20th century, Free to Choose especially the chapter on Hong Kong, or Adam Smith's discussion of the "captains of industry" colluding to form monopolies.
What we need is a blended society. Not too much of any one idea, but a reasonably comfortable blend of all.
And I have no intent of continuing to argue about this.
-- I feel so much better since I stopped trying to believe.
"We are entitled to our own opinions. We're not entitled to our own facts"- Al Franken
"If death isn't sweet oblivion, I will be severely disappointed" - Ruth M.
What cj said.
Pure economic ideologies are naive. Current data (human history) shows us that some level of socialism is necessary for a society to exist. When someone comes in and starts ranting about how everything will work out if everyone just hoards their own wealth without any kind of social contract I just tune out. Show me a society that exists without socialism and we can talk about whether or not we want to live there.
To me it seems clear that you need enough socialism to create a stable society where people can fail and not die miserably, with enough free market so that the system generates wealth and people have a material incentive to produce. Finding that balance is rather tricky, naturally.
And no matter what, humans and multiple cultures are involved so no matter what system you use it will get fucked up eventually.
Everything makes more sense now that I've stopped believing.
What works for one society/culture may not work for the next. So different nations will have different blends - AND THAT IS ALL RIGHT, WE DON'T NEED TO FIGHT OVER IT!!!
My apologies for yelling, but it drives me nuts that some in here in the US think we need to fight for democracy (read capitalist interests). Yeah, North Korea is pitiable, and so is Cuba, but we don't have to fight them, they are doing a bang up job on their own of keeping their societies down. Pure communism can't work. Repeat until you no longer feel the urge to go murder innocent people.
-- I feel so much better since I stopped trying to believe.
"We are entitled to our own opinions. We're not entitled to our own facts"- Al Franken
"If death isn't sweet oblivion, I will be severely disappointed" - Ruth M.
That was my point.
Everything makes more sense now that I've stopped believing.
Amen to that.
Our revels now are ended. These our actors, | As I foretold you, were all spirits, and | Are melted into air, into thin air; | And, like the baseless fabric of this vision, | The cloud-capped towers, the gorgeous palaces, | The solemn temples, the great globe itself, - Yea, all which it inherit, shall dissolve, | And, like this insubstantial pageant faded, | Leave not a rack behind. We are such stuff | As dreams are made on, and our little life | Is rounded with a sleep. - Shakespeare
My apologies, I wasn't yelling at you, just yelling to be yelling. Happens some days.
-- I feel so much better since I stopped trying to believe.
"We are entitled to our own opinions. We're not entitled to our own facts"- Al Franken
"If death isn't sweet oblivion, I will be severely disappointed" - Ruth M.
YOU BETTER BE SORRY, YOU PINKO HIPPIE!!!
Everything makes more sense now that I've stopped believing.
"A superior woman... for a superior intellect."
I'll follow your lead AE - (((RRS)))!
Unfortunately, you've already made a logical fallacy in your first sentence - I rely on nothing more than what rests between the temples of my skull for a "civilized life". Ex gratia; the the same organ that separates you, me, and everyone else here from the rest of the animal kingdom.
You make a very valid point. (or two, I should say) Labor should be well compensated! But in what manner possible? To me, the (corporation-)free market is both the question AND the answer.
And yes, government is the world's biggest asshole. Period. The past 10 or so years have successfully convinced me of that.
But my belief... is that I shouldn't take responsibility for someone else's prosperity, and fucking NO ONE is going to take responsibility for mine. Ideally, I should have only myself to thank/blame for my life's successes/failures. Simpler that way, don't you think? I think individual prosperity should be up to the individual, and no one else. (save for a possible future canadian trophy wife!)
Secondly, "broader human society" doesn't mean shit living in a "human society" that feels as if it has punished me nonfuckingstop for essentially being a "brainy loner".... for being too damn smart. 'Smart' as in 'intelligent enough to realize god doesn't exist without anyone's help, at age 10.' (I feel really proud of that, btw.)
meh!... fuck whatever else I was going to say here. I feel really burnt out all of the sudden.........
“A meritocratic society is one in which inequalities of wealth and social position solely reflect the unequal distribution of merit or skills amongst human beings, or are based upon factors beyond human control, for example luck or chance. Such a society is socially just because individuals are judged not by their gender, the colour of their skin or their religion, but according to their talents and willingness to work, or on what Martin Luther King called 'the content of their character'. By extension, social equality is unjust because it treats unequal individuals equally.” "Political Ideologies" by Andrew Heywood (2003)
So you don't rely on food from plant and animal domestication for sustenance? You don't require clothes from industrial manufacturers to stay protected from the elements? You don't rely on technology for EVERYTHING? You do rely on them because you wish to live a civilized life. Your brain isn't enough, since by that definition, humans have always been civilized. Hmmmm... I seem to remember reading about a time before plant and animal domestication where hunter-gatherer nomadic life was the norm, and not civilized societies. So it was YOU who made the logical fallacy (equating your brain, and not the things that the brain have made possible, with civilized life), not I.
I think that is a valid point, but not against socialism as a whole, only state run socialism, since I take it as you using the phrase "I shouldn't take responsibility for someone else's prosperity" to mean "governments shouldn't take responsibility for someone else's prosperity". The thing is though, if I think of other people's needs then there will be other people thinking of mine. It's all about mutual aid, if we all help each other, all of us will be stronger, since it will be much harder for any of us to "fall through the cracks" so to speak.
Look into the history of the First International Workingmen's Association of the World. It is where socialism really split into three factions. That's where the differences between communism, socialism, and anarchism come from. Before that, all three factions considered themselves socialists. But from the meetings of that very early international union, the socialists were divided on the issue of governments. The communists believed in the complete authority of the state as a weapon the proletariat could wield against the bourgeoisie, so they thought complete loyalty to it would be necessary to achieve the "socialist utopia". The socialists (modern day socialists/social democrats), thought the state could be used to help boost the living standards of everyone, but would not necessarily have to go to war with private business and could work hand in hand with it to find a balance. The anarchists were against both capitalist businesses and the state, thinking that a socialist society with the goal of helping everyone could be brought about by self organized collectives of people networking together without the hierarchy of a government or capitalist business. All three are socialists but are all very different from one another.
So Kapkoa, your point IS valid when leveled against the socialists who would agree that the state structure is an adequate tool to achieve socialism, but not those socialists that think the state is as much an enemy of socialism as capitalism is. That's the problem with attacks on "socialism". It's very similar to arguments against "god". It all begs the question; which one?
"This may shock you, but not everything in the bible is true." The only true statement ever to be uttered by Jean Chauvinism, sociopathic emotional terrorist.
