In Defense of Capitalism

[Georwell]

So I am currently having this debate, and one of my opponents is using an article from a "Capitalism Magazine".

“There are two important facts regarding the industrial working class of this era. One is that it was poor. The other is that its living standard was gradually rising. The first is capitalism’s inheritance from feudalism. The second is its own achievement. Capitalism’s critics are guilty of a logical fallacy: they drop historical context. No event or phenomenon can be understood outside of the causal factors that give rise to it. The impoverished condition of the working class of this era is the direct result of the feudal system. To ignore this is to sweep aside the facts of its genesis. To then accuse capitalism of causing the poverty – while in the very act of eradicating it – is to commit both a historical error and a profound injustice. The close correlations in the world today between freedom and prosperity — and between statism and destitution — were discussed above.”

Knowing that the community is—for the most part—extremely intelligent, could you guys help me break this down? So far, I jotted down a couple of notes.

Examining Capitalism only in the sphere of America isn’t enough. To simply state that “Because America is successful, Capitalism is also successful” is a woefully inadequate explanation that it both ignorant of the global proletariat and their struggles against exploitation. Feudalism was ended by the Bourgeois, those who attained power in Capitalism. Feudalism was ended through various wars for land, such as the Hundred Years War, War of Roses, Crusades, ect. Land consolidation was legislation passed by aristocrats upon a golden throne of parliamentary injustice. Feudalism’s decay was marked by a growing disparity in the production of capital amongst the merchants of the era and the stationary Lords of the feifs.

[Revolution starts with U]

Where was the feudalism in America? Was it the feudal or capitalist interests behind the state that pushed for the enclosure movement?

[#FF0000]

I guess you could almost sorta kinda say the south had some bizarro feudal bullshit going on for awhile, maybe? I feel like that's a little bit of a stretch though. Regardless it doesn't really change the fact that capitalism did create this poverty by forcing people out of the country-side where a lot of folks had a somewhat self-sufficient lifestyle and into the cities where they were forced to work harder for less.

And to say capitalism was ever in the process of eradicating poverty is laughable. Technology and the people who fought for a better life and threatened to demolish the whole thing are responsible for an improved quality of life -- not capitalism itself.

[Ocean Seal]

I guess you could almost sorta kinda say the south had some bizarro feudal bullshit going on for awhile, maybe? I feel like that's a little bit of a stretch though. Regardless it doesn't really change the fact that capitalism did create this poverty by forcing people out of the country-side where a lot of folks had a somewhat self-sufficient lifestyle and into the cities where they were forced to work harder for less.

And to say capitalism was ever in the process of eradicating poverty is laughable. Technology and the people who fought for a better life and threatened to demolish the whole thing are responsible for an improved quality of life -- not capitalism itself.
I would say that the South did have feudalism or something like that until they eradicated slavery. And capitalism did improve living standards all around the world from its inception to quite a few years in, even though it depressed the living standards of the petty bourgeoisie of the countryside.

[Conscript]

I wonder what he thinks about the relationship between feudalism and capitalism in countries like Russia and China.

I don't understand the connection at all really. The idea that scarcity and poverty are a feudal leftover and that there are 'leftovers' of modes of production in new ones doesn't make any sense to me. Poverty exists because both exploitation, which allows the accumulation of capital and thus the enriching of some and the depriving of others, and a need for a rate of profit, which suffers from abundance and thrives on large amounts of unmet demand, exists..

[TheGodlessUtopian]

I am quite sure slavery and Feudalism are two different constructs; similar in some regards but ultimately different.

[Caj]

And feudal society had higher living standards for most people than slave societies. So?

[Anarcho-Brocialist]

The notion of that Capitalism raised living standers on its own is comical. All rights for those who labor, in regards to compensation and health standards for where they inhabited, was fought by those who labor against the Capitalists. Early example is the Luddites.

What Capitalism did during its rise to new socioeconomic order was split society into two new classes. You have the owners of machines, and those enslaved by them.

