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"Greed has poisoned men's souls" Greed used to considered a sin. Now it seems to be seen as a virtue by some. It's not enough to have a Ferrari - you need to h

"Greed has poisoned men's souls" Greed used to considered a sin. Now it seems to be seen as a virtue by some. It's not enough to have a Ferrari - you need to have a whole garage full. It's not enough to have a yacht - it's got to be a super yacht.

chopete3 3y ago
I think he is not referring to an individuals greed, for example an actor buying a few Ferrari's to satisfy their desires or a business person buying a yatch. He is referring to political/country leaders greed. Only their greed can cause violence and bloodshed at the level he is talking about. Ambition and greed both refer to the intense desire to achieve success. Sucess includes money, power, or status. The difference is a major one. Greed is to achieve those for themselves at the cost of depriving others. Ambition is to do for greater good of others. I think all the leaders(democratic,communist,fascist) understand this, and they are all likely ambitious. The path to achieve success forces them to define boundaries. They seem to define others as their country people - during the war times. In peace times, it is their party supporters.
- AlexandrB 3y ago
  I'm not sure there's a distinction here. Especially when personal greed often informs how one votes and what political causes one supports financially.
- jvm___ 3y ago
  Convince someone buying a new iPhone to buy last years model or half the GB of what they can afford. That's the greed that's ingrained in all humans. "Humans take the perceived path of the most pleasure." is true in every human interaction I've witnessed or can think of. We're all greedy by default. I think Agent Smith was right when he was talking to Morpheus, humanity is a virus that consumes all the resources in the local environment until they're depleted without thought for the greater good.
  - nicoburns 3y ago
    > We're all greedy by default Perhaps, but we’re also all generous by default. Which wins out is determined by some combination of upbringing, circumstance and individual nature. There are many people in this world who will give away things they dearly need to those who also need them.
    - willsoon 3y ago
      Maybe bc they fighting they own greed. Maybe it works!
  - hermitcrab 3y ago
    >We're all greedy by default. That is a pretty bleak view of human nature. Maybe try reading "Human kind" by Rutger Bregman for a counter view. I think we are highly social creatures who care a lot about our status. If society looks up to people having a garage full of super cars as 'successful', then that is something to aspire to. If society looks down on these people as greedy and taking more than their fair share of the world's resources, then it isn't something to aspire to. I hope society soon changes to the latter attitude, for the sake of our children.
- atoav 3y ago
  He very certainly meant this was economic greed as well. Even the worst people in history somehow believed they were the good (or at least the needed) guys and they deserved their riches. Political power always was a vehicle to maintain, defend, multiply those riches. This is why in the best version of that spiel the royals would understand that their position/riches came with very real duties attached. Duties towards those who had it worse than them. But this was already a forgotten idea, even in Chaplins time. As someone whow grew up around both poor and very rich (including very old-rich) people, I can assure you that the poor people would often share their last penny while the rich ones were mostly afraid that someone might be after their money. Greed is buying a Lamborghini when your neighbour/employee/sister/village starves. Even when you totally earned it using your superhuman work ethic. Everybody wants to be the good guy in their own story, so everybody will come up with their own reasons why they deserve it (they worked harder than a single mom with three bone breaking jobs) and why doing a good thing is actually a bad thing ("they will waste it on drugs and alcohol"). If you care about your real true self lies like these are a danger to ever discovering it in your life. And you only get one of those. In the end the question is very simple. Do you care primarily about yourself or do you more care about the people and nature around you? Everybody likes to say they do — and so they lie to themselves why buying that Lamborghini is actually a totally selfless act. But if you realize the world would be a worse place if everybody decided like you, you might be the baddy all along. So if you want to stay rich you have to somehow get the fact that tou don't do what is needed into balance with your own image of a good person. Aa result you become that attavistic kind of rich person that believes being good is naive and a luxury (no pun intended) they cannot afford. People who want to make the world better are idiots, only you know the world as it truly functions (let's ignore the fact that you profit from that believe). This is a quite common stance among the rich and powerful. Everybody is out to get you. Your game is not doing meaningful things, it is doing things that look meaningful to other rich people. Things become very symbolic. Actually meaningful is naive and dangerous so it must be avoided. These people are rarely ever happy and in the short moments they are, it is because they fell for the lies of their own greatness. We grew up in a world that told us money buys us happiness. To a certain degree it can give us safety and freedom, but after that it comes at a mental price. Greedy people are people who are willing to pay that price, no questions asked. And there are many of them. Remember, you get only this life.
jncfhnb 3y ago
This may surprise you, but people were in fact greedy previously as well
- hermitcrab 3y ago
  Yes, but it gnerally wasn't considered a virtue.
  - jncfhnb 3y ago
    That holds up pretty poorly against historical scrutiny to very obvious examples
    - hermitcrab 3y ago
      Certainly in western/Christian culture greed was traditionally been seen as a sin, not a virtue[1]. I'm not sure how much this applies in other cultures. Perhaps you could cite some examples? [1]Not that this stopped the clergy being greedy of course. The grossly overweight priest is very old trope.
      - jncfhnb 3y ago
        You are citing some dickheads with Ferraris as evidence that greed is a virtue now but disregarding the fact that people had similar gross displays of wealth in the past as evidence of the same.
        hermitcrab 3y ago
        But was it regarded as virtuous?
        jncfhnb 3y ago
        The evidence that it was seen as virtuous seems equally plentiful for the past as the present
derbOac 3y ago
I think the "greed is good" speech represents a sort of counter movie speech along the lines you're pointing to: https://www.americanrhetoric.com/MovieSpeeches/moviespeechwallstreet.html https://www.americanrhetoric.com/MovieSpeeches/moviespeechwa...
- hermitcrab 3y ago
  I think some people don't realize that speech was intended to be satirical. Possibly the same people that think Ayn Rand was a great thinker and writer.
deleted 3y ago
[deleted]

