Capitalism V Communism

OutOfBreath wrote:

I say what I say coz I dont trust any revolution,

As I stated earlier, I'm not saying "get behind me".

I am not enslaving you.

The instant any man tells me to work for his purpose instead of my own and is willing to back his words with violence is the instant that man becomes a slavedriver.

Yet you leave it completely outside your society and never lets it have anything to do with how we act, why and so forth. In your case man can still be all that, but you leave it no importance or worthy of mention.

No mention??? The essence of what I'm talking about is exchange. How does one exchange without the social element?

I just dont readily agree with a theory that disregards human social interaction, cooperation and organization

Stop thinking that it disregards it. It does not. Human social interaction, cooperation and organization are intrisic to human existence. But not as intrisic as the concept of self.

ryan198 wrote:

First of all Bill Gates gets most of the money he 'contributes to social security' etc. back through his ownership of Microsoft...tax money has gone from 50 percent to the people/50 percent to corps in the 50s and 60s to 10 percent to the people/90 percent to the corps now (mostly Bill Clinton's fault). Additionally Microsoft requires people to work 80-90-100 hour work weeks which does little to contributing to the betterment of the social fabric of our country. Finally Pearl Jam are similar to microsoft on the levels of power/donation at a smaller scale. The members of the band have, however done things like actually build houses for other people, donate ticket proceeds to charity (this tour), fought corporate corruption (ticketmaster), and actually had a mathmetician figure out how much CO2 they used on a tour and bought an equal amount of rainforest in south america to make up for it. Bill Gates on the other hand has made his living selling microchips, processers, and software packaged not in America, for very cheap. I'm sure you could find similar issues with PJ, but to hail Bill Gates as some sort of humanitarian when his business model has been at the forefront of pushing unfettered corporate capitalism to its most greedy heights is wrong in my opinion.

Read Paulo Freire (1970) Pedagogy of the Opressed and you can see a pretty powerful argument against the rich "doing charity to maintain their power/privilege/interests". It's a quick read too.

I wasn't knocking Pearl Jam. Yes, they donate to charity but so does Gates. It could be said that Pearl Jam explotes a much poorer demographic in selling their goods than Microsoft does. That Pearl Jam truly does make it's money on the backs of the poor. Pearl Jam had the opportunity to be more successful, provide more jobs and they chose not to. Not because they thought roviding jobs was wrong but for selfish (but understandable) reasons. But that's nitpicking and doesn't help the arguement for either side.

angelica wrote:

Someday I hope to be making my money off of the backs of the mentally ill and their loved ones. That's because they will hopefully hear and understand my vision. And if I'm as blessed as I feel I am, they will find some comfort in what I have to offer. They will relate to what I've seen and experienced.

Hopefully, I'll stick to my heart's vision and continue on that path, rather than switch to a wealthier market of the self-actualising--those in the business world, looking to become wealthier. I realise that the self-actualising are generally more financially stable and I might be able to make more money there.

I don't have any problem with this, in fact I think it commendable. I'm so selfish that I know that there are some income related and career decisions that I will not make until my son is finished school. I take a stupid amount of pride in trying to provide a great childhood and growth experience for my kid. I try to off-set some of the guilt through charitable donation and some volunteer work, but realize it would be so much more fulfilling doing something more worth while on a full-time basis even if the income is a quarter of what I get now.

surferdude wrote:

I don't have any problem with this, in fact I think it commendable. I'm so selfish that I know that there are some income related and career decisions that I will not make until my son is finished school. I take a stupid amount of pride in trying to provide a great childhood and growth experience for my kid. I try to off-set some of the guilt through charitable donation and some volunteer work, but realize it would be so much more fulfilling doing something more worth while on a full-time basis even if the income is a quarter of what I get now.

I'm happy to see there are people who care about themselves and their families. It sounds like you've got your priorities right.

Every man is free to use force. You have fists. You have guns. Nature gave them to you with the idea that someday you'd need them. Nature was right. Just like any action, force extends from a man’s purpose which extends from a man’s morality. There are two moralities that define the use of force: the morality of reason (defensive force) and the morality of denial (aggressive force).

Aggressive force is man's physical means of denial. Just as a man may shut off his mind in an effort to deny reality, a man may attack reality in an effort to destroy it.

