You have particular way of defining capitalism. Most of those that support capitalism don't see current system as capitalism but as corporatism or mercantilism. Most of them are minarchists some of them are market-anarchists. It is worth pointing out just so you won't think they support current system when someone says they support capitalism. Ask first judge later.
Thanks for the view and the comment. I am VERY aware that MOST people who use the word "capitalism" do NOT in fact mean "capitalism". They almost always begin the next sentence with the phrase "free market" as if doing so makes the word "capitalism" synonymous with the phrase "free market".
It is also true that most people who use the phrase "free market" do not mean "free market" and have given very little thought to what a free market actually is.
One of the principle motivations for making videos like this is to get people to think about what they say and whether or not their words communicate what they intend to communicate.
For example, you used the word "corporatism", did you look it up to make sure it means what you think it means? Corporatism arises from Age of Reason and the revolutions in France and the colonies. It is the system that permits We the People to do business as a city, township, county or state.
Meaning of words is subjective since it originates from our minds and cannot exist indepenently out of it. Meaning of words changes (see word liberal in USA). Given all this pointing out ethymology as objective source of meaning of a word is puzzling, as at best it may be just a guide which should not be necessary here. I provided context in which corporatism should be interpreted so I think I made myself clear what I mean by it.
Why bother using words? They can mean pretty much anything to the sender and something totally different to the receiver! Words have meanings that have evolved over very long periods of time. Whenever one group of people uses a word in the standard, well established and long used way and another group uses the word to mean the exact opposite there is some willful miscommunication going on.
I bother because I want to communicate. Its imperfect way, a lot of confusion stems from using it (subjective nature of undestanding of words and concepts behind them, using words is a skill to master, language barriers etc) but still it is useful. Meaning of words is achieved by intersubjective consensus. You say that meaning evolved over time. But what does that mean? To me it means consensus evolved. I don't agree that miscommunication is necessarily willful.
It may just mean that evolution of the meaning of a word is taking place.
"They can mean pretty much anything to the sender and something totally different to the receiver!"
Yes! That is why when you debate you first have to agree on definitions so you won't argue past each other. As I said. Meanings evolve through intersubjective consensus like in example with debates.
It seems to me that the social function of anarchy is merely to facilitate a transition of power from one archon to another. Nature abhors a vacuum and the absense of rules and rulers simply sets the stage for the appearance of new rules and new rulers. The question is then whether or not the new rules and rulers will be better than the old ones.
@zthustra did you at least google market anarchy? Almost no one knows what it is but everyone acts like they understand it. It would not be a vacum. there would be market institutions in charge of defense.
Anarcho-capitalism, libertarian anarchism, market anarchism, free market anarchism, or private-property anarchism ... it's all a good theory until the next archon emerges.
I don't have the patience to draft hundreds of 500 charachter replies in an effort to persuade you that I have sufficiently investigated market anarchism and my position is not altered by what I have learned. Feel free to comfort yourself with the assumption that my understanding is somehow deficient.
@zthustra Anarchy as a transition between archons. I love the way you put that. I've often pointed out to anarchists that anarchist systems of govt are never successful, but such obvious facts don't dissuade the true believer. I suspect most self-proclaimed anarchists are actually minarchists rather than anarchists. Anarchy is an unattainable ideal. Minarchy is the closest an anarchist can get to their ideal, but the difference between anarchy and minarchy is vast.
It doesn't have to be transition between rulers. It depends on beliefs of the people. If people want the state - there will be a new state after collapse of old one. It is not necessarily true however and that is why market anarchists are so fixated on education and convincing others Just like saying that after monarchic state collapse there necessarily had to be another monarchic state At some point beliefs of people changed and democrazy was born
@zbigniewzapora Here is the difference. When monarchic states were prevalent, there were many examples of people living outside of such political systems. There isn't an equivalent to what anarchism criticsm which goes beyond just statism and includes all forms of hierarchical social systems. There aren't many examples of functioning anarchism. In fact, I've never come across any functioning examples of anarchism on the largescale, certainly none that have lasted.
There are historical examples of anarchistic societies from both anarcho-syndycalist and anarcho-capitalist perspecitves. In both cases examples are not perfect but are hard to ignore. If you are interested in reading about them you will find enough material in google. The biggest example of anarchy that we had, like for ever, is anarchy between states themselves. Anarcho-capitalist does not view hierarchy as something bad if it is not forced.
It can be said about any state. They come and go. No state lasts, all eventually collapse. There is a reason for that. States are essentially forced central planning agencies. Mises in Economic Calculation In The Socialist Commonwealth and Hayek in The Use of Knowledge in Society showed us that central planning is an impossible task.
I question very much that capitalism set us free, capitalism is more the transmuted feudalism. If we are free it is largely because of popular pressure and not some benign "entrepreneurs" who valiantly strive for our freedoms...
If capitalism is properly defines as the condition of money and property concentrated at the top and freedom has something to do with broad distribution of money and property, then capitalism is the oppositve of freedom.
Usually I love these videos. However, this time I find it to be too much sophistry. There exists an ugly question revealing an ugly fact that in turn pokes a hole in the - sorry to say - beautiful but also whiny boo-hoo "capitalists are evil and out to get me"-theory.
The question is: name one historical precedent of a society that has given humans so much personal freedom, wealth, health and in fact bettered the lot of the poor and the ordinary citizens as the Capitalist West? Name one!?
The question must be begged, has "capitalism" brought personal freedom, wealth and health to the west?
If capitalism is charachterized by the concentration of wealth in the hands of a few, then most of the freedom, wealth and health that we enjoy was at its peaked at a time when wealth was more evenly distributed.
Also there is the issue of cheap and abundent resources like crude oil, wood, fish, top soil and copper that contributed greatly to our quality of life ... esp. oil.
@zthustra Hehe, just answer my question ;) Let me clarify. I'm being practical: looking at ALL of history, please tell, is not the USA and even my country, Denmark, a peak on all of your important parameters? Have we EVER had ANY comparable freedom and wealth, despite the crap? I don't see the alternative. We transitioned from feudal lords and kings and robber barons to where we are now due largely to philosophers like John Stuart Mill etc. Capitalism TODAY is more a consequnce of that freedom,.
I must again beg the question, your reply implies that the social and economic transition from nobility to robber baron industrialists to capitalism was guided by philosophers. I'm thinking that common people who took up arms against nobles and clergy might have something to do with it.
Whenever the vast majority of the means of production and exchange are held by a very few people instead of broadly distributed, their is less freedom in the marketplace and common people have less.
I think we are largely talking past one another. Here in the US, most of the right-wing, conservatives would NOT consider Denmark to be a capitalist economy, but would call it a socialist state.
Every now and then someone posts something and states that they are a fascist. I usually visit their channels hoping to learns something about fascists. Here is what I have learned. Fascists never have faces, names, places or videos. Fascists post lots of anonymous comments but don't really put themselves out there. Good luck with the fascism thingy.
The general difference between Fascism and Communism is this: Fascism uses government regulation (often very tight regulation) to make private corporations into instruments of public policy. Communism does away with the fiction of private corporations in favor of making them explicit organs of the state.
In practical terms, for the poor schmuck on the ground trying to stay alive in these insanities, it makes no real difference which one it actually is, since both are just about equally bad.