chopete3 3y ago

I think he is not referring to an individuals greed, for example an actor buying a few Ferrari's to satisfy their desires or a business person buying a yatch. He is referring to political/country leaders greed. Only their greed can cause violence and bloodshed at the level he is talking about. Ambition and greed both refer to the intense desire to achieve success. Sucess includes money, power, or status. The difference is a major one. Greed is to achieve those for themselves at the cost of depriving others. Ambition is to do for greater good of others. I think all the leaders(democratic,communist,fascist) understand this, and they are all likely ambitious. The path to achieve success forces them to define boundaries. They seem to define others as their country people - during the war times. In peace times, it is their party supporters.

AlexandrB 3y ago
I'm not sure there's a distinction here. Especially when personal greed often informs how one votes and what political causes one supports financially.
jvm___ 3y ago
Convince someone buying a new iPhone to buy last years model or half the GB of what they can afford. That's the greed that's ingrained in all humans. "Humans take the perceived path of the most pleasure." is true in every human interaction I've witnessed or can think of. We're all greedy by default. I think Agent Smith was right when he was talking to Morpheus, humanity is a virus that consumes all the resources in the local environment until they're depleted without thought for the greater good.
- nicoburns 3y ago
  > We're all greedy by default Perhaps, but we’re also all generous by default. Which wins out is determined by some combination of upbringing, circumstance and individual nature. There are many people in this world who will give away things they dearly need to those who also need them.
  - willsoon 3y ago
    Maybe bc they fighting they own greed. Maybe it works!
- hermitcrab 3y ago
  >We're all greedy by default. That is a pretty bleak view of human nature. Maybe try reading "Human kind" by Rutger Bregman for a counter view. I think we are highly social creatures who care a lot about our status. If society looks up to people having a garage full of super cars as 'successful', then that is something to aspire to. If society looks down on these people as greedy and taking more than their fair share of the world's resources, then it isn't something to aspire to. I hope society soon changes to the latter attitude, for the sake of our children.
atoav 3y ago
He very certainly meant this was economic greed as well. Even the worst people in history somehow believed they were the good (or at least the needed) guys and they deserved their riches. Political power always was a vehicle to maintain, defend, multiply those riches. This is why in the best version of that spiel the royals would understand that their position/riches came with very real duties attached. Duties towards those who had it worse than them. But this was already a forgotten idea, even in Chaplins time. As someone whow grew up around both poor and very rich (including very old-rich) people, I can assure you that the poor people would often share their last penny while the rich ones were mostly afraid that someone might be after their money. Greed is buying a Lamborghini when your neighbour/employee/sister/village starves. Even when you totally earned it using your superhuman work ethic. Everybody wants to be the good guy in their own story, so everybody will come up with their own reasons why they deserve it (they worked harder than a single mom with three bone breaking jobs) and why doing a good thing is actually a bad thing ("they will waste it on drugs and alcohol"). If you care about your real true self lies like these are a danger to ever discovering it in your life. And you only get one of those. In the end the question is very simple. Do you care primarily about yourself or do you more care about the people and nature around you? Everybody likes to say they do — and so they lie to themselves why buying that Lamborghini is actually a totally selfless act. But if you realize the world would be a worse place if everybody decided like you, you might be the baddy all along. So if you want to stay rich you have to somehow get the fact that tou don't do what is needed into balance with your own image of a good person. Aa result you become that attavistic kind of rich person that believes being good is naive and a luxury (no pun intended) they cannot afford. People who want to make the world better are idiots, only you know the world as it truly functions (let's ignore the fact that you profit from that believe). This is a quite common stance among the rich and powerful. Everybody is out to get you. Your game is not doing meaningful things, it is doing things that look meaningful to other rich people. Things become very symbolic. Actually meaningful is naive and dangerous so it must be avoided. These people are rarely ever happy and in the short moments they are, it is because they fell for the lies of their own greatness. We grew up in a world that told us money buys us happiness. To a certain degree it can give us safety and freedom, but after that it comes at a mental price. Greedy people are people who are willing to pay that price, no questions asked. And there are many of them. Remember, you get only this life.

jncfhnb 3y ago

This may surprise you, but people were in fact greedy previously as well

hermitcrab 3y ago
Yes, but it gnerally wasn't considered a virtue.
- jncfhnb 3y ago
  That holds up pretty poorly against historical scrutiny to very obvious examples
  - hermitcrab 3y ago
    Certainly in western/Christian culture greed was traditionally been seen as a sin, not a virtue[1]. I'm not sure how much this applies in other cultures. Perhaps you could cite some examples? [1]Not that this stopped the clergy being greedy of course. The grossly overweight priest is very old trope.
    - jncfhnb 3y ago
      You are citing some dickheads with Ferraris as evidence that greed is a virtue now but disregarding the fact that people had similar gross displays of wealth in the past as evidence of the same.
      - hermitcrab 3y ago
        But was it regarded as virtuous?
        jncfhnb 3y ago
        The evidence that it was seen as virtuous seems equally plentiful for the past as the present

derbOac 3y ago

I think the "greed is good" speech represents a sort of counter movie speech along the lines you're pointing to: https://www.americanrhetoric.com/MovieSpeeches/moviespeechwallstreet.html https://www.americanrhetoric.com/MovieSpeeches/moviespeechwa...

hermitcrab 3y ago
I think some people don't realize that speech was intended to be satirical. Possibly the same people that think Ayn Rand was a great thinker and writer.

deleted 3y ago

[deleted]