Thus, the industrial revolution sprang about, with most of the nation living in the boondocks, companies spread propaganda on how you could get rich by coming to the cities and working in the factories. What they found there was back breaking labor for little pay.

Capitalism in itself creates poverty. The way it can only sustain itself is by surplus-value. For it to work someone has to be exploited so that someone can generate new capital. The origins of how commodities are manufactured is not around its natural means (for labor to provide the needs of oneself), but to work around capital. If it doesn't work around capital the system would come crumbling down on itself.

[#FF0000]

And capitalism did improve living standards all around the world from its inception to quite a few years in, even though it depressed the living standards of the petty bourgeoisie of the countryside.

How are we going to measure that quality of living though? I mean the sheer amount of stuff produced even in the early days of capitalism was positively immense, and farming certainly isn't an easy job with comfortable hours, but you had an immense number of people packed together, working dangerous jobs for, what, 12 hours minimum?

But I'm just sort of throwing this out there. Not looking at numbers just yet.

[Dean]

Capitalism relies on the accumulation of land (primitive accumulation) which deprives the working class of the means for self-subsistence. The fact of rising living standards is not a consequence of capitalism any more than it is a consequence of the state apparatus - most innovation and living standard expansions came as a consequence of the latter institution. The state has always had to underwrite innovation and living standards have only been improved at the opposition of the capitalists.

Freedom and prosperity are correlated for the very obvious reasons that Marx described:



"Mankind thus inevitably sets itself only such tasks as it is able to solve, since closer examination will always show that the problem itself arises only when the material conditions for its solution are already present or at least in the course of formation."1"The realm of freedom really begins only where labour determined by necessity and external expediency ends; it lies by its very nature beyond the sphere of material production proper. ...Freedom, in this sphere, can consist only in this, that socialized man, the associated producers, govern the human metabolism with nature in a rational way, bringing it under their collective control instead of being dominated by it as a blind power..." More (http://thethinred.blogspot.com/2011/05/individualism-utopian-socialism.html#more)

However, the correlation between statism and destitution is not accurate. The US, for instance, has a very closed market system, while nations which are liberalizing their markets (think India) are experiencing atrocious conditions. As I mentioned before, state interference in the market is often at the behest of industrialists not wanting to foot the bill for innovation. But just because they don't complain about the "unfree market" caused by asking NASA and the military to take on all the risk of innovation, doesn't make the US market freer.

Nations like Germany and Sweden, with stable economies and high standards of living respectively, are incredibly rife with regulation as well.


Capitalism demands a destitute population to provide the cheapest labor; this is why economies like China and India have so much production capital and yet some of the worst working conditions in the world. It is a fact, acknowledged by policymakers at the time, that the S. African mining barons demanded a cheap work force but the native S. Africans were "lazy" - they could farm their fields, and enjoy the fruits of their labor without going into dangerous mines for a pittance. And so land reform was legislated with the specific goal of land acquisition from the Black population. The result was a "healthy" labor pool, prepared to work the mines for a pittance, as they now had no other means of subsistence.

The fact is that Feudalism and Capitalism both demand land deprivation for the working class, which makes them beholden to those who own said land. Outside of polemical arguments, this is hardly controversial.

[Valdyr]

There are two important facts regarding the industrial working class of this era. One is that it was poor. The other is that its living standard was gradually rising. The first is capitalism’s inheritance from feudalism. The second is its own achievement. Capitalism’s critics are guilty of a logical fallacy: they drop historical context. No event or phenomenon can be understood outside of the causal factors that give rise to it. The impoverished condition of the working class of this era is the direct result of the feudal system. To ignore this is to sweep aside the facts of its genesis. To then accuse capitalism of causing the poverty – while in the very act of eradicating it – is to commit both a historical error and a profound injustice. The close correlations in the world today between freedom and prosperity — and between statism and destitution — were discussed above.

