At what point did Socialists become something to rant about?

K-9 · 20-03-2012 3:13pm

af_thefragile wrote: »

So a capitalist society is totalitarian, racist/sexist/bigot and only serves 1% of the population.

Says the person who owns an iphone, drives a car, uses a computer, wears nice cloths and all the big and small things that are a result of a capitalist economy.

All probably made in the Far East because it's cheaper, more profit for the Capitalists and most importantly, cheap labour.

Princess Consuela Bananahammock · 20-03-2012 3:17pm

K-9 wrote: »

The other side is the near zealot belief that the market is always right and any Government intervention should be small, markets would by and large regulate themselves and would discourage bubbles., somehow!

if they were responsible enough, yes, but when one's first instinct is to screw everybody in fvour of yourself, you can not then turn around and crticise societal evils.

Eric Cartman wrote: »

We live in an enlightened age of information, people have seen how mass socialism creates a bloated oublic sector, bails out banks, raises taxes , keeps everyone poor and allows mass immigration all in the name of 'equality' so its about time people stood up and looked for a better system , like capitalism.

Where has mass socialism ever been practiced in the enlightened age of information??

We've been down this road. Do you want what's best for you or what;s best for society? Because they general contradcit each other. And the problems with your argument have been pointed out i differetn threads. Bascially, that in an unequal capitalist society that you propose, the weak will be exploited, rebel en masse and where does that leave us.

af_thefragile wrote: »

So a capitalist society is totalitarian, racist/sexist/bigot and only serves 1% of the population.

Lose the "totalitarian" bit and you've got it.

Says the person who owns an iphone, drives a car, uses a computer, wears nice cloths and all the big and small things that are a result of a capitalist economy.

I know what wasn't meant for me, but I only fit into one of those criteria.

KyussBishop · 20-03-2012 3:19pm

Chuck Stone wrote: »

There will always always be people who will feel commit fraud for personal gain. Look at Bernie Madoff (rest of life in prison and a son in the grave). There's no amount of potential punishment that will stop that type of person.

Ok agreed on this point; so it can be agreed, that in the unregulated free market system you propose, it is inevitable that a bank will at some stage be subject to fraud or gross mismanagement, and it will collapse, losing all (or most) of its customers money.

The customer has no way to inform himself of the risks (as banks would not be transparent about their practices), and no matter what bank that person chooses in the market, he is taking a gamble (as there is no way to determine which is less riskier than another).

Those customers will either have their lives destroyed, or will effectively lose many years from their lives due to time spent earning the lost money.

That seems inherently unfair to me, and not acceptable; it is something than can only be prevented with enforced transparency, and some amount of regulation.

What are the negative aspects of regulation which can in any way come close to making things worse than the above situation?

For the sake of argument (so we don't get into an absolute "all or nothing" discussion regarding regulation), lets restrict this proposed regulation to the absolute minimum amount required to prevent this kind of fraud/embezzlement or mismanagement of customers money.

Doc Ruby · 20-03-2012 3:19pm

K-9 wrote: »

All probably made in the Far East because it's cheaper, more profit for the Capitalists and most importantly, cheap labour.

As a direct result of which hundreds of millions of people in China are lifting themselves out of poverty and looking forward to a better life. And when they get sufficiently comfortable they'll want the products of other countries at a low cost, and so on.

Its not perfect and can be abused, but so can anything.

Sergeant · 20-03-2012 3:20pm

pawnacide wrote: »

Hmmm .. iphones and cars are the result of a capitalist society .. strange definition of capitalism you have.

If they are not the result of a capitalist society then can you enlighten us as to what they are a result of?

K-9 wrote: »

All probably made in the Far East because it's cheaper, more profit for the Capitalists and most importantly, cheap labour.

Would we rather we didn't use cheap labour in the Far East at all? How would that improve their lot?

K-9 · 20-03-2012 3:27pm

Doc Ruby wrote: »

As a direct result of which hundreds of millions of people in China are lifting themselves out of poverty and looking forward to a better life. And when they get sufficiently comfortable they'll want the products of other countries at a low cost, and so on.

