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Are you ready to consider that capitalism is the real problem?
- Thread starter Lime
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Billy_Pilgrim
Member
Untrammelled capitalism is the major problem. Social democracy ftw.
It's about class, people. Always class.
It's about class, people. Always class.
Fallout-NL
Member
How do you not see that it amounts to the same fucking thing?
SaviourMK2
Member
People and ideologies are the problem. Communism. Socialism. Capitalism. Etc. It all theoretically works but the human inability to compromise and grasp at power is always the poison to a theoretical system. Socialism doesn't work if everyone doesn't contribute within reason. Capitalism doesn't work if corporations get greedy.
That's how I see it.
That's how I see it.
This must be one of the dumbest statements yet in this thread.
Who's the lord of your fief whom you asked for the right to marry your spouse?
Yeah, this answer left me speechless. Great talk.
I like this logic.
The stock market and investment system was literally invented by a handful of super-rich men in a coffee shop in the 18th century.
And somehow nobody thought to re-jig that system for the next three hundred years. It's literally made to benefit a few friends who wanted to make each other's businesses grow.
JordanN
Banned
I agree that farming isn't easy but that's not the point.
My problem with capitalism is humans are turned into machines. I don't see how humans can ever be happy working 7 hours as a cashier or janitor when these tasks feel completely artificial and only serves to put money in the top.
This is on top of the already disgusting work conditions that everyone at the bottom must suffer through. Look at video games. Capitalism means we can enjoy them but at the cost of artists being slaved away to make them and only to be laid off when done.
This is where capitalism has failed me. At least in past societies, jobs like farming appealed to the human state. You weren't expected to consume everything a CEO throws at you. Today's world has become a slave to the dollar.
We should have taken all the wealth we made and used it to bring back certain elements of the past so humans can be happy doing what they really enjoy, instead of creating more societies around the globe where we work ourselves to death.
jellies_two
Member
Capitalism could be ok if externalities were better taken into account. If the resources lag science by too much capitalism should violently react before returns in 2020 or 2050 or 2200 suffer. Right now the time horizon is too short. I don't know what would fix that. The externality of getting away with human suffering and pollution appears to be addressed partly by laws to make Bhopal less tempting but there appears to be no cost to using land and air and water as a secret garbage dump.
Who would make video games in a non-capitalist society?
Edit: there is a follow up to this discussion, stop quoting this damn old post by now.
CornBurrito
Member
Socialism is workers owning the means of production.
Explain how that was the case in the USSR.
I thought socialism is the community, the state owning the means of production, not just the workers. Because, you know, workers can own means of production also in capitalism.
The Hermit
Member
I expected a lot of nonsense in this thread, but this is correct.
What the thread title should be is " are you ready to consider the American capitalism (Ie: corporativism) the real problem"
Razorback
Member
Can we stop for a second and define some concepts here? I feel like everyone's talking past each other.
Those criticizing capitalism, is it just the American style or all forms of capitalism that you have a problem with?
Isn't democratic socialism, (what they use in Scandinavia) still capitalism?
If you're also not a fan of that, then what's the alternative? Maybe you think capitalism is not appropriate for the future, but do you also think capitalism was a mistake all along or was it a necessary evil to get us where we are today?
What does an alternate history look like with no capitalism?
Those criticizing capitalism, is it just the American style or all forms of capitalism that you have a problem with?
Isn't democratic socialism, (what they use in Scandinavia) still capitalism?
If you're also not a fan of that, then what's the alternative? Maybe you think capitalism is not appropriate for the future, but do you also think capitalism was a mistake all along or was it a necessary evil to get us where we are today?
What does an alternate history look like with no capitalism?
Capitalism isn't a particularly good way of handling an economy, but it's much better than a number of the alternative systems that humanity has tried over the years.
For example, in the period that capitalism has boomed (post WW2), look at the increase in global life expectancy:
It's also worth considering the number of global deaths due to conflict per year:
EDIT: image is quite large, link here
Are things perfect? No. Is there a better system? Almost certainly. Has capitalism generally been good for society? Yes.
For example, in the period that capitalism has boomed (post WW2), look at the increase in global life expectancy:
It's also worth considering the number of global deaths due to conflict per year:
EDIT: image is quite large, link here
Are things perfect? No. Is there a better system? Almost certainly. Has capitalism generally been good for society? Yes.
You are right to a certain extent. The Czech Republic proved that co-opting industries was the best way to convert from communism to democracy/socialism. It helped them avoid the rampant destruction and corruption that most eastern block countries faced in the early 90s.
