Define individualism.
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From where I am sitting Randian Objectivism and political economic libertarianism are one in the same thing.
I’m not discussing socialism with this many clueless americans around, sorry. They don’t know what it is, and I don’t have the patience to explain.
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Rand hated Libertarians. Do you know what she called them? Hippies on the right.
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Define individualism.
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Hahahahaha that’s pretty good.
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I didn’t say they were all clueless, just a great many of them.
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As long as I made a comment here, I might as well leave my suggestion that you abandon the “capitalist” moniker. It is a socialist term, you are letting them define you. If you are going to use socialist terminology, might as well go as reactionary.
My deux soux.
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And yet all the political libertarians worship the writings of Ayn Rand utilizing them to define their own politics.
Capitalist, fascist, nihilist, liberal, mercenary financial bankers, libertarians, cutthroat privateers, industrial techno corporate tycoons, or venture market opportunists, it’s all the same thing to me.
At the end of the day they all support human economic financial exploitation.
Though I hold “objectivism” against Rand, too. “Realist” would have been a better word. Otherwise it’s “Platonists on the right.”
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Plato was a monarch and neoconservatives despise central governments or even centralized government political interventionism.
They despise government interference with corporations and financial institutions, but they love a powerful centralized government, a powerful intelligence sector - with extensive surveillance and disruptions of groups they want to use or destroy, powerful federal and local law enforcement, their own central control of foreign policy (up to and often including war) with no need to ask Congress about any of that. They’re happy with a very powerful central judicial branch, as long as it is stacked with people with their beliefs. IOW they want small government in terms of no oversight of corporations, economic policies, foreign policy, aid to poor and so on. But they want a merged oligarchical central government with vast powers over the world and its own citizens.
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The problem with pitting Communism/socialism against capitalism/libertarianism is that it belongs to the past. Our societies are regressing, led by the US, into something that has many similarities to the late decadence of the Roman Empire, and Trump attempts to build a throne like Nero, allowing himself to be deified, and lets the country slide into poverty and wars, offering bread and games as a consolation.
Our media contributes to the deterioration of sophistication, invoking a survival mode that is primarily an expression of their fears, prejudices, and hatred, and people are unable to see what is happening to them. That is why all the democratic institutions are collapsing or being torn down, manipulated or corrupted, and the majority of those who cheer on Trump and his sycophants are unable to recognise the disdain he has for them as soon as they need something.
You can cheer or fight for these people, but don’t expect favours. You are just the same “scum” as his critics, and you are only rewarded when you take part in the dismantling of social order or can pay him for his favour. They will do everything to present you with new enemies to attack, people to fear or hate, and if there are casualties, so what! For these people, there are too many people on the planet anyway, creating too many problems. His “strategy” is to use his military to rid himself of all criticism, resistance, and opposition.
So, for as long as we are struggling with such despots, communism with all of its pitfalls would be the revolutionary way to change the situation, socialism would try to create an opposition in favour of a common good, capitalism was yesterday, today we are falling back into feudal environments, and libertarianism is just something that crazy Americans made up. In America, it is also complicated by the crazed evangelicals who see Trump as some kind of epiphany, but the so-called Christian Heritage that they call up is far removed from the Jesus of the Gospels, just like in the UK, where their interpretation falls back to crusades, not to the Gospel message.
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I’d take your opinions much more seriously if you would include a healthy dose of humility, as in noting that your perception can be very skewed. You seem to be on just one very particular view of things, and fixated on new things. It’s a sad view
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Whoever fits the bill, but it’s a reply to @Bob
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Everybody’s perception can be skewed, but since when has humility been your maxim? You oppose my thoughts because you have a particular view yourself, but you never offer it as a counterargument. You are quite lazy in fact, just making this statement shows it.
In one thing you are correct, this situation is saddening, because America has propagandised
their own people and much of the Western world as well, but with the power of the entertainment industry behind it. I have spoken to Americans about the history of socialism and communism, showing them evidence, but they told me they had never heard of that side of the story.
The same is the facts behind capitalism, and what only Americans refer to as Libertarianism, which in Europe has a different meaning. I have also been informing myself on current affairs since the 1980s, drawing on various sources, and I have written several novels implementing that information, which, despite never wanting to publish, has given me an insight into how historical events have affected human lives.
My travels have also allowed me to speak with non-Western people who have shown me their problems, and when researching it became apparent that the West has done as much damage as Russia or China, if not more. The West has continually detached itself from the rest of humanity, which is only to be exploited for not being “civilised” in the same way as we are.
But the consequences are coming, and we will be rewarded by those we have empowered with subjugation and absolute control. That is truly saddening.
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You will find that it is an international cabal that runs the entire planet where they want the entire world all to themselves and are willing to kill everybody around the world just to get it. The ultimate coveted prize or trophy of conquest.
It’s what you liberals refer to as crazy unfounded wild conspiracies but such is this world we inhabit regardless of mental sentiment. The United States currently is being ferociously pawned away to achieve that purpose or end.