I wish I could give this comment five thumbs up! I really need to do something on what a corporation is. I don't care if it is a so-called private corporation, a municiple corporation or a corporate sole, it is the mask behind which those who have real power and wealth hide.
I especially like the phrase "organs of the state" since it applies whether the corporation is city government or Big Box Mart or even a religious or professional society. Thanks for commenting.
Actually, those with wealth and power will use whatever legal fiction exists in the state they are operating in. In communist regimes, money comes ot those with power, and the form is some sort of state agency. In a corporatist system, the form is the corporation, and power follows from money. In a free market situation, there are likely to be many forms, and none of them is likely to be able to do much global harm to people.
Paradoxically, I think there is something in our animal nature that gives some of us a serious advantage over others in the power and wealth game. As I am growing older, I am recognizing the need for social structures that check the ambition of those few who would lord over the rest of us.
Spock was right, "Sometimes the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few."
There is also this problem with limits to growth. We seem to be programmed for economic and population growth as well as unlimited desire for consumption. Unfortunately, we live in a world with finite space and resources. Our animal instincts need some restraint or we, like other prolific and consumptive species, will be extinct.
We may already be beyond hope. Perhaps we will evolve and adapt socially to a life on a resource poor planet? I'll be dead before we adapt but not before we suffer.
Well, there's a few things that you seem to not have gotten quite right.
The technologically developed states have the interesting feature of having NEGATIVE internal population growth. They grow more populous because of immigration from the less developed states with internal population growth. So, if everyone had technology, we might have a problem with not having enough people after a while.
The other issue is that you're assuming we can't increase our resource base or habitation area substantially on this planet, or go elsewhere for space and resources. Neither is really true, if people will just do what is needed. Look up the Living Universe Foundation for one proposal to resolve these issues. (Initial projects will buy enough time for population stability to occur, while raising everyone's standard of living.)
I'm not assuming anything! The planet earth is finite and it has just so much easily usable planet surface and just so much easily accessible oil and mineral resources and just so much easily accessible fresh water.
Humans have achieved an unsustainalbe population by consuming the "low hanging fruit" that exists only after millions of years of biologic and geologic time.
We cannot, in decades, improve resources sufficiently to counteract the fact that we have overconsumed and over grown.
The Club of Rome began working on this problem in April 1968. They published their landmark report, Limits to Growth, in 1972 and have been working ever since for social and technical change toward a sustainable human future. Today they have a membership that includes 1,500 of the best and brightest people on the planet earth and all of their effort has done nothing to alter the future they predicted 37 years ago from comming true. Most of the original members are dead.
Yes, there are those assumptions that we can't DO anything about the effective usable area, fresh water, energy, and mineral resources. All of these assumptions are false.
Go have a look at the Living Universe Foundation. (Yes, it's a dopy name. The original name was First Millennial Foundation, which is also kind of dopy, but not as bad. Apparently there was some issue with converting it from one corporate form to another, so it was decided to create a new entity and transfer the content.)
I appreciate your points but you are evading my points by subtle manipulation of words.
Can we use what we have better? Yes.
The point is that there is only so much there and there are limits on how much better we can use it, like how many resources are needed to desalinate water or convert shale to oil or harvest ore from soil.
The only reason our planet supports 6,800,594,689 people is because resources have been EASY to get. Reducing the population is going to be painful.
To be fair, I did go to the Living Universe Foundation website. I found nothing there but a graphic and a link to a Yahoo! group.
That is why I mentioned the Club of Rome. The Club of Rome is an incredible collection of world-class scientists and other leaders. It is well funded and has been in existence for many years.
How is LUF, without even a web page, going to achieve in the coming decade before we have insufficient resources what CoR hasn't achieved in 37 years?
The Club of Rome has made bad assumptions about what can be done. They weren't actually bad assumptions 40 years ago, but they are bad assumptions now.
You would actually have to look at the material (yes, there's a LOT of it) to get an understanding. You also might want to see if you can get a copy of Savage's The Millennial Project. The engineering proposals don't all work, and there's some places where the physics is WRONG, but it gets the Earth-bound phase rather well.
The book is called, The Millennial Project: Colonizing the Galaxy in Eight Easy Steps by Marshall T. Savage.
The planet earth has already consumed all of the easy oil, the easy uranium, the easy copper, the easy to farm soil, and vast reserves of easy underground fresh water and our population is still growing and hungry for more consumption.
With less of everything available to more and more people, how can we even dream of galactic colonization?
Ah, yes, he covers even that attitude. Not expanding as soon as possible risks dooming us to never being able to expand, leaving us stranded on an increasingly less hospitable planet.
The Club of Rome has revised its report called Limits to Growth twice to accomodate changes in available information and technology. Even with the fact that knowledge and technology have changed, the original predictions made in 1972 were remarkably accurate 20 and 30 years later. The only living contributor says he will not bother with a 40 year report because all of the things they hoped to avert will have happened by then.
Still making the same assumptions, then: That there's no were to expand to, that there's no other means to produce food on a commercial scale, that there's no way to produce more drinking water, that there's no energy sources we haven't taken into account. All quite wrong. They didn't look wrong 40 years ago, but they are wrong now.
You so totally don't get me, you think something of my thought process that is totally untrue.
I KNOW there are other and better ways to use the resources that are available. I even BELIEVE that a MASSIVE AND MILITANT effort to transition could lead to a controlled contraction of population and modest to high quality of life for everyone.
We, as a species, are not moving that way. By the time we realize we have no choice, we won't have the option, we will be overpopulated and resource poor
The Chinese forced population reduction option won't work for anyone.
Fortunately, we already know how to resolve the population and resource problems, we just have to ensure people like you don't stop it from being done.
What in the world are you posting this crap about me for? Strawman and ad hominem!
1. I NEVER suggested anything like "Chinese forced population reduction."
2. I'm not trying to stop anyone from doing anything! If you have wealth, power and influence, please use them to solve the problem in any way you see fit.
You seem to be having difficulties reading your own posts.
1: You are now denying that you said: "I even BELIEVE that a MASSIVE AND MILITANT effort to transition could lead to a controlled contraction of population and modest to high quality of life for everyone."
2: You have stated that you oppose space colonies because you want to hijack the resources needed for them for your own purposes. That is the only possible interpretation of your rebuke of using them to get more resources.
The amount of resources needed to transition to the new world that I believe you envision is more than anyone can imagine and while I don't advocate the use of military force to make it happen, I believe that it won't happen without that kind action, and by that kind of action I simply mean extreme actions taken on a massive scale by the governments or the wealthiest people.
So, what false assumptions have you used in your estimation of the required resources and their relative availability for correcting the Malthusian issues the proper way?
I have NOT opposed space colonization, I have only ask how a resource poor and overpopulated world will find the resources to colonize galaxies. It is absurd to the nth degree to think that Homo sapiens, genius species that we are, would deprive themselves of warmth in the winter and food when they are hungry so that we can colonize planets we haven't discovered yet with technology that hasn't been developed yet.
If you had BOTHERED to look at the LUF materials, you would know that the LUF is proposing algae as the basis of primary food production on a massive scale.
