Capitalism: The Unknown Ideal

[Mr. Wynand]

Tell me the evils of capitalism. Tell me how millions of "proletarians" were "forced" to work for the greedy industrialists instead of starving on the streets, waiting for the government to allow them to live. Capitalism raised the standard of living to an all time high. Serfdom was the standard of the feudal system. Capitalism merely inherited the impoverished.

A man's life is his own, the product of his mind is, his by right. The only power that government should have is the prevention of injustice to preserve freedom. What about "exploitation", you say? What is the definition of this word but a voluntary association between employer and employee? Who is exploiting who? The union that demands 100% the producers profits along with his factory? By what right do they claim this? That my gang is bigger than yours? How do you think that these profits are created? I will tell you: through incentive.

The philosophy that you socialists hold so dear, the philosophy of altruism, holds man to be a sacrificial animal and forces him to work for his brothers; he lives at their will. Every man, then, has an unlimited claim to the lives of his brothers. Is this what you say to be moral. For the competent to serve the incompetent? For America to be brought to her knees, apologizing for her success? You have already succeeded in this.

You believe that America is a capitalism? Look around you. This is the embodiment of the two most evil ideas in history: communism and fascism, or, in a word, statism. The first is why the government thinks it can decide for us, by taking our money and giving it to the lazy. I suppose that this isn't a surprise, for the standard of socialism is not only equality, but laziness. The second is why we have constant war going on throughout the world. I will agree with you that it is a useless endeavor, further jeopardizing our security, but not an symtom of capitalism. A principled capitalist politician does not advocate war, and when the "military-industrial complex" attempts to bribe him, he refuses because it is against his principles. What interest does a free man have for war? We do not have many of these men, and that is why America has NEVER been a laissez faire capitalism.

Now if you wish you may respond. I will answer any question pertaining to distinct issues that you want to settle.

[Mindtoaster]

Tell me the evils of capitalism. Tell me how millions of "proletarians" were "forced" to work for the greedy industrialists instead of starving on the streetsAnswered your own question.


Capitalism raised the standard of living to an all time high. Serfdom was the standard of the feudal system.Well no shit. Socialists have written entire books about this, Marx especially. The transition from feudalism to capitalism was an inherently progressive, positive measure and a natural part of the history of class conflict.


The union that demands 100% the producers profits along with his factory? By what right do they claim this? That my gang is bigger than yours? How do you think that these profits are created? I will tell you: through incentive.
The workers built your factory, the workers made your products. You sit in a chair and make 45 times the amount of money the worker makes whilst you do an equal amount of, or in most cases far less amount of work. All you do is organize our creations to build a profit for yourself, whilst the creator struggles to feed a family and pay off his loans.


The philosophy that you socialists hold so dear, the philosophy of altruism, holds man to be a sacrificial animal and forces him to work for his brothers; he lives at their will. Every man, then, has an unlimited claim to the lives of his brothers.uh.... No... We don't.


laissez faire capitalism.I would just LOVE to hear about how the whole era of the industrial revolution was not laissez faire, because I seem to distinctly recall hearing about this whole violent labor movement and "communist" thing that came about because everyone was fucking starving.

Are you seriously going to stroll into this site trying to turn us into free-market libertarians? You think we're going to suddenly decide "Oh he's right, I would be much better off if there were no labor laws to protect me. Then i could have my wage cut in half and I could withdraw my children from school to work in cole-mines to prevent us from starving to death!"

No one here gives a fuck what some rich, austrain economist hack has to say about socialism. If your system was implemented the living standards for everyone here on RevLeft would plunge. Come back when you're a worker, then we'll see how much you love the free market.


This is the embodiment of the two most evil ideas in history: communism and fascism, or, in a word, statism. The first is why the government thinks it can decide for us, by taking our money and giving it to the lazy. I suppose that this isn't a surprise, for the standard of socialism is not only equality, but laziness.

Welfare capitalism

Unless you're going by the Bill O'reillyian definition of Socialism :rolleyes:

[TheCultofAbeLincoln]

You believe that America is a capitalism? Look around you. This is the embodiment of the two most evil ideas in history: communism and fascism, or, in a word, statism. The first is why the government thinks it can decide for us, by taking our money and giving it to the lazy. I suppose that this isn't a surprise, for the standard of socialism is not only equality, but laziness. The second is why we have constant war going on throughout the world. I will agree with you that it is a useless endeavor, further jeopardizing our security, but not an symtom of capitalism. A principled capitalist politician does not advocate war, and when the "military-industrial complex" attempts to bribe him, he refuses because it is against his principles. What interest does a free man have for war? We do not have many of these men, and that is why America has NEVER been a laissez faire capitalism.

