Forum Post: Corporations are NOT Evil
Posted 13 years ago on Oct. 24, 2011, 1:42 a.m. EST by ThreeBees
(19)
from Lehigh Acres, FL
This content is user submitted and not an official statement
While I agree corporations are an important part of our economy here in America, and by no margin are they inherently evil; I disagree that there should be "corporate welfare" that comes out of the pockets of an everyday taxpayer.
If corporations want to have this kind of public assistance it should be done from an account that is funded from corporate taxation. To be eligible to receive the funds, your upper management cannot make more than a small percentage of your annual profits based on a sliding scale depending on the corporation's actual profits.
As a person who would like to own my own business one day, having a corporation not only provides me with the security of knowing - should I fail - my children will still have a home to live in. In addition, I would have external funding I would be unable to get from a bank. I see no problem with corporations IN THEORY, just as there is nothing wrong with socialism or communism IN THEORY. The problem comes when people attempt to apply things to real-life situations forgetting that human beings are an X factor - an uncontrollable, volatile variable that can neither be predicted or altered.
Corporations only become dangerous when they become entities that believe they are above the law, above ethical behavior, and privy to benefits even the American people have no been granted.
Yes, you employ hundreds of thousands of people, but if you can't properly manage funds or produce a good product, why should I have to pay for you to stay in business? I didn't want your product to begin with, why am I just handing you my social security benefits with absolutely NOTHING in return?
I'm not saying Bush (didn't vote for him) made a bad decision when he didn't veto this corporate bailout fiasco - in fact, he probably prevented mass unemployment and a severe financial depression which would would still be roiling in - but it could have been handled better and with more sensitivity to the plight of the American people. The gifts these companies were given should have been high-interest loans from the American people that were returned to our communities as a whole: not put into government nonsense (read: White House parities or the military), but put to use for the Americans who have been dedicated to this country for generations.
It is a sad day when Americans aren't proud to be from our own country anymore. A country other people are literally getting killed to get into. A country were we aren't raped by soldiers, murdered by drug cartel, or forced to follow a certain religion by a dictator. Yes, we are quite fortunate to be free of the horrors of Africa's wars, North Korea's slavery, and the dangers of South America. But we are trapped here by a government who might as well be a dictator. A government which was created to be of service to the people. A government which is following centuries-old and invalid procession; one that no longer listens to the people who command it. Instead, we have a dictatorship that we pretend to vote on.
One day it will change, but it has to start somewhere. I am the 99% and I'm pissed off.
No system accounts completely for human behavior. But if we take a look at systems which produce the fairest distribution, and the most positive outcomes for the greatest proportion of people, they look more socialist than ours. The societies with the lowest infant mortality and the highest life expectancy as well as the highest quality of life tend to have a few things in common. They have national healthcare, proportional representation, they are signatories to international law (specifically self-executing treaties), and they often have some form of comprehensive unemployment insurance.
At the other end of this spectrum, you have the US and the so-called third world.
Austrian economics - subjective valuation. Libertarianism - freedom & human rights.
Austrian economics - The Merits of Fascism
"It cannot be denied that Fascism and similar movements aiming at the establishment of dictatorships are full of the best intentions and that their intervention has, for the moment, saved European civilization. The merit that Fascism has thereby won for itself will live on eternally in history. "
Tell me, who wrote these lines...
did you find that on the "Quotable VonMises" board over at mises.org?
Von Mises, What your point?
It is depressing to know that we come nearly in last place in the developed world in nearly all aspects of the well-being of our citizens. Not only is it deeply disturbing that the government shows such little concern for the future of this country, but it is an atrocity to know that our children will be the greatest sufferers and the generation that has come before them took so long to try to fix the problems.
The Great War was called "The Great War" until World War II came about at which point it's name changed to World War I.
The Great Depression will soon undergo a name change. It will be called World Depression I. The current, deepening world depression depression, of course, will come to be called World Depression II.
Europe was leveled by the two wars. I think this accounts for why they take care of their own. But what about the American Civil War? It was pretty destructive. I'll bet there were national healthcare bills floating around during that time. I would love to read them. I would love to see who blocked them.
I'm a 99%er and I disagree with you. Corporations can be very evil. Look at CIGNA Insurance Company, very evil. It may not be a person in general but it is Wallstreet pushing this evil. That is why "Corporate Treason" laws should be made.
CIGNA is evil, evil, evil. Check it out. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sAKtW1W6Y74
Still feel the same way?