Now, what are the projections for food, fresh water, and energy production in deep-ocean habitats from the Club of Rome, since you claim they took EVERYTHING into consideration?
OK, you are really starting to tire me with your stawman arguments!
1. I already told you that I went to the LUF web site and all they have is a graphic and a link to a Yahoo! group. People without a web site aren't going to colonize galaxies.
2. I NEVER said that Club of Rome took EVERYTHING into account. Your arguments are starting to resemble Christian apolgist positions.
3. I conceded we can probably use existing resources better, especially the oceans and specifically mentioned algae.
1: Admitting you ignored the materials that are presented doesn't help your position, particularly when you just admitted to deliberately ignoring the material.
2: Did the Club of Rome make the predictions you claimed or not? Continuing to make person insults will be taken as an admission that you already know their assumptions were wrong.
3: You can only be working from the assumption that there cannot be any significant resources not already being utilized. This is false.
Why do you keep writing things like " no other means to produce food " and "no way to produce more drinking water" and "no energy sources we haven't taken into account" when I clearly concede that there are other ways to use existing resources better to produce more food, drinking water and energy?
Some nations, like Denmark, are already doing an awesome job of utilizing good technology to do these things. And better technology is in the future.
A Fasces was the symbol of the Italian Fascist party, as a link to the old Roman Republic/Empire. The Italian Fascist party used the Fasces as a symbol of the strength in unity: A single stick is easily snapped, but the bundle is much stronger and more difficult to break.
actually some votes do get deleted, parties need to get more than 5% of the votes on the federal level, otherwise they will get no seats. enough to keep the neo-nazis and the communists out ;)
Excellent presentation. Your definition of capitalism has me thinking afresh about the word, as I am one who has advocated capitalism in some videos, but intending by that a free market, not power through wealth. Hmm. On to parts two and three.
ill go for the "ism" that doesnt even have an "ism" in it: democracy.
and of all the "ism"s that actually do have an "ism" in them, anarcho syndicalism would be my choice. but maybe this is just because anarcho syndicalism is compatible with democracy and because you can get there in a gradual process starting with representative democracy.
Something to think about: Russia and China are both governed by democratically elected representatives.
How I love to stir the pot!
In democracy we all have an equal voice in government, its just that some people have a more equal voice than others and they usually end up being the ones with the most wealth.
you need to differentiate between democracies, dysfunctional democracies, and totalitarian / other regimes that just pretend to be democracies. russia and china are both pretending to be democracies, with limited success.
the united states would be an example for a dysfunctional democracy, this becomes clear by looking at the election system which deletes most votes instead of counting them. you have to vote for the winner in your state to have your vote not deleted.
You're wonderful! I knew that if I pulled your chain I would get a reply.
We should do a blogTV on this subject. In REAL democracy, ALL of the people have a say and participate.
In a representative democracy, the majority have a seat at the table and the rest are out in the cold.
I'm sure you've seen the proportional representation schemes? Some are in use in more advanced societies, but in the evangelical, conservative U.S. society.
well, i agree, the problem is... how do you implement what you call "real democracy"?
i think representative democracy is the gold standart, if its actually democratic. here in germany we have 5 political parties in government, parties get seats according to the percentage of votes they get on the federal level, no votes get deleted in the process.
now all people need to be educated so that they can vote in a meaningful way and are clever enough to vote for the right people.
then i would like to point out what noam chomsky says about the best possible strategy for revolutionaries of any kind....
you need to push for democratic change within/of the existing system first, otherwise you will never get the support of the people. either the system gives in and gets more democratic, or the system will be exposed as oppressive and irresponsive by the reactions you provoked by pushing for democratic change. and then your movement will grow. you win either way.
REAL democracy is a HORRIBLE form of government. What you want is a republic, with some form of popular election for some (but not all) of the positions. (You need the basic divisions of the US system: Legislature for creating laws and policies, executive for the operation of the government, and judicial for review, and you generally don't what to elect judges.) Republic is rule by law, while democracy is rule by the force of the majority. Law gives you a set of rules.
Yugoslavia was once a regional industrial power and economic success. Two decades before 1980, annual gross domestic product (GDP) growth averaged 6.1 percent, medical care was free, literacy was 91 percent, and life expectancy was 72 years.[8] But after a decade of Western economic ministrations and five years of disintegration, war, boycott, and embargo, the economy of the former Yugoslavia collapsed.
The former Yugoslavia was set up to fail if the rule of force was removed. It was composed of several mutually hostile ethnocultural groups, with key industries largely partitioned between the areas primarily occupied by these groups. Take away the force of the regime that kept the lid on those longstanding hostilities (places with complicated history tend to have bad and deep rivalries with no simple way to sort them out) and the place blows up.
Well, it survived for almost 50 years. I don't agree about the "hostile ethnocultural groups". Nationalists used the same tactics they always use, blaming everything on other ethnicities and communists, and of course, preaching of homeland, God, great battles, suffering and other bullshit. As for the socialism part, people were fooled by bright lights and big billboards. They were fooled into believing that capitalism will bring everything. Now a lot of people think that life was better then.
People have a tendency to mistake the past for better. Look at some of the people in Russia who've waxed nostalgic for Stalin, who murdered as many people in the USSR as Hitler did.
Russia is one of the most capitalistic nations on the planet earth. About 50 people own the whole country. My father in law is a diplomat and he made that point clear to me almost 25 years ago. And it is still true.
Actually, it was filled with more and more ruthless capitalists under the communist regime because the only way yo get what you needed was to buy whatever random goods you could find in the stores, then trade them with whomever you happened to meet who had something you could either use or hope to trade further.
In 1984 the country was OWNER by the Party/KGB/Red Army triumvirate, since the regime was still in operation and didn't look to be collapsing imminently.
Of course it isn't, but people tend to forget the worst parts (like the paranoid purges that nearly destroyed the Red Army on the eve of WWII) and remember the better parts (there was generally food available, unless you were in the Ukraine where a lot of it was grown).
A good part of Russia's problem is that there isn't a particularly strong belief in the rule of law, something that really only grows when you have the rule of law. And the law isn't seen as stupid.
I find it interesting you see how corrupt things can be, and how the government works on behalf of whatever the government chooses to work behalf of [themselves, wealthy interests] but you still consider its violent rein over 3rd parties as "credible." Almost in the same way you could call a hitman hired by a rich person killing a 3rd party "credible."
And when you shame supporters, many people who support "capitalism" are referring to a specific way to organize the structure of production.
While I think the exploration of words and their history is relevant, I don't think saying something like "If you say you support capitalism" applies because people who say that, just simply are not referring to what you're referring to.
I seriously hope that calling people who support capitalism idiots, I will get them to thinking more on what capitalism is and si not. If they, the idiots, can't get their arms around the idea that fascism is power to those with weapons and capitalism is power to those who own most the majority of everything, then they deserve the title. To avoid beign an idiot, all a person has to do is say, "Oh, I don't think beign rich gives you the right to lord over the rest of us so I'm not a capitalist."
That actually puts you over towards the Libertarians, who don't view ANYONE as having any right to lord anything over anyone else.