Under the capitalist system there has always been great powers which exploited the world for profit. Whether this be Britain, France, Germany, Japan, or America only depends on who possessed the stregnth to enforce their version of capitalism on the world.

Laissez-faire libertarian anarcho-capitalism can only exist if there is a power which will protect the market from external threat. Otherwise, there is going to be a strong motive to conscript/draft (ie force) people to defend their property (or, more likely, the property holders will force the proletarians to fight for them). And that is partly why it is not laissex faire but corporatism which rules the world.

[StalinFanboy]

OP makes me lol. We are forced to work, because otherwise, we would be starving on the streets. And capitalism sets this up. Pretty fuckin' simple to me.

You say we're lazy? We say that we shouldn't have to sell our bodies, our minds, and our time to survive. Things like food and water and shelter should be provided to everyone, so that we may spend our time and our labor on things that we enjoy, and things that are going to enrich our lives. We want to move from barely existing to actually living.

I don't think many serious socialist, anarchists, communists, whatevers, believe in altruism. I'm an Anarchist because Anarchy is going to benefit me, my family, friends, the rest of humanity, and the environment, the most.

America is most certainly capitalist. And the worst kind of capitalism: Corporatism. CEO's are getting millions of dollars a year in bonuses while the rest of us are suffering through housing crises, debt, etc. simply because they are the head of a corporation. And don't say that America has never been laissez faire, because it was in the 1800s. Companies had free reign over fucking everything. People were dying because of disease and extreme poverty, and this didn't end until the people took their lives into their own hands.

[casper]

Tell me the evils of capitalism. Tell me how millions of "proletarians" were "forced" to work for the greedy industrialists instead of starving on the streets, waiting for the government to allow them to live.
simple, their forced because its be a wage-slave or die. they don't have the education, and often times don't have the extra cash or just don't have the plain ability to acquire or invest in capital(which takes time they shouldn't be forced to give up), rather all they have and all they can have is their time and their labor to sell due to their initial state. if a person works to live, and lives to work, then that person truly doesn't live at all. A man also needs more then bread, self-actualization is considered the top of the pyramid of human needs, but it is still a need, one that pure capitalism would only allow for those who basically own the masses. because the masses would be to worried about needs closer to the base of the pyramid, like clean water... in pure capitalism, conditions will naturally be produced that will create a defacto-slave labor force. its rather obvious.


Capitalism raised the standard of living to an all time high. Serfdom was the standard of the feudal system. Capitalism merely inherited the impoverished.

... it was feudalism man...
capitalism still has its flaws. also,
capitalism only raises the standard of living if it is regulated, or else monopolyes (or like a few large companies)may develop and take over the market( and thus our lives) then we're all fucked if we don't own a large portion of the monopolie or if we arn't individually or majorly important to it, like how a top level manager or skilled worker might be. considering that the bottom line would likly be the bottom line...


A man's life is his own, the product of his mind is, his by right. The only power that government should have is the prevention of injustice to preserve freedom.
which is exactly why the goverment puts limits on capitalism, however, capitalism is just the best model so far, once the modes of production advances, capitalism will be outdated, and greater freedom will be allowable under a move advance system.(communisim)




The philosophy that you socialists hold so dear, the philosophy of altruism, holds man to be a sacrificial animal and forces him to work for his brothers; he lives at their will. Every man, then, has an unlimited claim to the lives of his brothers. Is this what you say to be moral. For the competent to serve the incompetent? For America to be brought to her knees, apologizing for her success? You have already succeeded in this.

i'm a commi, but socialism doesn't believe that man should be a slave to his fellow man, but rather that though goverment control of the economy that man will be more free becuse he won't be neglected by a laissez faire system. in my opion both systems have their problems, and are best when combined.




