Is capitalism evil?

[above_us_only_sky]

I once worked in an office building in the CBD of my town, and here is a scene I experienced, I don’t know whether it is universal:

Employees spent the day work hard in a crowded office and have an one hour lunch break, during this lunch break the only place where an exhausted employee can relax herself within this building is the shopping mall downstairs, it is also the only place where she can buy her lunch. So she goes downstairs to buy the lunch, but the lunch deli is placed near the exit end of the shopping mall, so she has to walk through the cosmetics section and the cloth section, the models in the cosmetic and cloth advertisement looks so elegant, and the big mirrors placed there reminded her how homely she looks. Then she bought her lunch and then eat it with her colleagues, they usually discuss something like who gets a promotion… After the lunch she has few minutes so she walk around the shopping mall… Then she returned to her office, she finished her task after some hours, and there are still one hour left before closing time, she wants to leave earlier, but she has to pretend to be busy, unless the boss would give her another task… When she woke up this morning she asked herself what the meaning of her life is, now she has an answer, she wants to be successful, to buy good things in life, dress like a model and drive a sports car and make others envy her… this is her meaning of life.

Then I changed jobs and now I work in a factory as a low-level clerk, This is what I see:

People dressed in ugly uniforms are organized into two groups, one groups work 12 hours at day time, 6-7 days a week, another groups work 12 hours at night, they make jeans for a company in another part of the world. They are not allowed to wear it at work, if they are caught, they would be fined. Some are young adults who like wearing jeans yet they usually buy counterfeit jeans because four authentic items they made cost them a month’s salary. One morning, when a worker woke up with her seven other co-workers in dorms within the factory wall she doubted whether her life is worth living, yet at the end of this month she spends some money and bought an authentic pair of jeans, and her roommates who wear counterfeit ones watch her with envy. It really boosted her ego.

Schopenhauer once said

…nature has given a man only as much physical power as will suffice, if he exerts it in moderation, to gain a sustenance from the earth. No great superfluity of power is his. If , then, a not inconsiderable number of men are relieved from the common burden of sustaining the existence of the human race, the burden of the remainder is augmented, and they suffer…and this is the chief source of evil…under the name of the proletariat…

We are all cogs of this great apparatus, some of us are consumers, others are makers. after all, is capitalism evil? If so, can it be replaced? On a personal level, is it ethical for an individual to seek advancement within this system?

[phyllo]

This OP contains various ideas worth discussing, so I will make a few brief comments.

In any economic system, products will need to be produced, transported, distributed and disposed of. Therefore, persons will be ‘employed’ in doing all that.

If Schopenhauer was a squirrel, then each day he would have to collect nuts and seeds. If he did not collect enough, then he would starve. It seems reasonable to expect humans to make an effort to provide food and shelter for themselves. When did this idea of equating employment and slavery arise?

These days a lot of people say that there is no objective meaning. In a world where meaning is subjective, getting meaning from the products that you own is as good a meaning as any other.

[Orbie]

Here is the most basic philosophical answer to this pre pondering question.

Capitalism is the true mirror of animal behavior, because of inherent needs to compete, to outdo, to
envy, and to selfishly hord.

People are animals after all, and they all want to
maximize on pleasure.

More money=More pleasure (& leisure, health,)

Therefore capitalism is more natural than any other system, because, it is closest to any non system ever thought up.

Dynasties are proximally closest to the sustenance of lasting values to begotten progeny of successful men.

This too, is a constant reinforcer, inter generationally speaking, a reminder that capital value is the most ontologically valid form of economic practice and
theory.

I once had a neighbor, an uneducated truck driver, who over the years became a multi millionaire on
account of owning several gas stations, and the word
around the neighborhood by non envious people was that he was a nice hard working guy,med serving of his good fortune

The guys living under a bridge up aways, eating out of garbage cans did not share the sentiment.

[Zoot_Allures]

Capitalism isn’t evil but it is very naive. It assumes that somehow the exploited working classes will happily follow the rules and laws of a system that cannot operate without a margin of that society existing as economic parasites to those working classes.

Laws do not apply universally to people unless they are first equal. Once that is established, social contracts can be made. But until then, a capitalist’s laws and rules do not apply to the working classes in principle. Capitalism’s naivety is to expect that not to be the case.

I prefer capitalism to socialism because it creates this dilemma. It creates the grounds upon which a conflict of powers is essential to its system operating. I enjoy breaking the rules and laws of a system based on subterfuge and deception, and would not want it any other way.

In a perfect, socialist world I wouldn’t know what to do with myself.

[Ultimate_Philosophy (Ultimate Philosophy 1001)]

the evil stems from man’s inability to live lightly. people do not need to buy 700,000 dollar homes. if everyone lived lightly the workload would be nominal and there wouldnt be slave labor everywhere.

[Zoot_Allures]

Who are you to tell people what they can and cannot own you… you… primitivist!

I much rather prefer capitalists believe they’ve worked for what they have so that I can enjoy taking it from them.

if everyone lived lightly the workload would be nominal and there wouldnt be slave labor everywhere.

If cavemen stuck to eating roots and berries they wouldn’t have to spend all day fashioning pointed stones and hunting spears.

Where do you draw the line, TZ?