Interestingly, one of the natural results of Libertarianism would be lots of people with lots of money, lots of people being able to make lots of money, and people being able to be armed as they wish.
wow, all I can say is thanks for having the patience to study this. I've wanted to... but lack the will to keep going LOL. Amazing video as always... now on to the next :)
Interesting video! For the first time I see somebody who knows this topic and knows what they are talking about.
I've been mulling these things in my head, planning to make a video, but there's so much to say, and one must be careful, so that not to be misunderstood. There is a lot of ignorance about the driving forces behind these social systems, isn't there?
If you see an image of the center of the Congress Hall where US laws are debated you will see on both sides of the American flag (hanging vertically by the way!) Fasci.
Talking about cancer and the FDA and the industry I came across an interesting article. Google "The Story of Dr Sam Chachoua" and you will get to the article,
Thank you for adding something to my understanding. Now I understand why the rods were bundled together instead of just one rod.
Yes, Mussolini was telling Italians that they had a right to plunder their neighbors, just like in the good old days. These guys came very close to pulling it off.
Germany had a lot of support here in the U.S. I often wonder what might have happened IF the U.S. had entered on the side of Germany.
The Japanese ended that prospect, they needed Manila hemp!
I don't get it. Isn't capitalism the idea of everyone being able to produce and own production tools? Isn't that the actual default state of affairs?
The word is so laden with confusing meanings - such as abuse, poverty and control - that people started to believe that this basic freedom that everyone deserves is actually bad.
No, free markets and free enterprize exist when many opportunities exist for individuals to own their own business and the like.
Capitalism is about wealth and power. It is the accumulation of large quantities of wealth and controlling major industries and the like.
If I own my own shoe shop, I am a free market entrepreneur, but if I own 2/3rds of the shoe manufactoring in the world and small business can't compete, then I am a capitalist.
I also struggle with the issues. That is one of the reasons that I have a like/dislike relationship with Marx. It is probably one the most natural things for humans in a free market to increase their holdings and improve their place in the market and may even lead to abuses. But here is the trick! Without the help of government no small group of people could dominate the marketplace. Professional societies, corporations and modern money systems exist to aid capitalists at our expense.
Interesting. I'm not sure how that trick would work.
Am I to understand "without the help of government" as a sort of economic anarchy?
In that sort of an environment, is the government to introduce absolutely no control mechanisms, for or against the wealthy?
What if that doesn't do anything to stop shelf abuse (company bribes the market to sell their own brand), hidden contracts (mutual plans between separate companies, conspiring alliances), big fish syndrome (buys the small fish) etc.?
Let's just use one example here. Imagine that YOU knew how to cure cancer. Could YOU do anything with that knowledge? Why not? How many obstacles have been constructed to prevent you from curing cancer?
It is a fact that more people earn a living curing cancer than even have cancer and nobody is really "cured", they are only "treated".
Maybe one more example? I know a little about the medical industry ...
Imagine that there was a safe and effective human blood subsitute that was inexpensive, easily implemented, and ended teh need for blood donations and transfusion services.
How might capitalists making HUGE amounts of money in blood donations and transfusion services keep this from the market without government help?
They couldn't! Lucky for them their money buys influence or they would be unemployed.
But what I was really getting at was corporate personhood, professional licensure rules, regulations designed to block out new competitors, tax advantages and subsidies for big business, etc.
I'm sorry, the psychopath in me is refusing to stop thinking critically :)
In theory, isn't a technological breakthrough supposed to rapidly shift the whole market balance? How is the government aid of big business going to stop someone from patenting and producing artificial blood plasma? How are they going to stop someone from eradicating cancer using whatever new tech? Do big businesses and government kidnap and torture people who come up with an innovation?
Good luck discovering the answers. I wonder if you need FDA approval for those new ideas? I wonder if the FDA is managed by the same people who own the medical industry?
Another example, is genetics. Can a corporation OWN the gentic code of a corn plant that has been around for thousands of years? Can they sue farmers who have grown that corn for generations if they keep growing corn OWNED by the corporation? How might government respond to this kind of practice?
You have particular way of defining capitalism. Most of those that support capitalism don't see current system as capitalism but as corporatism or mercantilism. Most of them are minarchists some of them are market-anarchists. It is worth pointing out just so you won't think they support current system when someone says they support capitalism. Ask first judge later.
zbigniewzapora 2 months ago
@zbigniewzapora
Thanks for the view and the comment. I am VERY aware that MOST people who use the word "capitalism" do NOT in fact mean "capitalism". They almost always begin the next sentence with the phrase "free market" as if doing so makes the word "capitalism" synonymous with the phrase "free market".
It is also true that most people who use the phrase "free market" do not mean "free market" and have given very little thought to what a free market actually is.
zthustra 2 months ago
@zbigniewzapora
One of the principle motivations for making videos like this is to get people to think about what they say and whether or not their words communicate what they intend to communicate.
For example, you used the word "corporatism", did you look it up to make sure it means what you think it means? Corporatism arises from Age of Reason and the revolutions in France and the colonies. It is the system that permits We the People to do business as a city, township, county or state.
zthustra 2 months ago
@zthustra
Meaning of words is subjective since it originates from our minds and cannot exist indepenently out of it. Meaning of words changes (see word liberal in USA). Given all this pointing out ethymology as objective source of meaning of a word is puzzling, as at best it may be just a guide which should not be necessary here. I provided context in which corporatism should be interpreted so I think I made myself clear what I mean by it.
zbigniewzapora 2 months ago
@zbigniewzapora
Why bother using words? They can mean pretty much anything to the sender and something totally different to the receiver! Words have meanings that have evolved over very long periods of time. Whenever one group of people uses a word in the standard, well established and long used way and another group uses the word to mean the exact opposite there is some willful miscommunication going on.
zthustra 2 months ago
@zthustra
I bother because I want to communicate. Its imperfect way, a lot of confusion stems from using it (subjective nature of undestanding of words and concepts behind them, using words is a skill to master, language barriers etc) but still it is useful. Meaning of words is achieved by intersubjective consensus. You say that meaning evolved over time. But what does that mean? To me it means consensus evolved. I don't agree that miscommunication is necessarily willful.
zbigniewzapora 2 months ago
@zthustra
continued
It may just mean that evolution of the meaning of a word is taking place.
"They can mean pretty much anything to the sender and something totally different to the receiver!"
Yes! That is why when you debate you first have to agree on definitions so you won't argue past each other. As I said. Meanings evolve through intersubjective consensus like in example with debates.
zbigniewzapora 2 months ago
Comment removed
zbigniewzapora 2 months ago
I like your videos , you are a smart guy
Peace from Romania
mentallystressed 2 months ago
Free market anti-capitalism FTW. All should study market anarchy and left-libertarianism.
greenghost2008 9 months ago
@greenghost2008
It seems to me that the social function of anarchy is merely to facilitate a transition of power from one archon to another. Nature abhors a vacuum and the absense of rules and rulers simply sets the stage for the appearance of new rules and new rulers. The question is then whether or not the new rules and rulers will be better than the old ones.
zthustra 8 months ago
@zthustra did you at least google market anarchy? Almost no one knows what it is but everyone acts like they understand it. It would not be a vacum. there would be market institutions in charge of defense.
greenghost2008 8 months ago
@greenghost2008
Anarcho-capitalism, libertarian anarchism, market anarchism, free market anarchism, or private-property anarchism ... it's all a good theory until the next archon emerges.