That said, workers owning the means of production in the textile, coal or steel industries would not have changed their fate. Globalization has changed the market completely allowing corporations to seek the most competitive means of production. This has been a net positive for our (US) economy but unfortunately the folks who worked in these industries were completely forgotten and abandoned by the system. Also it is worth noting that these were all highly unionized industries. These folks simply did not posses transferable skill sets that would allow them to work in other industries.
Fallout-NL
Member
Capitalism isn't a particularly good way of handling an economy, but it's much better than a number of the alternative systems that humanity has tried over the years.
For example, in the period that capitalism has boomed (post WW2), look at the increase in global life expectancy:
It's also worth considering the number of global deaths due to conflict per year:
EDIT: image is quite large, link here
Are things perfect? No. Is there a better system? Almost certainly. Has capitalism generally been good for society? Yes.
Yeah? That's great for baby boomers and, to a lesser degree, us. But what about the fact those gains seemed to have been made in a way that's totally unsustainable? See climate change.
Conciliator
Banned
if capitalism is so good, why does it rhyme with crapitalism
This is a bit a romantisised look at older professions. Especially as a farmer you rarely worked for yourself as you didn't own the land. You didn't consume because you had no money in the first place - and no (or less) time for leisure.
You took the job of your father because that's how things went (and that's where the familys capital was invested). As second or third born son you became a priest or a soldier. Or simply had nothing. Being able to more or less choose what you do for a living, is a modern achievment.
This idea that there was ever a time where the majority of the population was happy and content with their work and earned a fair wage and weren't explioited is wrong. That's not something capitalism ruined. It's never been the case in the first place.
For the vast majority of humans, from the dawn of time and even today, living is struggling. You don't work or hunt or tend to fields because it's fun. You do because if you don't you starve and die.
You're correct in some senses - which is one of the reasons it isn't perfect - but to be fair, global warming has only been truly in the public conscience for about the last 15 years or so.
On top of this, we've seen that governments are generally useless at combating climate change, but market forces bringing down solar prices and making coal and soon oil obsolete is what will actually change things. Capitalism will be what solves this problem and I'm much more optimistic now than I was a couple of years ago.
He's right tho
travisbickle
Member
Fuckin' everyone. And they'd just swap them with each other with no greedy capitalist extracting the surplus value.
Screaming Meat
Unconfirmed Member
I'm not a fan of this counter-point.
Why do we need to exactly emulate other countries to develop Socialism? Why can't we, instead, learn from their mistakes and develop a new version of it that works for us?
Explain how capitalism is feudalism rebranded.
How do you see this happening? You still work in a company or cooperative or whatever, it's just owned by the state. I'm not even sure that the concept of indies can exist in a socialist society. There is no pressure for profit, but do you have the impression that there are no more leaders? There will still be some people making decisions, people that might or might not be qualified for that, people that might or might not seek personal success by all means.
Do you think crunch exists just because some greedy capitalist? There is a full chain of overly ambitious people along the line. Those exists also outside capitalism.
Or how do you see this perfect society for game developers?
I'm not sure if thats entirely true. Farming in the beginning and for quite a while later must have been less intensive and more efficient time wise than the other forms. You can see it in the explosion of other tools and implements, and decorations. People clearly had lots of free time to do other things and they used it to innovative and experiment.
Its once populations reached certain sizes, and had certain ideas about forcing labour that things took a certain turn. Lots of civilizations didn't struggle, and likely the farmers(who werent forced) and everyone had plenty of free time to communicate and mess about.
You clearly have no idea what you're talking about. Farming is incredibly labor intensive, so much so that you needed small children to help you do it instead of getting an education. Greek inventions and temple buildings happened because farming improvements resulted in less people needing to farm. Farming is awful, not some panacea to be espoused
If you have a chance go out in the real world and talk with people who work the land and raise animals just to ensure their and their family existence. It's most of the time dusk to dawn heavy work. Usually for all the family.
Eh, it was surely better than a hunter gatherer lifestyle and allowed further distribution of labour. But "everyone had plenty of free time" seems like a stretch (it's not like you need a big percentage of people innovating for huge advancements in progress). Look at farming today, with all the technology, and how much work it still is.
We're comparing to a 40-50 hour week. In some european countries the average is even lower than 40 hours of work per week. That's a lot of free time.
Any Questions
Member
DiEM25
Google it
Google it
GameAddict411
Member
If you look at the highest quality living in the world, you would notice that capitalist countries are are at the top of the list. It's just not all capitalist governments are equal. The US government for example lacks a lot of regulations to prevent corruption of politics by the rich and the powerful. Current government policy favors multi-million corporations over the citizen. It explains the increasing poverty rates, hunger, and wealth gap between the rich and the middle class that's already shrinking. The former indicates government corruption regardless of government policy.
Hello? This is Hailun!
Member
Are you a high school drop out or something?