As I stated earlier, a man who points a loaded gun at you seeks to replace your mind with his gun. He is saying to you: "You will not think and act. I will think and you will act". But that man does not realize that he cannot think for you nor can his gun.

The men of threats count on the following: your fear. They typically desire that you fear the man with the gun.....they fail if you fear nothing. That leaves them with two choices: drop the gun or become a man of violence.

Each man that uses aggressive force shares the same morality specific to his action. However, each has a unique or semi-unique purpose. A rapist may hold you at gunpoint in an attempt to erase your will not to have sex with him. A robber may hold you at gunpoint in attempt to erase your right to your property. A terrorist may hold you at gunpoint in an attempt to erase your ability to live freely.

The greatest number of these men are employed by the government. Every lawmaker, every policeman, every soldier....each man holds a gun because he's willing to inflict pain or death on a human being that will not meet his terms. Until theirs are objective codes of defensive force that dictate the operation of each lawmaker, policeman and soldier, each one who kills is an aggressor.

A government that forces a man to abide by the standards of "the public" rather than his own attempts to negate the will of the very same "public" they refer to. For nearly every person on this board who has used the term "the public" or "society", I'm here to tell you something:

I am part of "the public" and the "society" you refer to. And I am not suicidal.

When you tell me to do something "for the people" at gunpoint, do you not understand I am one of those people? What you're saying is that I have myself at gunpoint. And, as I said, I'm not suicidal.

There are two ways to defend yourself in the face of an aggressor: you may reason with him or you may attack him yourself. The former is a tricky proposition: the very fact that a man tells you that his gun can think for you means that this is not a man that is likely reasoned with. The latter is a dangerous path: defensive violence can quickly turn into the very thing it was meant to reject.

Defensive force is a form of justice. It is a response to the statement: “your mind or your life”. Since one cannot exist without the other, one uses one’s mind to choose the only viable option: the defense of life via the use of the mind. While aggressive force is based on the rejection of reason, defensive force is based on the acceptance of reason.

The purpose of defensive force is the rejection of aggression, not the death of the aggressor. If the defense of your life absolutely requires the death of another, you are just in killing him. However, if only the absolution of your fear requires the death of another, you are a murderer.

I own a gun. Why? To defend myself in the situation where my choice is simple: my life or my mind. My gun is not a tool of fear. It has no purpose in the face of another. It has only the purpose to defend my life, in and only in the event that it is necessary.


Power is the measure of a man’s influence on his purpose, or more simply stated as the measure of his ability relative to his desire. A good farmer who wishes to eat has a significant amount of power over his desire. A woman who defines her perception of her body based on only her standards has a significant amount of power of those who want her to define her perception of her body on their standards.

Power gets a bad rep, for the most part. We all know the saying: power corrupts. While those who espouse it typically have their hearts in the right place, they don’t understand that the corruption happened before the power. The brings us to the important difference between man’s power over his environment and man’s power over other men.

When man deals with his environment, man deals with objective truth. A man must deal with his environment honestly. A man cannot connive water out of a desert. He must find a river. Similarly, when men deal with other men they hold power by accepting reality: reality about Self and Other. A man who seeks to achieve power by the use of guns ignores the will of Others and has little power indeed. The death of Other or the simple refusal of Other destroys the power. Similarly, the man who seeks power by the use of lies ignores the fact that a lie reduces his power: he becomes a slave to his own invented reality and the perception of another to it.

True power over men is achieved by respect. Respect is achieved by merit. Respect binds men to each other over long spans of time and through differences of opinion and purpose.

All forms of power are a two part equation. The first part is the actions of one, the second part is the sanction of the other. This teaches us an important lesson. Those who hold power based on lies or guns only achieve that power when we sanction it. Unlike the power of respect (or the power of love that I won’t really touch on here), the power of guns and lies require your sanction to go against your reason. When a politician tells you that he will do a good job simply because his opponent will not, his power is dependent on your erroneous belief of his flawed logic. When a gunman tells you that his gun will replace your mind, his power is dependent on your erroneous fear of his proposition. When a poster here insults you instead of addressing your argument, his power is dependent on your erroneous lack of indifference to his insults. When a businessman tells you this his product will fulfill your emotional needs, his power is dependant on your erroneous belief in his words. When a priest tells you to sacrifice your life to your death, his power is dependant on your erroneous abdication of reason.

