A-Anti-AntiCapitalista!
Posted 11 years ago on Nov. 26, 2013, 3:55 p.m. EST by OccupyWallSt
Tags:
direct action,
occupy,
capitalism,
street
Without capitalism, there could be no undue influence of money in politics. Without capitalism, trade would be truly free. Without capitalism, the financial sector would be an embarrassing relic of the past, a warning to future generations. Without capitalism, there can be no neoliberalism.
Anticapitalism is the true big tent. Whether or not you think the reforms proposed and enacted by various Occupy-related groups (like StrikeDebt, Occupy Sandy and the Occupy Card) will fix the systemic problems of capitalism, they are campaigns worth supporting. They provide temporary relief to people who need the most and allow us to experiment with alternatives. This is a good thing. But we can't let a good treatment distract us from a cure. Without addressing the underlying cause of capitalism, these problems will only get worse.
Globalization will continue to send jobs overseas. Technology will continue to automate human labor and obsolete the professions of millions of workers who will have no choice but to adapt. But for those who can't adapt to the new economy, the sentence under capitalism is death. This is because capitalism denies the necessities for human survival (like food, housing, and health care) to those unable to sell themselves to corporations. Even in times of plenty when you'd think we'd have to work less and less.
The end of capitalism means the beginning of your new life - a life where your home cannot be taken from you by force to maintain the bottom-line of a multi-billion dollar company that pays less in taxes than you; a life where you own your future; a life where politics represents you. The end of capitalism means the life you’ve always wanted but never thought you could have. The end of capitalism means freedom.
The 1% owned the mainstream American political system long before the Supreme Court upheld Citizens United. The 1% oppressed the global 99% long before “free trade” agreements became the norm. The 1% used the financial sector to swindle the people long before Dodd-Frank was repealed, long before the Federal Reserve.
It is important that as we oppose the institutions that capitalism has created to oppress us, that we oppose capitalism as well. If we allow ourselves to be held hostage by the symptoms of our disease we will never find our way to the cure. The cure, as we knew and demonstrated two years ago, is revolution.
Two years after Occupy Wall Street was founded we are still here, and so are our problems. Take the street, take your jobs, take back your money, take back your power. Organize.
Today's piece in the Washington Post on statements by the new pope well worth reading. Here's a sample of what the pope said:
“Some people continue to defend trickle-down theories, which assume that economic growth, encouraged by a free market, will inevitably succeed in bringing about greater justice and inclusiveness in the world. This opinion, which has never been confirmed by the facts, expresses a crude and naive trust in the goodness of those wielding economic power and in the sacralized workings of the prevailing economic system. Meanwhile, the excluded are still waiting.”
Here's the whole article: http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/eugene-robinson-pope-franciss-pointed-message-on-economic-inequality/2013/11/28/6b9c18a8-57aa-11e3-8304-caf30787c0a9_story.html?wpmk=MK0000205
Hey therising, Nice to see you.
You too Nevada. Cheers.
Realistically, the end of capitalism is a evolutionary imperative for life on earth.
We should flex our muscles and have folks who are there on the ground cause the uproar verbally and in scenes as many as we can, conversation about history etc. - if not now we'll get stuck with trillions of dollars of debt, and most of us don't like money? Umm
There is another model, which can work and be not socialism or communism or capitalism; but the most important other thing for you in the City is probably to get to a rent-to-own situation. Both these are covered on the blog http://eddiemill.wordpress.com/ and the talking makes it happen! *flex
The black and white of capitalism vs. socialism is how they like to paint it. To confuse people. To scare people. To make people think it must be all or the other. When, in fact, what would work is a hybrid.
Agreed, but there needs to be some semblance of process after it is gone.
What are the authors suggestions?
Great point. There is too much focus on critiquing and ending capitalism and not enough on what comes next. You can't just bring capitalism crumbling down and leave a power vacuum in its place. That's how dictators and opportunists come to power. Without alternative structures in place, the old power structures tend to replicate themselves because that's all most people know.
Plus, it's hard for people to buy into ending capitalism when they have no idea what might replace it. You are expecting too much of people if you think they will give up one ideology without another example to follow. We need to focus on building up direct democracy from the bottom up, and we need to start with ourselves. If we can't demonstrate how alternative power structures work by applying them to our own organizations, then what kind of example are we?
I was thinking of writing a letter to the Economist on this same topic, actually. "People" talk about hating capitalism, and then "people" say, aw, well it would be great but it can't be done. Which is another way of saying they still use money. Wait, I'm talking about actually taking down capitalism as in, developing a new system that works for the most of humanity. Don't folks think that would take some time? I think the truth is that another way is possible. If that is a 99%, and there is a time of transition, like expected to have a suggestion now, then I would say help those out who are living a free life by better sorting your trash, for one. Probably the well-intentioned people of means, consider planting and growing gardens with a seed library? In the meantime also, any of us who are reading in this forum, it is my opinion and experience that making anything free is a good deal of hacking/work right now to aid the transition. I was doing a few more things yesterday: sugar, kombucha, beer, mushrooms: https://eddiemill.wordpress.com/
This works because it overwrites greed. Those who still live in the capitalist paradigm should acknowledge that there are those who choose not to and not hate them for it. Breathe. Then, when the time comes, all will join us. They've nothing to lose but their chains.
