Is Capitalism the Best Economic System?

Chris OConnor

Dissident

I don't think I've ever disagreed with anyone on any message board more than I disagree with you right now. It's amazing how very differently two people can view the world. And I'm trying desperately to see things from your perspective, but it is increasingly difficult since your points are so clouded by fallacious reasoning and personal attacks.

Since you're conveniently avoiding accountability on the Colin Powell thread, I'll ask the same question here. Can you name some highly prosperous socialist nations? Your entire argument is based on the evils of capitalism and the merits of socialism, yet you cannot provide a single example of a prosperous socialist nation. This might mean something Shannon.

Where you got the idea that hard work at a young age is somehow unhealthy and harmful to a child is beyond me. Flipping burgers, stuffing tacos, parking cars, sweeping garages, and any other respectable wage-earning job is indeed character building. Learning at a young age the importance of hard work, smart work, saving money, paying bills, and contributing towards the welfare of your own family is not something to be ashamed of.

By the way...neither Sandor nor myself had to work at 14 years of age. We made the choice to work, and neither of us was forced into child labor. We recognized that hard work was a tool for getting things we wanted. I happened to have wanted a Raleigh 10-speed bicycle. Perhaps Sandor wanted a blow-up doll. The point is we made choices, paid the price with our own labor, and were afforded the opportunity to get those things we wanted in life.

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...disempowering work is compensated with pennies compared to what profit is derived- this is the issue.

What does the unskilled laborer risk and/or contribute when they flip the burger, park the car, or scrub the toilet? They bring their labor to the equation. For this they earn one level of wage. But what does the owner of the business risk and/or contribute when they go into business and enter the competitive market? They risk their labor, land, capital, and possibly their entire life’s savings. With great risk comes the potential for great reward. Why should the person that contributes very little earn the same as the one that contributes and risks everything they own?

If the child who is flipping burgers pays attention and learns the rules of business he/she has the same opportunity to succeed. By telling them they shouldn't be working...what are you really teaching? How are you building the characters of young adults by lying to them and telling them life is a bowl of cherries and everything is fair. Would life be fair under socialism? Show me where it has worked. I can show you example after example of how capitalism fuels ingenuity, passions, technology, medicine, the arts, and a million other areas. What does socialism do? It stagnates. It robs people of the will to produce. If it doesn't....and I know you'll tell me that it doesn't...show me. I can back up my words with examples from the real world, while you do nothing but talk about hypothetical Utopias.

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Educating citizens is no burden, on the contrary- it is a blessing to society to have its members skilled, equipped, thinking, informed and prepared to create the Good Society.

You're committing the appeal to emotion fallacy, amongst others. Anytime we have to dig into our pockets and spend money it is a burden of sorts. Paying an electric bill is a burden. Having the power company turn your electricity off for nonpayment makes that burden worth carrying. Paying for a college education is a financial burden, and attending college has an opportunity cost. Why should one man have to shoulder the burden of educating another man? This is robbery. Just because an education is recognized as a "good thing" doesn't make it fair for one man to demand that another man finance his education. Want to go to college? Take out some loans and foot the bill. Or look to your family for support, not the collective community. There are plenty of programs in existence for people that want a higher education. My degree was financed by my own sweat and labor. If you believe so much in paying for goods and services that you personally are not consuming…. please send me a check right away as I sure would appreciate the help.

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You, it seems, would rather build bombs than build minds.

10 points for anyone that can name this logical fallacy. An entire essay could be written about this twisted statement, but for anyone educated in critical thinking, and/or economics it’s more than obvious.

Do you ever rent movies and watch them at home? Ahah! You would rather be selfish and entertain yourself than feed the poor starving children Ethiopia! How "sociopathic" and insensitive. Enough of the manipulation and semantics. Try to argue your point without baffling people with bullshit Shannon. Because I don't believe that a community should shoulder the burden of providing a free higher education to anyone that wants it...I MUST want my money to go towards the manufacture of weapons of mass destruction. Brilliant Shannon.