"A Boss in Heaven is the best excuse for a boss on earth, therefore If God did exist, he would have to be abolished." Mikhail Bakunin
"The means in which you take,
dictate the ends in which you find yourself."
"Strange women lying in ponds distributing swords is no basis for a system of government! Supreme leadership derives from a mandate from the masses, not from some farcical aquatic ceremony!"
No Gods, No Masters!
You sound a little like a guy who was in the cubicle across the aisle at my last job. He had one child, a son. He was 45 when his son was born, 40 when he got married. Before he got married, he had money set aside for private school and private university for any future children. He could only save enough for one, so he has only one child. He believed that everyone should have families this way.
Maybe, but he is the only person I have ever met who bothered to do so.
It would be nice if we could all take care of ourselves without help. But it doesn't always work out the way we have planned. You are one car accident from being totally dependent on other people for your care and well-being. One case of cancer. Tell me you would rather commit suicide in that case. I believe you.
We could go on with instances of your life savings and your job going up in smoke through no fault of your own. But it all boils down to shit happens to everyone and very often it is not because of anything you have done or not done. "A conservative is a liberal who has been mugged, a liberal is a conservative who has been jailed." For this discussion perhaps, "A libertarian/capitalist is a socialist who has made a fortune, a socialist is a libertarian/capitalist who has lost a fortune."
Which is rather simplistic, but so is your argument.
-- I feel so much better since I stopped trying to believe.
"We are entitled to our own opinions. We're not entitled to our own facts"- Al Franken
"If death isn't sweet oblivion, I will be severely disappointed" - Ruth M.
I have literally had people tell me that. "We should take care of ourselves. If someone can't afford medical coverage, they shouldn't get it!"
Drives me nuts. As it is, unless you are at least middle class with a job and good insurance you are fucked if you get sick or hurt. With the system these 'conservatives' (usually libertarians) want everyone but the super rich is one accident or disease away from dying under a filthy bridge. I really don't get it...most of these people are lower-middle class, and they think the system will work better if they are able to fend for themselves in a 'free market'. Jesus Christ, I I just don't get it.
Everything makes more sense now that I've stopped believing.
They have bought into the propaganda. "You too can be a millionaire, just do like <insert wildly rich person's name here> did!" It takes a lot more to get there than hard work. I have worked hard all of my life, and I just used up the last bit of what retirement savings I had this last year after I lost my job. It was my choice, I could have been homeless instead of using the savings.
I may still mange to become homeless if I don't get work soon. (an aside: just how do you answer the question, "Why have you applied for this position?" when your answer is, "because I am out of work and I don't want to live under a bridge"?)
I once found some old stock certificates. My paternal grandparents owned stock in Kennecott copper mines (huge open pit mines in the SW US) - and they sold them during the depression. I could have been a trust fund baby except for bad luck. My husband's great-grandparents sold land for pennies on the dollar during the depression around Lake Tahoe - where all the casinos are. I could have married a trust fund baby but for bad luck.
It takes hard work, intelligence, persistence, and luck to get wealthy. Yeah, you have to be in the right place at the right time, have to have a manager who sees your potential and doesn't hold you back, have to get the right product mix to the right demographic at the right time, buy the right stocks at the right time, be born into the right family, go to the right schools. Not everyone can hit it. Most of the people on this forum are still young enough they are sure they will get there. They have to get old, tired, under insured, probably laid off at age 55+, and staring 20-40 years of retirement in the face before they will have a clue.
-- I feel so much better since I stopped trying to believe.
"We are entitled to our own opinions. We're not entitled to our own facts"- Al Franken
"If death isn't sweet oblivion, I will be severely disappointed" - Ruth M.
But I've always wondered whether it was actually possible for socialism to pay for itself. In the same vein I've also wondered if capitalism and socialism should not be considered symbiotic by default. I know that sounds a bit mental but capitalism does not necessarily insist on crushing the little guy - efficiency to some extent can be improved by design and by mechanisation rather than just milking the chinese masses. Modern democracies - consider the northern europeans, the brits, the french in particular, the kiwis and Australia and Canada as well, have strong socialist undercurrents even to their conservative/liberal/right wing governments. Maybe this contest between profit and social empathy is the sort of moral marketplace that represents the best we can do.
"Experiments are the only means of knowledge at our disposal. The rest is poetry, imagination." Max Planck
My great grandfather had a claim in Gabriel's Gulley in Otago in New Zealand during the gold rush down there in the mid 1800s and they ingeniously swapped this plot for a team of 4 draught horses. Not surprisingly, it was the richest claim in the strike and each morning when I wake up and head off for another dose of fiscal servitude I decry their lack of persistence with swearing.
Getting ahead is a matter of luck, combined with all those other things CJ mentioned and leavened with plenty of balls/ovaries. You have to want it. My favourite business story is The Winter of Our Discontent. Yes, I know it's immoral but you have to bend the rules to birth a business. Personally I think our discontented hero went too far but I can see why he did it. You can't be beneficent until you've seized your slice and no one is giving it away.
"Experiments are the only means of knowledge at our disposal. The rest is poetry, imagination." Max Planck
I can always count on some idiot to give me a good laugh with his theories of "how to become wealthy" in this forum. These guys here are in the more boring end of reiterating the same educational propaganda of "persistence and hard work" and the same old media indoctrination about how you "have to bend the rules". As is the norm, they mention luck as a necessary explanation for the slight 180 degrees of difference between their theory and actual reality.
Of course, if you did a study, 99.9% of super wealthy would turn out to have been just "lucky", while the 0.1% persistent, intelligent, lucky, confident, criminal and all-around brilliant at getting stuff done would turn out to be the one's the media and educational system promote as the role models, IF they have the correct and presentable sound byte views, that is. I think we should take a closer look at what exactly this "lucky" element in the 99.9% of the super wealthy really is. You might find that almost all of it is successful public investment handed over to private hands, while all these other fringe cases you jarheads talk about here constitute guys like me - not ridiculously wealthy, but competent enough to successfully gather the crumbs that fall off the table. Considering someone like me as a role model is unadulterated bullshit - it's like looking under the table to see what's for dinner and who cooked it. You think the crumbs will give you an accurate picture, you inbred lunatic?Logic is a systematic method of coming to the wrong conclusion with confidence.
economically viable.
Nope, still wrong.
I am very thankful for the things you mentioned. They make my life comfortable and functional (hint: I need medicine to stay alive longer then 3-4 days before my blood becomes poisonous and acidic). I STILL only require my cerebral cortex to live "civilized", even if being "civilized", in this case, means sitting on a round piece of stone and pondering the nature of everything around me... (everything else, is just creature comforts to me... albeit very rewarding ones.)