They commit the same error they accuse "critics of capitalism" as engaging in, namely ripping things out of their historical context. Obviously, at least to a Marxist, capitalism was progressive relative to feudalism. In The Communist Manifesto, among other places, Marx and Engels praise capitalism relative to feudalism.

Capitalism creates relative poverty. Obviously a proletarian under capitalism will often live in more material comfort than, say, an ancient Roman slave. However, how exactly is this a condemnation of socialism? As Marxists, our assertion is not an ahistorical claim that capitalism is "morally" bad across all times and places. Rather, it creates poverty in the sense that the vast majority of people are exploited to create a surplus on the back of which a few can ride, while the material productive capacities could be used for the benefit of all, and millions of people suffer for this. The claim that capitalism eliminates poverty is silly.

Now, I haven't seen their claims of the correlations between "freedom and prosperity" and "statism and destitution" (whatever the hell statism is supposed to be) substantiated, because I haven't seen the whole article. They say they discuss it earlier. However, there are a few problems with this analysis. For starters, "prosperity" and "destitution" are indeed morally loaded terms, but how are they being used here? What are we measuring as "prosperity?"

Second, suppose I accept their claim that "statism" correlates with "destitution." Perhaps this is because the destitution of those places leads to what these bourgeois apologists call "statism" as being more desirable or even inevitable, and not the other way around. By statism, for example, I think they might mean something like the Soviet system. Now, in the preceding sentences, these guys criticize critics of capitalism for being ahistorical. Russia, at the time of the bolshevik revolution, was much poorer than, say, the United States. It was semi feudal. At a time when the Ford Model T was finally making a car accessible to many more Americans than could've had a car before, most people in Russia were literally peasants. The socialist revolutions in countries like this made enormous advances relative to what they started with, far more rapidly and equitably than could've been achieved under capitalism. Then, in a supremely ahistorical turn, these capitalist apologists criticize these countries for not being as "prosperous" (presumably referring here to the availability and quality of consumer goods, among other things) as first-world capitalist nations that were/are imperialist powers! Talk about "ahistorical" and "missing context."

Despite not being a Trotskyist, I can seriously recommend "If America Should Go Communist" by Trotsky here. Whatever shortcomings of the "statist" socialist societies that there were, the answer should be "yeah, and imagine what would happen if that system were applied to a first-world nation's productive forces!"

Also, they use the word "fallacy" wrong. A logical fallacy is an invalid inference in a formal syllogism. It's not a "fallacy" to be ahistorical, it's an arguable methodological error, though one I'd happen to agree is an error.

[Lev Bronsteinovich]

You are so right, Valdyr. The objections Marxists have to capitalism is that by WWI, it was a fetter on the development of productive forces. The rise of capitalism was responsible for an incredible increase in the wealth of the world, but it had run its course.

[Dean]

Second, suppose I accept their claim that "statism" correlates with "destitution." Perhaps this is because the destitution of those places leads to what these bourgeois apologists call "statism" as being more desirable or even inevitable, and not the other way around. By statism, for example, I think they might mean something like the Soviet system.

Propertarians usually use the term "statism" to refer to the state taking on responsibilies one might expect the markets to be able to take on, or the use of force.

However, the most destitute regions in teh world are also the most loosely regulated. Less regulation is synonymous with a freer market. Markets like the US, Japan, and most European nations are not only much more prosperous than many 3rd world nations, they are also more highly regulated, and the state function is almost universally a larger share of GDP in these nations.

These are not controversial facts. The ideological underpinnings - regulation and statism as synonymous - is basically from the horses' mouth, and the state spending figures are available online (http://www.usgovernmentspending.com/us_20th_century_chart.html). The US emerged from the 2nd world war as the preeminent power - at which time state spending was about 50% of GDP.