I don't have the patience to draft hundreds of 500 charachter replies in an effort to persuade you that I have sufficiently investigated market anarchism and my position is not altered by what I have learned. Feel free to comfort yourself with the assumption that my understanding is somehow deficient.
zthustra 8 months ago
@zthustra Anarchy as a transition between archons. I love the way you put that. I've often pointed out to anarchists that anarchist systems of govt are never successful, but such obvious facts don't dissuade the true believer. I suspect most self-proclaimed anarchists are actually minarchists rather than anarchists. Anarchy is an unattainable ideal. Minarchy is the closest an anarchist can get to their ideal, but the difference between anarchy and minarchy is vast.
MarmaladeINFP 8 months ago
@MarmaladeINFP
It doesn't have to be transition between rulers. It depends on beliefs of the people. If people want the state - there will be a new state after collapse of old one. It is not necessarily true however and that is why market anarchists are so fixated on education and convincing others Just like saying that after monarchic state collapse there necessarily had to be another monarchic state At some point beliefs of people changed and democrazy was born
zbigniewzapora 2 months ago
@zbigniewzapora Here is the difference. When monarchic states were prevalent, there were many examples of people living outside of such political systems. There isn't an equivalent to what anarchism criticsm which goes beyond just statism and includes all forms of hierarchical social systems. There aren't many examples of functioning anarchism. In fact, I've never come across any functioning examples of anarchism on the largescale, certainly none that have lasted.
MarmaladeINFP 2 months ago
@MarmaladeINFP
There are historical examples of anarchistic societies from both anarcho-syndycalist and anarcho-capitalist perspecitves. In both cases examples are not perfect but are hard to ignore. If you are interested in reading about them you will find enough material in google. The biggest example of anarchy that we had, like for ever, is anarchy between states themselves. Anarcho-capitalist does not view hierarchy as something bad if it is not forced.
zbigniewzapora 2 months ago
@MarmaladeINFP
"certainly none that have lasted."
It can be said about any state. They come and go. No state lasts, all eventually collapse. There is a reason for that. States are essentially forced central planning agencies. Mises in Economic Calculation In The Socialist Commonwealth and Hayek in The Use of Knowledge in Society showed us that central planning is an impossible task.
zbigniewzapora 2 months ago
@zbigniewzapora Many states last for centuries. Attempts at anarchist communities never come close to lasting this long.
MarmaladeINFP 2 months ago
I question very much that capitalism set us free, capitalism is more the transmuted feudalism. If we are free it is largely because of popular pressure and not some benign "entrepreneurs" who valiantly strive for our freedoms...
kingofqwerty 9 months ago
@kingofqwerty
If capitalism is properly defines as the condition of money and property concentrated at the top and freedom has something to do with broad distribution of money and property, then capitalism is the oppositve of freedom.
zthustra 9 months ago 2
Usually I love these videos. However, this time I find it to be too much sophistry. There exists an ugly question revealing an ugly fact that in turn pokes a hole in the - sorry to say - beautiful but also whiny boo-hoo "capitalists are evil and out to get me"-theory.
The question is: name one historical precedent of a society that has given humans so much personal freedom, wealth, health and in fact bettered the lot of the poor and the ordinary citizens as the Capitalist West? Name one!?
hrvad 1 year ago
@hrvad
The question must be begged, has "capitalism" brought personal freedom, wealth and health to the west?
If capitalism is charachterized by the concentration of wealth in the hands of a few, then most of the freedom, wealth and health that we enjoy was at its peaked at a time when wealth was more evenly distributed.
Also there is the issue of cheap and abundent resources like crude oil, wood, fish, top soil and copper that contributed greatly to our quality of life ... esp. oil.
zthustra 1 year ago
@zthustra Hehe, just answer my question ;) Let me clarify. I'm being practical: looking at ALL of history, please tell, is not the USA and even my country, Denmark, a peak on all of your important parameters? Have we EVER had ANY comparable freedom and wealth, despite the crap? I don't see the alternative. We transitioned from feudal lords and kings and robber barons to where we are now due largely to philosophers like John Stuart Mill etc. Capitalism TODAY is more a consequnce of that freedom,.
hrvad 1 year ago
@hrvad
I must again beg the question, your reply implies that the social and economic transition from nobility to robber baron industrialists to capitalism was guided by philosophers. I'm thinking that common people who took up arms against nobles and clergy might have something to do with it.
Whenever the vast majority of the means of production and exchange are held by a very few people instead of broadly distributed, their is less freedom in the marketplace and common people have less.
zthustra 1 year ago
@hrvad
I think we are largely talking past one another. Here in the US, most of the right-wing, conservatives would NOT consider Denmark to be a capitalist economy, but would call it a socialist state.
Here is something interesting, visit:
ifitweremyhome com
compare
US
DK
zthustra 1 year ago
Our leaders are selected through the wealth primaries.
DaHonestAbe 1 year ago
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didle66 1 year ago
Democracy is a weak bitch. I'm a Fascist.
didle66 1 year ago
@didle66
Every now and then someone posts something and states that they are a fascist. I usually visit their channels hoping to learns something about fascists. Here is what I have learned. Fascists never have faces, names, places or videos. Fascists post lots of anonymous comments but don't really put themselves out there. Good luck with the fascism thingy.
zthustra 1 year ago
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didle66 1 year ago
Comment removed
didle66 1 year ago
@zthustra Thank you. Don't worry, there are other places in the world to have a voice than youtube.
didle66 1 year ago
I came back for a second viewing. Keep up the good work my friend.
aiyic 2 years ago
The general difference between Fascism and Communism is this: Fascism uses government regulation (often very tight regulation) to make private corporations into instruments of public policy. Communism does away with the fiction of private corporations in favor of making them explicit organs of the state.
In practical terms, for the poor schmuck on the ground trying to stay alive in these insanities, it makes no real difference which one it actually is, since both are just about equally bad.
evensgrey 2 years ago
I wish I could give this comment five thumbs up! I really need to do something on what a corporation is. I don't care if it is a so-called private corporation, a municiple corporation or a corporate sole, it is the mask behind which those who have real power and wealth hide.
I especially like the phrase "organs of the state" since it applies whether the corporation is city government or Big Box Mart or even a religious or professional society. Thanks for commenting.
zthustra 2 years ago
Actually, those with wealth and power will use whatever legal fiction exists in the state they are operating in. In communist regimes, money comes ot those with power, and the form is some sort of state agency. In a corporatist system, the form is the corporation, and power follows from money. In a free market situation, there are likely to be many forms, and none of them is likely to be able to do much global harm to people.
evensgrey 2 years ago
Libertarian? Yes, that is how I describe myself.
Paradoxically, I think there is something in our animal nature that gives some of us a serious advantage over others in the power and wealth game. As I am growing older, I am recognizing the need for social structures that check the ambition of those few who would lord over the rest of us.
Spock was right, "Sometimes the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few."
zthustra 2 years ago
There is also this problem with limits to growth. We seem to be programmed for economic and population growth as well as unlimited desire for consumption. Unfortunately, we live in a world with finite space and resources. Our animal instincts need some restraint or we, like other prolific and consumptive species, will be extinct.