... at least, for a few hours only before feeling a mild form of malaise, followed by some mild nausea, followed by SEVERE nausea and heartburn that feels like a hedgehog is literally crawling around in my digestive tract, right before I start vomiting black, icky-smelling shit, seizing, feeling super woozy and having next to no energy (mental or physical), and finally entering a ketosis-induced coma.
I was in such a state of physical chaos... that my body practically went into 'standby' mode while my mind remained somewhat active. I could still hear my name being called while in this state... or so I was told.
I was lucky enough to get out of it.... without enduring the whole twatty "white light at the end of a blue tunnel" routine. That's one thing I'm "grateful" for.....
WHOA!!! Whhhhooooaaaa.... tone down the irony here! It's so damn bitter, the level of it escapes words! I've never heard a concept so absurd in my days, except the whole "kindness to/from strangers" bullshit routine from xtians.
Maybe I should tell something of my experiences with "fall(ing) through the cracks." (I have quite a bit of experience in this particular 'arena' of TKOs. Far too much actually... but I'm on anti-depressants now so iz allll guhd hur hur hur *drools*!)
In either case, I'm useless to the human race. I've never worked a day in my life. I'm the ultimate jobless loser. I have no other niche in evolution other than "familial leech". I should've won a Darwin Award by now. I didn't, AND THAT PISSES ME OFF TO NO FUCKING END. At least then I would've proven Social Darwinisn correct, and maybe served some kind of purpose. Nope, my purpose in life is "in the can" basically. But then... I think... I *did* deconstruct the existence of God at a relatively VERY young age. People talk about god... I shy away and look for an alternative to the situation. "Hey, look! A shooting star! Let's stop talking about a cruel fucking version of Dad that punishes his own kids for being human."
I'm anti-syndicalistic by my very nature. My contributions to the world can be measured in negative numbers. Tell... and tell me accurately... what the fuck's wrong with me?
Which one? You mean like Yin and Yang? Or maybe the "white rabbit"? How about the Thumb Puppet kind of god? The kind that makes you drink kool aid?
That's all gods are... thumb puppets that trick people into drinking kool-aid.
THERE IS NO "which one?" in the case of "Gods".
“A meritocratic society is one in which inequalities of wealth and social position solely reflect the unequal distribution of merit or skills amongst human beings, or are based upon factors beyond human control, for example luck or chance. Such a society is socially just because individuals are judged not by their gender, the colour of their skin or their religion, but according to their talents and willingness to work, or on what Martin Luther King called 'the content of their character'. By extension, social equality is unjust because it treats unequal individuals equally.” "Political Ideologies" by Andrew Heywood (2003)
SEE?! This guy understands my lines of thought perfectly!
I feel.... woozy. If I don't get some sleep soon.... i'm going ape.
edit: y'know....... I'm sooooo damn good at ignoring my hypothalamus. Too good actually....
edit2: woah! Did you see that? I just winked at my screen and... I swear(!) it fucking winked back at me! I swear.... sleep deprivation is soooooooooo awesome! I. MUST. HAVE. ANOTHER. RRS. HIT. FOR. THE. DAY. JONESING.... JONESING..... *muscle spasms* *uncontrollable sweating*...
“A meritocratic society is one in which inequalities of wealth and social position solely reflect the unequal distribution of merit or skills amongst human beings, or are based upon factors beyond human control, for example luck or chance. Such a society is socially just because individuals are judged not by their gender, the colour of their skin or their religion, but according to their talents and willingness to work, or on what Martin Luther King called 'the content of their character'. By extension, social equality is unjust because it treats unequal individuals equally.” "Political Ideologies" by Andrew Heywood (2003)
No, you are the one who is wrong. The things I mentioned don't just make your life comfortable, they ARE civilized life. Lets look at the definitions of the words, shall we?
Main Entry: civilized
Function: adjective
Date: 1611
: characteristic of a state of civilization <civilized society>; especially : characterized by taste, refinement, or restraint
Okay, so civilized is a characteristic of a state of civilization. So lets pull out the definition of that one too
Main Entry: civ·i·li·za·tion
Pronunciation: \ˌsi-və-lə-ˈzā-shən\
Function: noun
Date: 1772
1 a : a relatively high level of cultural and technological development; specifically : the stage of cultural development at which writing and the keeping of written records is attained b : the culture characteristic of a particular time or place
2 : the process of becoming civilized
3 a : refinement of thought, manners, or taste b : a situation of urban comfort
So no, it isn't just your brain, since if that was the definition, our earliest ancestor's first though would have been the birth of civilization, but it wasn't. It wasn't until the domestication of plants and animals that humans began to develop civilized life. So yes, those things you regard as just comfortable creature comforts, THEY ARE CIVILIZATION! Our earliest ancestors pondering existence were not civilized or living in a civilization, they were creating the fertile soil of intelligence so that the seeds of thought and technology could sprout and BECOME civilization.
SO ABSURD?!?!?! The concept of mutual aid is what enabled all of our ancestors to survive in their communities long enough to procreate and eventually give rise to us, so unless you hate your life and are raising the gun to your head right now to fix the situation, you should have more respect for our social nature. How is helping other people NOT going to lead to them in turn helping you? I don't get it.
I'm sorry for my outburst, it was only because I felt like I was being compared to a Christian (or any religious nutter for that matter), and that I will not stand for. Plus it's very hard to pick out an ironic tone from text. XD
Bullshit. You may have medical problems which stop you from working a normal job, but if you are able to share a poetic idea or a scientific concept with someone which helps them live their lives better, then you HAVE done something. A very powerful and important something. We seem to diminish our own actions and possibilities when they don't fit the bill of the people we view as inspirations. Well guess what, those inspirations of ours did the same thing with the people that gave them inspiration. It's called being human.
To end I have two small comments for Kapkoa:
1) I love the new avatar, The Gunslinger is one of my favorite books!
2) Part of your signature, the "if god really existed..." was from Mikhail Bakunin, who was an anarchist, which is a form of socialism. Just thought I'd let you know. I obviously love the quote too. XD
"This may shock you, but not everything in the bible is true." The only true statement ever to be uttered by Jean Chauvinism, sociopathic emotional terrorist.
"A Boss in Heaven is the best excuse for a boss on earth, therefore If God did exist, he would have to be abolished." Mikhail Bakunin
"The means in which you take,
dictate the ends in which you find yourself."
"Strange women lying in ponds distributing swords is no basis for a system of government! Supreme leadership derives from a mandate from the masses, not from some farcical aquatic ceremony!"
No Gods, No Masters!
You came close to the answer.... AND YOU STILL MISSED THE MARK!!!
I don't blame you, honestly; nobody here is a mind reader. 
But I'll answer my own question nonetheless, strawman army style.