[the zizekian]

“There are two important facts regarding the industrial working class of this era. One is that it was poor. The other is that its living standard was gradually rising. The first is capitalism’s inheritance from feudalism. The second is its own achievement. Capitalism’s critics are guilty of a logical fallacy: they drop historical context. No event or phenomenon can be understood outside of the causal factors that give rise to it. The impoverished condition of the working class of this era is the direct result of the feudal system. To ignore this is to sweep aside the facts of its genesis. To then accuse capitalism of causing the poverty – while in the very act of eradicating it – is to commit both a historical error and a profound injustice. The close correlations in the world today between freedom and prosperity — and between statism and destitution — were discussed above.”

We have to look at China to see that capitalism today survives only by keeping alive feudalism, i.e., Confucianism.

[the zizekian]

So I am currently having this debate, and one of my opponents is using an article from a "Capitalism Magazine".

“There are two important facts regarding the industrial working class of this era. One is that it was poor. The other is that its living standard was gradually rising. The first is capitalism’s inheritance from feudalism. The second is its own achievement. Capitalism’s critics are guilty of a logical fallacy: they drop historical context. No event or phenomenon can be understood outside of the causal factors that give rise to it. The impoverished condition of the working class of this era is the direct result of the feudal system. To ignore this is to sweep aside the facts of its genesis. To then accuse capitalism of causing the poverty – while in the very act of eradicating it – is to commit both a historical error and a profound injustice. The close correlations in the world today between freedom and prosperity — and between statism and destitution — were discussed above.”

Knowing that the community is—for the most part—extremely intelligent, could you guys help me break this down? So far, I jotted down a couple of notes.

Examining Capitalism only in the sphere of America isn’t enough. To simply state that “Because America is successful, Capitalism is also successful” is a woefully inadequate explanation that it both ignorant of the global proletariat and their struggles against exploitation. Feudalism was ended by the Bourgeois, those who attained power in Capitalism. Feudalism was ended through various wars for land, such as the Hundred Years War, War of Roses, Crusades, ect. Land consolidation was legislation passed by aristocrats upon a golden throne of parliamentary injustice. Feudalism’s decay was marked by a growing disparity in the production of capital amongst the merchants of the era and the stationary Lords of the feifs.

From feudalism to capitalism the very social status of the poor was inverted: in Middle-Age, the first Christian virtue was to be poor and with Protestantism, being poor became the sure sign of God’s damnation. The sole purpose of this inversion was labor/human exploitation.

[Fawkes]

In addition to what everyone else has said, you could probably just drop a bomb on this person by simply asking them to explain exactly how poverty in contemporary society is the result of feudalism. That statement is absolutely absurd and whatever justification they try to give for it will be nothing short of a torrential outpouring of ass gravy.

[the zizekian]

So I am currently having this debate, and one of my opponents is using an article from a "Capitalism Magazine".

“There are two important facts regarding the industrial working class of this era. One is that it was poor. The other is that its living standard was gradually rising. The first is capitalism’s inheritance from feudalism. The second is its own achievement. Capitalism’s critics are guilty of a logical fallacy: they drop historical context. No event or phenomenon can be understood outside of the causal factors that give rise to it. The impoverished condition of the working class of this era is the direct result of the feudal system. To ignore this is to sweep aside the facts of its genesis. To then accuse capitalism of causing the poverty – while in the very act of eradicating it – is to commit both a historical error and a profound injustice. The close correlations in the world today between freedom and prosperity — and between statism and destitution — were discussed above.”

Knowing that the community is—for the most part—extremely intelligent, could you guys help me break this down? So far, I jotted down a couple of notes.

Examining Capitalism only in the sphere of America isn’t enough. To simply state that “Because America is successful, Capitalism is also successful” is a woefully inadequate explanation that it both ignorant of the global proletariat and their struggles against exploitation. Feudalism was ended by the Bourgeois, those who attained power in Capitalism. Feudalism was ended through various wars for land, such as the Hundred Years War, War of Roses, Crusades, ect. Land consolidation was legislation passed by aristocrats upon a golden throne of parliamentary injustice. Feudalism’s decay was marked by a growing disparity in the production of capital amongst the merchants of the era and the stationary Lords of the feifs.