You believe that America is a capitalism? Look around you. This is the embodiment of the two most evil ideas in history: communism and fascism, or, in a word, statism. The first is why the government thinks it can decide for us, by taking our money and giving it to the lazy. I suppose that this isn't a surprise, for the standard of socialism is not only equality, but laziness.

communism is an entirly different system then capitalism, one i believe most have a problem visualising. don't confuse communisim and socialism, there is a difference. also, the money given out in walfare systems don't neccassarly go to the lazy, alot of it has to do with intial conditions, the conditions have to be fixed, and prevented.


The second is why we have constant war going on throughout the world. I will agree with you that it is a useless endeavor, further jeopardizing our security, but not an symtom of capitalism. A principled capitalist politician does not advocate war, and when the "military-industrial complex" attempts to bribe him, he refuses because it is against his principles. What interest does a free man have for war? We do not have many of these men, and that is why America has NEVER been a laissez faire capitalism.
what principles are those? war is profitable, especially for the free man, becuse he is the one who can sell to the slaves, and also force them to give him the loot. ever heard of game theory? the game of laissez faire doesn't sound good for the people.



Now if you wish you may respond. I will answer any question pertaining to distinct issues that you want to settle.

[mikelepore]

Capitalism raised the standard of living to an all time high.

In making this assessment, have you correctly subtracted out of the data all improvements in the standard of living that are due to new discoveries, new inventions, science, technology? If you don't subtract that out, you are giving the choice of a particular economic system the credit for something that would happen under any economic system.

[Die Neue Zeit]

Another Austrian pop-in doesn't realize that most inventions were made by employees of the state (defense bureaucracies or otherwise), including this wonderful internetworking communication medium I'm on right now. :rolleyes:

[mikelepore]

What about "exploitation", you say? What is the definition of this word but a voluntary association between employer and employee? Who is exploiting who? The union that demands 100% the producers profits along with his factory? By what right do they claim this? That my gang is bigger than yours? How do you think that these profits are created? I will tell you: through incentive.

If that were true, if the employer's profits were not extracted by paying the workers less, but were created because the employer has a state of mind called incentive, then an interesting outcome would happen. Every time a worker asks an employer for a raise, the employer could say "yes" and give the raise without hesitation, simply for the asking, and the employer's profits wouldn't be reduced a bit. Double the worker's wage, triple it, quadruple it, every day, and the employer's profit' wouldn't be affected at all. After all, the thing that supposedly produces the employer's profits, the mental attitude known as incentive, still remains in the employer's state of mind.

But what happens in reality? If worker's asks for a raise, the employer usually resists the suggestion and says "no", "wait until next year", etc. The employers knows that giving the worker a raise must always mean that the company will have less cash flow remaining to pay dividends. So now, what is the source of the employer's profit? Its source is the employer's decision not to take the entire cash available for both wages and profits and to pay it all to the workers.

Conclusion: The workers produce all of the wealth of society, but receive in the form of wages a mere fraction of that wealth. All workers as a whole never get paid sufficient wages to buy back their own products.

[mikelepore]

Tell me how millions of "proletarians" were "forced" to work for the greedy industrialists instead of starving.

The force is of a particular type. It arises because we are not the kind of animal that carries the means of production as parts of our own bodies. We don't survive by such bodily characteristics as the ability of a cat or a bird to encounter prey and grab it with sharp claws, or the ability of a fish to gobble up plankton, or the ability of an insect to gnaw on trees. We are the kind of animal that has its means of production external to our bodies, in artificial tools. Accordingly, if we are born into a society that has already adopted the institution of private ownership of the tools, we will find ourselves being the slaves of the owners of the tools.

[Demogorgon]

I am getting tired of dealing with Randroids. A political "philosophy" designed to exploit naive teenagers who think being socially awkward means they are in fact part of an elite being held back by the commoners really does have narrow appeal.

Rand's crap simply has no credibility, even the Austrians don't have anything to do with it, simply because it is so weak. Rand built a cult around her to feed her own ego and mitigate her depression, but what interest should it hold to anyone else?

If the OP is not a troll, then he no doubt thinks he has come upon some great truth, has come to understand fundamental truths of the world, I am afraid not. He has come to the same conclusions every other seventeen year old who has been put in the lethal combination of being anti-social and reading The Fountainhead has come to.

Don't worry though, you'll grow out of it.

[Pogue]

Can we sticky this thread? A few of the responses to the OP have been classic.