[Ultimate_Philosophy (Ultimate Philosophy 1001)]

cavemen did not spend their days as slaves…

i am dirt poor compared to other americans yet i have lots of clothes i dont need, enough is enough, americans are so wasteful that homeless people get untouched meals in the trashcan

[Ultimate_Philosophy (Ultimate Philosophy 1001)]

instead of pumping volumes of drab and repetitive items, people should make unique and quality items, anything else is wasteful. rules of rarity

dailymotion.com/video/x19bb6 … hattan_fun

[Zoot_Allures]

cavemen did not spend their days as slaves…

The modern day working class do not spend their days as slaves, either. That’s an old, worn out metaphor in the arsenal of socialist propaganda. They choose to enter into the contract of wage labor, and are therefore responsible for that decision.

“When I enter into the war I choose to make it my war”- Sartre

enough is enough, americans are so wasteful

Waste and excessiveness is not an objection to progress but rather a condition of it, don’t you think?

[surreptitious57]

Capitalism itself is not evil but it does allow for incredibly unequal distribution of wealth
So if that could be contained within it then it would not be so evil as some think it to be
I notice with interest those who most complain of it are perfectly happy to take from it
Now anti capitalist demonstrators buying Mcdonalds is just about as ironic as it can get
So I eagerly anticipate the mental gymnastics required to square that particular circle

[Ultimate_Philosophy (Ultimate Philosophy 1001)]

@Zoot Allures

The modern day working class do not spend their days as slaves, either. That’s an old, worn out metaphor in the arsenal of socialist propaganda. They choose to enter into the contract of wage labor, and are therefore responsible for that decision.

That is a false conclusion, capitalism results in slave labor in other countries. Also, not to sound like ecmandu, but ecmandu is right, for lots of males it is not a choice, because of sexual stratification and brainwashing they never develop the mental powers to get laid without being rich

[surreptitious57]

@Trixie Z

americans are so wasteful that homeless people get untouched meals in the trashcan

There is absolutely no excuse for throwing away food especially if you buy it yourself

[Zoot_Allures]

That is a false conclusion, capitalism results in slave labor in other countries.

No more than the proletariat in a socialist society who is forced to work, or be thrown in the gulag.

Also, not to sound like ecmandu, but ecmandu is right, for lots of males it is not a choice, because of sexual stratification and brainwashing they never develop the mental powers to get laid without being rich

Or, modern women have less interest in men’s intelligence and more interest in their wealth… something that signifies an ability to protect and secure their efforts to reproduce. So then the mental powers of men become less and less relevant anyway, see.

Men dumb down in proportion to the number of dumb women.

Two minutes ago I heard a college girl in a conversation with her friend. She said ‘like’ eight times in less than thirty seconds.

Like, what is the deal with that?

[Peter_Kropotkin]

@Zoot Allures

cavemen did not spend their days as slaves…

The modern day working class do not spend their days as slaves, either. That’s an old, worn out metaphor in the arsenal of socialist propaganda. They choose to enter into the contract of wage labor, and are therefore responsible for that decision.

K: And here the myth is strongest. You do not choose. You have no choice as
every company follows the capitalist system and so you have no choice.
Choice is the myth of our time.

Kropotkin

[Zoot_Allures]

There is absolutely no excuse for throwing away food especially if you buy it yourself

You would not say that if you tried my turkey casserole.

[Artimas]

@phyllo

This OP contains various ideas worth discussing, so I will make a few brief comments.

In any economic system, products will need to be produced, transported, distributed and disposed of. Therefore, persons will be ‘employed’ in doing all that.

If Schopenhauer was a squirrel, then each day he would have to collect nuts and seeds. If he did not collect enough, then he would starve. It seems reasonable to expect humans to make an effort to provide food and shelter for themselves. When did this idea of equating employment and slavery arise?

These days a lot of people say that there is no objective meaning. In a world where meaning is subjective, getting meaning from the products that you own is as good a meaning as any other.

Because it is slavery.

[Artimas]

@Peter Kropotkin

@Zoot Allures

cavemen did not spend their days as slaves…

The modern day working class do not spend their days as slaves, either. That’s an old, worn out metaphor in the arsenal of socialist propaganda. They choose to enter into the contract of wage labor, and are therefore responsible for that decision.

K: And here the myth is strongest. You do not choose. You have no choice as
every company follows the capitalist system and so you have no choice.
Choice is the myth of our time.

Kropotkin

There is no choice, you have to in order to live.

[Artimas]

@Trixie Z

@Zoot Allures

The modern day working class do not spend their days as slaves, either. That’s an old, worn out metaphor in the arsenal of socialist propaganda. They choose to enter into the contract of wage labor, and are therefore responsible for that decision.

That is a false conclusion, capitalism results in slave labor in other countries. Also, not to sound like ecmandu, but ecmandu is right, for lots of males it is not a choice, because of sexual stratification and brainwashing they never develop the mental powers to get laid without being rich

Im not rich, I get laid…

[phyllo]

Another thread goes down the hole.

[Artimas]

It shouldn’t even be questioned that capitalism is evil, it is corrupt and exploits people, but I guess that’s ok for two kinds of people. People who are too dumb to realize they are being exploited and people who don’t care because they exploit themselves.