We flex the muscles that makes things not work - gogo our random shapeshifters in NY! Causing money problems in the sto', the home depot's a good one to start!, the streets, really because = if we don't do something about this money system now, we will all be stuck in trillions of dollars of debt. and that a lot of us don't like money already, ... the crash doesn't happen from here, but 20,000 new yorkers talking about it well maybe...
There's now a model for there in the NY, called free world institutes. But the most relevant thing for you at the moment is to get to a rent-to-own situation. ?https://eddiemill.wordpress.com/2015/10/16/new-york-needs-another-skyscraper-on-rent-to-own/
Capitalism is not sustainable.
Civil disobedience Czech Republic http://obcanska-neposlusnost.blog.cz/ for donors - bitcoin address 13BRj45LZobb57uoFnfvp2dBJB64jD4tDH
I disagree. The big tent is anti-oppression. Even better: pro-democracy or pro-freedom.
To end capitalism, there are two options: (1) We could tear down the current power structure and hope something better rises from the rubble of our dead brothers and sisters. (2) We move toward social democracy, a system with universal health care and state-funded college education and restrictions on predatory lending and general freedom from debt bondage--and everyone will call it capitalism. In fact, most mainstream economist would say it's better capitalism because more individuals are able to participate. Make a choice. But to be anti-capitalism is to be pro-revolutionary war, and that's not something I can support.
[Deleted]
When I was a young boy I set up a lemonade stand on my block.
Other kids chose not too....
I remember holding the first buck ( 4 quarters) I ever earned.
Had quite an impact on me.
The end of capitalism means the beginning of your new life - a life where your home cannot be taken from you by force to maintain the bottom-line of a multi-billion dollar company that pays less in taxes than you; a life where you own your future; a life where politics represents you. The end of capitalism means the life you’ve always wanted but never thought you could have. The end of capitalism means freedom.
Realistically=do you see this happening?
Still figuring out the posting protocol here...but...My "Realistically, the end of capitalism is a evolutionary imperative for life on earth." above was what I see.
I would like to respond to your "Realistically=do you see this happening?" by saying yes.
Consider that the first stage of the "end of capitalism" is watching/living its falling apart... and yeah, I see that.
I see this website and the many, many resistance movements across this country. This is new...and I see that.
I see this happening.
You are not the only one who sees change happening everywhere.
Resistance is on the rise globally as the colonialism and imperialism is being rejected. People are expressing anger in a positive form through not supporting tyranny nor bowing to threats.
This throws fear into the hearts of capitalist parasites who rely on subjugation and robbery of others so make the rules for themselves. They are ruthless but must be resisted. The cost of change will be high but options are few.
OWS is a breath of hope that is breathing freer each day.
[Removed]
Seeing it as imperative is not the same as seeing it end. No. Had it have been the first stage then we would have seen it in the 1870s and again in the 1890s and for sure in the 1930s. But it did not end. Did it?
The exploitation of fossil fuels and environmental damage, is the game changer.
An evolutionary imperative is, technically, not the same as seeing it end. However, before you can see something end you must watch/live in the awareness of its crumbling.
Using your historical argument has some merit, I believe. I also suspect that the planetary global zeitgeist in this post-millennial time we find ourselves is unlike any other time our species, and all species, have known.
Using my evolutionary imperative argument in simply seeing that the structures of laissez-faire capitalism and the hierarchical structures of society have reached the ending of their usefulness in an evolutionary sense. This is more than simple politics. This is zeitgeist change and the many ways we (?) participate in it. It is an awakening born of necessity, and therefore, impossible to stop. I'll let this go after this arrow flies. Good luck on your path.
Historical argument can have merit if we see the patterns repeating. Hindsight helps link actions with consequences which produces an understanding of possibilities. We learn by looking back. Looking forward we can apply possibilities.
Some are not happy with that but want answers. There are only possibilities and likelihoods ahead but some possibilities have shown themselves to be extremely significant when matched with circumstances. That is what research is about.
I love the line from the film series Carnivàle, "Everything is impossible until it isn't."
Like the line too, and have been quoting it a lot finally found where I got it ha! Let's help make it possible, then. These are real theory and practice from Oakland/Bay and Oberlin wo. https://github.com/EM-Che/Appropriate-building-technology/wiki
You can read my response above.
What you refer to in "read my statement above" chronicles human corruption, not specifically capitalism. Atrocities have been known in the Human Nation under many systems of government and economy, not just capitalism (though they are bedfellows.) Are you committed to the notion that capitalism cannot end? Replying to another here, I quoted from the film series Carnivàle, "Everything is impossible until it isn't."