[Robert]

To the OP: are you John Galt?

[Mr. Wynand]

The thing that bothers me the most is that you want the government to control everything economically. I think some of you want them to control every aspect of your lives, but I may be wrong. I just want to know what other books have you all read besides The Communist Manifesto, Das Kapital, Utopia etc.? I've read the communist manifesto three times on a train ride in Poland, and as I read the nonsensical rantings of Marx, I witnessed the result of them. Please read as much as you can from both sides. Not the neoconservative bullshit or necessarily the republicans, but try to learn before you make your final judgment.

Here's some other questions. The Soviet Union didn't work, China only is successful because they employed some free market strategies. They both had way more people starving on the streets than any remotely capitalist society, if the government didn't kill them first. Why do keep fighting for this "paradise"? Who knows how to run a factory better? A group of workers that vote on every issue or an experienced industrialist who has built a business from the ground up?

Oh and the deal with the monopolies. First of all, under a communism, the government is the only producer. Therefore, they are a monopoly. But more importantly, a coercive monopoly is impossible under a free market. Give me an example of a coercive monopoly that didn't get monetary help from the government (ie. the railroads) or wasn't efficient enough to crush competition. If there is a monopoly that is not efficient enough, the competition will increase and if that monopoly buys out the competition, they will have to raise their prices, hence inviting further competition. But a monopoly that is or was efficient such as standard oil will bring decades of prosperity to a nation as it did at the turn of the century. General electric is another example. They were sued under the anti-trust law (which has no objectivity, so it is undefinable) for having too low of prices. The justification was that if another company wanted to compete, that they couldn't with such low prices...!

And yes I am John Galt... I am the man who loves his life. hahaha

[Demogorgon]

Telling us to read more is pretty rich. I have read vast amounts from across the political spectrum, I am trained in neoclassical economics, I have investigated all sorts of different economic policies and their effects and I have never come across anything indicating Rand was right on, well anything really.

I honestly doubt that anybody could come to agree with her who has knowledge of other political theories. Her views are simple crap and have been refuted as extensively on the right as they have on the left. Even the Austrians, as much as they can succeed at anything, have succeeded in showing her for the hack she was. She is the "philosopher" of the lonely teenager, what possible interest does she hold for anybody else?

And incidentally, the question no Randroid ever answers. If it is in my clear self interest to murder you, why shouldn't I do it?

[mikelepore]

There are SOME people who call themselves socialists or communists who "want the government to control everything."

MOST people who call themselves socialists or communists, at least in the U.S. where I live, want some kind of network of workers' organizations to administer industry. They debate among themselves what kind of workers' organizations they would prefer.

For example, I would prefer a federation of industrial constituencies, with an association of agricultural workers being the management of agricuture, an association of medical workers being the management of the medical industry, etc. To interface one industry with another, there must also be a central board of directors composed of representatives elected by the workers of all of the industries.

Watch out for the word "government." The one meaning of this word which implies the control of human behavior is distinctly unlike the the other meaning, control of inanimate objects, as when we say that a thermostat governs an electric circuit, etc.

It is the truly government in the political sense that, for example, passes a law against murder. This has nothing to do with the administration of objects and things, such as managing how many chairs to manufacture, etc.

To encompass everything under the phrase "the government controlling everything" is most misleading. You would be much more accurate if you say, "Instead of having stockholders elect the managers, the workers will elect the managers." Is there any "government" involved in doing that? Yes, in the sense that murder is outlawed in the workshop, just as murder is outlawed on the street. In that sense, government will always be everywhere. But industrial management itself is not "the government."

[trivas7]

Laissez-faire libertarian anarcho-capitalism can only exist if there is a power which will protect the market from external threat. Otherwise, there is going to be a strong motive to conscript/draft (ie force) people to defend their property (or, more likely, the property holders will force the proletarians to fight for them).
Oh, you mean like the Communist Party of China?

[trivas7]

The philosophy that you socialists hold so dear, the philosophy of altruism, holds man to be a sacrificial animal and forces him to work for his brothers; he lives at their will. Every man, then, has an unlimited claim to the lives of his brothers.
uh.... No... We don't.

Tell that to the tens of millions that have died under Communist regimes.

[mikelepore]

Who knows how to run a factory better? A group of workers that vote on every issue or an experienced industrialist who has built a business from the ground up?