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But, that makes sense, because Capitalism does not want an educated population...

Of course capitalism doesn't want educated citizens. Capitalsim also doesn't want ignorant citizens. Capitalism cannot have wants and desires and needs. Capitalism isn't a living, breathing, sentient creature with a conscious mind. Then again....neither is socialism. Capitalism is indifferent.

And by the way, you and a few others have made the fallacious statement that capitalism is immoral. Utter nonsense. Capitalism is "amoral," meaning neither moral nor immoral. The methodology of science would be a fine example of another amoral system. Is science responsible for creating nuclear weapons and then using them to kill hundreds of thousands of people? Of course not. Science was simply a process or methodology for uncovering the technology. Science also cures diseases. Well, capitalism raises standards of living, reduces unemployment, and generates advances in so many areas. Are there some negatives? Sure, but let's address the problems and not pretend the entire system is flawed.

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Capitalism...requires a passive body of always ready consumers.

You have the freedom to spend your money in the fashion you see fit in a capitalistic society. Entrepreneurs struggle to meet the needs of the consumers at the lowest possible cost, or they'll get squeezed out of the market by the competition. How does this make the consumer passive? How insulting to say that consumers are passive participants in the buying/selling process. Buyers create the markets Shannon. If you and I quit buying Coke they would be out of business.

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You know, kinds like yourself perhaps, for who the end-all in life is the accumulation of stuff?

You don't have enough information about me to make such a statement. But this doesn't ever seem to stop you.

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And, this is pathological and sociopathic and deadly.

So I'm sociopathic now? ...pathological? ...And all I care about is the accumulation of stuff? You're brilliant Dissident. You're intellect is staggering. You've got me figured out. I'm a selfish bastard that wants nothing more out of life than to accumulate material possessions. All this you gleaned from me supporting the most successful system ever known to man. Amazing.

Instead of trying to illuminate the weaknesses of capitalism, why don't you detail for us your idea of a good system? No, I don't mean copy and paste dozens of quotes from socialist authors. Explain who would own the factories, the plants, the media, and the transportation companies under your socialistic Utopia. Tell us in detail how it would all work.

I really don't want to hear another comment about BookTalk members being antisocial, immoral, pathological, sociopathic, selfish, or not concerned with the welfare of other peoples children. Not to mention the numerous ad hominems launched at Sandor. It needs to stop immediately. The entire tone needs to stop, not just the personal insults.

Chris

"The man who does not read good books has no advantage over the man who cannot read them" -- Mark Twain

Edited by: Chris OConnor at: 4/5/04 2:02 am

Katala Au · Posted: Sun Apr 04, 2004 11:11 pm Post subject: Re: Personal attacks...

I emphatically agree with Kostya's post.

Particularly as this messageboard is a medium conducive to reflecting on what you say before the whole world sees it (and even editing it anytime afterwards), please try to reread your own posts and make sure they're clean of ad hominem attacks.

Nicole

Dissident Heart

Chris,

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Can you name some highly prosperous socialist nations? Your entire argument is based on the evils of capitalism and the merits of socialism, yet you cannot provide a single example of a prosperous socialist nation.

My entire argument is based upon moral accountability. I am not defending socialist nations, I am holding myself accountable for beloning to a capitalist one. I find Capitalism to be particularly odious and quite dangerous to the health of the planet and its lifeforms.

No where, anywhere, have I said, "We must have a Socialist nation to replace this Capitalist one." I did include a particularly brilliant essay by Albert Einstein in support of Socialism, one that carefully outlines the evils of Capitalism and points towards a possible set of Socialist solutions. But, I haven't demanded we follow any particular Socialist model.

I have fully endorsed the democratic economy of Participatory Economics (Parecon) as meticulously charted out by Michael Albert and Robin Hahnel. And I've introduced his devstating critiques of Corporate Capitalism and State Socialism in his recent book, Parecon: Beyond Capitalism.