Yes I do, because CIGNA does't make decisions. Neither does a street in New York. It is the HUMAN BEINGS that are FILLED WITH GREED. It is the 1% who run the corporations, who work on Wall St., who are sociopathic to the point of watching the world around them rotting and not giving a damn.
It's not a building and words on paper that are evil. It is the actions of mankind that have put us where we are.
I share your thoughts. People have choices in life. When others don't play fair because of control issue's....well then so be it. Let's have a civil war. It's long past do. Should have happened with the first Bush as president.
Won't be much of a war if it's millions vs. a few hundred. Can't we just exile them to some place horrible... like China? Where they can be the <1%?
Don't you wish it was that easy. Accountability is better, it shows we don't accept that kind of behavior anymore.
Should have added the +sarcasm+ at the end...
I can do that.
Accountability is better, it shows we don't accept that kind of behavior anymore. +sarcasm+ lol
Sorry, I mean I should have added +sarcasm+ to the end of my statement; haha!
"Corporations are people. Human nature is good. Obviously they aren't evil."
Is this meant to be ironic comedy?
Some corporations are very, very fucking evil. Enron, for one. Some people are very, very evil. Do you need examples?
Corporations should never be allowed to become 900 pound gorillas tearing apart our jungle and squashing common people like bugs. They should be highly regulated to insure that people's environment, safety and rights are not violated. Those responsible inside them should face criminal charges should they run afoul of common sense protections of workers, the air, land and water. More bad corporate actors need to see the inside of cells. That would go a long way to correcting what's wrong with the world today.
Dissonance, Where do you see legal entities doing this? Oh, that's right, it's the decisions of a HUMAN BEING that are the problem here. Not the idea that a person should be allowed to own a business, and, should that business fail, not lose their home and everything they own to creditors.
Enron is not evil. The people who ran Enron made terrible, selfish, degenerate decisions and they had the power to do it because of laws that were created for corporations.
This would be like saying "Metal is evil." Then justifying your opinion by saying metal is what makes up guns/bullets/swords/armor/cars/nukes. It's not the metal that's evil, it's what PEOPLE do with it that is wrong.
ThreeBees - VERY well said. I work for a corporation. I used to be SO PROUD to work there - it treated all people with respect, it took its social responsiblity VERY seriously, it made the world a better place, AND it made a profit. Now we are nothing but a soulless money machine - grinding employees into the ground while the executives take double digit pay rises and cash in their share options the instant they are able to. It is not corporations that are evil - it is the people that are currently running them. I wish you good luck with your plans, and I hope that some day you will have a corporation that people are once again proud to work for.
Double digits? Like $20?
I believe he means x10 not $10 when he is referring to pay raises.
People should be proud of the work they are doing - and we shouldn't have to sacrifice our morals to make sure our families are fed.
I once attended a writer's workshop where the visiting speaker was a published author. I had the fortune of her looking over a piece of fiction I was writing at the time and she told me over and over again: things cannot feel or think or choose. The corporations are not evil, malicious, money-hungry machines. They do not choose who makes what money. They don't choose who owns and operates them. They simply ARE.
I completely agree with you - the problem is with the people.
"If the hearts of the people are pure, then the land will be pure." - Nichiren Daishonin, ca. 1222 - 1282 CE
If the conduct of the leaders accords with the integrity of the Great Way [of life], the people will revere integrity, sustaining peace, and the nation will prosper." - ancient Chinese saying, ca. 600 BCE
3 Bees, I empathise with you, deeply. As a semi-retired entrpreneur, who started several successful companies despite each recession since 1969, I witnessed & experienced the mounting devastation, excess pain & suffering of the aftermaths. Finally, most of the rest of the "Baby Boomers" are getting their dose of cold, hard, cruel Plutonomy (Casino Capitalism's deep Bust phase of the cycle). That means that this is different than all those other recessions of the last 40 years.
Over 25% of home owners have "underwater" mortgages, sliding down the slippery slope. 1 million homes are in the Repo pipeline and nearly 2 million more are on hold. This is great news!
Now, besides the OWS crew, the small business folks, workers, and retirees who got screwed out of sustainable prosperity (and/or retirement) over the last 50 years, we have the rest of the global middle-class & grandparents joining our team.
BTW, a plutocratic oiligarchy is not a dictatorship. What enslaved so many of us was disinformed ignorance and habit, the habits of selfishness, complacency, apathy, and all the other forms of negativity that can be exploited by cunning sociopaths.
The cure is a zealous love of truth, voracious curiosity, a passion for discovery (learning), an undefeatable will to evolve, and an obsessive commitment to compassionate respect for life, children, elders, and other living beings.