This isn't the age of Thomas Edison and Andrew Carnegie. This is the age in which absentee owners who may live anywhere in the world, and who don't have to know anything the phone number of a stock broker, vote annually to choose the chief executive and the board of directors. This group that doesn't have to know anything at all about the industry also has an aristocracy among them, in that a million shares inherited from great-grandpa represents a million votes when chosing the chief executive and the board of directors.

So you are on very thin ice to present the argument that capitalism is an optimum way to run a factory based on knowledge an experience.

On the contrary, it the workers who run a plant from top to bottom, and not as abssentee owners who possess stock certificates, but as the daily hands-on operators, who have a vast accumulation of technical knowledge and experience. Who could know more about the steps involved in making a product than the people whose own hands and brains put it together?

To use the capitalist method of administration, to have stockholders choose the directors, and then have these directors appoint the management pyramid in a top-down fashion, you might as well have chimpanzees throwing darts.

The workers in every industry are the respository of all of the specialized knowledge that has been discovered and tested and documented.

[Pogue]

Tell that to the tens of millions that have died under Communist regimes.

You've been on this forum for 7 months, and have over a thousand posts, yet you're still stupid enough to make that post. What a joke.

[mikelepore]

Demogorgon, you're right, but I bother answering them because their pure and concentrated mass of misconception is like a distillation of the widespread set of prejudgements that circulate among the media-indoctrinated working class. If we practice answering their crystallized heap of every known type of fallacy being committed simultaneously, we will be better educators when we encounter the common misconceptions a few at a time.

[Mr. Wynand]

Demogorgon, if it is your interest to kill me then it is in violation of my right to life. This is the only reason that we need government: the prevention of injustice to preserve freedom. Rand made this very clear. You really have no knowledge of objectivism; only what people have told you.

[mikelepore]

Tell that to the tens of millions that have died under Communist regimes.
You've been on this forum for 7 months, and have over a thousand posts, yet you're still stupid enough to make that post. What a joke.

And no one in the world has ever killed anybody in the name of expanding their property and making profits!

And Alice jumped through the looking glass and saw a dancing deck of playing cards....

[Demogorgon]

Demogorgon, if it is your interest to kill me then it is in violation of my right to life. This is the only reason that we need government: the prevention of injustice to preserve freedom. Rand made this very clear. You really have no knowledge of objectivism; only what people have told you.I do have knowledge of objectivism and I am trying to show that it is contradictory. It posits a set of rights (defined very conveniently to be exactly what Rand thought they should be) and also says we should act in our self interests. So if it is in my self interest to ignore your rights, why shouldn't I do so?

Or to go at it from the other end of the problem, if I am to go against my self interests when it comes to your rights, why do I only need to respect the rights Rand thought we should have? What about the rights, say, the framers of the United Nations charter thought we should have? Why do I have to go against my self interests to respect Rand's rights but not their rights?

[Zurdito]

I found Atlas Shrugged in someone's house (it wasn't theirs), and borrowed it, thinking that maybe here was something to engagewith.

After about 100 pages I was asking myself if it was necessarry to make the same simple point with 5 or 6 seperate manifestations of the same stereotype, expressing themselves through horrible dialogue which a 12 year old could have written better. So I skipped to the part where John Galt gives his great speech, and trully, it was disappointing, and much too long. I don't see why Ayn Rand spent over 1000 pages writing such a simple book.

Alsoit's horribly written, and she herselfadmits she had only ever read Aristotle and not a single other philosopher, so really why take seriously someone's opinion on Marx who never read Marx? Or on philosophy when you haven't read phiosophy? Here we have someone claiming todismiss the entire history of previous human thought, without even reading the philosophy of past societies and her own? :s

Also you can't call yourself an econmist if you don't cite a single real economic example or engage with a single economsit.

All I found the book to be was a moralistic rant with no relation to the real world and which leaves even basic reformist arguments undealt with, let alone marxism. it was also very boring to read, and I think Ayn Rand had mental problems.

[RGacky3]

This is the only reason that we need government: the prevention of injustice to preserve freedom. Rand made this very clear. You really have no knowledge of objectivism; only what people have told you.

Yes and that is ALL they will do right? There is no way they'd abuse their power right? Or use it to further the interest of the ruling class of which either they are apart of (99.9% of the time) and/or which they rely on (100% of the time).