Now, as for your demand that I produce a 'prosporous socialist nation' or shut up about the obvious ills and delusions facing Capitalism and its endorsers...I simply refer you to the vast history of human progress.

I can imagine a person in the late 18th Cent. saying, "I think we should try Republican Democracy- you know Respresentational Government free of the stupidities of Royalty and Caste Deference" And, there would be folks like yourself saying, "Well, Monarchial Aristocracies have served us quite well, thank you very much, I mean look at how prosperous we are! And, anyway, show me one nation where such an experiment or approach has worked!"

Or maybe, an Abolitionist in the early 19th Cent. saying, "You know, Slavery is odious and wrong and trading in human chattel is sociopathic and immoral- we should end it immediately and demand universal human rights for all humans." And, there would be folks like yourself saying, "Well, Slave Societies have served us quite well, thank you very much, I mean look at how prosperous we are! And, anyway, show me one nation where such an experiment or approach has worked!"

Thus, any serious progressive movement toward greater equalities would be met with your rebuttal, "If you can't show me anyplace where this has worked, we don't have to take it seriously."

Furthermore, Chris, you seem to be uninformed of the trillions of dollars spent by the Capitalist Nations to stop Socialism wherever it attempted to grow...trillions of dollars in weaponry, sabotage, uprooting democratically elected officials, mercenary forces, propaganda and misinformation, and a genuine Crusade against it for the last half century mis-titled "Cold War".

As for the 'personal tone' of my posts, I am simply following a train of logic that finds its conclusion in the dangerous and deadly consequences of belief systems such as Capitalism. Persons hold belief systems, and these beliefs have personal consequences. The consequences, as I see them, and have meticulously outlined in multiple places across these boards, are sociopathic and pathological.

Einstein called them 'evil'. But, I'll leave the theology to the experts.

sandor at the zoo

I feel like that character in the gangster movies; every time I get out, they pull me back in. Trying to stop by BookTalk and post once in a while is futile. When I read the replies I inevitably want to respond.

For the most part, I'm willing to let Dissident's libel speak for itself ... it honestly says nothing at all about me but volumes about him. However, there is one statement in his witless diatribe that I am compelled to respond to because it really had an effect on me (though almost certainly not the one he was hoping for).

Dissident says:

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The truly sad part about this, (beyond the fact that any real civilized nation would be completely ashamed to force 14 year olds into jobs, and be embarrassed of the stupidity in making people pay their own way through college) is that Sandor has betrayed his class and abandoned the struggle by siding with the enemy. He, and he is hardly alone, is an Uncle Tom. He made his way from Field Negro to House Negro, and is proud to serve in the Master's home.

It is good, once in a while, to go look up a word that you think you already know the meaning of. In this case I went and looked up two:

Bigotry: Intolerance toward people who hold different views, especially on matters of politics, religion, or ethnicity.

Prejudice: A pre-formed opinion, usually an unfavorable one, based on insufficient knowledge, irrational feelings, or inaccurate stereotypes.

Never before in my life have I understood these words as well as I do now. I always knew what they meant, but I never understood them. Until Dissident's post I had simply never been a victim of either. But now I know - now I understand - how it must feel for a poor black kid to work hard all through high school to get a scholarship, struggle to make ends meet during college, finally get a good job, work hard at it, raise his family in a nice neighborhood, and at the end of it all have some lazy jerk from back in the 'hood call him Uncle Tom. Better, says the lazy jerk, to have stayed in the ghetto with the gangsters, pimps, and crackheads. Better to have kept getting that welfare check - The Man owes to it us anyway - than to have worked both hard and smart to get ahead and carve out a little piece of the American dream for himself. Sell out! How dare you use your head, hands, and heart to achieve excellence! What gall, to reap the fruits of your own labor! I cannot - or will not - work so hard and make such sacrifices, the lazy jerk whines, and therefore neither should you.

Those who do are traitors. Sell outs. Uncle Toms.

