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I think a lot of it is the disconnect that happens when you’ve been well taken care of all your life. If you had to work in school, and then apply for jobs, and then had to show up and do the work, but it was all pretty much straightforward and fair, then it’s easy to think that if someone doesn’t have enough money to live they probably just aren’t doing those easy life things and it’s their fault and nothing needs to change.
If you’ve had experience on the unfair side, it looks totally different.
Yeah this is true, but also money is made up? Like all animals just go in and eat food, and they will regularly do so on farms, but only humans get punished for it. Humans get kept away from food which they need to survive for purely social reasons.
Like imagine an alien looking down on us and for them money is totally arbitrary and they’re all "wait what are those humans even doing? Like there’s food right there and they are stopping the hungry humans from eating it, but they don’t seem to mind as much when it’s other animals…
So for me, the really screwed up thing about statements about money is that a bunch of people have just… forgotten? that money is made up? Like the old statement “people can sooner imagine the end of the world than the end of capitalism”.
Well, but, there’s a reason societies that made up money did better than societies that didn’t. I do actually think there’s a perfectly valid point on the “other side,” that it’s not a good thing for society if people can just sit around and expect others to take care of everything for them food and shelter wise. There’s an inherent justice in the concept that if the economic conditions are such that you can get decently-rewarding useful work and make a living at it if you decide to, you can kind of assume that if someone’s struggling financially it’s their own fault. Because that does happen sometimes.
But that’s not at all the current economic climate. A lot of the rich people don’t really do that much useful, if anything. A lot of the poor people work their asses off and they’re still struggling for basic necessities. As technology’s gotten more capable, what we should have done is make sure that the opportunities that are available are aligned with work that still really needs to happen: Science, art, working on important problems. The stuff that can’t be automated – construction, transport, a lot of physical jobs – should pay well and wind up being a realistic way to ensure a good life and good retirement once you can’t do it any more. Basically, the world should have justice; to me I don’t think that should mean necessarily an escape from the “you gotta have a job” system, because (a) I don’t think that’s good for you, if the job that you’re replacing “nothing” with is a good one (b) automation or no we’re sure as shit not yet at a point where all the important things that need to get solved or worked on are solved.
Instead of doing all that, we just built a more efficient system for exploiting and grinding people down, committed ourselves to making the biosphere unlivable in 50 or 100 years, and worked hard on putting up systems to make it difficult for any of that system to change.
Hooray
Well, but, there’s a reason societies that made up money did better than societies that didn’t
I’m just wondering what societies you are historically speaking about since there’s no sources for me to follow. Are we talking about native populations that were colonized? Competing societies that were conquered by warring neighbor states? What’s your definition of “did better”? If they had more military and slave labor forces due to economical conditions in which to destroy the other societies, I wouldn’t consider that a better outcome.
The rest of the statement is the same as it was back in historical context, “A lot of the rich people don’t really do that much useful, if anything. A lot of the poor people work their asses off and they’re still struggling for basic necessities.” That statement could’ve came from any century. I think you’ve put a capitalistic economic structure up on a pedestal. Would you say “plastics” are better for our society and environment since it’s dominating our lives? Disease and plagues are superior since our industry produces those side-effects? Cancer must be a positive because our society is leading to higher exposure of contaminants in which it can develop.
Nevermind, after re-reading your comment I realize you may just be confused on which “side” you are on.
There’s an inherent justice…you can kind of assume that if someone’s struggling financially it’s their own fault. Because that does happen sometimes.
Doesn’t matter that you put a competing statement in “italics”. The very simple picture is very simple and your comment further demonstrates we rationalize ourselves into inhumanity and derangement. I really don’t care if it’s their fault or the pope’s fault. Donate to your local food banks or food-drive event kids. That old can of beef stew you don’t even look at anymore can keep someone warm and alive for the night.
I’m just wondering what societies you are historically speaking about since there’s no sources for me to follow. Are we talking about native populations that were colonized? Competing societies that were conquered by warring neighbor states? What’s your definition of “did better”? If they had more military and slave labor forces due to economical conditions in which to destroy the other societies, I wouldn’t consider that a better outcome.
