Why do you think that in capitalism it is so important to erode the person?

[a_ghost_from_your_past]

 

[a_ghost_from_your_past]

ANd if you figured out the significance, can you single out forms of cultural transmission in specific terms that have produced this mentality?

 

[Ex-User (14663)]

Sheep people – who will always be desperately in need of someone telling them what to do and what to think – will also always complain about the instructions and thoughts given to them. I guess one can consider this liberty to complain an added luxury. Others just see the freedom and opportunities given to them.

 

[Deleted member 1424]

At least the sheeple can always rely on you serac. Rely on you to compulsively jerk yourself off where ever you roam. Why don't I send you a shirt that says 'mind the splash zone.' I'm sure anyone that has to interact with you in future will appreciate it.

My treat <3

 

[gilliatt]

What Nonsense!

 

[Ex-User (14663)]

At least the sheeple can always rely on you serac. Rely on you to compulsively jerk yourself off where ever you roam. Why don't I send you a shirt that says 'mind the splash zone.' I'm sure anyone that has to interact with you in future will appreciate it.

My treat <3

People want to be in the splash zone - my cum has medicinal properties.

 

[ZenRaiden]

At least the sheeple can always rely on you serac. Rely on you to compulsively jerk yourself off where ever you roam. Why don't I send you a shirt that says 'mind the splash zone.' I'm sure anyone that has to interact with you in future will appreciate it.

My treat <3

People want to be in the splash zone - my cum has medicinal properties.

Reminds me of this article lol.

 

[ZenRaiden]

At least the sheeple can always rely on you serac. Rely on you to compulsively jerk yourself off where ever you roam. Why don't I send you a shirt that says 'mind the splash zone.' I'm sure anyone that has to interact with you in future will appreciate it.

My treat <3

People want to be in the splash zone - my cum has medicinal properties.

Reminds me of this article lol.

Woman develops IQ of 220 after drinking sperm everyday for a year

A student from UCLA has just achieved the highest score in history on an IQ test designed by Mensa, and she claims her astonishing result is due to her daily ingestion of sperm. 26-year old Alicia Franklin, was already a member of the high IQ society Mensa, after scoring 154 in her qualification te

worldnewsdailyreport.com

 

[Cognisant]

Why do you think that in capitalism it is so important to erode the person?

In capitalism there's capitalists (people who have capital) and resources to be utilized insofar as it is profitable to do so.

Consider yourself a business owner with bills to pay (including rates or a lease), supplies to buy, costs to cover (maintenance, insurance, consumables) one of the largest of which is paying your employees, whether your business sinks or succeeds depends almost entirely upon the effective utilization of these human resources.

By "utilization" I mean extracting the maximum amount of work (which generates sales and thus profits) for the minimum expense and to that end you want a servile compliant homogeneous workforce, not free thinking individuals who are difficult to deal with.

 

[Pizzabeak]

People want to be in the splash zone - my cum has medicinal properties.

And how is it any different from other peoples’ sperm? You and it are both normal with nothing unique about you.

 

[Cognisant]

 

[Kormak]

In capitalism every individual is a consumer and as a consumer they are the means to profit. Capitalism is incapable of treating the individual as an end in itself with intrinsic value. Logically it should be possible, however greed usually wins out and the individual becomes either the product itself (selling data to advertisers) or a cash cow, think "super whales" in the gaming industry. Lies & manipulation, problem-reaction-solution marketing.

Similarly within communism the individual is the means through which the the end of the commune is realized, a brik in a wall, something that must be sacrificed for the greater good of the many.

Neither system can be logically considered as moral and in both the individual must be broiken down and manipulated towards the desired end.

 

[Ex-User (14663)]

I think when people talk about “capitalism wants this and that”, they are forgetting that capitalism doesn’t want anything - the only fundamental principle of capitalism is your freedom to own things and allocate your resources whither you want. A system like communism infuses morality into the situation in a completely different way by saying that the said freedoms lead to unfairness and thus things have to be managed top-down. I.e. it claims that certain ends are more “moral” than freedom itself. That’s why I have a severe distaste for communism, leftism and all that nonsense.