Your assertion is beyond absurd. It's a new depth of willful ignorance for you. If your accusation were true than every single working class kid who excels, gets an education, and makes something of himself (inclusive) is an Uncle Tom. Every coal miner's daughter who becomes an astronaut, every fisherman's kid who gets an M.B.A., and every carpenter's son who becomes a history professor is lowly treasonous scum. But every junkie and layabout with their hand out for a welfare check is a paragon of moral virtue, true to "their class" and worthy of praise from the ivory tower which you inhabit.

As I said, ludicrous. Even for you.

I wasn't forced to work at 14, Dissident, I went to work in the evenings after school because I wanted money for movies and pizza and D & D books, and I wanted to save for a car. No one was going to buy that stuff for me and I would have been surprised and insulted if someone had offered to. I'm healthy, smart, and employable; why shouldn't I work?

Nor did I "betray my class". I am still friends with the kids that I grew up with - I've known some of them for over 25 years - and they would be either shocked or utterly dumbfounded by such a statement. Though some of the families in our neighborhood were wealthier than others (and my family never could have lived there at all if my father hadn't built our house himself) all of us fall safely in the blue or white collar categories. But never, not once, did anyone accuse me of betrayal or say that my fiscal conservatism is indicative of such a thing. On the contrary, they respect my opinion and most of them agree with it - even the democrats (most of them are).

Your accusations - that I was "forced to work", that I've "betrayed my class", and that I serve some evil, disembodied capitalist master - are prejudice. It fits the definition precisely. You know nothing about me, my background, or my life, yet you feel qualified to make sweeping generalizations about who I am, where I come from, and what I believe. And you come to this prejudice purposefully; not through misunderstanding or ignorance, but through a deliberate twisting of my words and their meaning. You do this because of bigotry - that definition is also an exact match - evidenced by the way you've off-handedly stereotyped me (twice) and made decisions about my life and my character based on little or no information.

If I had accused you of such things on my own, Dissident, I surely would have drawn the wrath of BookTalk's Leftist Mutual Appreciation Society. But thanks to your latest seething rant I merely have to point out what you yourself make obvious: You are a bigot. Your opinions and attitudes are prejudiced. It doesn't matter what any of us say to you here at BookTalk; you are arrogantly self-assured that everyone to the right of Noam Chomsky is evil, or corrupt, or a traitor.

As for the rest of your post, suffice it to say that I agree precisely with what Chris has said. If socialism - any brand of it - works so well, where is your shining leftist utopia? Where is this paragon of human rights, technological innovation, environmental harmony, and egalitarian self-government? Why is it that the most successful nations on Earth have achieved their success not by following Marx, but by doing the exact opposite?

S

sandor at the zoo

Dissident says:

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I can imagine a person in the late 18th Cent. saying, "I think we should try Republican Democracy- you know Respresentational Government free of the stupidities of Royalty and Caste Deference" And, there would be folks like yourself saying, "Well, Monarchial Aristocracies have served us quite well, thank you very much, I mean look at how prosperous we are! And, anyway, show me one nation where such an experiment or approach has worked!"

Or maybe, an Abolitionist in the early 19th Cent. saying, "You know, Slavery is odious and wrong and trading in human chattel is sociopathic and immoral- we should end it immediately and demand universal human rights for all humans." And, there would be folks like yourself saying, "Well, Slave Societies have served us quite well, thank you very much, I mean look at how prosperous we are! And, anyway, show me one nation where such an experiment or approach has worked!"

The difference between these hypotheticals and Chris' challenge to point out a successful socialist state (successful on the order of the US, UK, Japan, etc...) is that the hypotheticals include no pre-existing failures. In the real world we have plenty of socialist failures to which we can refer, so Dissident's "democracy" and "abolition" analogies are not applicable.