Spoken like someone who’s never had another society come and destroy the society where they make their home. A society that’s strong enough to defend itself is, in my opinion, better than one that’s not.
Part of the thing is that I do think that it’s possible to do both. You can have a just and democratic society, you can have socialist economy, and definitely you can have economic justice, and you can still be organized and effective enough to defend yourself against outside threats. It’s not just a choice of being Nazis or helpless farmers. But I do think it’s fair to say that a society that structures itself around large scale non-employment won’t be able to perpetuate itself in the modern world. I’m not saying that as a good or bad thing, just the geopolitical reality. You can disagree of course. I’m completely open to it if you want to make an argument for a particular more-equitable society and how it can survive, but I think you gotta be the one to explain how it’s going to survive if you want to say it’s “better.”
I think you’ve put a capitalistic economic structure up on a pedestal.
Not at all. There’s a difference between “this is what I think can survive” and “this is what I like.”
Would you say “plastics” are better for our society and environment since it’s dominating our lives? Disease and plagues are superior since our industry produces those side-effects? Cancer must be a positive because our society is leading to higher exposure of contaminants in which it can develop.
I think societies that live are better than ones that don’t. That doesn’t mean anything, pollution or crime or etc, that happens in the world is automatically good.
In fact, the impending destruction of the biosphere in a form that can sustain the current human population is one of the main indictments of capitalism. “You guys say you’ve got it all worked out, but it seems like you’re not gonna be around in 100 years based on what you’re doing to the planet right now.” To me that kind of logical argument is fine. I don’t think it’s unreasonable of me to say that you need to look at how things play out in the real world though, whether they be capitalism’s strengths or its undoing flaws. Surely that’s a reasonable thing to do?
Doesn’t matter that you put a competing statement in “italics”. The very simple picture is very simple and your comment further demonstrates we rationalize ourselves into inhumanity and derangement. I really don’t care if it’s their fault or the pope’s fault.
My point is, an economic system where (if you’re able-bodied) you need to work or else you go hungry is actually reasonable, if everyone can have good and rewarding work. It’s a way of dealing with the reality that people have to do some things in order for society to function.
Why do you disagree with that statement? Again, I understand that the current economic climate isn’t that, and that safety nets need to be in place even in the most perfect version of that system that can realistically exist. Honestly, I think experiments with UBI are demonstrating that maybe I am wrong, and meeting people’s basic needs regardless of anything is a better way. I would say that maybe the current economic system is so wrong that UBI is a big improvement… but surely it seems reasonable to say that (a) following the data of what works is better than just theorizing (b) “forcing” adult able people to work in society isn’t a bad thing if you want the society to function, contingent on the jobs they’re doing actually making some sort of sense.
Donate to your local food banks or food-drive event kids. That old can of beef stew you don’t even look at anymore can keep someone warm and alive for the night.
I have done, yes. Also volunteered with a group going door-to-door, also done some volunteer work at the food bank itself.
it’s not a good thing for society if people can just sit around and expect others to take care of everything for them food and shelter wise
But also
A lot of the rich people don’t really do that much useful, if anything
Amazing. It’s almost as though capital itself should not be the driving force of society…
to me I don’t think that should mean necessarily an escape from the “you gotta have a job” system
If you are a mother taking care of a child, is that a job?
Amazing. It’s almost as though capital itself should not be the driving force of society…
I think looking around at what’s worked well in the past is a good way to decide what “should” happen. Not that we have to be limited to that, but it’s a good reality-touchstone for the conversation.
To me, the New Deal-era economy, if it had had racial justice and women’s rights, is the best example I can see for what I would think is a good economy. The government is going to keep a close eye on creating jobs, creating a strong safety net, and reigning in the oligarchs who are trying to unbalance the system. It ushered in decades of prosperity. It was good (again, for white men at least).