 

[Kormak]

I think when people talk about “capitalism wants this and that”, they are forgetting that capitalism doesn’t want anything - the only fundamental principle of capitalism is your freedom to own things and allocate your resources whither you want. A system like communism infuses morality into the situation in a completely different way by saying that the said freedoms lead to unfairness and thus things have to be managed top-down. I.e. it claims that certain ends are more “moral” than freedom itself. That’s why I have a severe distaste for communism, leftism and all that nonsense.

International corporations are not much different than a communist state tbh, for example, what big tech monopolies are doing. You have to heavily censor yourself to avoid getting thrown off of Twitter, Facebook, Youtube and so on even if you are telling the truth and when ppl decide to build alternatives, hose very same corporations will use the state, the media, their influence on other service providers and their own platforms against the new platform to crush it, in some cases going as far as involving the registrar & ISPs. There is some HEAVY thought policing out there.

The free market and well functioning capitalism is a myth that only exists within abstract thought.

Gaming corporations sell gambling to kids for example, because it makes them $, same reason as to why Youtube didn't stop putting ads on questionable kids videos till they got sued by the parents, or why Twitch allowed teenagers to pay for essentially softcore porn on their platform, Instagram & patreon still allows this.

Dairy companies will lobby, lie and manipulate ppl through the media so they buy milk and milk products despite research showing that for example drinking milk has no effect on bone health, while keeping quiet about the hormones they accidentally pump the milk full of. Even the government will lie about this because of the dairy companies lobbying. It's similar to how vegans will never tell you the harmful side effects of eating kale and soy. Or why "Soylent" will never tell you the biological consequences of not eating solid food.

In the case of publically traded companies publishing quarterly earnings is driving harmful short-termism through an unhealthy preoccupation with near-term profits at the expense of long-term value. Nowhere is this more visible than gaming companies. Shit games and gambling.

I can point out any number of fitness gurus on Youtube selling garbage products & broscience that can be scientifically proven to do absolutely nothing for you.

Its not a problem of capitalism tho. Its a moral & a legislative problem. Ppl and corporations simply view the customer as a means to profit, which is the true end goal. Profit at all costs.

Corporations usually support lefties, because they profit off of their ignorance & they support right-wingers for tax breaks & freedom to pursue crony capitalism. Example is the carbon tax. If ppl think the government wants to implement it to save the environment, they are wrong. Its all about money and taxing ppl more. The corporations will just offset the taxes on the consumer and trash will continue to be dumped into the environment regardless.

 

[Ex-User (14663)]

like you said, those are not issues with capitalism but individual behavior and the moral values of the individuals. Freedom means people will act as individuals and not uniformly as per prescribed imperatives designed by bureaucrats. But that’s not to say laws should not exist; there’s an infinitude of possible actions an individual can take and prohibiting a finite set of actions still retains an infinitude of possible actions.

As to how corporations view consumers, that’s no different from how consumers view corporations. The consumer simply wants what he/she wants to the lowest possible price while the corporation wants to sell at the highest possible price. And most consumers work for some corporation and it is in his/her interest that that corporation has positive profit margins. And that’s how we all make the world go round.

 

[ZenRaiden]

It doesnt take rocket scientist to realize that the system isnt working as intended. Anarchy, communism, capitalism, monarchy or whatever it all falls within the same problem and that the guy driving the system isnt really competent at all. When you drive the car you have to kind of know how to drive. You have to be sober. You need to know how to perform car maintenece and you sometimes want to upgrade the car, because riding on a old wartburg isnt always the most fastest way to get around the place.

The reason Soviet union never workout was twofold. It started a sort of pygmalion project, but it was more like lunatic trying to convince people that its all good. It doesnt work that way. Talking and propaganda is one thing and doing the thing is another. A lot of politicians have charisma and know how to influnece the crowd, but few actually know how to do what they preach. Frankly if you are too busy lying to people about your competence you probably have very little time to actually do anything woth a shit.

