some thoughts after several days of work

After working 8 straight days, I finally have a day off…
and being unable to post, I spent that time just thinking…

after working for those 8 days straight, I was really struggling with
the why?. Why was I killing myself for 23 bucks an hour…for a retirement
that statistically will only last for 8 years after I retire… that is bullshit…
and factor in the ill-health I, once again statistically will get, my
8 years of retirement will be consumed by my physical ailments…
physical ailments I am already seeing… bad back, hips,
feet problems ( I stand on my feet for 8 hours a day)…

after talking to a recruiter, I am basically unhireable due to my age, (I am 62)
so, I have only two choices, retire and lose quite a bit of money based on
my retirement age (I am basically too young) and the fact is if, if I can
find a job, it will be at minium wage with no or little benefits…
there is no benefit for me to do so… so I am stuck in a crappy job…
but once again, why should I be killing myself for such a crappy job?

One might say, but Kropotkin, you are being a “productive” citizen…
and productive, which is code for killing oneself for your society,
country, culture…and of course most important of all, killing oneself
for the greater good of businesses, and their all inclusive mission statement
which is this…

We will do anything it takes to make profits… even if it means killing both our
employees and our customers… profits over life is our mission statement…

and this is true in every capitalist business… for capitalism is the search
for the all might dollar…no matter who it kills…

and therein lies my problem… I no longer wish to be cannon fodder
for business or even the capitalistic system… now those who attack me
for being a “communist” don’t ever defend capitalism because it cannot
be defended… they attack those who have the gall to question the value
of capitalism, but they never offer up any defense of capitalism nor do
they ever offer up any other possibilities to capitalism…what other choices
do we have besides capitalism? and the logical answer is some form of
socialism or even a full blown communism society…

now my own preference is Anarchism, but I see that to be a century or more
away… its time will come… but I have to focus on today and in today’s world,
we have capitalism which has create such problems that we may not
be able to solve them… such as global warming, pollution, income inequality,
population growth, extinction of entire species… to name a few of the problems
caused by and exacerbated by our slavish devotion to a failed economic system
like capitalism…

so we must engage into some exploration of other economic systems or
even go “ad hoc” and change some if not all of the failed capitalistic system…

but Kropotkin, there is no need to overhaul the capitalistic system…

what, are you blind? can you not see the massive failures that capitalism has
put us into? The poverty of billions while we see a few people have as
much wealth as half the world’s population…

income inequality is a sure sign of the failure of capitalism…
less than 500 people having as much wealth as 3.5 billion people,
is not a sign of capitalism success…it is a sign of failure…

and so I begin to question my own personal role in maintaining
a system that is so clearly devoted to destroying my life…
making my life in the capitalistic system nothing more then
cannon fodder…I have more value then that and you have have more
value then that…

let us begin by the simple understanding that capitalism has failed
and go from there…

Kropotkin

Not bad Peter.

The problems with capitalism are many fold.

It’s an obsessive personality disorder who has one penny more than the other person. It’s an OCD mental disorder.

Once you get to a certain level, you spend money to write that laws to make that extra penny more than someone else has. People who write laws are all multi millionaires (good enough for them) while the billionaires make another billion dollars for creating 50 new millionaires; they make a profit off the business model. At a certain point, the business model is not about production… it’s about buying people for what the market will bear for keeping them wealthy enough for their comfort level. It’s cost/risk analysis. Give someone 9 million dollars that they’d never get otherwise to make a profit off laws that brings in an extra billion.

I think it’d be fucking hilarious if congress actually wrote a law that said, “we’re not going to settle for less than 50% of your profits from our bought laws”

So you have a shitty job and it’s everybody else’s problem?

Jesus Christ Kropotkin I’m 30 and I can make that salary. And I have no education and the CV of a bohemian.

Have you invested nothing in developing marketable skills during these 40-something years of working? In making yourself valuable to your bosses to get promotions? Have you simply been moving boxes from one corner to another for 40 years like a useless sack of shit? Not even time invested in a hobby to make your life nice instead of nightmarish?

I mean shit, you could at least have joined a union with your communist ass and made some money from graft.