Its not perfect and can be abused, but so can anything.

It's debatable how many are lifting themselves out of poverty, disposable incomes are dropping in China, though largely due to bail outs of their property bubble.

Sergeant wrote: »

Would we rather we didn't use cheap labour in the Far East at all? How would that improve their lot?

I'd prefer it it wasn't for the likes of Nike or cheap chickens! I do understand your point and it's linked to consumerism and getting everything at as cheap a price as possible. The ideal of Globalism and a consumerist society were the iPod is the most stolen item in the riots.

benway · 20-03-2012 3:31pm

44leto wrote: »

We need more capitalism in this country not less and we all should be grateful for the system that made Ireland one of the wealthiest countries in the world.

LOL'd so hard at this, throwing in the bitta Alan Morris at the end was a masterstroke. Comedy gold.

K-9 wrote: »

The idea is that regulation is needed to ensure they don't get too big but with the endless pursuit of profit and the days of globalism I don't know if that concept can work any more.

I think regulation is about more than letting businesses get too big to fail, there's also the dogma that competition is A Good Thing, and that monopolies are A Bad Thing. Which won't do too much to prevent abusive practices within particular sectors - for me, regulation is about setting a counterbalance to the raw greed of the corporate sector. Not saying that as a pejorative, it's just a reflection of the fact that the profit motive is the sole driving force in business.

Chuck Stone wrote: »

There was nothing even approaching free market capitalism being practised. There would be no such thing as central banks, state granted corporations and limited liability in a truly free market from what I've learned about it.

Is there any real evidence that such a system could ever work in practice? For me, it's as much of a pie-in-the-sky utopian ideal as anything that ever came out of the looney left.

I mean, it's only failed every single time it's ever been implemented, even in a very limited form. Without exception, that I'm aware of.

It's absolutely clear in my mind that what we're going through is the consequence of a failure of neoliberal, free market ideology. The way it worked was that the state stepped away - free movement of capital, light touch regulation, etc. - having been assured by the ideologues of The Markets that everything would be much more efficient, and generally better. Only to step back in when the thing overheated and and threatened to burst.

Chuck Stone wrote: »

There will always be gangsters. A libertarian would argue why give them the use of the state to get their way; see, Goldman Sachs et al.

Personally, I see the state as an invaluable bulwark against unrestrained corporate and gangster power. For all its failings, at least there's nominal accountability - without a robust state, what will we have other than a neo-feudal arrangement of corporate fiefdoms. Why do you think the likes of AJF O'Reilly are so keen on pushing the small state agenda?

Many libertarians don't seem to grasp is the kind of chaos that would likely have been unleashed had the banks been allowed to fail. From people losing their life savings or being unable to withdraw cash, through to the food riots, looting and starvation that would undoubtedly have occurred as a result, to the bank liquidators selling houses out from under people to pay back secured bondholders, a new underclass of dispossessed, homeless and destitute ... bad and all as things are now, they would be much worse had capitalism been allowed to run its course. I mean, Dark Ages worse.

Yes, big business held a metaphorical gun to the heads of governments around the world, but given the alternative, I would nearly think it'd be worthwhile if we can get another two generations of a balanced, mixed economy, markets in their place, but regulated, redistribution and social consciousness in its place.

The problem is that people don't seem to have picked up on the lessons of this - I find it shocking that people are still clinging on to Market ideology as if it's The Answer. I don't think the phrase "cognitive dissonance" was even in my repertoire five years ago, now it seems that I can't go a day without using it. It's like taking a patient with a prognosis of acute snake-oil poisoning, and prescribing another couple of gallons of snake oil.

Is "let the will of The Markets be done" good enough as a response? I mean, we may not have to pay the bondholders out of the public purse, we'd just have to watch as the country goes all Mad Max on us.

Not meaning to pigeonhole your views or anything, btw, I have no idea what you think about these things, not specifically addressing this to you ... but hey, it's the internet ....

af_thefragile · 20-03-2012 3:43pm

pawnacide wrote: »

Yep, pretty much .. America seems to fit the bill . wouldn't you say ?