I am the sorest, most bitter loser at the game of life. Wanna know why?
I used to think exactly as you do now.... the 'ultimate selfless act, without God's help.... because he's a regular piece of work to his own kids' was (more or less) one of my earliest memories. You wanna know where that lead me to? Suicidal ideation, and my first attempt, BOTH at age 12. "Life? Fuck this nonsense... I'm better off living in hell!" was the only words coming into my head...
And I was right, in a way. I felt as if I was 'condemned to a miserable existence' before being born. So I failed my first three attempts at death -and believe me, that's a bitter taste of defeat NO ONE should have to experience- and then I thought "wwwhhhyyyy?!". It doesn't really matter what I do now.... so long as... I feel good. Yesss...... feeling good (IE well-rewarded) from life... is more important to life itself then "being a good individual" ever was.....
And thus, if you think I will not try to be the 'master' of my own circumstances.....
....to effectively rise from my own 'ashes' like a 'Phoenix', however foolishly I may be in doing so.... you are astoundingly, and mind-bogglingly mistaken. It's the only ideal I have left in life (survival of the fittest in civilization?!)... along with seeing theism die an abrupt and painless 'death' on Earth.... to be an extinct approach to existence, that is.
And if you still think what lies between my skeletal temples doesn't make possible the exhibiting of civilized behavior... you should see what happens to people what happens to people who are lobotomized.
You confuse the symptoms of an ultimate cause, with the cause itself. My human brain is what makes me rational (albeit in a "vicious" manner, as one particular RRS'er so astutely said) ... nothing else.
“A meritocratic society is one in which inequalities of wealth and social position solely reflect the unequal distribution of merit or skills amongst human beings, or are based upon factors beyond human control, for example luck or chance. Such a society is socially just because individuals are judged not by their gender, the colour of their skin or their religion, but according to their talents and willingness to work, or on what Martin Luther King called 'the content of their character'. By extension, social equality is unjust because it treats unequal individuals equally.” "Political Ideologies" by Andrew Heywood (2003)
Lol, you sure like to insert flair into your fonts don't you?
Everything makes more sense now that I've stopped believing.
Resume
Razors pain you;
Rivers are damp;
Acids stain you;
And drugs cause cramp.
Guns aren't lawful;
Nooses give;
Gas smells awful;
You might as well live. -- Dorothy Parker
-- I feel so much better since I stopped trying to believe.
"We are entitled to our own opinions. We're not entitled to our own facts"- Al Franken
"If death isn't sweet oblivion, I will be severely disappointed" - Ruth M.
... and I'll admit this freely.
I had this (almost exactly the) same conversation with Bi66er at RD.net.... I remember almost like it was yesterday.
“A meritocratic society is one in which inequalities of wealth and social position solely reflect the unequal distribution of merit or skills amongst human beings, or are based upon factors beyond human control, for example luck or chance. Such a society is socially just because individuals are judged not by their gender, the colour of their skin or their religion, but according to their talents and willingness to work, or on what Martin Luther King called 'the content of their character'. By extension, social equality is unjust because it treats unequal individuals equally.” "Political Ideologies" by Andrew Heywood (2003)
staying alive isn't a problem for me now... because I remember another possible reason to exist: evolve or die trying.
“A meritocratic society is one in which inequalities of wealth and social position solely reflect the unequal distribution of merit or skills amongst human beings, or are based upon factors beyond human control, for example luck or chance. Such a society is socially just because individuals are judged not by their gender, the colour of their skin or their religion, but according to their talents and willingness to work, or on what Martin Luther King called 'the content of their character'. By extension, social equality is unjust because it treats unequal individuals equally.” "Political Ideologies" by Andrew Heywood (2003)
But it's just as subjective to you as it is to me. I have my own business and I know what I did to get it. I cut corner's throats, leveraged what talent I have, worked on relationships and I never quit. After 12 years in my own business I would have to say that for me, success has not been about what I can do, it's been about what I can keep doing at a high level over the long term. As for the super wealthy, that shit might be a different planet but those bastards run on the same principles you and I do. Greed and fear and that hunger you probably know about. I have a mate who runs a 30MIO a year integration business he and his wife started in their lounge room. It's true the core of this business is government contracts but the guys involved are just bloody good at what they do and they work hard at it. Billionaires - who gives a fuck about them from this perspective? But if you think the super rich don't have to offer a level of service and performance in order to survive in the world you aren't paying attention.
"Experiments are the only means of knowledge at our disposal. The rest is poetry, imagination." Max Planck
power from the selves of others.
30MIO? Ah, whatever. AE....
Under ideal circumstances, this is the attitude everyone should take towards life, regardless of past failures:
“A meritocratic society is one in which inequalities of wealth and social position solely reflect the unequal distribution of merit or skills amongst human beings, or are based upon factors beyond human control, for example luck or chance. Such a society is socially just because individuals are judged not by their gender, the colour of their skin or their religion, but according to their talents and willingness to work, or on what Martin Luther King called 'the content of their character'. By extension, social equality is unjust because it treats unequal individuals equally.” "Political Ideologies" by Andrew Heywood (2003)
Luckily, we don't have to have that discussion, because I am not presenting any definition of success to you. I am, however, putting what you think is "success" into perspective.
You see, I am sure feudal Pashas under Sultan's rule during the Osmanic conquests considered themselves successful and a model for any citizen to follow, all the while they taxed those same citizens in blood. Sure, ALL of their money came from the ruler, but they were certain they got it all due to their skill and compatibility wit the modern world. I am sure businessmen under the Nazi regime thought themselves successful enough, skilled and looked back at their early days as "pulling themselves by the boot straps". Sure, most of the contracts from 1933 and on were for the military and they kindof did have to dis the Jews (insert Arabs for modernisation of the analogy), but fundamentally they like to see themselves as the examples and saviors of the German economy and even German pride, even though ALL of their cash came directly from the state. Russian olygarchs today consider themselves God-given to man kind, never mind the fact that ALL their wealth is from illegal privatisation of public property and subsequent questionable and directly illegal activity. The situation is the same with supporters of tyranies accross the board.
All those people were (and we are), of course, avoiding application of the fundamental reality and moral test - two questions:
a) What are the odds that something that should make me proud at the same time is comfortable?
b) Does my explanation of what I do and who I am make me proud AND give me a comfortable living at the same time?
Now, if you answer those questions honestly, already there you have to start drawing parallels from yourself to the feudal Pashas, Nazi businessmen and Russian olygarchs, just to be sure. If you don't agree, try farting in a full elevator, see how proud that makes you, then come back so we can talk a bit more.
Assuming that you agree that we need to examine ourselves more closely, let's see what makes up the skill set of those I mentioned: Pashas, Nazi businessmen and Russian olygarchs.