How much have you saved up? Anything?

You disgust me.

23 is a living wage. I don’t know why he’s complaining either.

K: and missing the point… but that is what the right does best… miss the point…

I am trapped in a capitalistic system that is costing me my life…
and If I am trapped, then just as surely you are trapped…as
everyone on planet earth is trapped by either being within the system
or as victims of capitalism…one might say, but my country economic
system isn’t capitalism, so I am not affected…but you are affected…

capitalism has a world wide effect on the planet earth… as I pointed out
with global warming, pollution, population, income inequality,
in the destruction of entire species for the betterment of the
capitalists bottom line which is profits…

you are just as surely a victim of capitalism as I am… the difference being
I know capitalism is destroying my life… whereas you don’t have a clue…yet…

the dangers of capitalism cannot be overestimated… the very fate of the planet
can be decided by the fact that we keep going with capitalism, in which case,
in two generations, we will live in a hellhole that is beyond our understanding
right now or, or we overcome capitalism and rethink what it means to be
human… for right now, capitalism has turned people into thinking the meaning
of existence is the pursuit of money/profits, but that is about the last
point of existence… existence means something more then the pursuit of
money/wealth… but you wouldn’t know it because capitalism spends billions
of dollars in its propaganda war for the continuation of capitalism…that there
are other choices is even offered up by the capitalistic dictatorship that puts
its need for wealth and power above everything else, including our very lives…
and even before the well being of the planet…capitalist’s have no problem
destroying the planet if it meant greater profits for them…notice in
the mission statement of corporate America, the health and well being
of America or the health and well being of the planet is never mentioned…
that is because corporations don’t give a shit about America or the well
being of human beings or the earth… all corporations care about is the
pursuit of money/profits… nothing else…your life or your death is
irrelevant unless they, capitalists, can make money off of of you,
either in life or in death…

that is the point… not my shitty job, but what my shitty job means…

Kropotkin

K: and once again, missing the point…

Kropotkin

Get a job you looser.

I imagine,

Like many posters on ILP, he has me on ignore…

23 dollars an hour at a grocery store is a fucking fortune.

I’ve worked at grocery stores, for 5.50 an hour, and I’m 100% sure that I busted my ass more than Peter.

He should shut the fuck up about his life and talk about systemic problems instead.

For nihilists, nothing is good enough.

K: why yes, I do have you on ignore, but 23 bucks in the bay area is poverty level…
an one bedroom apartment goes for 2000 bucks, at a minium, and a two bedroom,
depending on where it is, can go for 5000 bucks a month… I couldn’t live on my own
in a studio apartment, that goes for 1300 a month, minium…
so yes, once again, circumstances dictate the reality of a situation…

two: I am talking about systematic problems… of which my shitty job is part of…
I am talking about systematic problems using my job as a baseline… so,
I don’t need to STFU… thank you… meanwhile, back on ignore for you…

Kropotkin

K: as mentioned, I have a job… your reading skills are pretty limited if you
can’t figure that out…

Kropotkin

K: and I am not a nihilist… I have made that very clear…but never let the truth/reality
interfere with your understanding of reality…

Kropotkin

Your opinion to deny something does not negate it as true. Biological men who deny they’re men does not make that true.
Of course, nihilists can deny that they are so, but it doesn’t change the fact of who they are and what they believe that is shown in what they write.

Just to get this in perspective :

ilovephilosophy.com/viewtopic.p … n#p2816540

K: and?

make some connection…

beside the fact that the housing market in this area is insane…
where a one bedroom shack could sell for over a million bucks
and where in my little city, the average, the AVERAGE house sale is
1.7 million dollars… that has nothing to do with me…

so make your point…

Kropotkin

Peter,

You lost your debate with life the moment you took it upon yourself to ignore someone.

Capitalism hasn’t been that bad for you.

You’re a millionaire.

You could sell your condo tomorrow, move to Costa Rica, buy a mansion and live like a king for the rest of your life.

Interesting. You write a post, pointing out the damage that capitalism undoubtedly does to the planet. At the same time, you express concern for every man woman and child on the planet… and what happens? You are attacked, again and again and again! Sad. :-k