Maybe to a small extent. But there are many other reasons for why things are the way they are in America and Capitalism isn't one of them.

A proper Capitalist society would be a free for all society. America isn't that.

America has a long history of oppression of the Blacks and other ethnic minorities. That has nothing to do with it being a capitalist society but more to do with the social thinking of the 19th and 20th century where they believed whites ("Nordic") were the superior race and all others were sub-human hence it was justified to oppress them. This wasn't just confined to American thinking but was widespread throughout the world. Its just because America had a very large population of Blacks and other ethnic minorities, the result of this thinking had big lasting effects in USA. South Africa is another country that suffered greatly because of this thinking.

Nothing to do with capitalism but more to do with Social Darwinist thinking.

Second reason why america is the way it is because it has a strong influence of the Evangelical Church, especially in the southern states. The thinking of these people led to all the racism, sexism and bigotry that's prevalent in the country.

Third reason is because of the Financial system which has merged with the political system in the form of the Federal Reserve. The way the financial system has been designed, it works by exploiting the population. That is a whole different topic and it is one of the main reason why the world is in such an economic mess. Again, nothing to do with capitalism.

You'll find the only true Capitalist politician in America, Ron Paul, is the only politician in America who talks about freedom and equality for all. He talks about ending the war, having friendly discussions with Iran and other countries rather than antagonising them. Ending the Federal Reserve and the ridiculous financial system which is root of all the economic mess. That's what capitalism stands for. Supporting people's personal freedom so they can do what they wish to without the state interfering with their personal matters as long as they are responsible people and its about giving every person the opportunity to contribute to the nation by gathering capital and investing them into a business venture which can contribute to the society and in return the person can generate more capital from it and live the kind of life they want to.

Bottom line, its the financial system, not capitalism that is the main problem here. The current financial system is completely exploitative and if it was an individual person rather than a bank which would be engaging in the practices the banks do, that person would be jailed for committing fraud. But because its the banks and the state seems to depend upon them, they let the banks do whatever they want!

Sergeant · 20-03-2012 3:44pm

benway wrote: »

It's absolutely clear in my mind that what we're going through is the consequence of a failure of neoliberal, free market ideology. The way it worked was that the state stepped away - free movement of capital, light touch regulation, etc. - having been assured by the ideologues of The Markets that everything would be much more efficient, and generally better. Only to step back in when the thing overheated and and threatened to burst.

It was the ECB that set historically low interest rates, it was European governments who invested in massive state spending programmes based on cheap money and revenue from property taxes. It was European governments who ran massive deficits and let their 'business' become financial basket cases. In the case of Ireland, it was the government who brought in mortgage relief, 25 different tax breaks for building shítty quality housing and hotels in areas people don't want to live in, and done everything in their power to keep the system afloat. They interfered in every aspect of the economy.

pawnacide · 20-03-2012 3:45pm

As I see it modern day capitalism is based on the assumption that the accumulation of wealth is good in and of itself and places no social obligations on those who have it. The only interference from government that a capitalist system seems to condone is the enforcement of it's policies on citizens through laws and sometimes through force. I would've thought totalitarianism is the logical outcome of a truly capitalist system.

I for one would like the corporations who control our lives to have a social conscience but don't see how they can as they are responsible to investors and not the public. Surely, therefore, it is in all our interests that law makers ensure they are responsible to the citizens and not just the vested interests. If this is too 'lefty' a view so be it but it's hardly communism now is it?

af_thefragile · 20-03-2012 3:46pm

Ikky Poo2 wrote: »

I know what wasn't meant for me, but I only fit into one of those criteria.

So you live in council housing, use a wood burning stove, have never seen what a fridge or a washing machine looks like, have never had the pleasure of watching TV, use the postal service to communicate with other people and have no idea what a computer does?

RichieC · 20-03-2012 3:49pm

Bipolar Joe wrote: »

I've just noticed this lately. It's like Americans blathering on about Communists. When the Hell did this happen?