Accusing the Left to ignore the historical context is part of the Right-wing totalitarian ideology (called libertarianism): for the Right, all problems related to capitalism come from the fact that capitalism is never pure enough! To combat this totalitarianism, the Left has to insist on capitalism’s capacity to retroactively distort and exploit the past.

[Regicollis]

The argument that capitalism eradicates poverty is quite absurd. The world is larger than the Western countries. Places like Congo are integrated and necessary parts of the capitalist system whether the capitalist apologetics like it or not.

There are numerous examples of how "free" trade has crushed local economies, how speculation has driven food prices up, leading to malnutrition etc.

But even if capitalism did eradicate poverty (as it has somewhat done in the rich countries) it would still be an unjust system. Firstly capitalism is robbery at broad daylight. Workers are being denied the full product of their labour in order to make capitalists rich - also in these countries where the workers can afford flat-screen TV's. It goes against any principle of fairness that anyone should be allowed a life in luxury at the expense of others.

Secondly capitalism is a totalitarian system. Under capitalism the trend goes towards all human relations being reduced to a question of profit. All other valuable things in life like culture, community, family etc. becomes subordinated to the capitalist imperative. Capitalism deprives mankind of all non-economic riches.

Thirdly capitalism is a non-sustainable system that can not last indefinitely. The pursuit of unlimited growth on a limited planet is impossible in the long run.

[the zizekian]

So I am currently having this debate, and one of my opponents is using an article from a "Capitalism Magazine".

“There are two important facts regarding the industrial working class of this era. One is that it was poor. The other is that its living standard was gradually rising. The first is capitalism’s inheritance from feudalism. The second is its own achievement. Capitalism’s critics are guilty of a logical fallacy: they drop historical context. No event or phenomenon can be understood outside of the causal factors that give rise to it. The impoverished condition of the working class of this era is the direct result of the feudal system. To ignore this is to sweep aside the facts of its genesis. To then accuse capitalism of causing the poverty – while in the very act of eradicating it – is to commit both a historical error and a profound injustice. The close correlations in the world today between freedom and prosperity — and between statism and destitution — were discussed above.”

Invoking history can only open up an infinite regression in a previous past; we stop such regression by invoking directly (eternal) ideal and values.

[Valdyr]

I see no cappies have posted in this thread yet. Maybe even they realize how stupid that argument is.

[Georwell]

Cappies exist on revleft?

[Georwell]

Anyways, the debate happened yesterday, and I must say I was pretty much able to hold off all of the people in that class. Overwhelmingly, the political demographic of the class was infested by liberals and a few libertarians, but they relied too much on the argument that I presented above. They employed skewed tactics, writing off contemporary China as an almost complete communist system—which I pointed that circa Den Xiaoping's, China has pretty much abandoned any sort of communist ideology and only pay lip service to the ideology. I also noticed that, when debating capitalists, they tend to believe the system to be omnipotent. "Anarchism and Communism have never worked", well, what about Barcelona? The Spanish Anarcho-Syndicalist communes? The Paris Commune?
Furthermore, am I wrong when I say that Capitalism is a somewhat progressive system? Compared to Despotism and Feudalism, Capitalism is a paramount achievement. As Marxists, our critiques of Capitalism come less from emotional angst and hatred for the established system and more from logical postulates. :)

[the zizekian]

So I am currently having this debate, and one of my opponents is using an article from a "Capitalism Magazine".

“There are two important facts regarding the industrial working class of this era. One is that it was poor. The other is that its living standard was gradually rising. The first is capitalism’s inheritance from feudalism. The second is its own achievement. Capitalism’s critics are guilty of a logical fallacy: they drop historical context. No event or phenomenon can be understood outside of the causal factors that give rise to it. The impoverished condition of the working class of this era is the direct result of the feudal system. To ignore this is to sweep aside the facts of its genesis. To then accuse capitalism of causing the poverty – while in the very act of eradicating it – is to commit both a historical error and a profound injustice. The close correlations in the world today between freedom and prosperity — and between statism and destitution — were discussed above.”