We may already be beyond hope. Perhaps we will evolve and adapt socially to a life on a resource poor planet? I'll be dead before we adapt but not before we suffer.
zthustra 2 years ago
Well, there's a few things that you seem to not have gotten quite right.
The technologically developed states have the interesting feature of having NEGATIVE internal population growth. They grow more populous because of immigration from the less developed states with internal population growth. So, if everyone had technology, we might have a problem with not having enough people after a while.
evensgrey 2 years ago
The other issue is that you're assuming we can't increase our resource base or habitation area substantially on this planet, or go elsewhere for space and resources. Neither is really true, if people will just do what is needed. Look up the Living Universe Foundation for one proposal to resolve these issues. (Initial projects will buy enough time for population stability to occur, while raising everyone's standard of living.)
evensgrey 2 years ago
I'm not assuming anything! The planet earth is finite and it has just so much easily usable planet surface and just so much easily accessible oil and mineral resources and just so much easily accessible fresh water.
Humans have achieved an unsustainalbe population by consuming the "low hanging fruit" that exists only after millions of years of biologic and geologic time.
We cannot, in decades, improve resources sufficiently to counteract the fact that we have overconsumed and over grown.
zthustra 2 years ago
The Club of Rome began working on this problem in April 1968. They published their landmark report, Limits to Growth, in 1972 and have been working ever since for social and technical change toward a sustainable human future. Today they have a membership that includes 1,500 of the best and brightest people on the planet earth and all of their effort has done nothing to alter the future they predicted 37 years ago from comming true. Most of the original members are dead.
zthustra 2 years ago
Yes, there are those assumptions that we can't DO anything about the effective usable area, fresh water, energy, and mineral resources. All of these assumptions are false.
Go have a look at the Living Universe Foundation. (Yes, it's a dopy name. The original name was First Millennial Foundation, which is also kind of dopy, but not as bad. Apparently there was some issue with converting it from one corporate form to another, so it was decided to create a new entity and transfer the content.)
evensgrey 2 years ago
I appreciate your points but you are evading my points by subtle manipulation of words.
Can we use what we have better? Yes.
The point is that there is only so much there and there are limits on how much better we can use it, like how many resources are needed to desalinate water or convert shale to oil or harvest ore from soil.
The only reason our planet supports 6,800,594,689 people is because resources have been EASY to get. Reducing the population is going to be painful.
zthustra 2 years ago
To be fair, I did go to the Living Universe Foundation website. I found nothing there but a graphic and a link to a Yahoo! group.
That is why I mentioned the Club of Rome. The Club of Rome is an incredible collection of world-class scientists and other leaders. It is well funded and has been in existence for many years.
How is LUF, without even a web page, going to achieve in the coming decade before we have insufficient resources what CoR hasn't achieved in 37 years?
zthustra 2 years ago
The Club of Rome has made bad assumptions about what can be done. They weren't actually bad assumptions 40 years ago, but they are bad assumptions now.
You would actually have to look at the material (yes, there's a LOT of it) to get an understanding. You also might want to see if you can get a copy of Savage's The Millennial Project. The engineering proposals don't all work, and there's some places where the physics is WRONG, but it gets the Earth-bound phase rather well.
evensgrey 2 years ago
The book is called, The Millennial Project: Colonizing the Galaxy in Eight Easy Steps by Marshall T. Savage.
The planet earth has already consumed all of the easy oil, the easy uranium, the easy copper, the easy to farm soil, and vast reserves of easy underground fresh water and our population is still growing and hungry for more consumption.
With less of everything available to more and more people, how can we even dream of galactic colonization?
zthustra 2 years ago
Ah, yes, he covers even that attitude. Not expanding as soon as possible risks dooming us to never being able to expand, leaving us stranded on an increasingly less hospitable planet.
evensgrey 2 years ago
The Club of Rome has revised its report called Limits to Growth twice to accomodate changes in available information and technology. Even with the fact that knowledge and technology have changed, the original predictions made in 1972 were remarkably accurate 20 and 30 years later. The only living contributor says he will not bother with a 40 year report because all of the things they hoped to avert will have happened by then.
zthustra 2 years ago
Still making the same assumptions, then: That there's no were to expand to, that there's no other means to produce food on a commercial scale, that there's no way to produce more drinking water, that there's no energy sources we haven't taken into account. All quite wrong. They didn't look wrong 40 years ago, but they are wrong now.
evensgrey 2 years ago
You so totally don't get me, you think something of my thought process that is totally untrue.
I KNOW there are other and better ways to use the resources that are available. I even BELIEVE that a MASSIVE AND MILITANT effort to transition could lead to a controlled contraction of population and modest to high quality of life for everyone.
We, as a species, are not moving that way. By the time we realize we have no choice, we won't have the option, we will be overpopulated and resource poor
zthustra 2 years ago
The Chinese forced population reduction option won't work for anyone.
Fortunately, we already know how to resolve the population and resource problems, we just have to ensure people like you don't stop it from being done.
evensgrey 2 years ago
What in the world are you posting this crap about me for? Strawman and ad hominem!
1. I NEVER suggested anything like "Chinese forced population reduction."
2. I'm not trying to stop anyone from doing anything! If you have wealth, power and influence, please use them to solve the problem in any way you see fit.
zthustra 2 years ago
You seem to be having difficulties reading your own posts.
1: You are now denying that you said: "I even BELIEVE that a MASSIVE AND MILITANT effort to transition could lead to a controlled contraction of population and modest to high quality of life for everyone."
2: You have stated that you oppose space colonies because you want to hijack the resources needed for them for your own purposes. That is the only possible interpretation of your rebuke of using them to get more resources.
evensgrey 2 years ago
Here is an example of controlled population reduction, "condom use."
Here is an example of uncontrolled population reduction, "starvation."
zthustra 2 years ago
So, apart from opposing the Catholic Church, anything else constructive you suggest for your MASSIVE AND MILITANT effort?
evensgrey 2 years ago
The amount of resources needed to transition to the new world that I believe you envision is more than anyone can imagine and while I don't advocate the use of military force to make it happen, I believe that it won't happen without that kind action, and by that kind of action I simply mean extreme actions taken on a massive scale by the governments or the wealthiest people.
zthustra 2 years ago
So, what false assumptions have you used in your estimation of the required resources and their relative availability for correcting the Malthusian issues the proper way?
evensgrey 2 years ago
I have NOT opposed space colonization, I have only ask how a resource poor and overpopulated world will find the resources to colonize galaxies. It is absurd to the nth degree to think that Homo sapiens, genius species that we are, would deprive themselves of warmth in the winter and food when they are hungry so that we can colonize planets we haven't discovered yet with technology that hasn't been developed yet.
zthustra 2 years ago
You'd stop making that kind of false assumption about the required resources if you'd READ THE AVAILABLE MATERIAL.
evensgrey 2 years ago
My only assumption is that the planet is finite and that there are real limits to growth whenever there is a finite resource.
The oceans are big ... really big ... well managed they could feed a big ... no, really big ... population. But we are idiots!
Did you see the report on Blue Fin Tuna?
Hell, we could live on algae if we had the collective will to do so! It could be our food, our oil, our plastic, our fertilizer. But, we are idiots!