Off the bat, these guys have the following traits:
1) obedience to the established power
2) acceptance that you have to "break a few eggs...", in other words a cynical view of the world
3) acceptance of public money as if they earned it
4) advocating own behavior as the "right thing to do", or at least as "the only way to make it"
Now we can try to see if some or most of those fit us. If we are the least bit honest, we will concede 1) simply because we own corporations - state enabled entities for control of small, mid-sized and large operations. We like the police, since they protect our "ownership rights", held more dearly than any other principle. If the state tells us to do it, we will. We accept state power implicitly. Even if we will try to avoid following the rules, we will only do so if we've gotten an OK-nod from lax regulation.
I don't think I need to convince you that you have all the symptoms of 2), but I will quote you on all the "cut-throat" stuff if you disagree.
Point 3) is often as obvious as it is with your friends with govt. contracts. That you and they think they earned it I don't think there is any doubt, but please correct me if I'm wrong. I will tell you this much: the economy as we know it is 99.9% public investment, 0.1% enterpreneurship. Take ANY industry in US - it is a direct consequence of govt. policy and would not exist otherwise - this goes from agriculture, over transport to insurance and military corps - all the biggest $ contracts are in-house and almost any invention is either publicly subsidised or directly invented using public funds. There is a VERY good reason why the main part of the funding for the MIT comes from Pentagon and same is true accross the educational and research board. All we "enterpreneurs" do is manage Pentagon-invented stuff and feel damn good about our "ingenuity". Computers, airplanes, medicine, all of it straight out of public risk and research pocket into private profit hands.
As to point 4) and advocating for own behavior as the model, that's exactly what you did in the last few posts, albeit with a hint of "it's too bad it has to be this way, but I accept it" sentiment. I don't think it has to be any particular way and some conjured excuse of "taht's the way the world works" has never given us pause when judging feudal Pashas, Nazi businessmen and Russian olygarchs. We should have the common decency or just the minimum of honesty and admit this to ourselves as basis for any further consideration and action.
Underneath our veil of ignorance and bliss are the same people that cooperated with the power in Germany when Jews were decimated in concentration camps, or in USSR when dissidents were sent to Gulag. The broad public understands this instinctively and rationally, because they see us the way we see Russian olygarchs - at a distance and with a better big picture. It's high time we took some time to see their point of view. Neither history nor our children will think of us as highly as we do now, if we continue supporting tyranies.
About your remarks that the billionaires have to obay by some customer rules - give me a fucking break from the grade school neo-liberal bullshit economics theory. Some of those billionaires are "rebuilding" Iraq as we speak - go ask their customers, both Iraqis and the US tax payer, if they're doing a good job, if they even know what fuck these billionaire companies are doing and if they can do anything about it. It took years just to get a hearing on the Blackwater Nisour Square massacre; standard - not an exception.
Logic is a systematic method of coming to the wrong conclusion with confidence.
And it's clear we have having two distinctly different discussions. Going long on payment of debts, havng no staff, essentially trading insolvent and the like in order to get initial traction doesn't really constitute the throat cutting you're implying. I run a bloody magazine - it's not a gulag. Quite simply I offer customers a service that's better than my competitors for less money. If I did not I would lose my customers. Sometimes I do lose them, usually on price but mostly I don't.
I don't disagree with some of the stuff you're saying about contracts in Iraq but fuck. Iraq is the basis for all the wealth in the U.S. now? To say entrepreurship is worth .1 of a per cent of your country's sales is a fucking crock. In our country about 60 per cent of all busines is SME and whether a coffee shop, an ISP or a retailer, it comes down to the quality of what you sell, your level of service and how you manage your overheads.
When you say government policy drives business 99.9 per cent of the time you ignore the fact that vast amounts of government funding are driven by business conditions and fundamentals like employment. Your idea that using my model as the one for success is a narrow personal view is correct but so is my personal view and your personal view on everything. At least I acknowledge my bias.
As for my mates - they do a good job, deliver on time and use quality components. They don't even have a service agreement. They are bloody good at what they do. There's no hidden galley slaves rowing the boat. The guys pull cables with the installers. That's the way they operate and that's why they are successful. I could try to read some weird cant into their success but it would end up being a bit too Atlas Shrugged.
I'm definitely aspirationalist. I have worked for a boss and I have worked for myself and I assure you that I'd rather work for myself. It gives me a solid feeling to think I've paid my own wages for 12 years. I'm not sure how the nazis fit into this but I think the rule is that whoever mentions them first loses the argument.
"Experiments are the only means of knowledge at our disposal. The rest is poetry, imagination." Max Planck
Guess I will have to quote you after all. You see the bold part? After saying something like this, you can't just go on and say you have a honest business and are doing a good job - those words are at best ignorant meaninglessness and at worst indifferent hypocrisy. We really have to dig deeper than that and what I suggest is comparing ourselves with people who have done and said similar things in the past.
Russian commisars, Nazi businessmen, British and American slave owners, Osmanic Pashas - all of them fall into this category and are a very good first approximation to what capitalist businessmen do today - not identical, but we comform to the 4 criteria that I laid out for you: support of power, cynical view of the world, magical acceptance of public resources as our own and advocating our set of values as acceptable and even desireable.
As to our dispute about how much of the economy is government investment, don't be ridiculous. Agriculture in US would not exist as it does today, if it wasn't for the government protectionism and economic war on third world countries. You can take this to technology (computers, planes, internet - all of it straight out of Pentagon investments), international trade (rates set by governments are de-facto standards for anything that happens and I hope I don't have to mention political relations and initiatives - Iraq was the biggest financial bonansa of the decade). Sure, companies compete to "add value" to the initial government product, whatever the hell that means in a world where price decides value, but this doesn't change the fact that the underlaying economy is 100% government decision. A travesty like Monsanto would not exist, if it wasn't for the very spoecific intelectual property rights enforced by the government - just start there and things should become clear fairly fast.
Logic is a systematic method of coming to the wrong conclusion with confidence.
ZuS. Ethan Hawley is not a good example of the young business executive. Betraying your best friend to build an airport is immoral. I should point out this is nothing I have ever done or would ever do. My worst crime is to compete with my former employer, ultimately leading to our purchase and closure of their business unit with the loss of jobs. One of the guys who lost his job was a former work colleague with a wife and 2 kids. We felt we were competing with a corporation but this part of the process is our biggest regret.