Knowing that the community is—for the most part—extremely intelligent, could you guys help me break this down? So far, I jotted down a couple of notes.

Examining Capitalism only in the sphere of America isn’t enough. To simply state that “Because America is successful, Capitalism is also successful” is a woefully inadequate explanation that it both ignorant of the global proletariat and their struggles against exploitation. Feudalism was ended by the Bourgeois, those who attained power in Capitalism. Feudalism was ended through various wars for land, such as the Hundred Years War, War of Roses, Crusades, ect. Land consolidation was legislation passed by aristocrats upon a golden throne of parliamentary injustice. Feudalism’s decay was marked by a growing disparity in the production of capital amongst the merchants of the era and the stationary Lords of the feifs.

For a dialectical materialist, the past is only the product of an internally contradictory present.

[Jimmie Higgins]

US slavery was not feudal - it was a backwards system as capitalism developed more but it was also the "start-up capital" for the industrial north. As the pro-capitalism article states, you can't take these things out of their historical context, and well you can't separate Northern US merchants, British textiles, and Slavery since they were all part of the same thing. Slavery was an institution of "primitive accumulation" that fueled capitalist development. Slavery in the new world was for cash-crops whereas feudal slavery and serfdom were just service at use-value, not for producing capital.


So I am currently having this debate, and one of my opponents is using an article from a "Capitalism Magazine".

“There are two important facts regarding the industrial working class of this era. One is that it was poor. The other is that its living standard was gradually rising. The first is capitalism’s inheritance from feudalism. The second is its own achievement. Capitalism’s critics are guilty of a logical fallacy: they drop historical context. No event or phenomenon can be understood outside of the causal factors that give rise to it. The impoverished condition of the working class of this era is the direct result of the feudal system. To ignore this is to sweep aside the facts of its genesis. To then accuse capitalism of causing the poverty – while in the very act of eradicating it – is to commit both a historical error and a profound injustice. The close correlations in the world today between freedom and prosperity — and between statism and destitution — were discussed above.”

Knowing that the community is—for the most part—extremely intelligent, could you guys help me break this down? So far, I jotted down a couple of notes.

Examining Capitalism only in the sphere of America isn’t enough. To simply state that “Because America is successful, Capitalism is also successful” is a woefully inadequate explanation that it both ignorant of the global proletariat and their struggles against exploitation. Feudalism was ended by the Bourgeois, those who attained power in Capitalism. Feudalism was ended through various wars for land, such as the Hundred Years War, War of Roses, Crusades, ect. Land consolidation was legislation passed by aristocrats upon a golden throne of parliamentary injustice. Feudalism’s decay was marked by a growing disparity in the production of capital amongst the merchants of the era and the stationary Lords of the feifs.

I think you have to question their assumptions and the way they've set up these arguments. To compare the industrial revolution to conditions for workers today, the main thing is not just absolute income or purchasing power but inequality. In that sense inequality is more or less the same in the US as in the "gilded age" - sure most workers have some more material wealth and live in bigger slums and apartments and homes, but we also produce vastly more than our industrial-era counterparts.

It was also a time of rapid change and while concentrated wealth grew quite a bit after the civil war, the old artisan classes were basically destroyed and so people who would have run a shop or been an apprentice in a skilled trade became working class workers instead which was a relative decline in wages and status.

Second, working class living standards fluctuated and continue to fluctuate so there is no straight line of progress. There was a series of economic busts in this time which would change things quite a bit and increase wealth concentration.

Third it's on them to explain how the internal mechanisms of capitalism, not social changes, trade-unions, legal reforms, etc have increased whatever it is they use to measure the well-being of workers.