The world I see is the world as it is: a world where power is checked by those whose sanction is required for it. The only difference between that world and the world we experience is the recognition by all of us that our rightful power over men lies in the same place as our power over Nature: in our minds. Rightful power is a power achieved by and sanctioned by reason.

Some people, including many objectivists, would reject my definition. They believe in the right of government to maintain a monopoly on force in order to protect the “Rights” of the people. They fear a monopoly of power being concentrated by corporations, so their solution is to monopolize power within another corporation.

It is not my responsibility to protect your rights, not is it your responsibility to protect mine. It is our responsibility to respect each other’s rights.

So what do we do to protect ourselves from power-seeking corporations? The same way we protect ourselves from power seeking mystics. Reject their presuppositions. Reject their products. Reject their force. Do so as individuals. Do so as groups. But do so as people united in purpose rather than people united in fear or confusion.

Questions?

Abookamongstthemany wrote:

in a democracy the people have the power. when a democracy is truly representative of the people it keeps the interests of the few wealthy elite in check to allow more policy making directed towards benefitting the masses.

In your democracy, you abdicate your power to go against the majority. The very definition of democracy tells you everything you need to know about your power within it: conform, convince, or leave. And you told me once how that power is maintained:

http://forums.pearljam.com/showpost.php?p=3071231&postcount=106

It is the responsibility of everyone in a democracy to remain vigilant and protect the rights so many have fought for throughout the years...

How is that my responsibility? What inherent responsibility do I have to protect anyone's rights but my own?

to keep our rights from being taken out from under us by private investors with the wealth and resources to buy our publically elected representatives, control our media and launch huge PR campaigns filled with 1/2 truths and lies about how good this will all work out for the world.

But that's what the majority want.

The playing field is far from equal so protection is needed.

But you don't demand equality. You only demand majority.

The people suffering most from the effects of these corporations do not buy these products, they have no visable alternatives, and most of those who do buy these products hear nothing about the ramifications of the production of their cheaply produced goods because the media has already been purchased.

First....a corporation or government has no right to invade a nation, destroy its resources, and leave. Unless of course that nation grants the corporation the right to do so. Regardless, pollution is a form of aggressive force and can certainly be met by a just defense.

Second...the media has no obligation to tell you anything. It is not the responsbility of the media to report to you everything that happens in this world. If you value an objective, holistic media, pay for it or start it. This nation, as a whole, consistently rejects objective, holistic media. They want the media, be it Fox News or Alternet to give them conclusions, not facts, hype, not substance, emotion, not reason.

Finally, if you buy a product you sanction that product and the man that produces it. Do not abdicate your responsibility and then complain when another does the same.

farfromglorified wrote:

In your democracy, you abdicate your power to go against the majority. The very definition of democracy tells you everything you need to know about your power within it: conform, convince, or leave. And you told me once how that power is maintained:

http://forums.pearljam.com/showpost.php?p=3071231&postcount=106



How is that my responsibility? What inherent responsibility do I have to protect anyone's rights but my own?



But that's what the majority want.



But you don't demand equality. You only demand majority.



First....a corporation or government has no right to invade a nation, destroy its resources, and leave. Unless of course that nation grants the corporation the right to do so. Regardless, pollution is a form of aggressive force and can certainly be met by a just defense.

Second...the media has no obligation to tell you anything. It is not the responsbility of the media to report to you everything that happens in this world. If you value an objective, holistic media, pay for it or start it. This nation, as a whole, consistently rejects objective, holistic media. They want the media, be it Fox News or Alternet to give them conclusions, not facts, hype, not substance, emotion, not reason.

Finally, if you buy a product you sanction that product and the man that produces it. Do not abdicate your responsibility and then complain when another does the same.

In a true democracy the people will decide what works for them as opposed to the current disaster of the few wealthy elite deciding for them. I demand equal representation from our elected officials...no group of people will ever unanimously agree on anything...so the polices in put in place should reflect the needs of the majority of citizens.

Why do you think the majority reject objective media?

farfromglorified wrote:

http://www.mediabistro.com/tvnewser/original/may06ranker.pdf

No, I'm not questioning the fact that they do, I was wanting to know why you think the reason for it is.

This post addresses the philosophy of both communism and socialism, and puts both under the umbrella of “communism”. The careful reader will recognize that, in practice, communism and socialism have some very notable differences.