The way I read you is essentially that history trumps evolutionary necessity. I see things differently. Someone above used the word "sustainable." Constant growth, which is essential to capitalism in any form we have known it, is completely unsustainable...constant growth is the definition of cancer. None of the other nations of beings that share this world with the Human Nation exist in a state of "constant growth." The cancer that is embedded within this "constant growth" will, unchecked, inevitably destroy all life and capitalism itself.
If your argument is that previous "undoings" of capitalism did not stop its returning, I agree. Still, I believe that in this zeitgeist, the rules that have ruled history are changed. Globalization and telecommunication have brought an evolutionary quantum jump to history itself. "Present Shock" (the modern version of Tofflers "Future Shock") "where everything is happening NOW" is a living reality.
I know these days anything that is said three times becomes trivialized and discounted, but we are experiencing a evolutionary quantum jump so I will use the word(s) "post-historical." In THIS time, evolutionary necessity trumps human history.
But...I was going to "let this go" and here I am again.
What you read in my above statement is that you aren't presenting anything new. Period. It's still capitalism and attempts to deflect from that definition simply because it shouldn't exist does not help your psuedo-intellectual argument. Pretending that the capitalist system ceases of it's own accord because of the number of humans that it tramples and due to climate change is preposterous, lazy and a waste of time.
"psuedo-intellectual, preposterous, lazy and a waste of time"...nice argument and great come-back.
…in the realm of human perception there is almost Nothing that can be considered "objective reality."
http://occupywallst.org/article/-anti-anticapitalista/#comment-1013124
Same argument found above.
You don't have an argument.
I did not start an argument, you asked a question. I answered it. You don't like it. Nothing will sway or influence you. I addressed YOUR arguments from my perspective. You resort to calling names. Methinks you need a bit of maturity to temper the dismal projections of your own disappointments, inability to consider anyone else's views, and dismissals of those who have a different perspective.
I had the same experience with "the girl" - waste of time. many societies have imploded - Egyptian, roman, Chinese, mayan and they were in no way capitalist but they were hierarchical. from what I understand the ruling classes in each case began sucking up so much of the production that the producing classes could not survive and they collapsed. seems like that is what we are watching right now in our world. one thing not discussed here (maybe I missed it) is resource scarcity. our world is running out of all the things it need to survive - like oil. the discussion of "systems" - capitalism etc seems to me mostly counter productive. we need some way of getting to a production for use economy - could probably be some version of grassroots capitalism - who knows. seems to me that we are likely to see a collapse like in roman times and we will see what rises from that.
I didn't say that I didn't like it. It's a beautiful response, however, it is inaccurate. Further, capitalism has a definition. You don't get to make one up simply because you want to. It is not subjective. Your attempts to justify how you feel about that definition and/or insistence that it must collapse are psudointellectual.
Your responses indicate that you have 1) bought into the propaganda fed through mainstream media that you and yours matter and, therefore, that will necessitate the collapse. It happens. I understand.
or 2) you belong to the upper class where you have come to believe that you are entitled to matter. Thus, it is vastly different from all others that have not mattered to date or in the future.
Subsequently you are a victim of your own perspective.
@ GirlFriday
I have followed your comments and ask "Where do you come from". An inquiry you have put to others.
An answer may assist when reading your contributions without making assumptions based on what your comments contain.
I agree - girl Friday has lost her way somehow. she seems to like pointless discussions
[-] 1 points by flip (4152) 11 hours ago
If the shoe fits ↥twinkle ↧stinkle permalink
Any time your ready douche bag.
ready for what? to see if the shoe fits you? or are you challenging me to a fight of some sort - I think you are on the wrong site - no?
[-] 0 points by flip (4139) 0 minutes ago
you must have confused me with someone else. in case you didn't notice I was not responding to you. do you have so little to do in your life that you come to this site and hunt for references to yourself? don't know who you and yours are exactly but I am on my own here. I answered all questions put to me - you on the other hand do not. seems to me that you have lost your way - try to find it again - you can have the last word - for sure it will be with a reference to some bodily function. a bit adolescent don't you think? ↥twinkle ↧stinkle permalink
Not confused at all. In fact, your trolling was begging for attention. I'm merely giving you what you desire.
I haven't lost anything. What I have found is a lot of circle jerking when you and yours are asked a direct line of questioning. Why is that? You spend an inordinate amount of time attempting to make them pointless discussions. Why is that, precisely, flip?
Scared?
I'm sorry - I take it all back - that was adolescent of me! no I am not scared - could you give me some of my posts where you think I am trying to engage in pointless discussions. please just my posts not those you think might be In league with me!
you must have confused me with someone else. in case you didn't notice I was not responding to you. do you have so little to do in your life that you come to this site and hunt for references to yourself? don't know who you and yours are exactly but I am on my own here. I answered all questions put to me - you on the other hand do not. seems to me that you have lost your way - try to find it again - you can have the last word - for sure it will be with a reference to some bodily function. a bit adolescent don't you think?
