CAPITALISTISM STUPID, OR STUPID AND PSYCHOTIC?

While greed might make us strive for more and achieve certain goals, it's in no way a virtue in a modern society(look at Chelsea's post)

And I blatantly disagree. You have an obligation to help your fellow men and women. Since you're a big supporter of human rights I'm going to cite article 25 and 26 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights:

You can't just pick and chose when it comes to human rights.(as I've come to realize with free speech)
Furthermore, the you and us mentality is really unhealthy amd you should not look at it like that. We are a society, and not just individuals.

See above and don't start insulting people who support public healthcare etc. by saying calling it a "half-baked ideological crusade"(again with the we and you)

There is no such thing as a positive right. You cannot have a right to the labor or property of another person, which education and healthcare both require. If you want to legally guarantee your citizens free healthcare and education, be my guest, but they are not human rights.

@Ler
As if that matters at all. Even if I were to just accept your claim that capitalism is responsible for all of those harms, it doesn't suddenly make taking away the fundamental rights of man okay.

So you don't agree with the UN's definition of human rights?
And if there are no positive rights, then I guess you don't have the right to a fair trial...?
You didn't say anything about the you and us mentality, so I suppose you agree with me, or did you just chose to overlook it?

No.

As I said, legally guaranteeing a 'right' is different from a natural human right.

I didn't see it in your initial post. Obviously my response is that we are just individuals. We live in society, we are not society itself. Each person should do what is right for them, and they will, in a manner of speaking. As I previously stated, altruism is only harmful when it enters into public policy, so if you want to run around and save the homeless or work at an animal shelter, then do it.

Fair enough. I'm not really going to try to change your mind because you propably good reasons for it.

Wasn't my point. The you and us mentality is seperating groups with different views or colour of skin etc. and all it's doing is to alienate and create hate and ignorance.

We are the society. Without us there would be no society and without a society there would be no us.(as we know it)

I agree, and they should later take the consequenses of their actions.

Except making it a public policy makes it so much more efficient and consistent.

Again, by virtue of being born into a more wealthy family you gain things like a better education, better food, nicer clothing. But by virtue of being born into a poor family you get little to nothing. And I'm not even talking about those born into, say, the top 1% wealthiest in America. They can have anything their little hearts desire, while the poor kids starve for being born poor.

Not to mention, those who are born poor, guess what, typically remain poor. Those who are born rich, guess what, typically remain rich. Mainly because the kid who has a tutor for every subject, attends only the finest schools, and has any resource available will do much better than a kid packed in to a 50 student class room with no resources available.

Fuck, kids in South Sudan have less students in their classes.

The mother did wait until she was in a good financial situation. It's not her fault her husband got cancer. She did everything right. And yet Capitalism never gave two shits when it fucked her over.

No one has 4 kids while they're in the gutter Matt, you know that. A few will for the government handouts, but they're such a minority it doesn't matter. The reason there are mothers or fathers with so many children is typically because of a death in the parenthood.

Again, people can catch on easily enough. It's not like you need to be a genius to realize you need income to pay for expenses. People don't get poor because they can't comprehend the complex idea of having to work a job, they get poor because Capitalism wont help them when they stumble.

It would be like if someone fell over, and you passed up every opportunity to catch them because they "should've known that rock was there".

No they shouldn't. No one deserves to starve so that some of the most hated people in America can buy a third house.

I'm sure that giving some people a little bit of unemployment subsidies, and some healthcare would be just peachy. It doesn't help. There will be the super rich, and the super poor. There will still be those with everything, and those with nothing. Social Democracy merely puts a band-aid on massive gash in humanity.

Of course it isn't, because they shouldn't even exist. The wealthy must be abolished if there is any progress to be made in humanity.

Its nice to see people arguing over me, but I thank Capitalism, because after college i am going to be a awesome and successful person, rich and famous, I will use my money to lead other people out of the problems i grew up with, Social programs are fine and all but I think charity works better in the long run.

I don't want to sound like an asshole, but the fact that you'll be a college graduated person is not a guarantee of success and etc. Bah, but we live in different societies, so I may be wrong.

Once again, they don't gain those things by virtue of being in a better family, they gain those things because that's how their parent's decide to allocate their wealth. Many wealthy families don't give their kids a inch more ground to go on.

What wonderfully sweeping and meaningless statements.