If the hypothetical inhabitants of these analogies could have pointed to failed democracies and states which had fallen into ruin immediately after freeing their slaves, then we'd have something close to the situation that Chris is talking about. We have seen socialism fail on a grand scale. We have seen it fail in microcosm (where are all the communes of the 60's?). It was never exactly the same twice - Stalin's was different than Hitler's, and Hitler's was different than Castro's - but each time it has led to mediocrity (at best) or unmitigated disaster (at worst). Does this mean that no socialist system will ever work as well as capitalism? Of course not. But it does mean that we have the right - no, the duty - to be very, very skeptical of any promises made by new brands of socialism. As I said to Tim earlier in the thread, it's up to the socialists to prove it works, not to the capitalists to prove it doesn't.

And of course we're going to hear the same tired complaints now, about "the costs" of capitalism. How it hurts the environment, oppresses the third world, stomps on the "common man", and causes earthquakes in Uruguay. There is little that can be said to such accusations, because those making them will never listen when you tell them that:

1) It's true, there is a cost. But it's not nearly as bad as the doom criers would like us to believe. I'm looking out my window right now - it's a working class neighborhood, we're all proletariat here - and I see no oppressed masses, no starving peasants, and no billowing pollution. I do see a little birdie though. Hello birdie.

2) We're better off trying to improve a system that does work well - capitalism - than trying to patch another random body part onto the Frankenstein's monster of socialism and hope it doesn't kill millions of people this time.

3) There are stable, working social democracies in northern and western Europe and you can go live in one if you want. They are decent, safe, and utterly mediocre places to live. But if you go there, don't get sick. The care is free, oh yes, but you'll wait three months for an appointment with a doctor who hates his job. Oh, wait, the care isn't really free either - you pay over a third of your income in taxes and that pays for the third-rate doctor.

Yes, the evils of capitalism. They guarantee that aging hippies, elitest intellectual snobs, and rich kids who hate their parents will have something to bleat about and protest against forever, virtually assuring that they never actually have to get a job and work for a living.

S

Timothy Schoonover

The fact that there has never been an effective Socialist nation or a socialistic economic model is hardly evidence of the inferiority of the concept. Aside from the excellent arguments DH put forth, I would add that socialist economies are undermined when subjected to a global market. They require self-sufficiency, or isolation from market exposure to thrive and the present state of global trade is simply not conducive to that requirement. Those nations which are able to beneficially enter into market relationships with other countries will always have an advantage over nations which can't, all else being equal. Wherever there is a market, profit trumps equality.

You must realize that wherever capitalism exists so does class warfare. The have's profit at the expense of the have-not's. If this exploitation does not occur, the have's fail to remain competitive and fall to the ranks of the have-not's and the belt tightens increasing the gap between the rich and the poor. The market ensures that everyone is always one step away from destitution, and the only way to prevent going under is to prop yourself up on the failure of others. Those that fail to compete are left to the mercy of those social institutions which decent human charity cannot abide to be without. We as Americans are largely ignorant of these conditions because we live fat and happy on the the excess profits that our huge corporations generate internationally. We are allowed to live relatively decent if only shallow lives by piggybacking the institutions which trample upon the rest of the world.

Certainly there are very real difficulties with socialism and other alternatives to capitalism, but we ought to view it as a goal to strive for rather than a competing ideology (i.e. belief system).

sandor at the zoo · Posted: Tue Apr 06, 2004 10:06 am Post subject: Re: The recipe...

Briefly, I feel the need to address some posts in this thread:

Tim says:

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Edited to remove stupid comments after thinking better of it. My apologies, your spirited participation and disagreement are most welcome Sander.

Kostya says:

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Add 2 buckets of insults and personal remarks. Turn the heat on High and stir quickly until the explosion…

There is always some useful information to be found everywhere…

I sincerely hope that people around here a capable of distinguishing between the attacker and the attacked, between disagreeing with someone’s opinions (perhaps vehemently) and insulting them with reckless ad hominems. I know people have said they’re not interested in “who started it”, but the reality of the situation is that all of the personal attacks are coming from one person. The disagreement has been heated on all sides, but if you look back over the thread it's obvious that only one poster has descended to the level of mere insult.

