18. Human Rights Lecture: Section 3: Three Generations of Human Rights: p. 17-24

[Ubernoob85]

Personally I think more investigation should be put into Marxism, but I'd be interested in your take on this. :) (Great videos by the way)

[Ubernoob85]

Umm, doesn't Capitalism (in the long term) necessitate violating some portions of the second degree of human rights (specifically economic equality and the right to employment (or protection from unemployment)). I.E. every capitalist model eventually leads to an economic elite, which gets smaller over time, which is also required to soak up all of the production of everyone not in the elite (who produces more and becomes less able to consume over time). This imbalance is unsustainable, no?

[Ubernoob85]

I agree with you in a sense, but I think your comment that "The distribution of wealth is changing" is misleading. You did say that the economic elite is changing, but I think it's important to remember that, in terms of percentages, the wealth of the elite is not only staying the same but INCREASING at an ACCELERATING rate.

[Ubernoob85]

@Ubernoob85 By the way I think this was the problem George Orwell discussed in 1984 (my earlier reference) , and we saw the horrid nature of his solution.

*shudder*

[drjasonjcampbell]

@Ubernoob85 Thanks for the feedback. I'm trying to give a well balanced presentation of info. so it was really difficult trying to present the lecture without biasing the information. In defense of capitalism [not that I have any interest in defending it] exploitation is inherent, but so many scholars have done that analysis, personally i find it as a bit of a cop out when scholars rehash material or take the easy way out. For me, the "defense" is that it is certainly undeniable that India...

[drjasonjcampbell]

@Ubernoob85 China, Brazil are starting slowly in some cases and more rapidly in other to see a burgeoning middle class. that wouldn't have been possible without the expansion of global-capitalism. I just really hate super simplified knee jerk scholarship. "Capitalism sucks! It's evil." "Okay so what's ur economic model?" .... and then nothing new. Infinite rehash of the same talking points. My attempt here is to "reframe" the boogieman. Collectively on a global scale more people are entering...

[drjasonjcampbell]

@Ubernoob85 the middle class. This is a good thing. More people making $ = more tax $ = better standards of living, better educational opportunities and possibly even more peace. This is the optimistic interpretation. Soon I will present the pessimistic interpretation, but I wanted to provide a balanced presentation and let you make a decision for urself. Just a really difficult analysis given the fact that nobody entertains remedying the existing model from within. It's always get rid of it...

[Ubernoob85]

@drjasonjcampbell No, I completely agree with you about the affects it's having on the current Global community, and I didn't mean to imply you aren't doing a great job -- you are. I was meerly trying to point out that in the long term it's almost inevitable that Capitalism will reverse all of the beneficial things it's done (as far as human living conditions are concerned) and furthermore degrade them to a worse degree than when it was introduced.

[Ubernoob85]

@drjasonjcampbell On the topic of changing the system from within, I believe you could do so if you removed inheritance. You could have a sustainable system whereby the ratio of rich to poor should be much more balanced simply due to the lack of time for the less-than-super-rich to slide down the economic gradient.