Corporation Socialism

[Will Bouwman]

Guns. Big Honking Guns. And lots and lots of ammo.

Last resort, of course.

Who decides when to use them?

When it comes to mine: me.

What are your chances against "Big Government, Big Media, and Big Business"?

[henry quirk]

Who decides when to use them?

When it comes to mine: me.

What are your chances against "Big Government, Big Media, and Big Business"?

Well, worst case scenario, I won't be shootin' at Big Government, Big Media, and Big Business. I'll be shootin' at flesh & blood agents of Big Government, Big Media, and Big Business. Question is: how many of them have the wherewithal to step up?

Not many, I think. If any did, they'd be leashing upfront instead of roundaboutly.

Understand, I'm talkin' about here, not across the water where you are.

[promethean75]

How many of you have a real reason to be anti-government? What's the worst thing a government ever did to you?

And how many of the roughest and toughest rebels among you would even be able to survive without a government protecting you?

[promethean75]

Notes:

[Immanuel Can]

How many of you have a real reason to be anti-government? What's the worst thing a government ever did to you?

You should pose that question to people in China, or citizens of the former Soviet Union, or Cambodia, or Cuba, or maybe the best would be the citizens of North Korea...

And how many of the roughest and toughest rebels among you would even be able to survive without a government protecting you?

Did you think that somebody here is against ALL government? I don't know any Anarchists here, but maybe there are a few. And maybe they'll have an answer for you.

But there's no reason to suppose this is an all-or-nothing equation. Small government, limited government, democratic government can be quite good, it seems, at least in some ways, and even if flawed: however Big Government is inevitably evil, it seems. So why not opt for something moderate?

[henry quirk]

Did you think that somebody here is against ALL government? I don't know any Anarchists here, but maybe there are a few. And maybe they'll have an answer for you.

Well, from time to time, I have been anarchistic in-forum. I ain't got nuthin' good to say about government or those in government. Mostly though, I'm minarchistic: gimme the smallest, leanest, proxy structure possible, just what's necessary to further and defend individual life, liberty, and property.

Each of us has a natural right — from God — to defend his person, his liberty, and his property. These are the three basic requirements of life, and the preservation of any one of them is completely dependent upon the preservation of the other two. For what are our faculties but the extension of our individuality? And what is property but an extension of our faculties? If every person has the right to defend even by force — his person, his liberty, and his property, then it follows that a group of men have the right to organize and support a common force to protect these rights constantly. Thus the principle of collective right — its reason for existing, its lawfulness — is based on individual right. And the common force that protects this collective right cannot logically have any other purpose or any other mission than that for which it acts as a substitute. Thus, since an individual cannot lawfully use force against the person, liberty, or property of another individual, then the common force — for the same reason — cannot lawfully be used to destroy the person, liberty, or property of individuals or groups. (F. Bastiat)

[Impenitent]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1IDtQH2Wapg

Seems like the more I think I know
The more I find I don't
Every answer opens up so many questions

Anarchy sounds good to me
Then someone asks, "Who'd fix the sewers?"
"Would the rednecks just play king
Of the neighborhood?"


How many liberators
Really want to be dictators
Every theory has its holes
When real life steps in


So how do we feed
And make room for
All the people crowded on our earth
And transfer all that wealth
From the rich to those who need it


Where Do Ya Draw the Line
Where Do Ya Draw the Line
I'm not telling you
I'm asking you


Ever notice hard line radicals
Can go on star trips too
Where no one's pure and right
Except themselves


"I'm cleansed of the system."
('Cept when my amp needs electric power)
Or - "The Party Line says no.
Feminists can't wear fishnets."


You wanna help stop war?
Well, we reject your application
You crack too many jokes
And you eat meat


What better way to turn people off
Than to twist ideas for change
Into one more church
That forgets we're all human beings
Where do ya draw the line


In Toronto someone blew up
A cruise missile warhead plant
10 slightly hurt, 4 million dollars damage


Why not destroy private property
When it's used against you and me
Is that violence
- Or self-defense
You tell me


Where Do Ya Draw the Line
I'm not telling you, I'm asking you
Where Do Ya Draw the Line
I'm not telling you, I'm asking you
Where Do Ya Draw the Line?

Dead Kennedys

-Imp

[henry quirk]

There's no catch-all solution. Some want the minimum, others the maximum, and others sumthin' in-between.

Centralized, distributed, high-regs, low-regs, democracy, bloodlines, natural rights, human rights, social, corporate, national, local, and on and on and on and...

There's a strain and a stripe caterin' to any- and every-one.

Whatever you want, it's out there in a book, essay, or manifesto.

And every heaven for one is hell for another.

So we contest and contend and compete, lookn' to get a leg over or for a sweet spot.

Same as it always was and same as it always will be: spicy.

[Immanuel Can]

There's no catch-all solution. Some want the minimum, others the maximum, and others sumthin' in-between.

Centralized, distributed, high-regs, low-regs, democracy, bloodlines, natural rights, human rights, social, corporate, national, local, and on and on and on and...

There's a strain and a stripe caterin' to any- and every-one.

Whatever you want, it's out there in a book, essay, or manifesto.

And every heaven for one is hell for another.

So we contest and contend and compete, lookn' to get a leg over or for a sweet spot.

Same as it always was and same as it always will be: spicy.

Well, here, the question is simpler than having to solve all the problems of governance. What I'd like to know is if any Socialists know that "the Bigs" are able to leverage Socialism to do their dirty work for them...or whether their heads are in the sand. That's all.

And so far, it sounds like not a one of them has a clue. And if that's the case, then there's nothing keeping from Socialism = The Triumph of Big Business over the Proles.

[henry quirk]

And so far, it sounds like not a one of them has a clue.