Furthermore, I have gone out of my way in almost every post to state plainly that I know there are flaws and drawbacks to the systems and institutions I support. Only one side of this debate - and only one poster on that side - has become polarized. Everyone else has maintained some degree of objectivity.

When posting to forums like this I offer two guarantees to those I enter debate with:

1) I will not knowingly engage in falsehood or fallacy. If I mistakenly do so, I will apologize for it immediately upon realizing it.

2) I will be civil. I attack positions, not people. I will very, very rarely throw an insult and I never engage in “flame wars”. If attacked personally I will respond with the maximum amount of civility that the attack allows.

Honesty and civility are the guideposts that I follow. But if people want nice they probably shouldn’t be involved in a forum where 90% of the debate is about religion and politics. Some people – like Tim – can get annoyed, perhaps even angry, when their position is under assault but still remain generally civil. Others have their identity so deeply wrapped up in their beliefs that, from their point of view, any disagreement amounts to censorship, villainy, or delusion. I am not at fault for their outbursts when I challenge their dogma and it is found wanting; people like Dissident are free adults and their behavior is their own responsibility.

That said, I’m ready to drop the entire matter and return to the discussion at hand.

S

sandor at the zoo

Tim says:

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The fact that there has never been an effective Socialist nation or a socialistic economic model is hardly evidence of the inferiority of the concept. Aside from the excellent arguments DH put forth, I would add that socialist economies are undermined when subjected to a global market. They require self-sufficiency, or isolation from market exposure to thrive and the present state of global trade is simply not conducive to that requirement. Those nations which are able to beneficially enter into market relationships with other countries will always have an advantage over nations which can't, all else being equal. Wherever there is a market, profit trumps equality.

I don't know, Tim. In any scientific experiment the repeated failure of the model to produce the expected result is, in fact, evidence of the model's inferiority. Not proof, no, but evidence.

You speak of socialism's inability to compete with capitalist economies and their requirement of isolation from free markets as if these things are not flaws. They very much are flaws, because you're never going to have a world free of market structure (at least not for the foreseeable future). Unless some authoritarian regime enforces socialism on the entire world, all at once, there will be outside free market economies mucking things up for the socialist states. Not intentionally, not spitefully, but just by their mere existence. If one has a truly superior socioeconomic model, shouldn't it be expected to at least coexist and compete with pre-existing systems? If not to actually be stronger and supplant them? How can a model so non-competitive that it actually requires complete isolation from the world market be seen as anything but flawed?

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You must realize that wherever capitalism exists so does class warfare. The have's profit at the expense of the have-not's. If this exploitation does not occur, the have's fail to remain competitive and fall to the ranks of the have-not's and the belt tightens increasing the gap between the rich and the poor. The market ensures that everyone is always one step away from destitution, and the only way to prevent going under is to prop yourself up on the failure of others. Those that fail to compete are left to the mercy of those social institutions which decent human charity cannot abide to be without. We as Americans are largely ignorant of these conditions because we live fat and happy on the the excess profits that our huge corporations generate internationally. We are allowed to live relatively decent if only shallow lives by piggybacking the institutions which trample upon the rest of the world.

This is where the debate becomes, at least in my opinion, a matter of experience and perspective. Terms like "class warfare", "exploitation", and "prop yourself up on the failure of others" are loaded. I know people from all walks of life - rich, poor, black, white, Asian, gay, male, female - and I have yet to experience any serious class warfare. I've worked all my life and I've never felt exploited. And I've had some real successes but I've never gotten them by [propping myself] up on the failure of others. For all of the hooting and hollering about the inequities of the system, the vast majority of Americans are at least content with what they have. Remember that the biggest problem for America's poor is obesity; not starvation or disease or violent crime, but that they eat too much. That fact alone should speak volumes to the intellectually honest. By our own standards we have millions of poor here in America, but as Professor Thompson remarked in his article, being poor in America is different from being poor in other places.