Second problem of Soviet Union was that the problems were really really really really obvious and solutions were kind of obvious too, but they were never ever implemented in any meaningful way, because the leading political parties were not interested in doing so. It simply didnt turn profit for them. Kind of irony in it self. The status of leaders was frankly challenged by these changes and that meant they had to pretend all is fine.

Everyone knows capitalism has so much more potential in theory. We could be building a Mars colony and have cured cancer by now. What is capitalism really doing? Well apart from burning through our limited resources at astounding rates, its really just a soft pillow to sit on, nothing more. There is no goal or end game. There is nothing practical. We arent getting anywhere really. We are just obsessed with building economy. Thats not to say there is no progress, but even Soviet Union was making progress. Its just that you kind of need more than simply capitalizing and consumerism.

Pretty damn sure bunch of geriatrics with onset of dementia arent going to do much good for any nation.

 

[redbaron]

the same reason why anything else is done in a capitalist economy: because it's profitable

people make the mistake of thinking that there's been some kind of error in how we've implemented capitalism, but there is no error. capitalism is working exactly as intended: it benefits those with capital in an exponentially increasing capacity

 

[Kormak]

I agree with ZenRaiden

 

[redbaron]

seems like people are conflating social democracy and capitalism

the kind of ethical conscience and humanitarian concerns that people bring up have nothing to do with capitalism. the interest private entities have in these things is proportionate only to the degree that these things impact on their capital.

moreover, it's not even so much that eroding the person is profitable: there's just no such thing as a "person" (implying individuality) in a truly capitalist system. your worth as a person is equivalent to your worth in capital. everything else is a secondary concern, at best

 

[Kormak]

seems like people are conflating social democracy and capitalism

the kind of ethical conscience and humanitarian concerns that people bring up have nothing to do with capitalism. the interest private entities have in these things is proportionate only to the degree that these things impact on their capital.

moreover, it's not even so much that eroding the person is profitable: there's just no such thing as a "person" (implying individuality) in a truly capitalist system. your worth as a person is equivalent to your worth in capital. everything else is a secondary concern, at best

Its a amoral system as it should be. The actors within the system however do have moral agency. I didn't outright blame capitalism, I blamed the actors operating within it. Often ppl refer to this as "crony capitalism".

For precision's sake and to clarify:
Amoral - lacking a moral sense; unconcerned with the rightness or wrongness of something. Not to be confused with "Immoral".

If I kill someone with a pipe, is the pipe to blame or me?

 

[gilliatt]

Capitalism-Marx slang/negative word for free enterprise. The first question to answer. The rest is immaterial. The basic issue is only: Is man free? In all of history, capitalism is the only system that answers: Yes. It is all about freedom, the recognition of individual rights, a capitalist society relationships are voluntary. Men are free to deal with or not deal with each other.

 

[a_ghost_from_your_past]

Surplus value - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

 

[a_ghost_from_your_past]

Capitalism-Marx slang/negative word for free enterprise. The first question to answer. The rest is immaterial. The basic issue is only: Is man free? In all of history, capitalism is the only system that answers: Yes. It is all about freedom, the recognition of individual rights, a capitalist society relationships are voluntary. Men are free to deal with or not deal with each other.

Do you really believe in all that bullshit?

 

[gilliatt]

Well, capitalism protects our survival. And it is all about human freedom, freedom is the fundamental requirement of man's mind. Why would a person like to go back to the Dark Ages, slave labor, executions without trial, torture chambers, concentration camps, mass slaughter...capitalism abolished all these things in the1900th century. We have to stop destroying reason with all this irrationalism. Stop It!

 

[a_ghost_from_your_past]

Capitalism protects our survival. huh?
I wonder how an economic system that's roughly 300 years old just dragged the human species along before coming into being. Astounding thesis.
Your rough historical revisionist ride about centuries past doesn't help your argument.
Can you explain this dubious and elusive quality of "freedom" to me?
Freedom to own, trade, employ and exploit on the side of the owner and employer and the great liberty to sell labour at a disadvantageous cost for the have not and employee, but what else?

