Capitalism in the Morgue at Long Last

[Cellblock2429]

Any economic system whose cohesion depended upon the enslavement of twenty million Africans over the four centuries of the Atlantic trade was born with one foot in the grave.

Good riddance.

/——/ And you don’t think the workers in China are forced labor?

 

[Grumblenuts]

Nobody knows the future. What will scientific / technological change bring? Will there will be a major war with nuclear weapons? Will ecological disasters strike? Will there be political movements in the West capable of forcing new social-democratic reforms? If Western alliances were to self-destruct due to a failure of leadership, then the question would arise whether China or other world leadership might emerge. China is not looking for this sort of responsibility. Clearly there is no “working class” leadership possible along old-fashioned Marxist lines.

It’s a conundrum and I think there are no easy answers.

Um, much of that has already occurred and Marx, being human, wrote interesting, pertinent stuff for human beings to consider - at no point more so than the present. Can't help reflexively responding fearfully like one of Wolff's Ivy League professors when simply asked a question about Marx? Okay, best move along then.

My point was not to denigrate Marx as analyst of capitalism or deny his insights into its history and its contradictions. My problem isn’t that I have read too little Marx (and Lenin and Trotsky), but too much. I was speaking of the changes to be expected and the process of getting there.

I know (and I think you do too) that there is no present or future “working class leadership possible along old-fashioned Marxist lines” to lead society out of the crisis of capitalism. The “death agony of capitalism” will probably be with us for some time, and may well bring humanity down with it. It certainly won’t be replaced by a “dictatorship of the proletariat” in the advanced countries, as Marx predicted. That is all I’m saying. Given the consciousness and organization of American workers, I don’t see how that much can be argued with. The old slogan of “socialism or barbarism” was probably more or less correct, but the future remains murky in the extreme.

I don't know why Marxist philosophy gets credited so often with "predicting" things as though everything must boil down to us being in some crazy race to impose our socioeconomic theories upon everyone else or something. Wikipedia offers:

In Marxist philosophy, the dictatorship of the proletariat is a state of affairs in which the proletariat holds political power. ... The Paris Commune (1871), which controlled the capital city for two months, before being suppressed, was an example of the dictatorship of the proletariat.

Ew, a two month "dictatorship", .. Horrors!
But,.. pertaining to the OP video,.. one might be tempted to say something like In Marxist philosophy, the dictatorship of the proletariat is a state of affairs such as found in areas with lots of cooperative business and industry such as Mondragon or the UPs mentioned, where workers enjoy far greater autonomy and security than elsewhere. Much reduced estrangement, abandonment, loss of housing, etc...

Major point being, like it or not, we're social animals. Designed and mostly raised to cooperate extremely well with one another. The main reason we've survived as a species. Competition, on the other hand, has risks and benefits. Good for play. Little to no benefits where applied to producing things in general from the perspective of the doer. Lots of potential risk / loss.

 

[Tom Paine 1949]

Nobody knows the future. What will scientific / technological change bring? Will there will be a major war with nuclear weapons? Will ecological disasters strike? Will there be political movements in the West capable of forcing new social-democratic reforms? If Western alliances were to self-destruct due to a failure of leadership, then the question would arise whether China or other world leadership might emerge. China is not looking for this sort of responsibility. Clearly there is no “working class” leadership possible along old-fashioned Marxist lines.

It’s a conundrum and I think there are no easy answers.

Um, much of that has already occurred and Marx, being human, wrote interesting, pertinent stuff for human beings to consider - at no point more so than the present. Can't help reflexively responding fearfully like one of Wolff's Ivy League professors when simply asked a question about Marx? Okay, best move along then.

My point was not to denigrate Marx as analyst of capitalism or deny his insights into its history and its contradictions. My problem isn’t that I have read too little Marx (and Lenin and Trotsky), but too much. I was speaking of the changes to be expected and the process of getting there.

I know (and I think you do too) that there is no present or future “working class leadership possible along old-fashioned Marxist lines” to lead society out of the crisis of capitalism. The “death agony of capitalism” will probably be with us for some time, and may well bring humanity down with it. It certainly won’t be replaced by a “dictatorship of the proletariat” in the advanced countries, as Marx predicted. That is all I’m saying. Given the consciousness and organization of American workers, I don’t see how that much can be argued with. The old slogan of “socialism or barbarism” was probably more or less correct, but the future remains murky in the extreme.