In america it's a shadow left on their brains from the red scare and McCarty era. Back then you got black listed if you so much as attended a socialist or workers party meeting in college. They had hyped Communism so much that most Americans quite literally thought it was a communicable disease spreading through the world. Propaganda like that from the most powerful nation on earth is bound to spread around a little. Fact is, most of the folk on here I would count as nuright probably haven't the foggiest idea what Socialism is or its relationship with communism. It's a herd mentality.

Channel Zero · 20-03-2012 3:56pm

af_thefragile wrote: »

Ron Paul, is the only politician in America who talks about freedom and equality for all.

Link please. (to where Ron Paul talks about equality for all)

pawnacide · 20-03-2012 3:57pm

af_thefragile wrote: »

You'll find the only true Capitalist politician in America, Ron Paul, is the only politician in America who talks about freedom and equality for all. He talks about ending the war, having friendly discussions with Iran and other countries rather than antagonising them. Ending the Federal Reserve and the ridiculous financial system which is root of all the economic mess. That's what capitalism stands for. Supporting people's personal freedom so they can do what they wish to without the state interfering with their personal matters as long as they are responsible people and its about giving every person the opportunity to contribute to the nation by gathering capital and investing them into a business venture which can contribute to the society and in return the person can generate more capital from it and live the kind of life they want to.

This sounds suspiciously like the great fallacy that is 'The American Dream'. The idea that everyone has equal opportunity and is usually espoused by those who have risen on the backs of others by being willing to be more ruthless than others. What does your utopian 'Capitalist' society do with the sick and mentally ill. How does it deal with the less intelligent.

Apart from the basic economics .. if you created a society where everyone was rich there'd be mass inflation .. there's a million and one reasons a capitalist society is all about the few at the expense of the many and could never be any other way.

af_thefragile · 20-03-2012 3:58pm

K-9 wrote: »

All probably made in the Far East because it's cheaper, more profit for the Capitalists and most importantly, cheap labour.

And yet you enhance your life with these things.
Some hypocrites you guys are!

I do not support exploitation of exploitation of labour but at the same time I do not undermine capitalism's contribution to society. If it wasn't for entrepreneurs willing to set up businesses and competition driving innovation, we wouldn't have half the things we do in the world right now. Why has society made such massive progress over just a single century?

pawnacide wrote: »

Hmmm .. iphones and cars are the result of a capitalist society .. strange definition of capitalism you have.

So where else did iphone and cars come from?
I don't see any good state owned corporation that builds good phones and cars. Most of the phones and cars are built by private corporations.
Isn't that what capitalism is?

Or is it only called capitalism when there are poor people in China and Indonesia working 16hrs a day to stitch together t-shirts and shoes for less than a dollar a day? Because thinking that's what capitalism is akin to thinking socialism is living in Soviet Russia working 16hrs a day in Siberian salt mines in -30c temperatures as slave labour.

af_thefragile · 20-03-2012 4:03pm

pawnacide wrote: »

This sounds suspiciously like the great fallacy that is 'The American Dream'. The idea that everyone has equal opportunity and is usually espoused by those who have risen on the backs of others by being willing to be more ruthless than others. What does your utopian 'Capitalist' society do with the sick and mentally ill. How does it deal with the less intelligent.

Apart from the basic economics .. if you created a society where everyone was rich there'd be mass inflation .. there's a million and one reasons a capitalist society is all about the few at the expense of the many and could never be any other way.

Inflation is the result of the financial system.

Well, the American Dream seems to have worked for the millions of American who live a more comfortable life than 90% of the world's population.

Why do ye all like to portray USA as a 3rd world country similar to Somalia and yet flock to there for holiday and spend thousands in massive shopping sprees?

Again, more socialist hypocrisy! If you really dislike the American capitalist system so much then why do you use american capitalist goods and go there for holidays or to find work?

RichieC · 20-03-2012 4:07pm

pawnacide wrote: »

This sounds suspiciously like the great fallacy that is 'The American Dream'. The idea that everyone has equal opportunity and is usually espoused by those who have risen on the backs of others by being willing to be more ruthless than others. What does your utopian 'Capitalist' society do with the sick and mentally ill. How does it deal with the less intelligent.