We NEED real leadership! :-(
zthustra 2 years ago
Yes, and you are opposing it.
If you had BOTHERED to look at the LUF materials, you would know that the LUF is proposing algae as the basis of primary food production on a massive scale.
Now, what are the projections for food, fresh water, and energy production in deep-ocean habitats from the Club of Rome, since you claim they took EVERYTHING into consideration?
evensgrey 2 years ago
OK, you are really starting to tire me with your stawman arguments!
1. I already told you that I went to the LUF web site and all they have is a graphic and a link to a Yahoo! group. People without a web site aren't going to colonize galaxies.
2. I NEVER said that Club of Rome took EVERYTHING into account. Your arguments are starting to resemble Christian apolgist positions.
3. I conceded we can probably use existing resources better, especially the oceans and specifically mentioned algae.
zthustra 2 years ago
1: Admitting you ignored the materials that are presented doesn't help your position, particularly when you just admitted to deliberately ignoring the material.
2: Did the Club of Rome make the predictions you claimed or not? Continuing to make person insults will be taken as an admission that you already know their assumptions were wrong.
3: You can only be working from the assumption that there cannot be any significant resources not already being utilized. This is false.
evensgrey 2 years ago
Why do you keep writing things like " no other means to produce food " and "no way to produce more drinking water" and "no energy sources we haven't taken into account" when I clearly concede that there are other ways to use existing resources better to produce more food, drinking water and energy?
Some nations, like Denmark, are already doing an awesome job of utilizing good technology to do these things. And better technology is in the future.
The issue is timing, math and human nature.
zthustra 2 years ago
So, what are the Club of Rome's projections for deep ocean habitat production of food, fresh water, and energy?
evensgrey 2 years ago
A Fasces was the symbol of the Italian Fascist party, as a link to the old Roman Republic/Empire. The Italian Fascist party used the Fasces as a symbol of the strength in unity: A single stick is easily snapped, but the bundle is much stronger and more difficult to break.
evensgrey 2 years ago
I have been learning so much about fasces from viewers! Thanks.
zthustra 2 years ago
... correction:
actually some votes do get deleted, parties need to get more than 5% of the votes on the federal level, otherwise they will get no seats. enough to keep the neo-nazis and the communists out ;)
kurtilein3 2 years ago
Excellent presentation. Your definition of capitalism has me thinking afresh about the word, as I am one who has advocated capitalism in some videos, but intending by that a free market, not power through wealth. Hmm. On to parts two and three.
kevinanity 2 years ago
interesting analysis.
ill go for the "ism" that doesnt even have an "ism" in it: democracy.
and of all the "ism"s that actually do have an "ism" in them, anarcho syndicalism would be my choice. but maybe this is just because anarcho syndicalism is compatible with democracy and because you can get there in a gradual process starting with representative democracy.
kurtilein3 2 years ago
Something to think about: Russia and China are both governed by democratically elected representatives.
How I love to stir the pot!
In democracy we all have an equal voice in government, its just that some people have a more equal voice than others and they usually end up being the ones with the most wealth.
zthustra 2 years ago
zthustra:
you need to differentiate between democracies, dysfunctional democracies, and totalitarian / other regimes that just pretend to be democracies. russia and china are both pretending to be democracies, with limited success.
the united states would be an example for a dysfunctional democracy, this becomes clear by looking at the election system which deletes most votes instead of counting them. you have to vote for the winner in your state to have your vote not deleted.
kurtilein3 2 years ago
You're wonderful! I knew that if I pulled your chain I would get a reply.
We should do a blogTV on this subject. In REAL democracy, ALL of the people have a say and participate.
In a representative democracy, the majority have a seat at the table and the rest are out in the cold.
I'm sure you've seen the proportional representation schemes? Some are in use in more advanced societies, but in the evangelical, conservative U.S. society.
Here in the U.S. dollars buy votes .. capitalism.
zthustra 2 years ago
zthustra:
well, i agree, the problem is... how do you implement what you call "real democracy"?
i think representative democracy is the gold standart, if its actually democratic. here in germany we have 5 political parties in government, parties get seats according to the percentage of votes they get on the federal level, no votes get deleted in the process.
now all people need to be educated so that they can vote in a meaningful way and are clever enough to vote for the right people.
kurtilein3 2 years ago
then i would like to point out what noam chomsky says about the best possible strategy for revolutionaries of any kind....
you need to push for democratic change within/of the existing system first, otherwise you will never get the support of the people. either the system gives in and gets more democratic, or the system will be exposed as oppressive and irresponsive by the reactions you provoked by pushing for democratic change. and then your movement will grow. you win either way.
kurtilein3 2 years ago
REAL democracy is a HORRIBLE form of government. What you want is a republic, with some form of popular election for some (but not all) of the positions. (You need the basic divisions of the US system: Legislature for creating laws and policies, executive for the operation of the government, and judicial for review, and you generally don't what to elect judges.) Republic is rule by law, while democracy is rule by the force of the majority. Law gives you a set of rules.
evensgrey 2 years ago
another good ism - titoism
dsego84 2 years ago
Yugoslavia was once a regional industrial power and economic success. Two decades before 1980, annual gross domestic product (GDP) growth averaged 6.1 percent, medical care was free, literacy was 91 percent, and life expectancy was 72 years.[8] But after a decade of Western economic ministrations and five years of disintegration, war, boycott, and embargo, the economy of the former Yugoslavia collapsed.
dsego84 2 years ago
The former Yugoslavia was set up to fail if the rule of force was removed. It was composed of several mutually hostile ethnocultural groups, with key industries largely partitioned between the areas primarily occupied by these groups. Take away the force of the regime that kept the lid on those longstanding hostilities (places with complicated history tend to have bad and deep rivalries with no simple way to sort them out) and the place blows up.
evensgrey 2 years ago
Well, it survived for almost 50 years. I don't agree about the "hostile ethnocultural groups". Nationalists used the same tactics they always use, blaming everything on other ethnicities and communists, and of course, preaching of homeland, God, great battles, suffering and other bullshit. As for the socialism part, people were fooled by bright lights and big billboards. They were fooled into believing that capitalism will bring everything. Now a lot of people think that life was better then.
dsego84 2 years ago
People have a tendency to mistake the past for better. Look at some of the people in Russia who've waxed nostalgic for Stalin, who murdered as many people in the USSR as Hitler did.
evensgrey 2 years ago
I don't think that life in Russia is so much better now with oligarchy back in place.
dsego84 2 years ago
Russia is one of the most capitalistic nations on the planet earth. About 50 people own the whole country. My father in law is a diplomat and he made that point clear to me almost 25 years ago. And it is still true.
zthustra 2 years ago
Actually, it was filled with more and more ruthless capitalists under the communist regime because the only way yo get what you needed was to buy whatever random goods you could find in the stores, then trade them with whomever you happened to meet who had something you could either use or hope to trade further.
In 1984 the country was OWNER by the Party/KGB/Red Army triumvirate, since the regime was still in operation and didn't look to be collapsing imminently.
evensgrey 2 years ago
Of course it isn't, but people tend to forget the worst parts (like the paranoid purges that nearly destroyed the Red Army on the eve of WWII) and remember the better parts (there was generally food available, unless you were in the Ukraine where a lot of it was grown).
