Welcome login | signup
Language en es fr
OccupyForum

Forum Post: Can we live independently? 7/4/15

Posted 8 years ago on July 4, 2015, 9:21 a.m. EST by agkaiser (2516) from Fredericksburg, TX
This content is user submitted and not an official statement

The economy, the collective works and transactions of our culture, fails to provide for an ever larger fraction of the human race. We tell ourselves that people get what they work for. Probably 90% or more believe they themselves don't deserve more, even when they know they work hard indeed. They don't realize the lie, even when they know that those they work for are profiting by our hard work in their employ and debt - not their own work.

A few of us are starting to awaken to the fact that most of us will, like our governments, never be out of debt to the winners we, in our stupidity, admire for the wealth they extract from our labor which they organize . . . for their profit! If you think your desires make you like them, think critical difference in scale of the harm done to the community in the pursuit of wealth by the greediest and most successful.

Each day more of us are unwanted, unneeded and left to malnutrition, inadequate health care, homelessness and death, by those who've sabotaged our under-built to begin with safety net. Will we awaken in time to do what's necessary to save our lives?

Some suggestions follow that outline things that might be done, which adhere to the notion that what we all need and want to live can be done in common on a non-profit basis. And we can keep down costs and pay ourselves enough to survive and even thrive in satisfaction, if not happiness.

The list: as always, police, emergency services and defense are common needs that can not be entrusted to private for profit entities, human or otherwise;

The FIRE sector produces no product but skims almost every transaction and endeavor, which adds unnecessary costs of profit and exorbitant executive compensation. All banking, investment, insurance, rentals, real estate sales etc. must be handled on a non profit basis of, by and for the people, if we are to survive and free ourselves from debt bondage.

The following economic sectors are similarly argued: Chemical industry and energy production, resource extraction and mining; Medicine and Pharmaceuticals; Communications, data processing and education; Mass Transportation.

Agriculture may be limited to individual family operations and cooperatives. Big agri-business, like big pharma and monstrous chemical/energy must be eliminated as for profit enterprises.

21 Comments

21 Comments


Read the Rules
[-] 0 points by agkaiser (2516) from Fredericksburg, TX 8 years ago

The simple truth is that civilization is the evil we're born into. The GOP and bankers and CEOs who own them (and the Dems) are just another manifestation of Original Sin. That is: the knowlege of and desire to do evil for personal gain.

Until we baptize ourselves by cleansing our desires and living in the cooperative, egalitarian and consensual spirit of the hunter gatherer clans, we will continue to decay. Life in the Garden of Eden provided sustainable economy for hundreds of thousands or millions of years before civilization's [agriculture's] ten thousand years of greed, corruption and death.

We've got to get back to, or forward to, a way of thinking and doing that can sustain the life of mammals. That is the truth!

[-] 0 points by agkaiser (2516) from Fredericksburg, TX 8 years ago

In case you're wondering: the story in Genisis really works well only as a metaphore.

[-] 0 points by agkaiser (2516) from Fredericksburg, TX 8 years ago

people need food shelter and health MattHolck0

That's not all we need! We need power over our own lives. As long as the 1% have most of the money and wealth we will be dependent on them for the stuff of life and everything else.

It's not all right with me for that dependence to exist. Tax the rich until they are no more and use the money to create our own independent economy.

Tax the parasites to death and be rid of the greatest threat to survival the human race has ever known.

Bernie is only a small step in the right direction. The change we need to live hasn't been imagined yet by any living politician or economist that I'm aware of.

[-] 0 points by factsrfun (8310) from Phoenix, AZ 8 years ago

While the sentiments are noble, I was once introduced to the concept that "he who governs least, governs best". Much could be done with small changes, a national law eliminating so called "right to work" laws, a federal card sign organisation law so that companies could not use elections to sort out the trouble makers.

[-] 0 points by agkaiser (2516) from Fredericksburg, TX 8 years ago

The target is sustainable economy that will support human survival. If we aim short of the mark because we fear it's unreachable, we will surely die.

You may think that's hyperbole. If so, you are wrong!

[-] 0 points by factsrfun (8310) from Phoenix, AZ 8 years ago

Centralized power has led to more problems than it has solved, the key is to understand that we are all people any of us could and most likely would take advantage if it is possible to do so, we must decentralize the decisions and power such that the natural greed of people will not undo us. Removing the social security cap and expanding benefits, single payer health care, real government support for unionization, I would rather see these things than limits set by a centralized government. I do support a transaction tax as well as an asset tax on stocks and bonds like home owner property tax, I think all forms of income should be treated the same under tax law including social security tax, but I do not think that strong centralized control of the economy such as farming and such would lead to a better outcome, i think deals would be made by those able to make them, they always are, better to spread the power and the wealth.

As far as sustainability goes, I'm think that ship has sailed, climate change makes sustainability unlikely, 15 years ago I suggested people support Al Gore for President now I suggest you don't have children.

[-] 0 points by agkaiser (2516) from Fredericksburg, TX 8 years ago

Decentralized is the most likely sustainable solution. I never suggested centralization.

