- Capitalism and Alternatives -

Sorry, David...

Posted by: Stoller on December 16, 1999 at 10:42:18:

In Reply to: Sorry Barry, you can't rely on Hitler to support all your arguments posted by David on December 16, 1999 at 00:43:29:

...continually associating the words Hitler and fascist with participatory government doesn't buoy your sinking argument

: Oh Barry, I forgot, you seem to advocate fluid 'rights' that change everytime you think the mode of production as changed.

Funny---after nearly two thousand years, western man's conception of slavery finally changed. Don't you think it's quite a coincidence that that change 'just happened' to coincide with the bourgeoisie's ascent and the Industrial Revolution?

: : In the work place, workers don't get to vote AT ALL on ANYTHING.

: : Boards of directors---usually unseen men in tall, skyscraper suites and tinted-glass limousines---get to 'vote' all the time.

: : Among the things they 'vote' on are whether or not to: fire thousands of American workers in order to move factories overseas where labor costs but pennies a day; install safety features on their products or (after some cost-effectiveness legerdemain) simply write off the probable wrongful death suits that arise from their shoddy design; conceal facts from consumers (tobacco); and (last but certainly not least) pollute the air and water that everyone breathes and drinks.

: : These 'votes' are taken EVERY DAY BY MINORITIES.

: Barry, you are engaging in false equivocation. There is a big difference from someone who owns a factory and decides it is more lucrative to move overseas than a group of desperate people in a depressed country deciding all of a sudden that the jews are a cause to all their problems.

You're pretty quick to write off un(der)employed workers, exploited workers, hazardous products, and pollution.

Let me see if I understand you correctly: if control is CONSPICUOUS , it's wrong; if it's INCONSPICUOUS, it's OK? Quick death by usurping minorities is wrong but SLOW death by usurping minorities is OK?

Is that what you're saying here?

: No Barry, I champion the rights of people. The right for people to their own life.

You sound like Richard Nixon after a couple of martinis.

Are the 'rights' of wage-slaves REALLY the same as rights of capitalists?

: : Which---as Hitler pointed out here---is fully compatible with CAPITALISM.

: For christ's sake! You are actually using Hitler to support your argument!??! My god, do you actually believe everything that Hitler said?

Well, you BROUGHT UP the topic of fascism in your hysterical post title---remember?

Those capitalists in Germany certainly believed what Hitler said. And you know what? After the Third Reich was gone, those capitalists just kept on doing what they do best---making piles of money. They're STILL around; the folks who brought western civilization Zyclon B are now making a fortune on Viagra.

: : And---for fuck's sake---how could job rotation of the entire state apparatus lead to crematoria? Who would vote today today to kill themselves tomorrow? Have you taken leave of your senses?

: They might not to vote to kill themselves, but I am sure that they wouldn't hesitate in your fab Utopia to kill those "cancer cells" that don't work hard enough.

: How would you explain this?

: "Force is also an option in the case of any individual's arrant refusal to perform an unskilled work quota." (See Message 11227)

You left out the following line, sonny:


Perhaps, in extreme cases, socialist society, taking a page out of the capitalist song book, may refuse to feed and house those perverse few who refuse to do such work. (To suggest that such a measure would abrogate human liberty is to admit that capitalist society does so on a DAILY basis.)


Now, that's a whole different thing, isn't it?

Or are YOU arguing against capitalism's 'fascist' tendency to NOT PAY people who don't work?

And as far as cancer cells go, global capital IS cancer.

--
McSpotlight: Much as I hate to intrude, might slightly snappier titles be in order?; we wouldn't mind at all, but it takes up a disproportionately large amount of space in the average browser window...




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