The thing that bothers me the most is that you want the government to control everything economically. I think some of you want them to control every aspect of your lives, but I may be wrong. I just want to know what other books have you all read besides The Communist Manifesto, Das Kapital, Utopia etc.? I've read the communist manifesto three times on a train ride in Poland, and as I read the nonsensical rantings of Marx, I witnessed the result of them. Please read as much as you can from both sides. Not the neoconservative bullshit or necessarily the republicans, but try to learn before you make your final judgment.

Most of us here are some type of Anarchist-Communists or Libertarian Socialist. Before you go around telling us what we want, why not read about that stuff first.


Here's some other questions. The Soviet Union didn't work, China only is successful because they employed some free market strategies. They both had way more people starving on the streets than any remotely capitalist society, if the government didn't kill them first. Why do keep fighting for this "paradise"? Who knows how to run a factory better? A group of workers that vote on every issue or an experienced industrialist who has built a business from the ground up?


The first question is irrelivent because I dont' think anyone here supports China and very few support the USSR. Second of all, your ignoring the hundreds and hundreds of free market Capitalist societies in the world that are third world and dirt poor, and the parts of first world countries that are also dirt poor, which in many first world countries is a large chunk of it.

First of all, very few times do "experienced industrialists" Actually own and/or have ultimate control over a company, so that being said, yaeh a group of workers, who may vote on some issues, or may give a person certain responsibilities that has the experience for it (responcibility is different from authority).

Basicly your argument is dictatorship against democracy. You can use your EXACT argument For a king, against democracy. "We should use an experienced leader to run a society rather than have all the citizenry vote on every issue."


Oh and the deal with the monopolies. First of all, under a communism, the government is the only producer.

Nope, read about what we believe first, heres a pointer first though, Marx is'nt the only communist thinker, there are many, I suggest Bakunin, Kropotkin, Chomsky (not an anarchist thinker perse, but gives good explinations of Anarchism and communism), Rudolf Rocker, and the such.

BTW talking about coercion, let me ask you, whats the difference between someone who owns a farm, never worked on it, but takes 80% of the profits from it, while his workers who do all the work barely get 20%, and a Mobster taking a cut from businesses in a town he claims to own. Both take their cut with the threat of violence, the only difference is, one is backed up by the law, the other is'nt.

[mikelepore]

Also you can't call yourself an econmist if you don't cite a single real economic example

Had time permitted, Rand would have included that in Prometheus Squatted, the planned sequel to Atlas Shrugged.

[mikelepore]

IAll I found the book to be was a moralistic rant with no relation to the real world

How about Galt's invention of a free energy machine. There's nothing like science fiction to form the setting for social fiction.

[Djehuti]

Tell me the evils of capitalism. Tell me how millions of "proletarians" were "forced" to work for the greedy industrialists instead of starving on the streets, waiting for the government to allow them to live.

Never heard of the Primitive accumulation of Capital (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Primitive_accumulation_of_capital)? Should should read Leo Hubermans "Mans worldly goods (http://www.amazon.com/Mans-Worldly-Goods-Wealth-Nations/dp/0853450706)" and David Harveys "Accumulation by dispossession (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Accumulation_by_dispossession)" to understand how it worked then and how it works today.

Bourgeoisie economists, such as Adam Smith tends to describe the development like this (to quote Harvey): "There were some people that were hard working and some people who were not. Some people who could be bothered, and some people who could not be bothered. And the result of that was that, bit by bit, those who were hard working, and could be bothered, accumulated some wealth. And eventually, those who could not be bothered, could not accumulate wealth, and in the end, in order to survive, preferred, actually, to give up their labor power as a commodity, in return for a living wage." Marx however had a more scientific approach to the primitive accumulation of capital, which can be summarized as: "entailed taking land, say, enclosing it, and expelling a resident population to create a landless proletariat, and then releasing the land into the privatized mainstream of capital accumulation" but I would reccomend you to read Hubermans book (or Marx chapter on the subject, I believe it's book one of Capital chapter 24) for a more detailed explaination.




A man's life is his own, the product of his mind is, his by right. The only power that government should have is the prevention of injustice to preserve freedom.