I spoke of cooperatives. The role of the federal government is the dismantling of the central power of Wall St. Any compromise with the conservatives (the majority of Dems and Repus) will lead to failure.

The half way measures you propose, while better than nothing in the interim, are doomed to long term failure compromises with the conservative ruling elite of Wall St. Their ownership of America is the problem. Compromise with parasites is a deadly mistake.

[-] 0 points by factsrfun (8310) from Phoenix, AZ 8 years ago

Any action or lack of action that allows a Republican to win any office is stupid. The GOP have one unifying principle the rich should be richer and money should have more power. That is simple truth.

Simple truth can change the world.

Half measures like saying the GOP is bad but the Dems aren't much better is killing us, we need to see truth and speak truth and stop being all wishy washy about it.

[-] 0 points by agkaiser (2516) from Fredericksburg, TX 8 years ago

The simple truth is that civilization is the evil we're born into. The GOP and bankers and CEOs who own them (and the Dems) are just another manifestation of Original Sin. That is: the knowlege of and desire to do evil for personal gain.

Until we baptize ourselves by cleansing our desires and living in the cooperative, egalitarian and consensual spirit of the hunter gatherer clans, we will continue to decay. Life in the Garden of Eden provided sustainable economy for hundreds of thousands or millions of years before civilization's [agriculture's] ten thousand years of greed, corruption and death.

We've got to get back to, or forward to, a way of thinking and doing that can sustain the life of mammals. That is the truth!

[-] 1 points by DKAtoday (33802) from Coon Rapids, MN 8 years ago

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1sH0uR2u7Hs

Well I came upon a child of God He was walking along the road And I asked him tell where are you going This he told me: Said, I'm going down to Yasgur's farm Going to join in a rock and roll band Got to get back to the land, and set my soul free. We are stardust, we are golden We are billion year old carbon And we got to get ourselves back to the garden.

Well, then can I roam beside you? I have come to lose the smog And I feel myself a cog in something turning. And maybe it's the time of year Yes, said maybe it's the time of man. And I don't know who I am but life is for learning. We are stardust, we are golden We are billion year old carbon And we got to get ourselves back to the garden.

We are stardust, we are golden We are billion year old carbon And we got to get ourselves back to the garden.

By the time we got to Woodstock We were half a million strong And everywhere was song and celebration. And I dreamed I saw the bomber jet planes riding shotgun in the sky Turning into butterflies above our nation.

We are stardust, we are golden We are caught in the devil's bargain, And we got to get ourselves back to the garden.

[-] 0 points by factsrfun (8310) from Phoenix, AZ 8 years ago

you might find this page interesting, it's open source

http://opensourceecology.org/

[-] 0 points by BradB (2693) from Washington, DC 8 years ago

well.... I... in ideology very much agree here... excepting a few issues...

in the garden of eden ... only the strong survived .... those with born health issues had no chance... nor did most who were born in areas of extreme client and fertil conditions... hence.. together we have build a social & technology structure to assist those who need help ... it is only the greedy that corrupt it ...

[-] 0 points by agkaiser (2516) from Fredericksburg, TX 8 years ago

That's the way the social darwinists who see themselves as today's winners tell it. But they know no more about the lives of hunter gatherers than you or I. There's no written history or even myths and legends except among indigenous peoples like American Indians. And they seemed to have revered visionaries and others our leaders today might find weak and useless.

I guess what troubles me is the question your information's source begs.

[-] 1 points by BradB (2693) from Washington, DC 8 years ago

it's my opinion... no other source... however ... I agree with the benefits the hunter gatherers enjoy... especially the added health benefits ... however not so sure that a society based solely on gathering could support 6B people very well

[-] 1 points by agkaiser (2516) from Fredericksburg, TX 8 years ago

I said the spirit of hunter gatherer economy and society - not the material practice!

[-] 1 points by agkaiser (2516) from Fredericksburg, TX 8 years ago

no shit!? And your opinion is based on intrinsic knowledge of human prehistory I guess? Couldn't be regressive extrapolation of a projection of self into others or that of anyone else, could it?

[-] 0 points by turbocharger (1756) 8 years ago

If you support the environment, why would you support someone who pushed all of our factories to a zero regulation country and hence increased the global pollution by lord only knows so much?

Why are you such a contradiction?

[-] 1 points by factsrfun (8310) from Phoenix, AZ 8 years ago

I support the destruction of the GOP by whatever means available, do you feel that Romney would have been better? and if you just want to say that you refuse to accept the "binary system" well i can refuse to accept that the sky is blue but it don't change a damn thing. So explain how you would make it such that it would not have been Romney.

[-] 0 points by MattHolck0 (3867) 8 years ago

people need food shelter and health

[-] 0 points by agkaiser (2516) from Fredericksburg, TX 8 years ago

That's not all we need! We need power over our own lives. As long as the 1% have most of the money and wealth we will be dependent on them for the stuff of life and everything else.

It's not all right with me for that dependence to exist. Tax the rich until they are no more and use the money to create our own independent economy.

Tax the parasites to death and be rid of the greatest threat to survival the human race has ever known.