Giving my position 2 options, one being ignorant meaninglessness and the other cynical indifference is erroneous. The motivations for self employment are multifarious. The visceral hunger Ethan has to succeed is the thing that spoke to me. And the fact he came from a nothing position. I strongly identified with his need. It's dangerous territory taken to extremes, but there it is. It's hardly likely to escape anyone's attention that my comment came with the caveat that Hawley went too far. Hawley ends up arguably killing himself, or planning to kill himself in order to escape his guilt over betraying his 2 friends in the final moments of the book - a book which is about the danger of capitalism and not a business bible. If I said I did not identify with what drove him I would be lying to you. If I said I could act as he did I would be lying to you.
I think you are undervalueing the creative effort of your entire nation. Is everything produced by you guys nothing more than a cheap spillover from public money presumably ripped off from the under classes? Protectionism does have an impact on the domestic economy but does this undermine the value of all your nation's work? Does everything have to be made in china at the lowest price so as to undo protectionism?
In Australia small business is the economy's largest employer. Your 4 principles generally do not apply to these people but I'm sure many would share with me and arguably with you (only one of us has revealed something of his personal position here), a strong will to succeed. How this relates to slave owners and nazis, in the broader sense, is unclear to me. None of these businesses own slaves. They are self employed. They work in their businesses up to 7 days a week. All have their arses taxed off. All are on the edge of a knife. Around 90 per cent will fail in the first 12 months. If they had no hunger they would not even bother. They'd remain employed by government departments or huge corporations - they would be fiscal slaves generating wealth for the few. Do you suggest this is a more moral position?
Additionally, on the topic of the redistribution of wealth, do you think the socialist revolutions were immoral, given you apparently contend capitalism is wrong and carries parallels with the worst excesses of the human race? Or do you think grassroots wealth redistribution (which in a practical sense was a farce) at the point of a sword is acceptable?
"Experiments are the only means of knowledge at our disposal. The rest is poetry, imagination." Max Planck
We aren't in agreement on what constitutes bending of the rules in small business. Using the word "seized" is probably more indicative of my competitive frame of mind than an actual assault on some one else's possessions. We did what we had to do to stay upright in the context of what we do but even that sounds more ominous than it actually was. We took no wages but rent and lunch money, ran ourselves into debt our creditors and suppliers could not have recouped had we failed. We chased our competitors clients relentlessly. We probably badmouthed our competitors. And as I say, we competed with, and ultimately destroyed a business that people we knew depended on. They were attempting to do the same to us, mind you, but as the victor in that instance, we have to carry the guilt of their personal losses. I still have that aggressive and possessive frame of mind about the business. Every time I see one of my competitors I get a hot flush. Lol. And if they all failed to my commercial benefit there would be a part of me that would secretly rejoice. If this is what you are getting at in your criticism of my position then I stand guilty as charged.
"Experiments are the only means of knowledge at our disposal. The rest is poetry, imagination." Max Planck
Forgive me for chopping up your post, but there are a couple of questions asked and I intend to answer.
I get the feeling here that you think I am accusing us of immoral action, while I do nothing of the sort. I do something much worse - namely accuse us of complete and utter inertness and inaction. You see, the four criteria start with "support of power", which effectively puts all of our actions subordinate someone else's reasoning. We are just playing in the sandbox, carefully delimited by the grownups. German businessmen of our caliber during the period just before the second world war (you so cling to the word Nazi, I will try to remove it) were insignificant - they just supported power. Indeed, the legal, practical and social structure of the game they engaged in permited nothing else. Whether they were moral in doing this or that is a completely irrelevant question - they didn't have more integrity than children playing in a sandbox and pushing each other around for the prettiest sand mound.
Whether Hawley is a good example is not the point. To be a business executive is a bad example of an attempt to become a complete human being.
If you take time to understand my point above, this bit of text will be clear to you. Ignorant meaninglessness is what children engage in while tossing sand around and assuming the box to be the world. I say that this is the best case, because all it takes is a good look around to start seeing the truth of your position and feeling invigorated to act on it. Hypocritical indifference is more or less knowing how things are, choosing to relish in the material benefits of today and in a sense not paying attention to your own mortality, hiding behind creative self-delusion. This is much worse than ignorant meaninglessness, because it's much tougher to get out of - your reason tells you that you need to move out of the stupor, but your gut keeps calling you a fool for even contemplating it, and then gently lulls you in false pride through a few convenient explanations.
Now for the questions.
Firstly, this "presumably ripped off from the under classes" has nothing to do with my argument. I am not saying that someone ripped off someone else, I am saying that we rip off ourselves.
Now, as to what "my nation" does, it could be killing Jews by the millions, NOTHING would change in my life. Of course, my analogy is out of touch with reality, since my nation is killing Arabs by the hundreds of thousands and not Jews, but do you understand what I am saying here? We are systemically assimilated, we are supporters of whatever is going on by default. That is worse than dead in my book and when you get tired of tossing sand around, and it will happen, I can't imagine you feeling any different. If at that moment you shrug and go "eh, what can you do?", notice that you will agree with my point: inert. If instead you go: "Bloody hell, I must do something about this", then you have a chance not to be inert.
I really didn't want to talk much about this and your questions demonstrate why. We can have an endless debate on economics, which would be about as meaningful as jerking off a fish on Mars.
I like this thing certain cunts call "protectionism" - indeed I think most of the healthy economy has no way of existing, if not protected from speculation. Let's look at how this plays out in reality.
Everyone should be food-independent from others; that is the first and indispensible requirement for any bi- tri- or whateverlateral relationship, right? Well, there's a reason Haiti isn't food-independent, and it's not the earthquake's fault. Same is the case on essential produce for Argentina, Guatemala, most parts of Africa, Nicaragua, really most of the third world. I really don't care if you call them "specialized economies" - they are being played, they know it and they can do nothing about it, and you are not helping with the extra planetary aquatic animal masturbation.
I mention these things, so that we might get to common ground on a simple fact: economy is not numbers, it's policy. It doesn't happen, it's guided.
Actually, my principle applies EXACTLY to small-to-medium businesses, since I have only qualified assumptions about, for example, Halliburton. For a businessman, there are only two ways to be exempt from the 4 criteria: don't be a businessman, or have NO ONE above you - in the latter case you cannot fulfill the first criteria, since you are the power and don't follow anyone else’s orders. Some people in mega conglomerates might actually be exempt from the first criteria on these grounds, but it's only a theoretical possibility.
Google "waged slavery". This was a concept very clear to the working people during the start of the industrial revolution. We are ingenious indeed with excuses for ourselves.
Ask yourself whether this kind of behavior might blind you to some of the things I mentioned. It's tough to see the box for all the sand.
Again, I want us to look at ourselves as we are, not as we might have been in some hypothetical scenario. If we were x, y, z, and I felt that we were so far the fuck off track that I needed to say something about it, we would be having that discussion. It so happens that we are having this one instead.