Apart from the basic economics .. if you created a society where everyone was rich there'd be mass inflation .. there's a million and one reasons a capitalist society is all about the few at the expense of the many and could never be any other way.

It's called the American Dream because you have to be ****ing asleep to believe it! - G Carling

K-9 · 20-03-2012 4:08pm

af_thefragile wrote: »

And yet you enhance your life with these things.
Some hypocrites you guys are!

I do not support exploitation of exploitation of labour but at the same time I do not undermine capitalism's contribution to society. If it wasn't for entrepreneurs willing to set up businesses and competition driving innovation, we wouldn't have half the things we do in the world right now. Why has society made such massive progress over just a single century?

You must have missed my post:

I'd prefer it it wasn't for the likes of Nike or cheap chickens! I do understand your point and it's linked to consumerism and getting everything at as cheap a price as possible. The ideal of Globalism and a consumerist society were the iPod is the most stolen item in the riots.

Obviously innovation has brought immense benefits, I'd say the ardent pursuit of profit and using the American dream and Globalism as tools, has its down sides as well and most of it can't be blamed on big Government and regulation.

czx · 20-03-2012 4:09pm

The ULA got less than 3% of the vote in the general election. Speaks for itself really.

benway · 20-03-2012 4:10pm

Sergeant wrote: »

It was the ECB that set historically low interest rates, it was European governments who invested in massive state spending programmes based on cheap money and revenue from property taxes. It was European governments who ran massive deficits and let their 'business' become financial basket cases. In the case of Ireland, it was the government who brought in mortgage relief, 25 different tax breaks for building shítty quality housing and hotels in areas people don't want to live in, and done everything in their power to keep the system afloat. They interfered in every aspect of the economy.

We probably could have muddled our way out of the deficit, if the banking sector hadn't collapsed. The banking sector collapsed because of reckless lending, which in turn was caused by deregulation allowing for the creation of fairydust financial "products" such as collateralized debt obligations, based on their lendings.

The rush to give out mortgages was primarily caused not by demand, or by the ECB, although both contributed, but by the fact that these mortgages had already been packaged and re-sold as investments, often before they were even signed.

There is simply no way that this can be characterised this as a failure of the state, or as a result of state meddling in the economy. It's a private sector disaster, pure and simple. Not saying that the state is blameless, of course - the financial services sector should never have been allowed such freedom.

czx · 20-03-2012 4:11pm

RichieC wrote: »

It's called the American Dream because you have to be ****ing asleep to believe it! - G Carling

Beats a Soviet nightmare everytime

Princess Consuela Bananahammock · 20-03-2012 4:12pm

af_thefragile wrote: »

Maybe to a small extent. But there are many other reasons for why things are the way they are in America and Capitalism isn't one of them.

It is the main one though, let's be honest.

af_thefragile wrote: »

So you live in council housing, use a wood burning stove, have never seen what a fridge or a washing machine looks like, have never had the pleasure of watching TV, use the postal service to communicate with other people and have no idea what a computer does?

For ****'s sake, I said I didn;t own most of things you mentioned in your previous post. I never said I was Amish.

RichieC · 20-03-2012 4:16pm

czx wrote: »

Beats a Soviet nightmare everytime

Don't know how to break this to you, but the soviet union collapsed man... it's gone!

AskMyChocolate · 20-03-2012 4:19pm

pawnacide wrote: »

Hmmm .. iphones and cars are the result of a capitalist society .. strange definition of capitalism you have.

Sergeant wrote: »

If they are not the result of a capitalist society then can you enlighten us as to what they are a result of?

Would we rather we didn't use cheap labour in the Far East at all? How would that improve their lot?

They are a result of state-sponsored industry and R&D. i.e. the military (as is modern commercial travel,IT, and communications technology)

To be fair there has been a lot of enhancements made by private industry. But whether public or private, it has been industry that has produced these things not either right wing or left wing ideology.