Oh, I imagine any who would answer would swear on a stack of Bibles they don't believe in that any socialism that could he subverted in that way isn't real socialism. Cuz, you know, real socialism, pure socialism, that there was handed down from on high (somewhere in London, in 1848).

But, mebbe, they'd declare that as proto and not socialism in its most evolved form.

Anyway: there are would-be members of the politburo all over this place. Some brave neomarxian will, I'm sure, step up eventually.

[promethean75]

Back in the feudalism days, folks thought mecantilism and capitalism were fairy tales. See how that turned out?

[Immanuel Can]

Back in the feudalism days, folks thought mecantilism and capitalism were fairy tales. See how that turned out?

If you check, you'll find that "Capitalism" was a word and concept entirely invented about the time of Marx...not, so far as we can tell, by Marx himself, but quickly adopted by him. Before that, people just called it "trade," or "commerce," or "buying stuff" or "having a market."

So no, they had no opinion of "Capitalism" at all, since it didn't exist.

It's interesting to contrast this with Marxism. Marxism has a founder we can identify (Marx), a source for his ideas (Hegelian dialectics), a manifesto (The Communist Manifesto, and also Das Kapital), an anthropology (man as self-actualizing through praxis), a fake history (including not only "capitalism" but a cartoony view of history as only about "class struggle"), a teleology (the triumph of the proletariat), a political program (Socialism), an economics (theory of surplus value), a whole set of ethics and demands (such as equalization and state ownership), a Satan (the bourgeoisie)...it's a total worldview, a package that's supposed to framework the entirety of live and explain its particular meaning. It has its own orthodoxy. It's an indoctrination, pure and simple.

And it's one that history between the 19th and 21st Centuries has demonstrated was actually quite wrongheaded, of course, as we can all see. Even Neo-Marxists have had to dump old Marx, because he was just so off-base. Nothing of what he said was coming about, and he had his anthropology, economics, and the whole dynamics of history wrong.

But "Capitalism"? It never existed before Marx's day, and hasn't existed since. It has no manifesto, no originator, no anthropological theory, no particular historical narrative, no ethics, no teleology, no particular political program, no demands...in other words words, it's nothing like a counterpart of Marxism, and isn't really a belief at all. The most you could say is that it's a collective term coined by a certain kind of Left-leaning brain, one that attempts to catch together in a collective noun a loose set of pragmatic decisions, made by different people with different values and objectives, the only commonality being the generating of some profit from labour, perhaps. And I'm not even sure that description would stick: even that seems too specific to be defensible.

Beyond that, there's not much to say for "Capitalism."

[promethean75]

"If you check, you'll find that "Capitalism" was a word and concept entirely invented about the time of Marx.."

This is embarrassing, Mannie. An apple and an orange are different before and independently of what they are called by language using bi-pedal featherless chickens like us.

In the same way, a wage earner is different from a business owner employer before and independently of what your homeboy Karl called these classes of people.

And, the idea of producing and selling your own goods and buying property with profits made existed when kings distributed land to lords and peasants in exchange for goods, and there was no real currency or banking systems, much less private property or employees being paid wages to work on that private property and produce goods for the owner.

But all that was conceivable and arguably a causal factor in bringing about that revolution at all. The idea comes out of the material relations (Hegel had it backward), relations that must be somehow creating conflict... in turn, stirring up ideas about how to solve these problems.

And right now, in the world, the idea of some alternative economic system to take the place of capitalism has been growing steadily since Marx... even though i highly doubt a genuine marxism will ever be established in a country... forget about the whole globe.

But you got the whole thing wrong. The real differences between capitalism and marxism that aren't just in our heads, and how and why ideas like Marxism come about in history.

That's two minus marks for you, Mannie. Even after two years, you're still just as lost. Are you losing IQ points hanging around Hylomorph Henry too much?

[Immanuel Can]

"If you check, you'll find that "Capitalism" was a word and concept entirely invented about the time of Marx.."

This is embarrassing, Mannie.

To you? It wasn't intended to be, but okay. I assume you looked it up, so you know I'm right.

your homeboy Karl

Not mine. He was probably the most wicked individual in history, if causing the deaths of people counts. He indirectly killed at least 120 million in the last century alone, through Marxist regimes.

And right now, in the world, the idea of some alternative economic system to take the place of capitalism...

Capitalism isn't a thing. It's a Marxist meme. You know that now, I presume.

But you got the whole thing wrong.

So you didn't check? And you're still talking?

That would be embarassing, alright.

[Age]

Did you think that somebody here is against ALL government? I don't know any Anarchists here, but maybe there are a few. And maybe they'll have an answer for you.

Well, from time to time, I have been anarchistic in-forum. I ain't got nuthin' good to say about government or those in government. Mostly though, I'm minarchistic: gimme the smallest, leanest, proxy structure possible, just what's necessary to further and defend individual life, liberty, and property.

Each of us has a natural right — from God — to defend his person, his liberty, and his property. These are the three basic requirements of life, and the preservation of any one of them is completely dependent upon the preservation of the other two. For what are our faculties but the extension of our individuality? And what is property but an extension of our faculties? If every person has the right to defend even by force — his person, his liberty, and his property, then it follows that a group of men have the right to organize and support a common force to protect these rights constantly. Thus the principle of collective right — its reason for existing, its lawfulness — is based on individual right. And the common force that protects this collective right cannot logically have any other purpose or any other mission than that for which it acts as a substitute. Thus, since an individual cannot lawfully use force against the person, liberty, or property of another individual, then the common force — for the same reason — cannot lawfully be used to destroy the person, liberty, or property of individuals or groups. (F. Bastiat)

Are you, STILL, 'trying to' SPREAD this ABSOLUTELY OBVIOUS CONTRADICTION?