Communism is an economic system that holds as its highest standard the needs of men. A man’s need, within most of these systems, is defined by a desire directly related to a man’s survival. Communism prescribes that all men within a society serve the needs of their neighbors, based on their own abilities.

A man within a communistic system has only one fundamental right: to need, creating one fundamental obligation: to serve. He has no fundamental right to live, since his life itself cannot intrinsically serve another’s need. There’s a reason that Marx did not say “From each according to his life, to each according to his need”. Similarly, a man has no right to his own freedom because his inherent obligation to others negates both his will and his choice, the fundamental elements of freedom.

Unfortunately, communists exist in the same objective reality that I described in my earlier post. When I said, “a man cannot contradict reality by his own perception of it,” I aim those words directly at anyone who believes that a need can create a reality. Hunger does not create food. Loneliness cannot create friendship. Orders cannot create freedom. Lust cannot create love. Greed cannot create money.

The needs within a communistic system are met by ability. Ability is man’s capacity for achievement. Achievement presupposes purpose. Purpose presupposes will. Will presupposes choice. Within a capitalistic system, there is no disconnect between a mans choice and his will, a man’s will and his purpose, a man’s purpose and his ability, a man’s ability and his achievement unless the man is unreasonable, meaning his perception is inconsistent with reality. In a communistic system, there can be no connection between a man’s choice and his will. He has no choice, therefore he can have no will. There can be no connection between man’s will and his purpose. He has no will. There can be no connection between a man’s purpose and his achievement: neither is his. The only purpose is the purpose of the commune. The only achievement is measured by the standard of everyone’s need but he who serves it.

How can a system that denies a man’s choice and denies a man’s will make any sense when men obviously have both individual choice and individual wills? Well, I’ll give you a little hint on how to spot a true communist. If Joe McCarthy would have known this, life would have been a lot easier for a lot of his victims. Furthermore, he might have been a little surprised at how close he was to that which he despised. A communist’s view of reality is most threatened by the biggest truth he cannot accept: that each man has a mind of his own and the contents of it are owned only by that man. When a man tells you that the mind is superfluous, communism is his desired end, even if he doesn’t realize it. When a man tells you that the mind is “collective”, communism is his desired end, even if he doesn’t realize it. When a man tells you that “perception is reality”, communism is his desired end, even if he doesn’t realize it. If capitalism is the system of the mind, communism is the system of the anti-mind. And here’s why:

A need has two operative halves: a desire and a fulfillment. No man really needs something that cannot be possibly fulfilled. Hunger presupposes the possibility of food. Love presupposes the possibility of a soul mate (or something like that). Self-esteem presupposes the possibility of achievement. This is not to say that need cannot exist without actually being fulfilled. Obviously many Africans are hungry and go without food. But we all know and they all know that food exists and their hunger says they want it.

Communism’s ultimate failure is created by the erroneous assumption that need creates fulfillment, rather than being subject to it. Rather than accepting the reality that fulfillment is created by the mind, communism expects the needs of some to dictate the abilities of others. How? Somehow! Why? Because we say so! Such a thing, unfortunately, is impossible. Your hunger cannot teach you (or anyone else) how to grow food. Only your mind can grow your food. But communism tells you to ignore your mind, and it seeks to destroy your knowledge of your own reason.

Communism tells you that you are not an end to yourself. You are a means to an end: the fulfillment of another’s need. Each man’s actions belong to everyone but himself. Fulfilling your own needs and desires becomes evil. Fulfilling everyone else’s needs and desires becomes enlightened.

The communist tells me – “you have no right to private property”. Fine, I say. Property is not my end. He can have it all. Now what? How can “the public” own the means of production when they can’t own the knowledge that created it?

The communist tells me – “you need security”. Exactly, I say. The biggest threat to me is the state that enforces the subjective law of another’s “need” with their guns.

The communist tells me – “people before profit”. Precisely, I say. Profit is the payment to people for the product of their minds. The rejection of profit is a rejection of the mind, the rejection of people.

I am not a communist. Here’s what I believe:

-This world is an objective place. I cannot affect that world based on my needs, my whims, or my desires. I can only affect that world based on my thoughts and the actions that stem from them.
-My mind is my greatest gift. I love my life and I desire to live it. My mind is my only means to do so. The man who tells me to ignore my mind tells me to die.
- I am a human being and I am free. You have no ability to force me to think for you. You have no right to force me to act for your happiness at the cost of my own.
- You are a human being and you are free. I have no ability to force you to think for me. I have no right to force you to act for my happiness at the cost of your own.