95% of kids have the same educational opportunities. Most attend the same schools, with a roughly equal level of enrichment and academic opportunities across the board. A poor kid has the same opportunities in school as a middle class kid. If you want to take on the private school system, be my guest, but once again, if that's how the parent wants to spend their money, that's their choice. Not to mention there are plenty of specialty schools being opened for the lower class that offer a greater degree of learning that the public alternative.

If she was in a decent position, they should have had health and life insurance. That's their problem then. Either way, it's not the fault of capitalism that a random chance of fate sent her down the drain. There are plenty of programs to help them back on their feet though.

From what I understand, the birth rate among immigrant and urban population is quite high, yet their income and savings are distinctively lower than other groups. It's not hard to see a correlation.

You'd be surprised by how financially inept most of the world is. It's why people like Dave Ramsey are so popular, he can give out basic financial and savings tips and make millions.

Sure, but the thing is that the rock is 400ft tall and painted purple. There aren't near as man "My husband got cancer and now I'm trying to keep my family afloat" cases as there are people who set themselves up for financial disaster because of incompetency and stupidity. Regarding people on a non-stable, mid-low income especially, they could do so much more. But then again, that's a problem with society and the education system.

Forced redistribution of wealth is a evil and a absolute removal of liberty and justice. A man is entitled to the sweat of his own brow, as is the man who managed him. And so on up the chain.

Unemployment and welfare should be a boat to ferry you from one profession to the next, and a safety net. Not a pair of artificial legs for people to run on.

Vast amounts of human progress ocurred before people even understood the concept of wealth disparity. That progress is continuing to be made. And it will continue to be made far after the failed social and economic experiment known as communism and socialism fade long into the history books. And even beyond that, when scarcity is no longer a issue, and the price system is a dusty old relic, progress will continue to be made, even without the application of your ideas that have already been torn from their mantle.

Lets say Johnny is born to a family in slight poverty in capitalist america. Johnny gets a job at his local factory or McDonalds or what have you, to support his poor family while he is in college. Johnny works his hardest and studies and does everything he needs to get good grades, and it pays off and he gets a partial scholarship to a good college. While he is in college, he is still working full time to support his family. Although it is tough, he graduates college and gets a job at a major financial company, because Johnny worked hard and his hard work payed off. He is then able to pay off all the debt from college in a few years, and help bring his family out of "poverty". Now Johnny is rich. He wants to make sure his children dont grow up having to worry about their financial situation, so when Johnny dies, he leaves all of his money to his children.

If Johnny wants to leave all his money to his children and have them grow up rich then he is and should be allowed to do that. He worked hard to get to where he was and he deserves to let his children grow up not having to work hard. To say the problem with capitalism is that people are born with silver spoons in their mouth is ridiculous, because their parents or grandparents were most of the time, poor themselves and climbed up the ladder through hard work and determination, just as the poor kids of today have the ability to do if they try hard enough.

Mostly a back and forth game about capitalism and rich people. Your standard debate that happens on any thread that has the words communism, socialism, or capitalism in its name.

Team 1: Capitalist argument "shut up we are capitalist"
Team 2: communist "Shut up capitalist are evil, WEALTH FOR EVERYONE WOOT"

If by many, you mean nearly none, then you'd be correct. For instance, many wealthy families own companies, as par their wealth. Given they own a corporation, do you really think there kids will ever have trouble finding a job?

You can't possibly deny that being born into a wealthy family gives you an inherent advantage.

No, they don't. For instance, the schools in my district are far better than the Tucson Unified School District. Since the school districts are decided by where you live, and better schools is a good selling point, it pushes up property values in my school district. Meaning, only the wealthy can afford to move here.

The poor are not given that opportunity.

Because the difference between poor and middle class is far less than the distance between poor and rich.

Again, someone is not entitled to be more knowledgeable because they're born into a wealthy family.

There's limited ones that only the most intelligent of the poor can get into. I suppose it plays into the same though, how is someone more entitled to knowledge by virtue of randomly getting genes ideal to modern society?

Insurance companies fuck people over all the time. Just ask around, you'll hear about people paying insurance on healthcare and such right up until they suffer a heart attack or something. Then the company will either find some excuse to get out of paying, or find some way to short-end the payment.

And really, isn't that what they're supposed to do? Why, if it's all for profit, fuck the mother with 4 children and a dying husband, there's personal wealth to amass.