I'd say no goverment, thats fine with me. But on what economic basis?
A hypothetical capitalist society were no one forces any person to do something (such society has never existed of cource) is still not neutral.

Communism is not controled capitalism or anything like that, communism is not "more control", "more force" or "more regulation" etc. it is just another and very different basis of society. Another, imo much better, way for us to relate to eachother.

[Drace]

Demogorgon, if it is your interest to kill me then it is in violation of my right to life. This is the only reason that we need government: the prevention of injustice to preserve freedom. Rand made this very clear. You really have no knowledge of objectivism; only what people have told you.

Hey great! I even made a blog against this crap.


I have become tired with the "life, liberty, and pursuit of happiness", or all together the 'individual rights' crap.

Those arguments are just dramatizing the non existent. The chains of society, the free market, individual rights...

One does not inherit directly from such freedoms. One does not look up at the sky and praise his liberty and that he is able to pursuit his happiness.
These are of no emotional value, they do not exist.
The term can be used to explain the opportunity of one to do so. The way I hear it from these guys is that those things alone are great fortunes. Determinism guides one to where he will be, so unless this capitalist system allows all to have true opportunity and not "you'll get there if you just try!", none of these terms can be put in effect.

They will describe communism as that of which chains are placed around everyone to disallow one from living for one self.

These individual rights are that of to be able to live, fairly..

The free trade, and these individual rights are only fair if the trade is fair. All trade is meant to be done fairly, but the free market has everyone live under exploitation.
It allows the evil's mind of greed freely take on the others.

Socialism just puts a regulation on trade, to make sure its only done for its right intention. Fair trade.

Who would deny fair trade? -- A capitalist who can exploit others for more then his share? http://www.revleft.com/vb/../revleft/smilies/001_smile.gif

Moreover, you are part of society.
So do they think that the evil dictator by the name of "Society" will rule everyone for him?

Or as they saw it, the "greater good", which is of course 'bad' (In their delusional vision)
But even so, is it not justified if you have someone work 15 hours for a week if it saves a person's lives? Now our evil leader, Socialist,
will have the person who has his life saved work 30 hours for a few days so the guy who helped him is repaid. http://www.revleft.com/vb/../revleft/smilies/001_smile.gif

[Kassad]

Oh boy. The Randroids are back.

So a government only exists to preserve rights? What are rights? Who is the universal decider of rights in a nation? Does the government decide? Do the people decide? What if I say it's my right to burn the flesh off your bones? Or maybe you have the desire to have sex with children. Is that your right?

So who winds up making those decisions? A group of leaders. That group of leaders turns into an elitist bureaucracy and here we are. Your ideas are absurd. In the laissez-faire Mises/Rothbard/Rand surrealism that is their economic ideology, they preach putting the market over the people. It's plain and simple. They advocate putting a price tag on everything. What happens when you introduce the profit motive? Someone makes money. What does the person making money do? Attempt to cut expenses so he can make even more money. Will he sacrifice quality for more profit? You bet he will.

Your perspective is far too narrow. Not only do you group everyone here into the Marxist bubble, but you completely misunderstand Marx's definition of the state, the destruction of it, the formation of the dictatorship of the proletariat and then the dissolution of it. Have you ever read Luxemborg? Stalin? Bakunin? Engels? Lenin? Zedong? Chomsky? Anyone besides Marx? I mean, you've read a few books by Marx and you already have lost any grasp of socialist economics by your obvious misunderstanding of the state. Hell, I've read every Rand book I could find. Mises, Rothbard, Rockwell, Hayek. All of that right-wing populist bile. I understand their concepts, yet you want to come into a forum, full of many people who do not align themselves with Marx, and group us all in together? Practice what you preach.

Welcome to capitalism. Meet the new boss; same as the old boss.

[Francis]

Businesses don't want a free market with perfect competition, because in such a market there is little profit. Profit happens when there is not a free market. When there is a cartel, and barriers to entry prevent competition from outside of the cartel. Politicians want to get elected.


Neither the businesses nor the politicians seem to care about the geater good, just their own greedy interests.


Without government interference, businesses would work towards the sole goal of creating monopolies and cartels so they can make profits without having to worry about pesky competitors.


Without government to protect property rights, I doubt the U.S. would have become the most powerful economy in the world. We would be like Somalia.


We need government to keep markets free but not to create cartels and monoplies in exchange for campaign contributions.

