RE: Nothing on the shelves - Some things that I found when researching the food shortages.

You are viewing a single comment's thread:

That's simply wrong and quite naive. Sorry to be blunt about it but nearly every, big E, economic choice nowadays shows that to be the case.

Not really. As a leader, what would be your goal with regards being in charge in situations where you have to make tough calls. It's rather like the train conundrum where you have to make the call to save one person or a group of people. As long as you have no personal connections to either, then you are going to choose the many over the one.

A word I could replace 'capitalism' with on your points is 'consumerism'. The point I'm making is that I wouldn't personally choose to believe that any of these 'isms' could be our saviour, which is why I also wouldn't blame any one of them for all the problems we have. When we can't keep open minds to see the good and bad in everything, then we have a tendency to start which hunts. Either that, or we can become religiously fixated on one solution being the saviour of all, which can also lead to witch hunts.

By calling the elephant in the room 'capitalism' at the start, you are essentially leading your reader down a path of your choosing. Yet with current problems being a the results of decisions that were made by countries across the world, then this includes socialist and communist countries too, unless you're saying that they are actually all capitalist (consumerist) in reality. In that case, I'll just replace them all with one word, consumerism, and agree that this is most likely what has brought us to this point. Every country is measured by its GDP and is raiding its resources to trade on the world stage. Some are even raiding other's resources, both the capitalist US and communist China for example. So in the grand scene of things, they are heading in the same direction, just under different 'isms', while claiming each one to be the superior one.

For every book you can read on the dangers of capitalism, you can likely find one similar for the dangers of socialism, communism, Marxism and how they are ingrained into the psyche. It would be my policy to read one of each and it's my experience that none of them will be wrong in what they are saying and concluding.

I don't think any of these systems were set up to be detrimental, quite the opposite, in fact. However, human nature is what human nature is and eventually we will always arrive at the same point. Have you ever read about John Calhoun's mice and rat social experiments? You likely know about the rise and falls of empires throughout history too.



0
0
0.000
3 comments
avatar

My choices as a leader and, probably yours are different to the choices of the sociopaths who make it big in Capitalism. throughout history, and especially since 1971, the folks who can afford to rise to power because of financial support (another aspect of Capitalism) have made decisions first, to support those who finance them, second, those who they can benefit from and third, those who will support them. Except for Roosevelt in after the depression, and perhaps in Bhutan. I can't name one world leader who has worked for the people.

Consumerism is one of the tools of capitalism.

I can pretty safely say that there are no communist or socialist countries any more. Take China for example, expanding and feeding itself wealth through the tools of capitalism. Indonesia, though listed as socialist is expanding through capitalism, etc etc.

Of course, one leads the reader where they want them to go.

All political systems (except Post Scarcity Anarchism) were set up to funnel wealth to the 'elite few' and to maintain their dominance. All of the systems that are actually working on behalf or little people are reactions against capitalism and are quite vocal in that respect. Worker owned coops such as are popular in the Basque Region, Cuba and most of South America are direct results against Capitalism. Roosevelts New Deal was a direct response against the aspects of capitalism that he could see crippling America in the future. He actually had a second bill of rights drafted and read on radio enshrining the very things that capitalists work to destroy, the things that are first taken away under communism such as the right to a home, adequate health care, representation, the right to a wage that is sufficient to feed a family, education etc etc.

I'm familiar with Calhoun's experiments but they only represent a very small slice of human behaviour. Rats and Mice did not set up the systems in which they are behaving for the dominance of other rats and mice. We did and that system's name is capitalism.

0
0
0.000
avatar

Of course, one leads the reader where they want them to go.

Not my style. I prefer my reader to go where they choose to go from what I've written. The results are more interesting and eye opening that way. 😉 For example, your responses always interest me, because while sometimes we seem to think alike, on the whole you reach similar conclusions to me in a completely different way, or we reach different conclusions from the same piece of information.

Indeed, Calhoun's experiments were set up by humans, which is why I find them so fascinating. After all, humans are the ones also driving our own systems. The rat one where they would end up sub dividing themselves into groups of no more than about 12 was thought provoking. There is a similar phenomenon with chickens, in that smaller flocks are generally more peaceful and cohesive than larger flocks.

There will always be those who crave power and they probably shouldn't be the ones given power. Power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely comes to mind. Yet these are the people who make empires as they conquer and unite tribes and countries, which isn't necessarily a bad thing.

Capitalism has become a dirty word, as has communism and even socialism has been sullied. I wonder if we'll get a new one to replace them and consign them all to the scrap heap. 🤔

0
0
0.000
avatar

We have to work to replace them. We work on the front lines of hunger, poverty and disadvantage every day (it is necessary even here in sunny S.A). You may not have noticed it but there is a war going on all around you and that war is against capitalism. Try as you might, you cannot stay above it for much longer. Nobody can.

Charities and NGOs are all stepping up their work, some are overwhelmed and struggling, individuals like us try to fill the gaps where we can and provide baseline support. The rhetoric, even in new policies is that of war.

0
0
0.000