[-] 1 points by flip (4140) 44 minutes ago
seems your world does - remember I was not responding to you! ↥twinkle ↧stinkle permalink
You should have not been running your mouth about me then, huh?
If the shoe fits
[-] 1 points by flip (4139) 9 minutes ago
I'm sorry - I take it all back - that was adolescent of me! no I am not scared - could you give me some of my posts where you think I am trying to engage in pointless discussions. please just my posts not those you think might be In league with me! ↥twinkle ↧stinkle permalink
Right after you get back to answering relevant questions that you claim that you don't have to answer. You're entirely too self absorbed. The world doesn't revolve around you.
seems your world does - remember I was not responding to you!
Apparently you have the "true" definition of socialism from your "Party" and everyone else is duped or members of the "upper class." I have argued with people with Tea Party ideological spectacles but never with one with "Socialist Party" ideological spectacles. Such ideological spectacles never allow true perception. Hence your "you are a victim of your own perspective" cuts both ways, doesn't it.
I think I would have to be an intellectual before I can become a pseudo-intellectual. But I 'm sure you will let me know as you are committed, apparently, to always having the last word.
So you return to proper Socialist Party principles which apparently include attacking the character of anyone who shares a different perspective than your own and attempt to keep such people and their opinions from feeling they have any validity.
In your attempt to put me on the defensive you present me with your own created options. Well #2 is way off base since I live at the poverty level and am currently self-unemployed.
Therefore I "must" be a dupe. Huh... Actually, I find people who toe party lines, whether they be Socialist, Dummycrat/Republicants, or other boring. Propaganda in any shape or form is for people who are unable to think for themselves. It is anathema.
I plead guilty to the charge that "me and mine" and "you and yours" and, in fact, all forms of life on earth "matter." If they did not matter why would we even bother with movements and change?
You conveniently leave out the line in my attempt to "answer" your question (which now becomes apparent was not a "real" question but bait to draw people into your ideologically driven dogma) that in the beginning of my "evolutionary necessity" perception I talked about "participating" in it, for our participation, or lack thereof, will determine the degrees of suffering experienced as change comes.
I could attempt to deconstruct your argument that "capitalism has a definition"..."It is not subjective", but why bother...you, me and everyone are "victims of their own perspective."
I know you will have to have the last word here so I will give it to you, realizing the hopelessness of arguing with people who are committed to dogma. I will look to visionaries of revolutionary change not so self imprisoned.
So GirlFriday, have at it! I'm sure you have many more pejoratives up your sleeve for people who dare to think and see outside your Socialist Party box and beyond the vistas of your ideological spectacles.
But before you fulfill your last word compulsion know that above our cute little exchanges lies the sentence, "The exploitation of fossil fuels and environmental damage, is the game changer" by JohnWa. It is interesting that you consider such statements diversions, even as the world burns. But what do we dupes know, eh?
Yawn.
The definition of capitalism does not change with a party. Simply because you think it is imperative that capitalism end does not mean that it will.
Try again.
Why not work towards a goal that is sustainable. Capitalism is not sustainable.
The accumulation of community wealth into the hands of a few is destructive globally, out of control of host communities, dangerous for the future of the biosphere and will not respond to efforts to curb its path of greater concentration of greedy spoils at a dire cost to all.
Capitalism is so toxic, so corruptive, so short term, so wasteful, so cruel, so immoral and yet has trained the minds of generations to accept its hegemony.
The brand of capitalism that has blossomed in the USA is diabolical.
We have a mainstream philosophy of self and to hell with the rest. The world is paying for this dearly and those who survive will learn to hate the perpetrators who have wrecked their children's chances of hope for a stable peaceful life.
There is no future in capitalism as the inequity grows, natural resources diminish, climate runs away into unknown territory man has not lived in before, US and others wage war around the globe for power and profit albeit short term.
Look at where we are going in senario one. We are right on track.
http://elmhcx9.elmhurst.edu/~chm/onlcourse/chm110/labs/limits.html
This stuff is not rightwing lies and propaganda. The science is not new and this knowledge has been around since 1972. Capitalism has suppressed it and told lies about it, many of which are still heard today.
Science stand by the analysis and common sense must prevail in the minds of the masses.
We live in a dark age of over population, fear and consumerism. Nothing is certain for the common people. Change on a massive scale cannot be avoided while the capitalist system drives us headlong to an impending crash with increasing speed.
The Financiers and banks are more concerned about share prices and gambling than our future. Their parasitic practices and predatory destructiveness leaves us no option but to replace them with common good. Planning and action for a sustainable future must over ride the capitalist hegemony and greed. The cost will be great but much less than allowing business as usual from the ruling criminals..
That isn't what I asked.
Fair enough I cannot see it happening easily while things are as at present but it will not remain this way.
Also I don't believe freedom will replace capitalism, but a better future could emerge if widespread knowledge of our dilemma is understood.