It’s a little hard to compare against socialist societies, because the West does its best to wreck any socialist country that might start working for its people, so that it can “prove” that socialism doesn’t work. So there’s a strong argument that socialism actually works better than historical examples would suggest. Cuba is actually a really instructive example in terms of what it does well (medicine in particular) even facing economic warfare from almost the entire rest of the world. But, even with that caveat, I still think that structuring an economy similar to 1930s through 1960s America (again, just with racial and gender justice added to it) seems like what works the best.
If you are a mother taking care of a child, is that a job?
Yes. The ability of one parent to draw enough of an income that the other parent can focus largely on child care and “living” as distinct from working, is one of the key features that makes me like the New Deal-era US economy. That’s as much an important part of my happy utopia as would be a happy life for the “working” partner in one-job families, with rewarding, balanced, satisfying work.
Actually, I think I remember seeing some kind of studies that argued that women in some Scandinavian countries seem to be happiest among modern societies, based on working like 10-15 hours per week. They have time for the family but they’re not stuck at home going out of their minds like a 1950s housewife. (And obviously everyone should be able to do whatever they want to do, just that as the tradition seemed like it worked well in practice.) I tried to find them to send to you but I ran out of motivation before I did.
But yes, short answer, whichever partner is taking care of the family shouldn’t be working full time. That is clearly insanity in the modern system and fueled just by greed of extracting value from people with no regard for what it’s going to do to us long term.
An upvote isn’t enough for this one
Under capitalism, food isn’t produced to eat but to make profits. When it’s not profitable to sell, they would rather dump foods, starving the people than to plainly donate.
We produce enough foods to feed the entire population. But the sole purpose of food is to not feed the people, but to feed the greed of the producers, the farmers, the corporates.
Capitalism created an artificial scarcity of food where we produce too much food for the obese and throw the rest away to rot in front of the poor.
Under capitalism, food isn’t produced to eat but to make profits.
A third of all food produced in the United States is wasted. A third. We could feed another 200 million people in this country if we stopped doing absolute bullshit like stocking produce and bakery shelves far above expected demand so the shelves always look full, or paying dairy farmers to pour out their milk so the price stays high.
I mean, I’m vegan, I want the dairy industry to roll over and die anyway, but the fact that lobbyists have set up a subsidy system so fundamentally broken that it pays dairy farmers to dump milk instead of sell it - so they not only torture animals for literally no benefit to anyone at all but also throw away calories while people starve - it’s just infuriating.
There’s a famous scene in The Grapes of Wrath about how, while people starved during the Great Depression, crops throughout America were burned and poisoned and destroyed so that food prices would stay high. And as crops fail with climate change and desperate refugees come to America by the millions we’re going to see those days again.
American capitalism barely survived the first Great Depression it caused. And I pray to whatever God is listening that something better than capitalism comes out of the next.
From a purely selfish perspective, starving people are fucking dangerous.
It’s in everyone’s best interest that society ensures everyone has enough. Otherwise people are going to do what it takes to survive
This is what I always think about when lawmakers take punitive measures against homelessness and drug addiction, or higher theft/property crimes, as though it isn’t abundantly clear why all of those things have increased.
San Francisco wants to drug test people applying for welfare
Same goes for people freezing to death in the cold, when there is plenty of housing for everyone.
There are people who think children should be responsible for paying for their own food. It’s despicable.
Good thing we don’t actually have a problem with people starving to death in our society then.
https://frac.org/hunger-poverty-america
If you say “well, not many people are really starving, if people just have to skip meals or suffer from malnutrition that doesn’t count”, congratulations, you’re part of the problem.
The United States has so much food that no one should be going hungry.
Frankly, the world has so much food that no one in it should be going hungry, but the United States specifically doesn’t have the excuse of civil war or crop failures or complete government dysfunction. We let our children go hungry from capitalism and spite.
Bro 40% of your country is morbidly obese and a disproportionate part of that are poor people as well as minorities. Food insecurity refers to the fact that people don’t have sufficient access to healthy food and your article admits as much.
I’m not American idiot.
But you talked about society, and the US is part of that, is it not?
Feels like you’re deliberately avoiding the meat of OP’s argument to catch them on a technicality
Yea, it was a low effort reply because the guy I replied to was moving the goalposts.