You also allude to the newest fad in Marxist criticism, that it's not our own proletariat we're exploiting, but rather the proletariat of other nations. Marx wasn't wrong, he just misplaced the revolution - it will be external, not internal. The misery and oppression of capitalism are not enacted upon the masses at home, but rather exported to the masses abroad.

Way to move the goal posts just as the other team gets inside the 20-yard line.

For almost a century Marx's adherents predicted the eventual doom of the free market economies via internal revolution of the miserable masses. When this utterly failed to happen - when the masses, in fact, turned out to be not so miserable after all - millions of professional naysayers and doomcriers were forced to wake up and smell the $4.00 latte. Most of them, to their credit, admitted they might have been wrong, that capitalism has some real flaws but they'd be darned if it didn't seem to work okay anyway. But a few - the hardcore, leftmost quarter or fifth of them - were so deeply wrapped up in the ideology of Marxist socialism that they simply couldn't bear to let go of the theory. Doing so would mean they had wasted all of that time and effort and money. So they looked around desperately for some huddled masses, and of course they found millions upon millions of poor, starving people in Africa, East Asia, and South America. "Aha!" they cried. "There are the people you're exploiting! Not your own workers - who are annoyingly content and patriotic - but these desperate, shriveled souls across the ocean. Their shattered tribal dictatorships and flimsy fundamentalist theocracies are the foundation upon which your mighty secular democracy rests. One day they shall revolt, and then you'll pay!"

At which point the capitalists of the world began to rub their throbbing temples and look for the Extra-Strength Tylenol.

Marx was wrong. Deeply and completely wrong in his assessment of human nature and what makes a successful society. This has been proven by the failure of proletariat revolutions to materialize; the proletariat, in fact, have become some of capitalism's staunchest supporters. So now you're putting a new spin on Marxist philosophy, claiming that the revolution is still to come, just from another direction. Well, I suppose that's possible. Anything is possible - the future is large and unknowable. But you'll have to excuse me if I go with the actual evidence I see around me and maintain my banal capitalist doubts.

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Certainly there are very real difficulties with socialism and other alternatives to capitalism, but we ought to view it as a goal to strive for rather than a competing ideology (i.e. belief system).

I can agree with this in principle. Are you likewise willing to see capitalism - and perhaps an improved version of it - as "a goal to strive for rather than a competing ideology"?

S

Timothy Schoonover

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Marx was wrong. Deeply and completely wrong in his assessment of human nature and what makes a successful society. This has been proven by the failure of proletariat revolutions to materialize; the proletariat, in fact, have become some of capitalism's staunchest supporters. So now you're putting a new spin on Marxist philosophy, claiming that the revolution is still to come, just from another direction. Well, I suppose that's possible. Anything is possible - the future is large and unknowable. But you'll have to excuse me if I go with the actual evidence I see around me and maintain my banal capitalist doubts.

Well, I think that's going a little too far. If Marx was deeply and completely wrong, as you put it, I doubt he would have had the impact that he did. Besides, the stauch support of the proletariat is something Marx expected. Revolution would only occur when the ideological mechanisms endearing the proletariat to their bourgeois masters fail to sufficiently decieve them about the true structure of economic relations.

Also, if you go back through my posts I think you will discover that I never claimed that there will be a revolution let alone which direction it might come from. Please don't invent goalposts in order to accuse me of moving them. And even if I did, there is nothing wrong with revising a theory where it is deficient. Would you expect any less? Your purposes and this community would be ill served if I gave up the ship at the first sign of a leak. I suppose I can't fault you for trying however.

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I can agree with this in principle. Are you likewise willing to see capitalism - and perhaps an improved version of it - as "a goal to strive for rather than a competing ideology"?

Absolutely. Progress is progress. And I would agree with you that the best system of capitalism is better than the best attempted socialism (that I know of); yet I am of the opinion that capitalism by virtue of its nature is limited in potential and will eventually need to be supplanted.