 

[gilliatt]

There is only one issue that is important: Is man free. Under Capitalism man is free, its up to the man, his choice. I find that the majority of the world, people were, is the past, slaves, peasants, and can't get over it!

 

[Ex-User (9086)]

I see it from two angles.

One is that the capitalist-materialist view of everything in existence reduces things, persons and places to two things. Resources and space to hold, process and generate said resources.

If it would be possible to erode the independence, personality or agency of an individual it would help bring said individual to the perfect idealized state a resource can have, it being nothing else but a resource, a thing.

Paradoxically this brings the second angle. Individuals with eroded agency and unable to exercise their freedom perform below average compared to resources fully immersed in the corporate vision and living their consumption-focused life as preordained by the system.

Thus the ideal resource is an individual who willingly gives up their agency and views in favor of the corporate ideals and views of their employer. If their vision is aligned with the corporation they will efficiently help the company with utilizing their labor.

There is only one issue that is important: Is man free. Under Capitalism man is free, its up to the man, his choice. I find that the majority of the world, people were, is the past, slaves, peasants, and can't get over it!

Choice is guided by economic necessity. Modern day laborer on the poverty threshold is no different from a medieval serf. Serfs were free to move around and sell their labor to different lords and so the laborers are free to work for different corporations and receive the same low wage and benefits package wherever they go. That doesn't change the fact that most serfs and most laborers can't ever hope to do anything other than being serfs and laborers struggling to survive.

Man is free to overcome their low market value, become a professional, a skilled worker, businessman, etc. This is both true and false, it holds true as an exception from the norm. This path is limited to individuals of above average conscientiousness and determination, not to mention economic investment necessary to switch careers or train. This also assumes that the individual hoping to escape serfdom is free from obligations such as debt, children, family and is also healthy; did not fall into depression, alcohol, gambling and so on.


Let's briefly entertain the amusing idea that everyone can increase their market value and become a skilled worker, unconditionally.
Firstly the modern economic system collapses as it is based on importing cheaply produced goods and services from poorer countries.
Secondly the earning and resource distribution reverses its proportions from the wealthy world to the poor world. The once wealthy world now receives the same per capita share of wealth as the rest of the world.
Thirdly, I think, we'd see only two classes remaining, the middle class and the wealthy class. The wealthy still control much of the businesses, resources and goods and the middle class works for them.
Finally, it's possible that this increase in knowledge and efficiency of labor would significantly increase the abundance of resources for everyone so that everyone enjoys a net increase in freedom.

 

[sushi]

the worst of capitalism is homeless and failure to provide basic needs, everything comes with a price

rentiers, and interest and bankers are the most parasitic. compound interest without limit only works for the beneift of the lender.
also winners get more and get everything, while losers keep ending up with less.

 

[scorpiomover]

Why do you think that in capitalism it is so important to erode the person?

In the opposite of capitalism, i.e. communism, the collective takes priority over the individual. Thus in communism, it is important to erode the person.

Capitalism relies upon lots of different people buying and selling things because they individually choose to buy & sell those things. Capitalism relies upon placing the individual on a pedestal, giving someone the opportunity to make their own purchases, even when the rest of his family know that he's buying a dud.

I think you are asking why, in your country, it seems to be very important to erode the individual and you are mis-associating that with capitalism.

The answer is simple: whether it's a corporation or government, the people who do the work are the people. Thus, the power of all corporations and governments rests in the proletariat. The power can never leave the proletariat, because if the workers all down tools simultaneously, everything stops. Thus, any system that appears to centralise power is the hands of a minority, whether that be in corporations or governments or those who lead social movements, is an illusion.

However, if the people just think rationally, then they will realise that they have all the power. If they have confidence as well, they'll make their own decisions, and then the people will exercise their own power, and corporations and governments will have none.

Therefore, any form of power centralisation requires that the people's reasoning and confidence are eroded, or the power of the minority elite would disappear overnight.