[Kassad]

Do we not recall the early 1900s when Rockefeller and Carnegie practiced their Horizontal and Vertical Integrations? Remember that? They were able to do just about anything they wanted and they were able to completely absorb their competition and the businesses they used to produce and manufacture. It wasn't until Congress passes anti-trust and anti-monopoly legislation that we put a stop to the monopolies they were creating. That's called restricting the market and it stops monopolies.

By deregulating the market, we allow corporations to do whatever they want. Monopolize, dominate and destroy. Why would they produce quality goods if they were the only ones and just wanted to make money? By regulating the market, we maintain social standards. This would prevent manipulation of the proletariat and it would preserve our environment from harmful corporate practices. We can't forget about that, can we? Deregulate them so they can dump their waste in our rivers, right? Free market, right?

[RedKnight]

Tell that to the tens of millions that have died under Communist regimes.
Millions of people have died under all kinds of regimes. All governments rule by force. If they are wise regimes, they will only take life when it is necessary for public safety. But there have been death squads http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Death_squad, and massacres http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sand_Creek_massacre, under capitalism. This picture says it all. http://www.northern.edu/wild/0708Season/Saigon/Kent_State_massacre.jpg

[TheCultofAbeLincoln]

Oh, you mean like the Communist Party of China?

Sorry, I missed this one.

China does keep it's population free from external threat, I can't argue with that. I have a hard time believing that Communist Party of China = Laissez-Faire capitalists though.

[Francis]

By deregulating the market, we allow corporations to do whatever they want. Monopolize, dominate and destroy. Why would they produce quality goods if they were the only ones and just wanted to make money? By regulating the market, we maintain social standards. This would prevent manipulation of the proletariat and it would preserve our environment from harmful corporate practices. We can't forget about that, can we? Deregulate them so they can dump their waste in our rivers, right? Free market, right?

Deregulation doesn't mean free market.

Big corporations themselves wouldn't exist were it not for government laws granting special recognition to the corporate structure and neither would labor unions.

Most of the government regulations don't exist to protect the public but rather to protect oligopolitic industries profits.

[IcarusAngel]

I think Kassad a Francis have already nailed down the criticism I had for this thread.

If deregulation isn't capitalist what the hell is, though? This is a more recent trick I've noticed among capitalists, to define the system so abstractly it becomes meaningless and impossible to criticize: Deregulation, that's not capitalist; privatization, that's not capitalist; corporations, that's not capitalist. I've even heard some attack inequality and monopolies.

A smart but ultimately ineffectual tactic.

[TheCultofAbeLincoln]

A smart but ultimately ineffectual tactic.

You must be kidding, it is most effective.

If Cappies were as rigid as Commies in their ideology we'd still be feudalists.

[Schrödinger's Cat]

I feel like I'm in a bad Terry Goodkind narrative. Wait, that's repetitive.

[Schrödinger's Cat]

The thing that bothers me the most is that you want the government to control everything economically.Right. You chastise others about not driving a wedge through Ayn Rand's incarnation of religious zeal after making a stupid remark like this? Half of this forum consists of anarchists. Try again. The shooter gallery is open till 12.


I think ...Clearly not enough.


First of all, under a communism, the government is the only producer. Here you go again, illustrating that you know nothing about communism. I wouldn't make mention of this with such insincere comments if you didn't barge into this forum expecting to get trumpets and cries of, "Your [sic] right!"


Rand made this very clear.Bet a nickel you can't tell me what freedom is without lapsing into a statist defense.

[Schrödinger's Cat]

Tell that to the tens of millions that have died under Communist regimes.

Millions? Is that all? I thought the entire East was emptied out.

Perhaps if you addressed the billions who died because of capitalism, this apology would have some meaning? I'm disappointed with you. That remark is something I'd expect from Captain Capitalism. What a childish remark.

[RGacky3]

Without government to protect property rights, I doubt the U.S. would have become the most powerful economy in the world. We would be like Somalia.

I think your missing what makes Somalia poor and the US rich (at least some in the US).

[TheCultofAbeLincoln]

Alsoit's horribly written... it was also very boring to read,

I could not agree more.

It might be just me, but I think her writing style is horrible.

The fact the she won the Nobel Prize for Literature completely devalues that award for me.