I don't know why Marxist philosophy gets credited so often with "predicting" things as though everything must boil down to us being in some crazy race to impose our socioeconomic theories upon everyone else or something. Wikipedia offers:

In Marxist philosophy, the dictatorship of the proletariat is a state of affairs in which the proletariat holds political power. ... The Paris Commune (1871), which controlled the capital city for two months, before being suppressed, was an example of the dictatorship of the proletariat.

Ew, a two month "dictatorship", .. Horrors!
But,.. pertaining to the OP video,.. one might be tempted to say something like In Marxist philosophy, the dictatorship of the proletariat is a state of affairs such as found in areas with lots of cooperative business and industry such as Mondragon or the UPs mentioned, where workers enjoy far greater autonomy and security than elsewhere. Much reduced estrangement, abandonment, loss of housing, etc...

Major point being, like it or not, we're social animals. Designed and mostly raised to cooperate extremely well with one another. The main reason we've survived as a species. Competition, on the other hand, has risks and benefits. Good for play. Little to no benefits where applied to producing things in general from the perspective of the doer. Lots of potential risk / loss.

I went back and listened to the talks more extensively. The Marxism these professors discuss for the most part does indeed leave out the key part of Marxism that Marx himself (let alone Lenin & Trotsky) emphasized. They are academic Marxists that talk of “Marxist philosophy,” of commodity fetishism, in the broadest of terms. The cooperative Mondragon-style organization of cooperative production under capitalism was not what Marx polemicized for, but rather against — at least he thought it mostly “utopian.”

Marx’s own utopianism was perhaps not so obvious in his day, since he thought an organizable industrial working class would become more or less a majority of society, or at least would have the social weight that it could develop the social consciousness and leadership to rule society. The struggle to build a genuine workers political party was seen as crucial. As Marx put it:

“My own contribution was (1) to show that the existence of classes is merely bound up with certain historical phases in the development of production; (2) that the class struggle necessarily leads to the dictatorship of the proletariat; [and] (3) that this dictatorship, itself, constitutes no more than a transition to the abolition of all classes and to a classless society.”

I don’t think Marx ever thought of either the dictatorship of the proletariat or “socialism” (the “first stage of communism” for Marx) as lasting for just a few months. It is true he didn’t describe these stages in any detail. I believe we need to accept that it is now clear that capitalism has developed in a way which undercuts all possibility of the working-class itself becoming a ruling class.

 

[Toddsterpatriot]

Major point being, like it or not, we're social animals. Designed and mostly raised to cooperate extremely well with one another. The main reason we've survived as a species. Competition, on the other hand, has risks and benefits. Good for play. Little to no benefits where applied to producing things in general from the perspective of the doer.

The old Warsaw block cooperated extremely well with each other.

Hungarian Revolution of 1956 - Wikipedia

Prague Spring - Wikipedia

Not like the competitive NATO countries.

Little to no benefits where applied to producing things in general from the perspective of the doer.

Exactly!
No benefit to this.......

Over this.....

 

[Grumblenuts]

I believe we need to accept that it is now clear that capitalism has developed in a way which undercuts all possibility of the working-class becoming a ruling class.

You say that as though workers everywhere had gathered together at some point and agreed they should become "the" rulers. Nonsense. It's just this kind of seemingly pointless simplification / reductionism that had me gagging the whole way through my college Philosophy and Political Science classes. Marx and Engels wrote particularly thoughtful and pertinent stuff. They were far from alone however. Many came before. Many after. This is certainly not about them particularly, nor anyone's vision of a socialist utopia, nor whatever. A workplace is one thing. Governing society is another.

I've stated my belief that capitalism is dead. By that I meant people everywhere can finally, easily see now (thanks to the internet more than anything) that it's been a sham of a solution to the initial problem all along. Today's billionaires make yesterday's feudal lords look like Santa Claus. The clothes of clowns like Trump have grown increasingly transparent. People won't be playing along any more. Not the way we did. Not so naïve, ignorant, willing to placate the endlessly stupid. Our astronauts went on strike one day recently and Houston backed right the **** down. I doubt it was televised, but the more sophisticated we get, the more essential our cooperation becomes. Those astronauts didn't want to replace their bosses in Houston. They had no ambition to "rule." They just wanted to be treated with dignity like they were equally human, considered a necessary part of the mission, deserving too.

 

[MisterBeale]

You can call fascism "Marxism" all you like, but the billionaires, their foundations, and organizations are still going to stay in control.

Keep fantasizing.