There will always be psychopaths and greed merchants that need to be held in check. We must keep antisocial behaviour and anti social systems from becoming accepted.
The idolization of wealth and luxury has to go, along with the associated hype appealing to the selfish side of human nature.
Survival is a great motivator. Working together is the best survival strategy but not always straightforward nor easy. It will be essential to provide any hope of a sustainable future.
"Communism" is not an answer and this word has been used to cajole and ostracize any who think outside the capitalist framework. There are many and varied approaches outside of capitalism.
Social responsibility is an essential mark of citizenship.
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article36870.htm
Fair enough I cannot see it happening easily while things are as at present but it will not remain this way.
How long do you think it's going to take?
The USA will be able to fend off some of the effect of World shortages for a bit but not without widespread hardship for the poor. The rich know that a crash of momentous proportion cannot be avoided hence a possible increased will to rob and pillage as much as they can now - at our expense of course.
The World "reserve" stocks of food have been depleted for the last three years and now climate change is manifesting in droughts and extreme events the food production here and elsewhere will be negatively affected.
Already we are using land in Africa to supplement our food shortages. The fertile land available is shrinking and Monsanto is killing off our traditional seed stock as as well as poisoning soil and water tables. Biofuel production from grains adds to the food shortage problem. We need to stop using cars. China and some other regimes are controlling car numbers now.
The Limits to Growth graphs show food supply peaking in the period from now out to about 2018 but Monsanto's damaging program was not envisaged. Shortages Globally are being felt currently.
One bad growing season could cause a wave of food scarcity as the reserves relied on in the past are now depleted. Climate change will ensure greater food shortage unfortunately but really the main problem is accumulated damage to the soil, intensive monoculture in cropping and too many people. Processing of food has generated a raft of health problems. As with Monsanto et al, processing is basically a capitalist corporate activity aimed at capturing wealth not promoting health. Animal products take many times more land and water than plant based foods. Farming and marketing practices are based on making profit not supplying what food is needed. The small farmer working with sustainable practices is driven out of business by corporate giants.
Population starts to peak about 2025 and falling by 2030. No doubt there will be resource wars before this point. Wars will further deplete everything. Non renewable resources will have dropped to about one third of what was available 50 years ago and all the easy stuff will have gone. We do not need the wastage caused by wars on top of that.
Industrial production is starting to flatten out now and will fall withing a handful of years.
Pollution will continue to rise out to about 2040 and then start to fall slowly as production will have halved but then and a falling population reverting to use less fossil fuel based consumption.
What actually takes place will depend on the interaction of the many factors already in place.
Even if mankind wiped out capitalism in a day and replaced it with cooperative intelligent planning, and programs to stem population, pollution, green house gas emissions. deforestation, use of fertilzers or GMOs, and fossil fuel; then decentralized human habitat so transportation was almost eliminated, and so allow a very much simpler life style.
It would take at least 20 years to show some change in trends. Much longer for world forests to recover. The sea would take very much longer. A warming climate may not allow a rapid part recovery but the trends of destruction would change for the good. Green house gas concentration would take generations to normalize so heating will carry on.
Most of the talk and hype about avoiding a crash is just idle talk at best or capitalist propaganda to stop panic allowing them to continue their dirty work sucking the life blood of hope and pocketing as much as they can while they can in the meantime.
I guess if the rampantly greedy financially obese [ sick ] manage to insulate themselves from the masses with enormous wealth then they may survive a bit longer. The fractured global society will be nothing like what we have today.
Long term the survival of the human race can only occur with a much diminished numbers and the longer we carry on polluting and consuming then the smaller those numbers will be.
Before fossil fuels allowed the exponential growth of humans, our numbers supported on this planet were a little over a billion. Without fossil fuels, and with a massive loss of non renewable resources, biodiversity, damaged to the environment; matching that population size that would be a challenge. Our accumulation of knowledge and experience may help us sustainably double that to 2 billion.
Meanwhile political change has to be where we start. It will take as long as it takes but the sooner we have change then the greater the hope for the immediate and future generations.
So to answer your question, it is not tomorrow that it will all happen but it will happen as there is no way available to avoid it.
Thank you JohnWa for your contribution here.
I have a hard time understanding the logic here. If there's a crash of momentous proportions, then the billions as CEO has in the bank will be worth nothing. If the 99% cannot live, the 1% cannot either. They need people working to gather food, oil, etc... You can't have rich people without workers. What's the point of having billions in the bank if there are no products to buy because there are no workers to make them.
It seems to me that it's in the best interest of the 1% to make sure the pyramid holds as long as possible. It's not in their best interest to save up and let the whole pyramid crash.
I agree with your position. The 1% rely on the 99% for their wealth collection as you say. When the effect of their aggregated wealth gathering methods do cause a crash it will be akin to the inertia of a speeding train rendering a rapid change of speed impossible. The brakes can only act to slow the train gradually. The inertia of monetary capitalism has increased with the corrupt speculation of bankers taking our economy into fantasy land.