[Lucretia]

So I am currently having this debate, and one of my opponents is using an article from a "Capitalism Magazine".

“There are two important facts regarding the industrial working class of this era. One is that it was poor. The other is that its living standard was gradually rising. The first is capitalism’s inheritance from feudalism. The second is its own achievement. Capitalism’s critics are guilty of a logical fallacy: they drop historical context. No event or phenomenon can be understood outside of the causal factors that give rise to it. The impoverished condition of the working class of this era is the direct result of the feudal system. To ignore this is to sweep aside the facts of its genesis. To then accuse capitalism of causing the poverty – while in the very act of eradicating it – is to commit both a historical error and a profound injustice. The close correlations in the world today between freedom and prosperity — and between statism and destitution — were discussed above.”

Knowing that the community is—for the most part—extremely intelligent, could you guys help me break this down? So far, I jotted down a couple of notes.

Examining Capitalism only in the sphere of America isn’t enough. To simply state that “Because America is successful, Capitalism is also successful” is a woefully inadequate explanation that it both ignorant of the global proletariat and their struggles against exploitation. Feudalism was ended by the Bourgeois, those who attained power in Capitalism. Feudalism was ended through various wars for land, such as the Hundred Years War, War of Roses, Crusades, ect. Land consolidation was legislation passed by aristocrats upon a golden throne of parliamentary injustice. Feudalism’s decay was marked by a growing disparity in the production of capital amongst the merchants of the era and the stationary Lords of the feifs.

I think the argument basically boils down to very reductive understanding of feudalism = poverty and capitalism = wealth. Therefore, by definition, if you have poverty in capitalist society, it is not the product of capitalism but must be a holdover from feudalism.

There are multiple problems with this, of course. First, it ignores the fact that both feudal and capitalist societies are class stratified and therefore impossible to characterize in toto as "rich" or "poor" without glossing over the key distinctions between wealthy exploiter and impoverished exploited. It is of course a truism that society in general has more material goods at its disposal under capitalism than under feudalism, but no Marxist would try to deny that. As I said, it's a truism. What is missed by talking about society as an abstraction is the relationship between the people who create the stuff and those who appropriate it without creating it. Second, the argument attributes poverty in the heart of the most advanced and longest-developed capitalist countries in the world (e.g., a homeless person in London) to a system that literally has not existed there for almost half a millennium. It just doesn't make any sense. It goes back to the question-begging equation of "capitalism=wealth" and "non-capitalism=poverty" a priori constructions.

[the zizekian]

So I am currently having this debate, and one of my opponents is using an article from a "Capitalism Magazine".

“There are two important facts regarding the industrial working class of this era. One is that it was poor. The other is that its living standard was gradually rising. The first is capitalism’s inheritance from feudalism. The second is its own achievement. Capitalism’s critics are guilty of a logical fallacy: they drop historical context. No event or phenomenon can be understood outside of the causal factors that give rise to it. The impoverished condition of the working class of this era is the direct result of the feudal system. To ignore this is to sweep aside the facts of its genesis. To then accuse capitalism of causing the poverty – while in the very act of eradicating it – is to commit both a historical error and a profound injustice. The close correlations in the world today between freedom and prosperity — and between statism and destitution — were discussed above.”

Knowing that the community is—for the most part—extremely intelligent, could you guys help me break this down? So far, I jotted down a couple of notes.

Examining Capitalism only in the sphere of America isn’t enough. To simply state that “Because America is successful, Capitalism is also successful” is a woefully inadequate explanation that it both ignorant of the global proletariat and their struggles against exploitation. Feudalism was ended by the Bourgeois, those who attained power in Capitalism. Feudalism was ended through various wars for land, such as the Hundred Years War, War of Roses, Crusades, ect. Land consolidation was legislation passed by aristocrats upon a golden throne of parliamentary injustice. Feudalism’s decay was marked by a growing disparity in the production of capital amongst the merchants of the era and the stationary Lords of the feifs.