Marx is obsolete and irrelevant. He didn't even know about computers and robots. Wake the **** up and stop dreaming!

Try these;

http://www.takeoverworld.info/Zbigniew_Brzezinski__Between_Two_Ages.pdf

I watched your video, now watch mine.

 

[georgephillip]

/——/ And you don’t think the workers in China are forced labor?

China's state capitalism also uses forced labor today not unlike US prisons, but you would be hard pressed to find any Chinese atrocities in Africa that rival white Europeans and North Americans centuries ago:

"The marches to the coast, sometimes for 1,000 miles, with people shackled around the neck, under whip and gun, were death marches, in which two of every five blacks died..."

"Then they were packed aboard the slave ships, in spaces not much bigger than coffins, chained together in the dark, wet slime of the ship's bottom, choking in the stench of their own excrement.

"Documents of the time describe the conditions:

https://www.stetson.edu/other/alana-ia-caucus/media/12 Howard Zinn, Drawing the Color Line.pdf (P. 4)

 

[BasicHumanUnit]

And yet another thread exposing the cruel and dismal fate of everyone because.....

"All that is required for evil men to prevail is for good men to do nothing"

 

[Grumblenuts]

cc

Any economic system whose cohesion depended upon the enslavement of twenty million Africans over the four centuries of the Atlantic trade was born with one foot in the grave.

Good riddance.

/——/ And you don’t think the workers in China are forced labor?

Ah, zee old both zides do it / two wrongs make it okay chestnut..
zzz..

 

[Captain Caveman]

Under capitalism, you reap what you sow. Some do well, some don't so some were joyful and some wallowed in misery.

Under socialism, you will now all wallow in and share the misery.

So you've been living in a cave under some rock in England imagining yourself somehow above it all?

No, I'm explaining capitalism and socialism. Capitalism gives winners and losers, because unfortunately, humans are not equal.

Socialism believes everyone can be winners, so they take off the winners to give to the losers.

And a large proportion of National debt is the cost of paying Socialist policies off. Once you use the public purse to pay for someone's meal and not to stimulate the economy, you get debt. A stimulus Cheque will go straight onto national debt because most of it will go on household bills and food. And Lefty fools are celebrating and gloating that that's Socialism and Trump is implementing it.

Economics is definitely not a Lefties Forte, once they grasp economics, they become Right Wing.

 

[Grumblenuts]

And a large proportion of National debt is the cost of paying Socialist policies off.

You mean like buying more bombs to replace the ones currently being dropped by the socialist military?
Or were you banging on about the socialist Post Office?

A stimulus Cheque will go straight onto national debt because most of it will go on household bills and food.

Bravo! Clearly, you can make this shit up!

 

[Captain Caveman]

And a large proportion of National debt is the cost of paying Socialist policies off.

You mean like buying more bombs to replace the ones currently being dropped by the socialist military?
Or were you banging on about the socialist Post Office?

A stimulus Cheque will go straight onto national debt because most of it will go on household bills and food.

Bravo! Clearly, you can make this shit up!

Here's a link for you to read on Socialism.

WKD: These 3 Countries Tried Socialism. Here's What Happened

Socialists are fond of saying that socialism has never failed because it has never been tried. But in truth, socialism has failed in every country in which it has been tried, from the Soviet Union beginning a century ago to three modern countries that tried but ultimately rejected...

nationalinterest.org

So not only economics is not your Forte, history too!!

 

[Grumblenuts]

And a large proportion of National debt is the cost of paying Socialist policies off.

You mean like buying more bombs to replace the ones currently being dropped by the socialist military?
Or were you banging on about the socialist Post Office?

A stimulus Cheque will go straight onto national debt because most of it will go on household bills and food.

Bravo! Clearly, you can make this shit up!

Here's a link for you to read on Socialism.

WKD: These 3 Countries Tried Socialism. Here's What Happened

Socialists are fond of saying that socialism has never failed because it has never been tried. But in truth, socialism has failed in every country in which it has been tried, from the Soviet Union beginning a century ago to three modern countries that tried but ultimately rejected...

nationalinterest.org

So not only economics is not your Forte, history too!!

So, in other words, you have no real answer. Nothing to offer. Well, Happy New Year's Eve and thanks for playing!

 

[Captain Caveman]

And a large proportion of National debt is the cost of paying Socialist policies off.

You mean like buying more bombs to replace the ones currently being dropped by the socialist military?
Or were you banging on about the socialist Post Office?