Which socialist revolutions? The imaginary ones in our history books, or the hypothetical ones conjured up by people like you and I for purposes of self-deception and generation of false pride? No social revolution ever happened on state level, just like no capitalist system ever existed on state level. I simply use the word "capitalist" interchangeably with "inert supporter of power, hypocrite, self-excuser and falsely proud", simply because the real meaning of the word has no meaning, other than for propaganda purposes.
And even if we could dissect some "socialist revolution", our first principle of investigation has to center on ourselves, on the things we do, can affect and are therefore responsible for. We are not responsible for the foreseeable consequences of other people's actions, we are responsible for foreseeable consequences of our actions (close summary of Chomsky position, might even find a quote if you want me to bother to look). Avoiding this by pointing fingers is just that - avoidance, not an argument.
Logic is a systematic method of coming to the wrong conclusion with confidence.
But need some time to digest all of them. I'm considering all this at a more local level than you are, clearly. From inside the sandbox. There are points you make I have to contest while seeing the bigger truth of what you are saying. I struggle with the thought that businesses would sit by through another holocaust and that all staff are slaves and that government is the sole driver of an economy. Maybe your situation in the U.S. is more extreme than ours. The social revolutions I mention are imaginary ones that are supposed to have happened but that really just moved power from one group with a big stick to another - China, Russia, Cuba, France to a far lesser extent. Even the industrial revolution in Britain qualifies, the social implications being pretty horrible.
I'd agree that power and wealth are increasingly concentrated. But I have for so long thought that small business ventures were the answer to corporate excesses and government inefficiencies that I can't see past this mindset right now. I also wrestle with your insistence the situation in the world is guided, presumably deliberately, by governments. I think corporate greed, which variously reflects a chain made up of management greed and shareholder greed fueled by the urge for security and consumption, do damage undeveloped nations but I see this operating in a far more random way than you seem to. I tend to see it as a conglomerate of corporate and government social treacheries or failures played out one fuck up at a time. Again I have always seen small and local business as the answer to these problems rather than part of the problem. In small business you can actually make socially beneficial decisions.
In truth, what sort of a model do you think is the ideal? Is socialism actually possible, even inevitable given the stresses the planet is under? I won't argue that rampant capitalism driven by exploitation of resources and labour markets has a use-by date. Does human nature allow for a sustainable and mutually beneficial way of delivering the products and services we need?
"Experiments are the only means of knowledge at our disposal. The rest is poetry, imagination." Max Planck
a lot of people try to moveout of that place for some reason...
O'K lets examine why people are trying too leave this utopia . First, most of those people would not try to leave their homeland,but thanks to uncle Sam who has put santions on that Island and remember 90% of a Island Nation depends on imports.We here in the good old USA are trained to think of Castro as an evil dictator,but in reality we're the evil one,a failed state. 
And if you read Einstein 's "Why Socialism" you'll realize that Socialism is the only way that will teach humanity not to be greedy. www.huppi.com/kangaroo/Einstein.htm
Signature ? How ?
A Goddess has rejected my prayer for salvation, Bi66er>you 8 times a week, twice on sundays, I'm not in a rational state of mind atm, etc..
WEAVE ME AWONE
No one left for Canada from America in 2005? News to me... or, hey! What about from Nazi Germany to the US back in 1932-1950something?
I know Arcadian (of Mexico) sees the US as his best Social Welfare program for some reason... we can't be THAT evil now, can we?
“A meritocratic society is one in which inequalities of wealth and social position solely reflect the unequal distribution of merit or skills amongst human beings, or are based upon factors beyond human control, for example luck or chance. Such a society is socially just because individuals are judged not by their gender, the colour of their skin or their religion, but according to their talents and willingness to work, or on what Martin Luther King called 'the content of their character'. By extension, social equality is unjust because it treats unequal individuals equally.” "Political Ideologies" by Andrew Heywood (2003)
Hehe. I am in Denmark - just the coalition of the willing. If you look us up on statistics, we are the happiest, most progressive people on the planet, we have more windmills than teeth and most of our workforce is in small to mid-sized businesses, increasingly flat structures. And we are killing brown people in the middle east with the biggest smile.
Accurate description of what our history books deliberately choose to quantify in terms of "isms".
I could talk to you on and on about the problems small organisations face with trying to solve large problems, or talk to you about lack of cohesion and problems with responsibility allocation in small flat organisations that try to delegate work, but even without looking at these problems, we have more severe issues in front of us. Yes, corporations are huge and insensitive. Yes, small businesses are closer to the ground truth and their own impact and therefore more responsive. But the fundamental issue is not "corporate greed" - that phrase is meaningless. Corporations exist for one sole purpose - accumulation of profit for it's own end - corporations are NOTHING BUT greed. Adding "greed" to "corporate" is just redundant. Unfortunately, small to medium businesses operate with same base parameters - as recognised by law in the letter, in the land and in minds of the people.
You might ask: "But isn't the close proximity to customer and increased responsiveness better?" Well, I will ask Iraqis and Afghanis whether Danish bullets hurt less next time I get the chance. Not only that, but I will draw your attention to something most atheists tend to forget, and that is how all these dangerous religions come to be: we made them! Big and small business came around in fairly similar manner to each other and certainly from the same source, which doesn't boad well for the theory of "small business" on the side of the people and these "big mean corps" on the side of the devil. More likely they are segments of the same system.
I think that there is a strategic and tactical flaw in asking the types of questions you asked. The strategic flaw is that the questions are of the type "can pink elephants ever exist?" - zero relevance promises zero effect. The tactical flaw is that they arrest your thought and action as you think about them and discuss them. You have sort of given up in advance.
What to do then? Let's me just take one of your questions and alter it slightly. I take the "is socialism possible..." and phrase it instead as: "has there been a move towards more transparency, democracy and influence by the general population on policy, what are the events and actions that made it possible and can we replicate those today and in the future in order to deliver more of the same?" See right there, there is an opening: you can establish criteria for transparency, democracy and influence, you can study history, evaluate events and actions and determine whether you can contribute. So let's give it a quick informal shot, as illustrative as possible.
Case in point: Vietnam vs Afghan/Iraq wars in terms of anti-war movement, it's effect and replicability.
History: When Kennedy announced that he would level parts of Vietnam, you couldn't get three people in the average American home to voice descent, let alone form an anti-war movement. When napalm carpet bombing started, you might have heard a few voices about how our noble goals are too expensive in terms of blood, but that's it. Only when the general draft started claiming tens of thousands of American lives, 7 years into the war, did a viable anti-war movement form. By then Vietnam and much of indo-china were completely destroyed, there was nothing left but burned down landscape and agent orange gassed general population. Now, when Bush anounced he would invade Iraq, there was a convulsion in the population, both in the US and world wide communities were forming huge protests and movements against the war that are very much alive today - and not a bullet has been fired at that point. That is radical change in just 40 years.