Of course it's Capitalism's fault. Do you really think that there was no rich man in all the world who could not have spared say, a hundred thousand dollars, to setting them up? Was there NOTHING that could've been done to help them?

Sure, chance set her down the wrong path, but if someone trips your to pick them up and ask if they're alright. Not tell them they should've been watching where they were going and walk off.

No, there's plenty of charity works the governments throws up so it can appease the masses.

In most parts of the industrialized world, the population is shrinking. Where it's not, the population is only growing due to immigration. Over-reproduction is not the issue.

No, they're not. Most people are perfectly reasonable. You take human intelligence for grant it.
Dave Ramsey and friends are so popular because they offer a false cure to a system that will not stop its abuse of the people. No one truly is helped by reading his book, they just begin to think that, by virtue of reading it, they'll have a second chance. Which they tend not to have.

All he does is swindle people out of what little the wage earns them.

The biggest cause of debt is unexpected medical expenses. Don't think that you yourself are not one heart attack away from a mountain of debt that you will never climb over.

If you refer to the credit crunch and such, it was the fault of the corporations. Everyone said it, "buy buy buy. You can go a little over what you can pay for now, it's ok because the value of the house will go up anyway." And then a crash happens and millions are under water.

It was the aggressive banks and real-estate salesmen.
[qute]Forced redistribution of wealth is a evil and a absolute removal of liberty and justice.[/quote]
No, actually it's an instatement of justice and fairness.

Exactly, but wage slavery is not getting your due share. Capitalism does not give people the sweat of their brow. It gives them a fraction of it, and gives the wealthy more wealth.

Of course, but regardless, petty programs do not help anyone. If anything they get people reliant on them and force them to stay.

Such as? Workers have fought with their masters for as long as economies have existed. Sure, they did it less when it was 1000 BC, but I'm sure it still happened.

Progress? What progress? Things are ever so slightly better than they were a while back because of technological progress. Do you think there was no technological progress in Soviet Russia?

What about Social Progress? Economic Progress? How is 1% of Americans owning the equivalent of the other 99% in any way, shape, or form Progress?

Anyway, Leftism will never die.

Scarcity will always be an issue. Post-scarcity is a dream that cannot be obtained.

What do you mean torn from the mantle? Last I checked, the Communists got about 30% in the Senate election in Russia. They may have even won if Putin hadn't done frauding.

To quote a song, "Joe Hill ain't dead."

Whats funny is Kara has found counters to these same exact arguments he is using now as a socialist, when he was a capitalist.

It's almost as though he did it only for having something new to debate.

It wasn't that I didn't have the counters, I just didn't use them because I was ignorant of the wrong doings of Capitalism.

How about the family who works hard their whole lives to support themselves, does everything that anyone would've asked of them, and then by pure chance has the father die with 4 kids and a widowed mother? Then, they have to struggle through poverty for YEARS just to get the glib chance of going to a college.

I believe Romulus' experience far more than your fictional bullshit.

He shouldn't have any money to begin with. So Johnny struggles his whole Goddamn life. Fighting his way through poverty, college, supporting his family all the way. Yet, he does not bat an eye at the fact that hundreds of millions of people in the Western world are doing the same thing. Instead, he charges forth, ignoring the suffering of his fellow human beings, and gives it all too his children who will never understand the value of money.

Unlike the poor children, who deserve to have to work hard.

Ya, Johnny's children will have to work so hard to wait for their father to die. Oh wait, they probably wont have to even wait that long because he'll get them into powerful positions in his financial company.

Oh of course. I'm entitled to be upper-middle class because my Dad did all the work.

I want you to get out of suburbia, and go find the poor. Find the widowed mother with many children and tell her she's not working hard enough. Tell the father who's child will die because he cannot pay for the medication, that he did not work hard enough. Tell the man who will soon lose everything because his healthcare will not cover his wife's heart attack that he should work harder.



I guess he's like that because he didn't work hard enough. Lazyass, eh?

After a while, it just seemed like what i was destined to do, i already got into college, i already have a shit ton of loans, i have a job to pay for certain things but its not much, and I am most determined to graduate. I have put to much at stake to crumble, if I do then i will never forgive myself, for i have let down not only myself but my family as well.

All that greed will ever be is a way of providing for tomorrow. Nothing more and nothing less. Any attempt to reform it out of man's system by method of controlling and regulating his actions rather then through physically altering the circumstance in which he lives to one such that greed is unnecessary is both folly and potentially harmful.