"Capitalism = Fairest System So Far; We Just Want Something Better Now."

[Dumb]

I was having a discussion some time ago with a friend responsible for taking me into the Marxist fold; this discussion culminated in the statement that "capitalism is the fairest system we've ever had; as a Marxist, I'm just bothered by the idea that we can't come up with something better."

As a Marxist, reading that statement, my first reaction is to coil back in disbelief. Then I reach stage 2 - "Well, you know, capitalism has increased productivity, made it easier for average people to not starve, etc. & so forth," and then I reach stage 3 - "Or am I glossing over the injustices of today and downplaying the advantages of past times?"

Anyway..."Capitalism = fairest system so far" - discuss if you're so inclined.

[ZeroNowhere]

Marxism isn't concerned about fairness, and certainly not moralizing about the past. Capitalism's certainly the closest we've got to the existence of a human morality, I suppose, although on the other hand this is only because it contains its inevitable self-negation. I don't think that there's anything particularly shocking about their statements, although from the first they do sound more like an ethical socialist than a Marxist.

[SacRedMan]

Capitalism = fairest system so far

Yeeaaah right!

[Desperado]

This was certainly Marx's view, so "as a Marxist"...

However, he was quite tied to the enlightenment and Victorian ideas of continual progress and lived long before resource scarcity and mass ecological catastrophe was sensibly plausible. And of course, it depends on the capitalism. Being a wage slave can pretty much mean a literal slave, being a poor agricultural labourer not that different from being a de facto serf. It depends on how you judge it. Certainly, we are more productive as you say - but this also means we are more exploited.

I definitely believe that we shouldn't resign ourselves to capitalism after feudalism or whatever - it is possible to reach socialism without capitalism (as Marx himself believed, and said could happen in Russia through the quasi-democratic peasant communes (which ironically were destroyed by the "Marxist" government completely)).

[Comrade_Oscar]

It was the fairest thing we had so far when it first started and didn't have corporate monopolies. Capitalism doesn't have the notion that some people are just naturally better , like the old system of kings and queens. However now capitalism is perhaps the LEAST fair system as monopolies have been established and wealth is so concentrated. That is why socialism must move to replace it and then ultimately communism to replace socialism.

[Ilyich]

It is a horrible, oppressive system. But it is probably better than the slave societies and feudalism. What about primitive communism?

[danyboy27]

Its a fair system for some, and its unfair for others, just like 99% of the opressive systems devised by human being.

Some german might have also said that fascism was a fair system, and the slaveholder, and the nobles.

it dosnt constitute really an argument, or at least, not an argument for any kind of moralistic fairness.

[Rusty Shackleford]

probably the "fairest" organization of society besides the various socialist states of recent history is primitive communism.


hardly any wealth disparity because everyone had jack shit and every day was a life or death struggle and the individual relied on the collective and vice versa. to put it bluntly.

[La Comédie Noire]

Class systems are inherently unfair because it involves one group of people living off the labor of others. It rigs the game in favor of the few. Capitalists try to mask this with plurality and individuality, turning unequal opportunity into freedom of choice.

My neighbors and I are equal in that we have clean drinking water, but we don't feel oppressed now do we? Now that's some "sameness" I can get behind.

Me and some black guy are different in that he went to a crappy public school while I went to a decent public school, but that isn't a difference he'd want to celebrate over now is it?

Capitalists have also back tracked in their rhetoric. "All men are created equal" well then why are some people degraded to low wage jobs, while others make money off the work of others?

"Oh, well some people are naturally endowed with talents and capabilities, which the market (totally neutral agent) sorts into the proper niches."

Capitalism seems to revel in the unfairness, while at the same time pushing systemic problems onto other individuals. "The Market is not unfair, you're poor because there is something wrong with you as a person." Thus externalizing the market as some force above nature, blindly choosing peoples' fates like the Greek Kosmos.

In fact you can take the ancient greek quote

"War makes some men free and some men slaves"

and change it to

"The market makes some men rich and some men poor."

The slave owning aristocrats saw their society as eminently fair. Anyone who is rewarded by a system sees it as fair, otherwise it would invalidate their success.

So no, Capitalism is note a "fairer" system, it is just a different form of exploitation.

[Octavian]

He only feels that way because he lives in a first world country. The difference is that over the years we have exported the oppression to countries in Asia and Africa. We traded our kings and nobles for CEO's and stock holders. Now we get to live in luxury while third world people piss around in the mud.

[Queercommie Girl]

Marxism isn't concerned about fairness, and certainly not moralizing about the past. Capitalism's certainly the closest we've got to the existence of a human morality, I suppose, although on the other hand this is only because it contains its inevitable self-negation. I don't think that there's anything particularly shocking about their statements, although from the first they do sound more like an ethical socialist than a Marxist.

"Ethical socialism" and Marxism aren't mutually exclusive, as long as morality is not considered to be more primary than socio-economic analysis.

Moral nihilism is just as stupid as abstract moralism. One needs to recognise that as long as there exists a human society, there will always be some kind of ethical structure to go alongside it. Ethics is the product of the particular socio-economic conditions in a society, and every society's ethics is different from other societies that have different socio-economic structures. Ethics is not something with a metaphysical source.

Generally speaking, capitalism is both fairer and more productive than both slavery and feudalism. Primitive tribalism was of course much more fairer still, but that was a terribly unproductive socio-economic relation.

Also, there is a difference between "not moralising about the past from a present-day perspective" and "acknowledging the moralising people of the past have done in their own time". It does not take modern people to morally criticise the destructiveness of the Mongol conquests for instance, since many people who lived in that era already criticised it.

[Tablo]

I would agree with Marx that capitalism is the fairest major post-civilization economic system to come into existence, but I would also agree with Marx that Socialism is the next logical step. I really do think there is a sort of gradual progression that humanity goes through. It is hard for me to imagine a system better than socialism. Beyond that I guess we would have varying competing socialist systems(like collectivist wage systems against gift economies I guess..).

Random thought.
Maybe eventually production will become so automated we have some kind of ultra-individualist economic system where no one has to rely on one another, but rather would only interact out of their own interest/enjoyment/curiosity? Not looking forward to anything like that. I feel humans are meant to interact and work together, but artificial evolution and further automation of production could change that... not saying it is bad, just saying there are some things I don't particularly want to live to see.

[reformnow88]

Capitalism is considered fair by those who live in the wealthy capitalist countries and have wealth themselves. But, there are so many other people in these countries and throughout the world that are completely exploited and downtrodden. Working horrible jobs for slave wages or being stuck in low income housing living off minimum wage while others have mansions and millions could never be justified as fair.

[Rafiq]

Capitalism is the greatest economic system humanity has ever adjusted itself to.

But it's destruction is inevitable.

[CHE with an AK]

"The laws of capitalism, blind and invisible to the majority, act upon the individual without his thinking about it. He sees only the vastness of a seemingly infinite horizon before him. That is how it is painted by capitalist propagandists, who purport to draw a lesson from the example of Rockefeller—whether or not it is true—about the possibilities of success. The amount of poverty and suffering required for the emergence of a Rockefeller, and the amount of depravity that the accumulation of a fortune of such magnitude entails, are left out of the picture, and it is not always possible to make the people in general see this."

--- Che Guevara

[ColonelCossack]

what about primitive communism...?

disclaimer:I am not necessarily an advocate of primitive communism.