Questions?

farfromglorified wrote:

As I stated earlier, I'm not saying "get behind me".

Marginal difference, really. Both cases is telling people what to think and/or do. Whether it is getting behind you or getting away from you doesn't do much difference.

No mention??? The essence of what I'm talking about is exchange. How does one exchange without the social element?

Stop thinking that it disregards it. It does not. Human social interaction, cooperation and organization are intrisic to human existence. But not as intrisic as the concept of self.

Yet, as I said, the consideration of interaction never enters your theory apart from economic exchange. You have little or no considerations of what happens when you have many people all pursuing their will, and how they will conflict, create new power constellations, and in the end reproduce class differences, especially without any mediating structures of redistribution. You talk of human interaction, but you don't really deal with it in your theory, you just put it aside. As for self coming before social interaction, I am not sure it is really relevant to put a sharp divide there, as all humans are from birth onwards engaged in social interactions continously, making it hard to see where the difference goes between faculties born with you, and faculties learned and raised by people around you. Hence, your individualist focus falls through for me as insufficient as a complete perspective.

I won't quote the whole force thing, but again make a few comments to it here:

First of all, to you a state is a state. Which is really preposterous. A working democracy does not have the same effect on its citizens as a totalitarian dictatorship. You always start from worst case scenario when it comes to these states. State power can for sure be abused, and is in many cases. But there is a difference of degrees here.

As for the entire gun-to-head analogy favoured by anarchists, fair enough, but I dont see how it really applies to the society where i live. Sorry. Few guns to head and threats of violence to my person here. As for police and soldiers, you really reduce them to non-thinking brutes. Where-as I know that many of them have a conviction to help people, and keep them safe from eachother, aka the monopoly of violence. I find it interesting that you that focus so much on cooperation the moment we talk of private capitalism, fail to see it in regards to a state. In essence, just because something is instilled in you other than you choosing it consciously (which goes for most of your upbringing at least and much more), doesn't mean it is gun-to-head force. Influence, persuasion and facilitating does not equal gunpoint, although they can certainly hold power and make you do one thing over another. Perhaps stop you from doing things you'd like in your mind, but you choose not to because of what others might think for example.

Furthermore, if you view the power wielded by the state as being automatically gun-to-head, then what is the power of a monopoly corporation that have cornered a market (and not necessarily through fair competition) equal to? You put to sharp a distinction between power and state power. The state may have the monopoly on physical violence, sure. But it does not have the monopoly on power, and it is not the sole structure that limit people's freedoms. People limit people's freedoms just as much. Corporations can limit them. Power groups outside of state structure can limit them. I dont necessarily disagree with your analysis of power either, but I think you focus too much of just one aspect of it.

The Weberian power term, which is pretty close to what you say actually, namely that power is the ability for one person or entity to make others act according to his will, even if the others dont necessarily want to. State is not the only powerwielding structure in society. Employers, capitalists, family, traditionally the head of the family and so on. The picture is a lot more complex

And I'll quote the final statements here:

farfromglorified wrote:

Some people, including many objectivists, would reject my definition. They believe in the right of government to maintain a monopoly on force in order to protect the “Rights” of the people. They fear a monopoly of power being concentrated by corporations, so their solution is to monopolize power within another corporation.

The difference between the corporations is that the democratic state is for and by the people, and can be influenced by the people. The other corporation can listen to people, but can just as well choose not to, and people can do nothing about it. I'm a democrat to the bone, so my answer to that would be democracy, really.

It is not my responsibility to protect your rights, not is it your responsibility to protect mine. It is our responsibility to respect each other’s rights.

All of the above, I'd say. It is my responsibility to protect your rights and well-being, and you should in return try to protect mine in the name of reciprocity (although I'd protect yours anyway), and we both have the responsibility to respect each others rights. Dont see the big difference between the two either.

So what do we do to protect ourselves from power-seeking corporations? The same way we protect ourselves from power seeking mystics. Reject their presuppositions. Reject their products. Reject their force. Do so as individuals. Do so as groups. But do so as people united in purpose rather than people united in fear or confusion.

Precisely. Totally agree. But that shouldn't be the only course of action.

I'll come back and comment on communism later.

Peace
Dan