Effect: well, as I said, Vietnam and most of indo-china was leveled with the ground, hundreds of thousands of dead, displaced, millions affected by the chemical warfare, tens of thousands of dead American soldiers, a traumatised generation and scars that are open until today. Could Bush have announced napalm carpet bombing of, say, Feluja or outskirts of Baghdad? Could he institute a policy of agent orange-type gassing of the general population? Could he at any point have pronounced Iraqis as the enemy? Culd he have instituted a general draft? Of course not. You may think that this is a small move, but in 40 years the nature and scale of what US can do has been altered dramatically and this has had a huge impact on both US population and the middle east. Like I said, for one Iraq and afghanistan have not been completely destroyed, and this is largely due to protests and resistance at home.
Can we replicate it: YES, we can do it today, with little to no risk to us. If we wanted to protest in, say, Saudi Arabia, we might lose our life, but not here - we have a huge potential to deliver change at minimal cost. This is another huge success of, among others, civil rights movement, minorities advocates, women movement, gay and lesbian movement, students, even what's called "moderate religious" movement etc. Notice how all these melt together into common goals? That's because they aren't "special interests", but the general population. Just like "national interest" really is the corporate world and their cronies in the govt., translated maybe 4% of the population. Orwell would have appreciated that.
As a summary, I propose two things: 1) look at history diffetently and 2) look at what you can do, as opposed to what "system we should have". Instead of looking at those high-minded hypotheticals, let's look at what's actually available to us today - ourselves. What can we do to affect change right now? History and future are nothing more than a chain of 4 year intervals. We should have a vision for the future, but our actions must be looking at the next 4 years, as if the change we can affect within that time period is all that matters - this is the only way you get anything done. Unfortunately, you will NOT learn about the anti-war movement of the late 60es as compared to 2003 in the history books and you will NOT learn about the violent and leanghty labor struggle throughout the US and world history from history books. Study of history in this context is not simple, but we absolutely must discover what the hell is going on. Take on many sources on any given subject and go for the most persecuted scholars to get the story. If you want to study Israel-Palestina issues, Prof. Norman Finkelstein has perspectives and history that will take you from an ignorant schoolboy to a competent human being in two books - he will not only give you perspectives on the subject Israel-Palestina, but shine a light on the way power works. As for examples of political action, Howard Zinn has in a single book summarised enough references to last you months of study and a lifetime of action.
Finally, I don't know what limits there are for what human nature allows. Apparently it allows for landing men on the Moon and robots on Mars. It has certainly allowed for the civil rights movement, labor struggle throughout centuries and it has allowed for an American anti-war movement and massive demonstrations before the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq were even initiated. These are real changes in a very short time. What we are capable of, I don't know, but the abundance of evidence for accellerating progress speaks loud and clear that anyone who tells you we "can't do better than this" is a liar, weather he knows it or not.
Logic is a systematic method of coming to the wrong conclusion with confidence.
Yes America is that evil. Maybe America is a bad word to discibe who. but that hasnt much to do with socialism.
... more to do with capitalism
Whatever goes upon two legs is an enemy.
Whatever goes upon four legs, or has wings, is a friend.
No animal shall wear clothes.
No animal shall sleep in a bed.
No animal shall drink alcohol.
No animal shall kill any other animal.
All animals are equal.
Corporate capitalism sux, bro
“A meritocratic society is one in which inequalities of wealth and social position solely reflect the unequal distribution of merit or skills amongst human beings, or are based upon factors beyond human control, for example luck or chance. Such a society is socially just because individuals are judged not by their gender, the colour of their skin or their religion, but according to their talents and willingness to work, or on what Martin Luther King called 'the content of their character'. By extension, social equality is unjust because it treats unequal individuals equally.” "Political Ideologies" by Andrew Heywood (2003)
just cross out corporate and u will have it right. Capitalism sucks. Right down to your little mom and pop stores.
btw here is a nice solution, i dont think it would work but whatever
http://www.thevenusproject.com/
Whatever goes upon two legs is an enemy.
Whatever goes upon four legs, or has wings, is a friend.
No animal shall wear clothes.
No animal shall sleep in a bed.
No animal shall drink alcohol.
No animal shall kill any other animal.
All animals are equal.
Hi Tapey,
As a quick question, what did you mean by the inclusion of "little mom and pop stores?" Does the existence of these businesses equate to an indictment of capitalism? Just wondering.
ment that its not just big corperate companys which are bad, its the entire system and that includes little mom n pop stores. in other words caplilatism = bad, all of it.
Whatever goes upon two legs is an enemy.
Whatever goes upon four legs, or has wings, is a friend.
No animal shall wear clothes.
No animal shall sleep in a bed.
No animal shall drink alcohol.
No animal shall kill any other animal.
All animals are equal.
At the level of the mom and pop store? Getting something in exchange for something? Last year I was in Cuba, retail outlets, zero. As I drove to Trinidada, hundreds of local people tried to sell me the fruits of their labour. Can't help thinking that trade is a human instinct. Swapping. Kids do it with lollies.
"Experiments are the only means of knowledge at our disposal. The rest is poetry, imagination." Max Planck
they are trying to sell you things because they have very little money... not out of some human instinct to trade. Human instinct to want more than you have, quite possible. Don't get me wrong, i think capitalism is the best we have had yet, i just think there is alot of room for improvment, just because its the best we have tried doesnt mean it is good.
Look the reason i say even the mom n pop stores are bad is because they still get what they sell from other places. if they make everything they sell themselves then they are still part of the entire capitalist system but really doing nothing bad (provided that they have no employees). Are they as bad as some huge multi billion dollar company? no, but that doesnt make them good. Still part of the problem.
One of the biggest lies of capitalism is that if you work hard you can become rich. But I can garentee you there are hundreds of millions maybe even billions that work harder than you and still have next to nothing. In capitalism what makes you rich is being born in the right place to the right parents and luck and a sprinkle of hard work. Sure there is the odd sucsess story but very rare and are mostly the result of luck.
Instead of me writing a crap load on what marx said instead here
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Karl_Marx
just look there and follow apropriate links if u don't know what the man said by now. Also if you have to look you should be ashamed.
P.S. forget about his proposed solution, just his critisims.
My main problem is capitalism on a global levev, its not so bad when you look isolated in one country.
Whatever goes upon two legs is an enemy.
Whatever goes upon four legs, or has wings, is a friend.
No animal shall wear clothes.
No animal shall sleep in a bed.
No animal shall drink alcohol.
No animal shall kill any other animal.
All animals are equal.