When the 99% have to act for their survival then the 1% have resources to protect themselves. The dollar will be of unknown worth but the !% also have massive assets including land, houses, food supply chains and the laws in place to protect that coupled with their positions of power and control of Govt.
We see already how the Police and Army can be used to suppress any threat to the 1% property and even their practices which are unconstitutional.
Your view does depend on assigning some rationality to the 1% behavior. I don't see a wider 1% rationality that would include everybody doing well. You are dealing with people who are not socially responsible and the dog eat dog nature of market capitalism as we see it, shows no social responsibility except occasional words uttered to placate the angry poor. Those words then are usually retracted or ignored and often mean nothing
. The title of psychopath is bandied around a lot but is solidly in evidence.
So, basically, you have a vague futuristic dystopia.
Dystopia is currently experienced by many societies and species.
Humans went into serious overshoot at about 4 billion in early 1980s. Non renewable resources to one side as they take millions of years to renew.
If you wish to catch up with where we are then I suggest the basic tenants of what is outlined above be checked.
Reading to explain about what over shoot means.
The Limits to growth was reviewed in 2004
http://akarlin.com/2010/02/review-limits-to-growth-meadows/
In 2008 the CSIRO, being an Austalian Government Scientific and industrial Research Organization, independent from corporate control, reviewed the Limits to Growth report [published by MIT back in 1972 before corporates applied strangulation ].
The CSIRO review was in depth with a team of PhDs attending, peer reviewed internationally and published. That report found the Limits to Growth - Senario One was right on track. This is the worst senario. Humans have paid no heed to the dangers ahead. Capitalist only heed profit now.
http://www.csiro.au/Portals/Multimedia/CSIROpod/Growth-Limits.aspx
The report
http://www.csiro.au/~/media/CSIROau/Divisions/CSIRO%20Sustainable%20Ecosystems/SEEDPaper19_CSE_publication%20Standard.pdf
Other scientific reviews have been done with similar conclusions.
Peak marine catch in 1988 and stocks have plummeted since. Now ocean acidification.
World grain per capita peak 1984. Currently approximately 50% of grain is used for animal feed and energy production in rich countries.. This diversion of food is a direct result of capitalist profit making as opposed to better efficiency in the use of resources for human food, thus pushing up the cost of food. Grain production falls with loss of fertile soil, exhausted water supplies, climate change and intensive farming using fertilizer from fossil fuel. Growing number of countries looking ahead to importing grain. Overall world production is falling. Demand is growing rapidly.
Peak water http://www.theguardian.com/global-development/2013/jul/06/water-supplies-shrinking-threat-to-food
Let me break this down for you. Capitalism is an economic system. That definition will remain the same even while climate change is occurring. The definition does not change.
We are in the midst of a crisis that is world-wide. Every country feels its ravages. Millions and millions of workers are unemployed and in acute poverty. Everywhere there is discontent and a feeling of insecurity, and the prestige of even the strongest of governments has been shaken. All sorts of emergency measures have been hastily adopted, but the depression still continues. Working men and women who normally ignore such questions, are now asking why the crisis has occurred, what will be its outcome, and whether it could have been avoided. In some minds there is a fear, and in others a hope, that the industrial crisis may bring the present system of society down in ruins, and make way for another.
The purpose of the Socialist Party is to show the working class the need for a complete alteration in the organisation of society. The basis of Capitalism is the private ownership of the land, the factories, the railways and the rest of the means of life. This is the root cause of poverty, insecurity and wars, and of a whole host of other evils. The remedy lies in making the means of production the common property of society. In other words, the working class must replace the existing social system, known as Capitalism, by a system of common ownership and democratic control, known as Socialism. But our work has been made more difficult by the idea that Capitalism may collapse of its own accord. It is clear that if Capitalism were going to collapse under the weight of its own problems then it would be a waste of time and energy to carry on socialist propaganda and to build up a real socialist party aiming at political power. If it were true, as is claimed, that Capitalism will have broken down long before it will be possible for us to win over a majority for the capture of political power, then, indeed, it would be necessary to seek Socialism by some other means. Workers who have accepted this wrong and lazy idea of collapse have neglected many activities that are absolutely essential. They have taken up the fatalistic attitude of waiting for the system to end itself. But the system is not so obliging!
At first sight there seems to be a ground for this idea. Capitalism from time to time develops acute industrial and financial crises; and at the depth of these it does appear to many observers that there is no way out, and that society cannot continue at all unless some way out is found. Men of very different social position and political convictions have been driven to this conclusion—reactionaries and revolutionaries, bankers and merchants, employers and wage-earners.
Let us go over some of the statements made by those who have foretold collapse, and notice how much alike they are. Notice, too, how each one falsifies the preceding ones. The fact of another crisis taking place is proof enough that the earlier crises did not turn out to be insoluble—the patient cannot have more than one fatal attack.