A stimulus Cheque will go straight onto national debt because most of it will go on household bills and food.

Bravo! Clearly, you can make this shit up!

Here's a link for you to read on Socialism.

WKD: These 3 Countries Tried Socialism. Here's What Happened

Socialists are fond of saying that socialism has never failed because it has never been tried. But in truth, socialism has failed in every country in which it has been tried, from the Soviet Union beginning a century ago to three modern countries that tried but ultimately rejected...

nationalinterest.org

So not only economics is not your Forte, history too!!

So, in other words, you have no real answer. Nothing to offer. Well, Happy New Year's Eve and thanks for playing!

**** me, you've started on the lash already.

 

[Captain Caveman]

Imagine we live in a Socialist country, where"s the motivation to succeed in business if the end product is taken off you or partially taken off you. Would you be happy to go into a pub and ask for a pint of beer, pay for a pint of beer and walk out with three quarters of a pint. I imagine your happiness will wear thin soon, assuming you were ******* gullible enough to think it was a good idea in the first place.

In the UK; TV (BBC), coal, gas, electric, telecommunications, railways, steel, healthcare and postal services were nationalised, the tax payer footing the bill when they made losses. Low and behold, all failing so coal, gas, electric, telecoms, rail, steel and postal services privatised. And if you want to share in their business profits, you go to a broker and buy shares in them.
Year on year, more and more people want the TV licence scrapped, get it off the public and turn it into a business.

Healthcare is funded across the planet in all countries in the same way, it's just the ratio on how it's funded between countries that's different. In the UK, some 74%-76% is footed by the tax payer. NHS worked well in the 1940's when implemented but times have changed. The cost needs evened out to reduce the tax payers cost and reduce the tax burden.

If Socialism is so fantastic, how can a nationalised business that's a monopoly make a loss? Because it's staff were on strike every year, staff were unproductive and where's the incentive to do well. It meant no profit was generated so it had little money to invest in infrastructure.

And the funny thing is, we have idiots celebrating Socialism over Capitalism. And why do they celebrate Socialism? Because 'on paper' Socialism is the best system to have, but in the real world, it doesn't work. Open your ******* eyes and look what's going on in reality.

 

[Grumblenuts]

Imagine we live in a Socialist country, where"s the motivation to succeed in business if the end product is taken off you or partially taken off you. Would you be happy to go into a pub and ask for a pint of beer, pay for a pint of beer and walk out with three quarters of a pint. I imagine your happiness will wear thin soon, assuming you were ******* gullible enough to think it was a good idea in the first place.

In the UK; TV (BBC), coal, gas, electric, telecommunications, railways, steel, healthcare and postal services were nationalised, the tax payer footing the bill when they made losses. Low and behold, all failing so coal, gas, electric, telecoms, rail, steel and postal services privatised. And if you want to share in their business profits, you go to a broker and buy shares in them.
Year on year, more and more people want the TV licence scrapped, get it off the public and turn it into a business.

Healthcare is funded across the planet in all countries in the same way, it's just the ratio on how it's funded between countries that's different. In the UK, some 74%-76% is footed by the tax payer. NHS worked well in the 1940's when implemented but times have changed. The cost needs evened out to reduce the tax payers cost and reduce the tax burden.

If Socialism is so fantastic, how can a nationalised business that's a monopoly make a loss? Because it's staff were on strike every year, staff were unproductive and where's the incentive to do well. It meant no profit was generated so it had little money to invest in infrastructure.

And the funny thing is, we have idiots celebrating Socialism over Capitalism. And why do they celebrate Socialism? Because 'on paper' Socialism is the best system to have, but in the real world, it doesn't work. Open your ******* eyes and look what's going on in reality.

So you continue to view this as some simplistic Capitalism vs. Socialism battle - 'cause, ya know, it's just gotta be one or the other, right? - never mind the one being about accumulation of material while the other evidently deals, oddly enough, with the people's needs - apples vs. oranges - And never mind that this is exactly all every ******* died hard, billionaires' ass-kissing, capitalist apologist ever offers - Distraction! Opinions! By the veritable boatload! But never with verification! We tried that! It can't work! We're broke! Because all you're really expressing is fear itself.

So, first of all, let me assert my firm belief that the only thing we have to fear is...fear itself — nameless, unreasoning, unjustified terror which paralyzes needed efforts to convert retreat into advance.

 

[Toddsterpatriot]

while the other evidently deals, oddly enough, with the people's needs

Poorly, oddly enough.