A good part of Russia's problem is that there isn't a particularly strong belief in the rule of law, something that really only grows when you have the rule of law. And the law isn't seen as stupid.
evensgrey 2 years ago
I find it interesting you see how corrupt things can be, and how the government works on behalf of whatever the government chooses to work behalf of [themselves, wealthy interests] but you still consider its violent rein over 3rd parties as "credible." Almost in the same way you could call a hitman hired by a rich person killing a 3rd party "credible."
And when you shame supporters, many people who support "capitalism" are referring to a specific way to organize the structure of production.
MotionFur 2 years ago
While I think the exploration of words and their history is relevant, I don't think saying something like "If you say you support capitalism" applies because people who say that, just simply are not referring to what you're referring to.
MotionFur 2 years ago
I seriously hope that calling people who support capitalism idiots, I will get them to thinking more on what capitalism is and si not. If they, the idiots, can't get their arms around the idea that fascism is power to those with weapons and capitalism is power to those who own most the majority of everything, then they deserve the title. To avoid beign an idiot, all a person has to do is say, "Oh, I don't think beign rich gives you the right to lord over the rest of us so I'm not a capitalist."
zthustra 2 years ago
That actually puts you over towards the Libertarians, who don't view ANYONE as having any right to lord anything over anyone else.
Interestingly, one of the natural results of Libertarianism would be lots of people with lots of money, lots of people being able to make lots of money, and people being able to be armed as they wish.
evensgrey 2 years ago
wow, all I can say is thanks for having the patience to study this. I've wanted to... but lack the will to keep going LOL. Amazing video as always... now on to the next :)
tattooskin72 2 years ago
Freedom requires an equal playing field, and the market pushes for inequality, within the flow of resources. So, a free market, breeds inequality.
TheReasonWhyGuy 2 years ago
Interesting video! For the first time I see somebody who knows this topic and knows what they are talking about.
I've been mulling these things in my head, planning to make a video, but there's so much to say, and one must be careful, so that not to be misunderstood. There is a lot of ignorance about the driving forces behind these social systems, isn't there?
dewonthegrass 2 years ago
I'm enjoying this, onto the next one...
MrUnscientific 2 years ago
If you see an image of the center of the Congress Hall where US laws are debated you will see on both sides of the American flag (hanging vertically by the way!) Fasci.
drdalet 2 years ago
The fasci is also engraved in the arms of the great stone chair of Abraham Lincoln's Memorial.
The fasci is on a lot of U.S. and other nation seals and the like, but in different forms.
The arrows clutched in the U.S. eagle's grip are a fasci. The symbolize the military power of the states unified in the new nation.
zthustra 2 years ago
Talking about cancer and the FDA and the industry I came across an interesting article. Google "The Story of Dr Sam Chachoua" and you will get to the article,
drdalet 2 years ago
Fascinating read!
watch?v=TFSkJhCcpBY
Reminds me of the Dr. Kelly story:
drkelley com
zthustra 2 years ago
Actually, the Fascii symbolised the strength of the many in rome united into one, holding the sharp head of the axe.
Mussolini was kind of fashioning himself the new Augustus Casear
1stCainite 2 years ago 2
Thank you for adding something to my understanding. Now I understand why the rods were bundled together instead of just one rod.
Yes, Mussolini was telling Italians that they had a right to plunder their neighbors, just like in the good old days. These guys came very close to pulling it off.
Germany had a lot of support here in the U.S. I often wonder what might have happened IF the U.S. had entered on the side of Germany.
The Japanese ended that prospect, they needed Manila hemp!
zthustra 2 years ago
I don't get it. Isn't capitalism the idea of everyone being able to produce and own production tools? Isn't that the actual default state of affairs?
The word is so laden with confusing meanings - such as abuse, poverty and control - that people started to believe that this basic freedom that everyone deserves is actually bad.
teenspirit1 2 years ago
No, free markets and free enterprize exist when many opportunities exist for individuals to own their own business and the like.
Capitalism is about wealth and power. It is the accumulation of large quantities of wealth and controlling major industries and the like.
If I own my own shoe shop, I am a free market entrepreneur, but if I own 2/3rds of the shoe manufactoring in the world and small business can't compete, then I am a capitalist.
Did you know there are no shoe mfrs in the US?
zthustra 2 years ago
Of course I get what you're saying and we have no disagreements about the level of abuse.
But what about free enterprise? Does it lead to capitalism?
Because I'm for free enterprise, but my opinions might just get tipped if I realize that it is harmful in the end.
By the way socialism is not off-limits to me. I'm not from the US where people have a hypocritical stigma against socialism.
teenspirit1 2 years ago
I also struggle with the issues. That is one of the reasons that I have a like/dislike relationship with Marx. It is probably one the most natural things for humans in a free market to increase their holdings and improve their place in the market and may even lead to abuses. But here is the trick! Without the help of government no small group of people could dominate the marketplace. Professional societies, corporations and modern money systems exist to aid capitalists at our expense.
zthustra 2 years ago
Interesting. I'm not sure how that trick would work.
Am I to understand "without the help of government" as a sort of economic anarchy?
In that sort of an environment, is the government to introduce absolutely no control mechanisms, for or against the wealthy?
What if that doesn't do anything to stop shelf abuse (company bribes the market to sell their own brand), hidden contracts (mutual plans between separate companies, conspiring alliances), big fish syndrome (buys the small fish) etc.?
teenspirit1 2 years ago
NEGATIVE of the anarchy angle.
Let's just use one example here. Imagine that YOU knew how to cure cancer. Could YOU do anything with that knowledge? Why not? How many obstacles have been constructed to prevent you from curing cancer?
It is a fact that more people earn a living curing cancer than even have cancer and nobody is really "cured", they are only "treated".
zthustra 2 years ago
Maybe one more example? I know a little about the medical industry ...
Imagine that there was a safe and effective human blood subsitute that was inexpensive, easily implemented, and ended teh need for blood donations and transfusion services.
How might capitalists making HUGE amounts of money in blood donations and transfusion services keep this from the market without government help?
They couldn't! Lucky for them their money buys influence or they would be unemployed.
zthustra 2 years ago
But what I was really getting at was corporate personhood, professional licensure rules, regulations designed to block out new competitors, tax advantages and subsidies for big business, etc.
zthustra 2 years ago
I'm sorry, the psychopath in me is refusing to stop thinking critically :)
In theory, isn't a technological breakthrough supposed to rapidly shift the whole market balance? How is the government aid of big business going to stop someone from patenting and producing artificial blood plasma? How are they going to stop someone from eradicating cancer using whatever new tech? Do big businesses and government kidnap and torture people who come up with an innovation?
teenspirit1 2 years ago
Good luck discovering the answers. I wonder if you need FDA approval for those new ideas? I wonder if the FDA is managed by the same people who own the medical industry?
Another example, is genetics. Can a corporation OWN the gentic code of a corn plant that has been around for thousands of years? Can they sue farmers who have grown that corn for generations if they keep growing corn OWNED by the corporation? How might government respond to this kind of practice?
zthustra 2 years ago
I see. Yes, they can indeed delay innovation. Anyway, thanks for your patience.
teenspirit1 2 years ago