The majority of innovative technology that we rely on today to enhance our lives has been state sponsored especially satellite/technology, IT. And was mainly produced for the military.

secretambition · 20-03-2012 4:22pm

benway wrote: »

There is simply no way that this can be characterised this as a failure of the state, or as a result of state meddling in the economy. It's a private sector disaster, pure and simple. Not saying that the state is blameless, of course - the financial services sector should never have been allowed such freedom.

It was primarily a state failure. It was the decision to bail out the banks that burdened the taxpayer with private sector debt. Anyone adhering properly to the principles of capitalism would have let them fail, or at most picked a couple of strategic banks such as AIB and BOI to support while definitely letting Anglo go. I would go along with the idea that better regulation would have helped, but even without strict regulation, it did not have to be this bad.

czx · 20-03-2012 4:22pm

RichieC wrote: »

Don't know how to break this to you, but the soviet union collapsed man... it's gone!

Thanks maaaaan

pawnacide · 20-03-2012 4:24pm

af_thefragile wrote: »

Inflation is the result of the financial system.

Well, the American Dream seems to have worked for the millions of American who live a more comfortable life than 90% of the world's population.

Why do ye all like to portray USA as a 3rd world country similar to Somalia and yet flock to there for holiday and spend thousands in massive shopping sprees?

Again, more socialist hypocrisy! If you really dislike the American capitalist system so much then why do you use american capitalist goods and go there for holidays or to find work?

I'm guessing you consider yourself middle class. I find it strange that the middle classes so often defend capitalism, I can only assume it's a result of the fear of loss that those at the top of the Capitalist tree like to instill in them.
Loss of income, loss of homes, loss of lifestyle. In a capitalist society the middle classes are the most exploited income group of all. They pay and consume the most while receiving the least. The advertising world has them down to T. Watch the prime time adds on t.v sometime there'll all directed at the middle classes.

A properly managed egalitarian system gives far more back than any capitalist system could. I've said it before and I'll say it again a Capitalist system cannot have the public interest at its heart and therefore needs to be policed .. simples.

BTW I think you're arguing with yourself coz I haven't mentioned socialism

af_thefragile · 20-03-2012 4:25pm

K-9 wrote: »

Obviously innovation has brought immense benefits, I'd say the ardent pursuit of profit and using the American dream and Globalism as tools, has its down sides as well and most of it can't be blamed on big Government and regulation.

Its naive to blame capitalism for that. There are many many more factors that have led to this and its these same factors that will also corrupt a socialist and any other system there is.

The capitalism described by Adam Smith is completely different from this mutated form of capitalism we have today.

Freedom comes with responsibility and this responsibility comes from morality.

The problem arises when morality is many times ignored from teaching. When university students studying economic and business studies are taught and encouraged to come up with new forms of exploiting people, there is no doubt these same university students then graduate, go to work in wall street and big corporations and use what they've learnt in university to exploit the system and the population. These are the people who then go to work in banks and come up with new investment funds which are morally fraudulent but they use their university education to fool people with and exploit them for their own gains. While others find more ways to spread their business to new 3rd world countries and use political influence to exploit foreign labour.

The government is just as involved in this than are the corporation. This video explains it really well:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n7Fzm1hEiDQ

Without the government, this really wouldn't be possible.

This is not capitalism. This is like mob rule. This is what Ron Paul wants to end.

benway · 20-03-2012 4:26pm

af_thefragile wrote: »

If it wasn't for entrepreneurs willing to set up businesses and competition driving innovation, we wouldn't have half the things we do in the world right now. Why has society made such massive progress over just a single century?

Because a tipping point in technology was reached towards the end of the 19th century. More fundamentally, "businesses and competition" haven't driven innovation nearly as far as US state subsidies in the guise of military spending did - most of our high tech gadgets owe their existence to this. The internet is a good example.

And this "you can't have an iPhone and take a critical view of capitalism" line is weak, weak, weak. Must try harder.

tony007 · 20-03-2012 4:27pm

czx wrote: »

Beats a Soviet nightmare everytime

It doesn't have to be one or the other. The Soviet Union wasn't socialist.

At what point did Socialists become something to rant about?

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