During the 19th century there were about ten well-marked crises. One commenced in England in 1825. William Huskisson, a former President of the Board of Trade, wrote about it in a letter dated 30th December, 1829:
“I consider the country to be in a most unsatisfactory state, that some great convulsion must soon take place . . . I hear of the distress of the agricultural, the manufactural, the commercial, the West Indian, and all trading interests. . . I am told land can neither pay rent nor taxes nor rates, that no merchant has any legitimate business . . . I am also told that the whole race of London shopkeepers are nearly ruined” (Huskisson Papers, pub. Constable, 1931, page 310).
Date: 1932 http://www.worldsocialism.org/spgb/pamphlets/why-capitalism-will-not-collapse
OK. I have no argument with your perception of what may happen and what you see as barriers to necessary change. Capitalism with its disgusting irresponsible carnage, is supported by many conditions most of which are about to change. That is is what i am getting at. Look ahead. What do you see.
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article37123.htm
is one of many assessments.
I don't think it will be pretty as systems break down but it is happening already. The less financially powerful will suffer terribly.
Leaders will be needed. They can't be scared of social responsibility and local social democracy or we will just replicate a worse of what we presently have.
Social equity has to become a new force. Sustainable use of the planet has to be fundamental.
There is no path for these without simplifying how we live, scrapping consumerism and fashion, planing for reduced human population, changing our diets to simpler sustainable harvesting of a wide range of plant foods, localizing trade and abolishing corporations as a structure. Wealth distribution not concentration, has to happen.
Denial comes in many forms.
Things are happening now.
I take it you have done some research into the subject. It may take a while for realization to happen. Don't give up learning as the future prospects are hinged on people today and what they are able to do.
Good luck with your research. You may not find what you would like always.
HRG was founded by Ashbritt, Inc., a Florida-based contractor who had received acres of bad press for their post-Katrina contracting. Ashbritt's partner in HRG is Gilbert Bigio, a wealthy Haitian businessman with close ties to the Israeli military. Bigio made a fortune during the corrupt Duvalier regime and was a supporter of the right-wing coup against Haitian President Aristide.
Although Lucke received $60,000 for two months work, he is suing because he says he is owed an additional $500,000 for the more than 20 million dollars in contracts he helped HRG obtain during that time.
As Corpwatch has reported, Ashbritt "has enjoyed meteoric growth since it won its first big debris removal subcontract from none other than Halliburton, to help clean up after Hurricane Andrew in 1992." In 1999, the company also faced allegations of double billing for $765,000 from the Broward County, Florida, school board for cleanup done in the aftermath of Hurricane Wilma.
Ashbritt CEO Randal Perkins is a major donor to Republican causes and hired Mississippi Gov. Haley Barbour's firm, as well as former US Army Corp of Engineers official Mike Parker, as lobbyists. As a reward for his political connections, Ashbritt won 900 million dollars in Post-Katrina contracts, helping them to become the poster child for political corruption in the world of disaster profiteering, even triggering a Congressional investigation focusing on their buying of influence. MSNBC reported in early 2006 that criticism of Ashbritt "can be heard in virtually every coastal community between Alabama and Texas."
The contracts given to Bush cronies like Ashbritt resulted in local and minority-owned companies losing out on reconstruction work. As Multinational Monitor noted shortly after Katrina, "by turning the contracting process over to prime contractors like Ashbritt, the Corps and FEMA have effectively privatized the enforcement of Federal Acquisition Regulations and disaster relief laws such as the Stafford Act, which require contracting officials to prioritize local businesses and give 5 percent of contracts to minority-owned businesses. As a result ... early reports suggest that over 90 percent of the $2 billion in initial contracts was awarded to companies based outside of the three primary affected states and that minority businesses received just 1.5 percent of the first $1.6 billion."
Alex Dupuy, writing in The Washington Post, reported a similar pattern in Haiti, noting, "of the more than 1,500 US contracts doled out worth $267 million, only 20, worth $4.3 million, have gone to Haitian firms. The rest have gone to US firms, which almost exclusively use US suppliers. Although these foreign contractors employ Haitians, mostly on a cash-for-work basis, the bulk of the money and profits are reinvested in the United States." The same article notes, "less than 10 percent of the $9 billion pledged by foreign donors has been delivered and not all of that money has been spent. Other than rebuilding the international airport and clearing the principal urban arteries of rubble, no major infrastructure rebuilding - roads, ports, housing, communications - has begun."
The disaster profiteering exemplified by Ashbritt is not just the result of quick decision making in the midst of a crisis. These contracts are awarded as part of a corporate agenda that sees disaster as an opportunity and as a tool for furthering policies that would not be possible in other times. Naomi Klein exposed evidence that, within 24 hours of the earthquake, the influential, right-wing think tank the Heritage Foundation was already laying plans to use the disaster as an attempt at further privatization of the country's economy.
