3 ms·

The root issue you are describing never gets the public’s attention during normal times. It’s an emergency right now, so we have to do it, but look - fuck the a

The root issue you are describing never gets the public’s attention during normal times. It’s an emergency right now, so we have to do it, but look - fuck the average person, they don’t give a fuck when things are fine. They don’t vote on real issues, and when shit hits the fan, I honestly don’t know anymore. It’s a seriously undereducated and literally unconscious public. We’ll forget about the underlying issues by summer.

thulecitizen 7y ago
What a great story to justify robbing other people. Keep telling that to yourself if it helps you sleep at night. In my experience, this sounds like grandiosity talking.
- runawaybottle 7y ago
  You’re suggesting an alternative that compounds the current collapse. The end goal of that is just total collapse. This is the alternative you are suggesting? I enjoy making straw man arguments, it’s my favorite usually.
  - thulecitizen 7y ago
    > The end goal of that is just total collapse. So then you agree that capitalism with it's overly parasitic rentier/usury mechanisms is a ponzi scheme, waiting to collapse? After collapse, hopefully we have a transition to a p2p mutual credit paradigm. "They assert a belief in ‘free markets’ and want us to believe that economic policies are extending them. That is untrue. Today we have the most unfree market system ever created. It is deeply corrupt because its leaders claim it is the opposite of what it is becoming." "How can politicians look into TV cameras and say we have a free market system when patents guarantee monopoly incomes for twenty years, preventing anyone from competing? How can they claim there are free markets when copyright rules give a guaranteed income for seventy years after a person’s death? How can they claim free markets exist when one person or company is given a subsidy and not others, or when they sell off the commons that belong to all of us, at a discount, to a favoured individual or company, or when Uber, TaskRabbit and their ilk act as unregulated labour brokers, profiting from the labour of others? Far from trying to stop these negations of free markets, governments are creating rules that allow and encourage them. That is what this book is about." "…today, a tiny minority of people and corporate interests across the world are accumulating vast wealth and power from rental income, not only from housing and land but from a range of other assets, natural and created. ‘Rentiers’ of all kinds are in unparalleled ascendancy and the neo-liberal state is only too keen to oblige their greed. Rentiers derive income from ownership, possession or control of assets that are scarce or artificially made scarce. Most familiar is rental income from land, property, mineral exploitation or financial investments, but other sources have grown too. They include the income lenders gain from debt interest; income from ownership of ‘intellectual property’ (such as patents, copyright, brands and trademarks); capital gains on investments; ‘above normal’ company profits (when a firm has a dominant market position that allows it to charge high prices or dictate terms); income from government subsidies; and income of financial and other intermediaries derived from third-party transactions." - Guy Standing
randomdude402 7y ago
Agree. There was a Reddit thread a day or two ago asking something along the lines of, "How is this pandemic going to change the future forever?" People had some really wild ideas about how the population at large was going to have these revelations about globalization, the economy, their expenditures, travel, caring about one another, UBI, social norms, voting habits... I don't know if these people were too young to notice around 2008 or what, but my prediction is that people will be only too happy to be able to be served a cheeseburger and a beer in a restaurant or bar, where they will bitch about the past few months for a couple weeks before promptly forgetting any of it happened.
- runawaybottle 7y ago
  Right, like if you think society is going to ponder ‘hey remember when our society went to shit because we all stopped going to restaurants for a month? Haha, weird, what a fragile economy/social system, wonder if we should figure that one out’ - not gonna happpen.
  - AnthonyMouse 7y ago
    This one's a bit interesting, because everybody is staying home. Disproportionately many people, who still have jobs waiting for them when this is over but aren't doing them right now, so right now they have time to organize. That hasn't really happened since the internet has existed.

thulecitizen 7y ago

What a great story to justify robbing other people. Keep telling that to yourself if it helps you sleep at night. In my experience, this sounds like grandiosity talking.

runawaybottle 7y ago
You’re suggesting an alternative that compounds the current collapse. The end goal of that is just total collapse. This is the alternative you are suggesting? I enjoy making straw man arguments, it’s my favorite usually.
- thulecitizen 7y ago
  > The end goal of that is just total collapse. So then you agree that capitalism with it's overly parasitic rentier/usury mechanisms is a ponzi scheme, waiting to collapse? After collapse, hopefully we have a transition to a p2p mutual credit paradigm. "They assert a belief in ‘free markets’ and want us to believe that economic policies are extending them. That is untrue. Today we have the most unfree market system ever created. It is deeply corrupt because its leaders claim it is the opposite of what it is becoming." "How can politicians look into TV cameras and say we have a free market system when patents guarantee monopoly incomes for twenty years, preventing anyone from competing? How can they claim there are free markets when copyright rules give a guaranteed income for seventy years after a person’s death? How can they claim free markets exist when one person or company is given a subsidy and not others, or when they sell off the commons that belong to all of us, at a discount, to a favoured individual or company, or when Uber, TaskRabbit and their ilk act as unregulated labour brokers, profiting from the labour of others? Far from trying to stop these negations of free markets, governments are creating rules that allow and encourage them. That is what this book is about." "…today, a tiny minority of people and corporate interests across the world are accumulating vast wealth and power from rental income, not only from housing and land but from a range of other assets, natural and created. ‘Rentiers’ of all kinds are in unparalleled ascendancy and the neo-liberal state is only too keen to oblige their greed. Rentiers derive income from ownership, possession or control of assets that are scarce or artificially made scarce. Most familiar is rental income from land, property, mineral exploitation or financial investments, but other sources have grown too. They include the income lenders gain from debt interest; income from ownership of ‘intellectual property’ (such as patents, copyright, brands and trademarks); capital gains on investments; ‘above normal’ company profits (when a firm has a dominant market position that allows it to charge high prices or dictate terms); income from government subsidies; and income of financial and other intermediaries derived from third-party transactions." - Guy Standing

randomdude402 7y ago

Agree. There was a Reddit thread a day or two ago asking something along the lines of, "How is this pandemic going to change the future forever?" People had some really wild ideas about how the population at large was going to have these revelations about globalization, the economy, their expenditures, travel, caring about one another, UBI, social norms, voting habits... I don't know if these people were too young to notice around 2008 or what, but my prediction is that people will be only too happy to be able to be served a cheeseburger and a beer in a restaurant or bar, where they will bitch about the past few months for a couple weeks before promptly forgetting any of it happened.

runawaybottle 7y ago
Right, like if you think society is going to ponder ‘hey remember when our society went to shit because we all stopped going to restaurants for a month? Haha, weird, what a fragile economy/social system, wonder if we should figure that one out’ - not gonna happpen.
- AnthonyMouse 7y ago
  This one's a bit interesting, because everybody is staying home. Disproportionately many people, who still have jobs waiting for them when this is over but aren't doing them right now, so right now they have time to organize. That hasn't really happened since the internet has existed.