You realize people said the same thing about Capitalism, right?
Owning the means of production isn't Socialism and the worker's were divorced from the means of production in the USSR via the bureaucracy.
Socialism isn't Co-Ops. Socialism isn't "work place democracy". Socialism isn't workers "owning the means of production".
Socialism is the abolishment of Capitalism and the value form, the realization of free association -- the ability to live how you want and do what you want without economic consequence. The democratization of labor and the democratization of access.
Glass Shark
Banned
I'm a card-carrying socialist, so absolutely. The more you think about it, the harder it is to ignore.
So you have no facts to back your hyperbole, as I was expecting.
TheLaughingStock
Member
There's no such thing.
I have read up a bit about the history of farming. I'm not talking about now, or the recent past. I'm aware its really intensive and hard work, I'm not denigrating farmers. When the farms are large and your feeding more than your family or using what your farming to buy other things then of course it will be hard. I'm thinking closer to the Fertile Crescent times.
I'm saying at some points, at the far distant past, it must have been less intensive than hunter gathering. Also with the less advanced/efficient farming methods, they wouldn't be required to do things all the time. There would be down times where they are waiting on things to grow or whatever. Its hard to say exactly how much free time farmers had but it hasnt been extremely intensive throughout history.
I'm not advocating returning to some idealistic past. I'm just not sure its correct to say, life has always been hard work since the dawn of time. Like its some universal law and we've just got to get on with it and keep it that way.
ZoltanXerxes
Member
Capitalism is not the problem, it's the implementation of capitalism that's the problem.
The most dangerous form of capitalism is where you merge capitalism and government (currently what is happening in the US). You get big companies paying large sums of money to government to get laws passed for their benefit. That is not what capitalism is. Capitalism is a variety of companies that want you use their product or service and will need to compete with each other to offer you the best deal they can afford, not giving government sums of money to sway the rules in their favor and keep prices high for the consumer.
The most dangerous form of capitalism is where you merge capitalism and government (currently what is happening in the US). You get big companies paying large sums of money to government to get laws passed for their benefit. That is not what capitalism is. Capitalism is a variety of companies that want you use their product or service and will need to compete with each other to offer you the best deal they can afford, not giving government sums of money to sway the rules in their favor and keep prices high for the consumer.
Glass Shark
Banned
Right, I remember those 12th century hipsters who just chose poorly where to be born.
RurouniZel
Asks questions so Ezalc doesn't have to
UNCHECKED Capitalism is the problem. Regulated capitalism that isn't allowed to "lobby" (bribe) politicians by donating to campaigns etc. can do great things.
Yeah, humans as a whole have it better than at just about any time in history, except maybe for a few years in the 20th century.
Capitalism is far from perfect, especially in the US where most of the complaints seem to come from, so let's focus on the hundreds of ways to improve it instead of setting everything on fire: money out of politics, higher minimum wage, socialized education and healthcare, etc.
I have to smile at the idea of going back to farming for yourself as if it's a better life that being a cashier at Walmart. In most cases, it's really not. And then there is the "we'll replace capitalism by a new wonderful system no one ever thought of" idea. Well, sure, go right ahead. Sounds realistic.
Oh the same period 20th century Marxism Leninism boomed (and fell). Remember life expectancy in SU compared to the US? I do.Capitalism isn't a particularly good way of handling an economy, but it's much better than a number of the alternative systems that humanity has tried over the years.
For example, in the period that capitalism has boomed (post WW2), look at the increase in global life expectancy:
It's also worth considering the number of global deaths due to conflict per year:
EDIT: image is quite large, link here
Are things perfect? No. Is there a better system? Almost certainly. Has capitalism generally been good for society? Yes.
ML was also generally good for society. That is like the lowest standard you can have.
Anyway funny to see people saying Scandinavia is the solution, Social democracy was my first love too. You'll learn it's nothing but a bandaid and want something different.
Hello? This is Hailun!
Member
I mean, do I really have to prove that we see significant market downturns? Where were you when the last one hit and sank hundreds of thousands of people into poverty 10 years ago?
Do I really have to "back up" things like the Fascist movement of the early 1900s?
This is why I'm asking if you sincerely don't know these basic things here.
Dr. Benton Quest
Banned
Dude, there are literally thousands of games made by individuals and teams who give them away. Their incentive was creation itself.
What the fuck are you even arguing? Are you aware of Linux?
Lol, and people call leftists naive dreamers.
When and how will we become enlightened?
cpp_is_king
Member
The article assumes minimizing inequality at the expense of every other metric is the universally agreed upon goal. Inequality is only one metric. Many people believe that it should only be minimized within the context of capitalism because the other benefits (hint: not "fuck you got mine") of capitalism outweigh the inherent inequality it created
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