Relief and recovery efforts, led by the US military, have also brought a further militarization of relief and criminalization of survivors. Haiti and Katrina also served as staging grounds for increased involvement of mercenaries in reconstruction efforts. As one Blackwater mercenary told Scahill when he visited New Orleans in the days after Katrina, "This is a trend. You're going to see a lot more guys like us in these situations."
And it's not just corporations who have been guilty of profiting from Haitian suffering. A recent report from the Disaster Accountability Project (DAP) describes a "significant lack of transparency in the disaster-relief/aid community," and finds that many relief organizations have left donations for Haiti in their bank accounts, earning interest rather than helping the people of Haiti. DAP Director Ben Smilowitz notes, "the fact that nearly half of the donated dollars still sit in the bank accounts of relief and aid groups does not match the urgency of their own fundraising and marketing efforts and donors' intentions, nor does it covey the urgency of the situation on the ground." http://www.truth-out.org/archive/item/93894:one-year-after-haiti-earthquake-corporations-profit-while-people-suffer
So, realistically, capitalism will not end. Not any time soon. If you have not seen it, please watch Voices from the Gulf: "One Year Later, We’re in the Same Situation as Last Year."
Capitalism did not end, it's just that these people flat out don't matter. In the exact same way that they don't matter in any corner of the world or in any area where trash dump sites have been placed in the US or where clean potable water is scarce due to pollution.
Which leaves us with .............what else you got?
Thank You.
I see where you are coming from and I have no criticism of the despair you express.
Apart from the politics and power structures some things caused by man now are out of his control.
The science in assessing what lies ahead is complex but not to hard to simplify. There is robust argument and much supposition as a framework of agreed likelihoods are used to build a picture that over 97% of climate scientists stand by.
This is not a doomsday fabrication but a summary of responses to looking at a new situation never seen before in man's time on the planet.
Without going through the various fields of science adding information, in brief, the outlook has many factors that compound in the summary of interactions.
Your points about persistence of capitalism reflect a real situation. Power and control of wealth often travel together each one feeding the other. Seldom are they purposefully put in place by the poor with understanding of what is happening . The poor are usually ignorant of how power and control over them is implemented. It is done largely with their complicity, ignorance or holding beliefs which are erroneous. The powerful use resources to manipulate others. Our media runs a campaign for the wealthy every day.
As there is breakdown the fabric of society will loose cohesion. Starvation and desperation allow manipulation. The rich can win again.
Bloody riots can be quelled with guns, gas. dogs or helicopters above using a range of devices. The rich win out again.
But at some point you can swap the word rich for a broader terms, the manipulators, psychopaths, Bankers and many politicians at the feeding troughs. Inspite of the destruction of their creation all around them.
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article37194.htm
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article36870.htm
our points about persistence of capitalism reflect a real situation. Power and control of wealth often travel together each one feeding the other. Seldom are they purposefully put in place by the poor with understanding of what is happening . The poor are usually ignorant of how power and control over them is implemented. It is done largely with their complicity, ignorance or holding beliefs which are erroneous. The powerful use resources to manipulate others.
I find this to be utterly fantastic. The poor are very knowledgeable of how power and control over them is implemented because it is something that they deal with on a daily basis. You must be aware that I firmly believe that the ICH is a pile of shit articles deliberately arranged.
I agree that generally "the poor" know the effects of the power and control over them and many do understand how that works, some in great detail.
What actually happens behind the scenes is largely not observable directly but patterns of what is likely can be guidance to a working understanding of the 1% strategy and the 0.001% mastery of power.
The dilemma is not having enough observable detail of behind the scenes corruption systems. The conservative section of society who just go along with business as usual, even when they are not doing well, need clear evidence of how things are done against them and even then need a support base of many before they will shift their belief.
Fighting the 1% highly invasive propaganda machine is a significant task.
A controversial example is the 911 fiasco where 3 buildings fell onto their own footprint, two of the buildings struck with alleged passenger planes and the third, building 7 just fell like one would expect a demolished building to fall, slightly faster than free fall.
In spite of comprehensive evidence presented by independent expert professionals , still much of the public just go along with myths presented by Bush and co. Two countries are invaded and over 1.5 million killed with a fair section of the US public behind that action.
This is all too difficult for many to look at, so they comply with what they are told even when hard evidence shows otherwise.
Ok The Information Clearing House is but one of many publishers . As I see it items presented come from a variety of sources and all need checking through. There are many traps in accepting info that fits your belief system. Being wary as a first and ongoing position is a must. All info should be challenged and continually tested else you get nowhere.
Capitalism will persist until a change is made , be it incremental or sudden.
Just as feudalism changed with circumstances allowing the roots of capitalism to grow, leaving one undesirable system does not guarantee a better system.
OWS is a significant ingredient in changing the game but can't do too much alone. It won't be alone as the consequences of capitalism will be a game changer. How to shape that change may become more evident but meanwhile some developing strong direction is important.
Capitalism relies on being difficult to change. It is not a new position.