Just recall the role of English Poor Laws in the Industrial revolution, capitalism comes from laws condemning the poor for being responsible for feudalism, nothing less!

[Rafiq]

So I am currently having this debate, and one of my opponents is using an article from a "Capitalism Magazine".

“There are two important facts regarding the industrial working class of this era. One is that it was poor. The other is that its living standard was gradually rising. The first is capitalism’s inheritance from feudalism. The second is its own achievement. Capitalism’s critics are guilty of a logical fallacy: they drop historical context. No event or phenomenon can be understood outside of the causal factors that give rise to it. The impoverished condition of the working class of this era is the direct result of the feudal system. To ignore this is to sweep aside the facts of its genesis. To then accuse capitalism of causing the poverty – while in the very act of eradicating it – is to commit both a historical error and a profound injustice. The close correlations in the world today between freedom and prosperity — and between statism and destitution — were discussed above.”

Knowing that the community is—for the most part—extremely intelligent, could you guys help me break this down? So far, I jotted down a couple of notes.

Examining Capitalism only in the sphere of America isn’t enough. To simply state that “Because America is successful, Capitalism is also successful” is a woefully inadequate explanation that it both ignorant of the global proletariat and their struggles against exploitation. Feudalism was ended by the Bourgeois, those who attained power in Capitalism. Feudalism was ended through various wars for land, such as the Hundred Years War, War of Roses, Crusades, ect. Land consolidation was legislation passed by aristocrats upon a golden throne of parliamentary injustice. Feudalism’s decay was marked by a growing disparity in the production of capital amongst the merchants of the era and the stationary Lords of the feifs.

The answer is simple. That only a select few of countries could experience the drastic change in living standards for the working class and so on, which was relatively new since the 1950's. This was, though, mostly done as a product of the War's fruits. Since the seventies, those fruits have disinigrated, and which leaves us in a debt crises.

The point is simple: To point out capitalism's inherent systemic contradictions, and why it isn't a stable system, despite the relatively good living standards it could generate in contrast to Feudalism.

[Rafiq]

It would also be of great importance to point out that the class contradiction is one of the contradictions within capitalism, and no matter how "Good" living standards are in contrast to standards in previous development stages of capitalism, the proletariat will inevitably develop a consciousnesses antithetical to the bourgeois class.

I believe Marx did also point out that capitalism's living standards could most definitely get better, as well.

[the zizekian]

So I am currently having this debate, and one of my opponents is using an article from a "Capitalism Magazine".

“There are two important facts regarding the industrial working class of this era. One is that it was poor. The other is that its living standard was gradually rising. The first is capitalism’s inheritance from feudalism. The second is its own achievement. Capitalism’s critics are guilty of a logical fallacy: they drop historical context. No event or phenomenon can be understood outside of the causal factors that give rise to it. The impoverished condition of the working class of this era is the direct result of the feudal system. To ignore this is to sweep aside the facts of its genesis. To then accuse capitalism of causing the poverty – while in the very act of eradicating it – is to commit both a historical error and a profound injustice. The close correlations in the world today between freedom and prosperity — and between statism and destitution — were discussed above.”

Knowing that the community is—for the most part—extremely intelligent, could you guys help me break this down? So far, I jotted down a couple of notes.

Examining Capitalism only in the sphere of America isn’t enough. To simply state that “Because America is successful, Capitalism is also successful” is a woefully inadequate explanation that it both ignorant of the global proletariat and their struggles against exploitation. Feudalism was ended by the Bourgeois, those who attained power in Capitalism. Feudalism was ended through various wars for land, such as the Hundred Years War, War of Roses, Crusades, ect. Land consolidation was legislation passed by aristocrats upon a golden throne of parliamentary injustice. Feudalism’s decay was marked by a growing disparity in the production of capital amongst the merchants of the era and the stationary Lords of the feifs.

Poverty is the solution, not the problem.