Do you have any suggestions on how to eliminate unemployment within Capitalism? What about the expropriation of the surplus value of labor? Or the tendency for business to disproportionately interfere with legislation? As I understand it, those elements (with the possible exception of the latter) are essential to the system.

T (I'm just playing)

Edited by: Timothy Schoonover at: 4/6/04 1:00 pm

Dissident Heart

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For all of the hooting and hollering about the inequities of the system, the vast majority of Americans are at least content with what they have. Remember that the biggest problem for America's poor is obesity; not starvation or disease or violent crime, but that they eat too much.

I guess this is key to the kind of utter disregard for the struggles for justice in this Nation that leads me to those unkinder elements sadly exhibited, by myself, on this board. "Hooting and Hollering" is the adjective used by those belonging to centuries old traditions of hard won battles for labor rights, chlidrens rights, woman sufferage, environmental protection, and civil rights across race and class...just a lot of howling at the moon. A lot of noise. If only they could keep quiet while the rest of America stuffs their faces into obese perversity. Any moral heart would see this as the most absurd state of affairs....surrounded by a world in starvation while stuffing ourselves into oblivion. This is a shame and scandal and part of the brilliance of a Capitalist system. Stuff a tiny few into obese servility, while the vast majority starve.

And, for your information, Hunger is alive and well in the USA. Check out the Hunger in America report, and ask yourself if 'hootin and hollerin' is the moral response.

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Unless some authoritarian regime enforces socialism on the entire world, all at once, there will be outside free market economies mucking things up for the socialist states.

The more accurate statement is, "There is an authoritarian regime that enforces Global Capitalism on the entire world...." and it is led by the World Trade Organizations, the International Monetary Funds, and the World Bank....all immensely secretive, non-democratic, authoritarian structures of immense power and influence- largely guided by American interests and supported with an American military larger than all the other militaries on the Planet combined. For an excellent outline of the machinery, tools, and process which such a Global apparatus enforces its vision of the "good life" on the rest of the Planet, try A Q&A on the WTO, IMF, World Bank, and Activism

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So they looked around desperately for some huddled masses, and of course they found millions upon millions of poor, starving people in Africa, East Asia, and South America. "Aha!" they cried. "There are the people you're exploiting! Not your own workers - who are annoyingly content and patriotic - but these desperate, shriveled souls across the ocean. Their shattered tribal dictatorships and flimsy fundamentalist theocracies are the foundation upon which your mighty secular democracy rests. One day they shall revolt, and then you'll pay!"

Again, beyond ignoring the blatantly unjust, immoral and criminal exploitations facing far too many American workers, your complete misunderstanding of an International approach to criticising Capitalism, as well as the International Solidarity espoused by those making the critique...makes it even clearer how deeply indoctrinated you are. "The poor in America are happy, now you bad Marxists have to find other unhappy poor across the Planet to make your revolution possible." All the while, taking absolutely no responsibility for the abuses and crimes waged overseas for American profit.

Please read some voices from India, Vandana Shiva; or Arundhati Roy...and get a look at the "hootin and hollerin" done by those on the receiving end of the your 'truly superior economic model'- perhaps some of the catastrophes unleashed by its principles, values and practices will become clearer when committed not so close to home.

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Marx was wrong. Deeply and completely wrong in his assessment of human nature and what makes a successful society. This has been proven by the failure of proletariat revolutions to materialize; the proletariat, in fact, have become some of capitalism's staunchest supporters.

Marx was wrong about many things, including his attachment to fantasies about historical inevitabilities, as well as his belief that an elite class of leaders will be required to lift the masses out of its addictions and alientation caused by wage slavery and factory abuses.

What he wasnt wrong about, was his faith in the human heart to desire freedom above all else; and that to chain it to any work or drudgery not of its own desire, will stifle, alienate and eventually kill the spirit of the one fated to such miserable conditions. He was also right that solidarity is far more virtuous than competition, and that capital could not capture the true worth of human imagination or ingenuity.

I am not a Marxist, but there is more than a lot that you could learn from good old Karl.


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