3B, don't just get mad, get even!
"Be the change you want to see in the world." - MK Gandhi
Let's liberate & enlighten it, starting with ourselves. Fair enough?
Beautifully put, MPowers. My father is one of those "Baby Boomers" and the hardships he's experiencing are beyond unfair. After working for well over 50 years of his life, he is still not able to say he outright owns his home - because a bank does. Despite having sold his house for so much more than what the original asking price was, because of the interest on his mortgage, he was left with nearly nothing when he moved three years ago.
Hopefully my family and I can survive these hard times and my children will be wise, passionate people who aren't afraid to make change when they've grown.
The way corporations are run in 2011 is evil.
corporations are most certainly evil, like godzillas... whether or not they intend harm their very natures are that people are harmed and that means that they are evil. The real truth is that corporations are socipathic meta entities which should thus be rigidly controlled in order to force them to behave in an ethical manner.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OPR3GlpQQJA
I have been active here since the very beginning, and since the very beginning I have been trying to make some core points. These points clearly have not been digested or fully understood by the mob, and so I'm going to try to make a further attempt here again.
For these reasons, I beg of you to please immediately join me on the wiki. We need to have all of these details and all of these ideas put together in an organized fashion, rather than posted in a long scrawl which will never be read.
http://occupythiswiki.org/wiki/THE_99%25_POLITICAL_PARTY
http://occupythiswiki.org/wiki/Main_Page
http://www.followthemoney.org/?gclid=CMbY87bB-qsCFUPt7Qod9HE8mQ
http://maplight.org/us-congress/guide/data/money?9gtype=search&9gkw=list%20of%20campaign%20donations&9gad=6213192521.1&9gag=1786513361&gclid=CP61oYbB-qsCFQFZ7AodcTF0jw
http://www.opensecrets.org/
http://occupywallst.org/forum/our-new-wiki/
http://occupywallst.org/forum/non-violence-evolution-by-paradigm-shift/
Gawdoftruth, paragraphs are your friends.
Some corps actually have strict standards on bonuses, stock options, and so forth regardless of profits. There is no blanket way to consolidate all corps one in the same.
Joyce, And corporations do not make their own policies and standards - HUMAN BEINGS do.
[Removed]
OK - BUTT the "evil I" in the corporate law tool box - It is called "personhood" gotta go can't use it - bad!!! very bad !!! peace AtomicZ...
Again, corporate CEOs and board members make the decisions regarding how their companies are run. Law makers and lobbyists fight for the "corporate law toolbox" that gives the business any kind of rights.
This is like blaming a tree for a fire. The tree didn't start the fire, it's inanimate. It's quite useful if we know what we are doing; but once some jerk in the woods forgot to set stones around the firepit and it caught on. Everything is burning to the ground. The tree is just a means, just fuel, just a vessel for the fire to burn through. Just like the fire. The fire is not evil. It did not start itself - a person did. The fire is the "personhood" and the business is the tree. The aftermath of the blaze is America - in ashes. And we are the bewildered on lookers, and the worst part is: we don't have to be. Grab a bucket. Grab some dirt. Pull out your hoses. Put the fire out, smack the idiot who started it with a lifetime of community service (because I'm not paying taxes so he can enjoy free meals for the rest of his life...) and let's get back to replanting the forest!
Have some passion, for crying out loud! Make yourselves heard!
Everyone needs to stop complaining about corporations and their "evil" laws and start MAKING PEOPLE RESPONSIBLE for their actions. MAKING GOVERNMENTS RESPONSIBLE for their actions. It's not too late.
Very poetic you are a wonderful writer... Now on to my problem with the corporate personhood - please explain to me and #OWS on this forum the advantage to giving anything power above and outside of "personal responsibility" Which is what granting of "personhood" to a business has done. If the business requires [ exceptional powers above social, moral behavior ] then that business is no longer apt to serve the social, moral behavior of our society - and will by the law of least resistance break every social, moral law to game the system for power and money [ this is called corruption ] I am of the opinion a "worthy business" stays in touch with "it's" social, moral behaviors that benefit and lift up our society - at present we have the complete opposite to a "worthy business model" [ this is new ] we must rewrite the laws to restrict businesses from conducting commerce that in point of fact [ look around you ] impacts our society in amoral & socially destructive ways, resulting in the use of tax money to fund such endeavors and as a result of [ TARP ] the stripping of the social moral tax dollars from our country - has driven over a 1,000 cities to be occupied by millions of people who are completely dependent on the whims of a corporate decision which is solely made to profit that corporate entity with impunity! Please explain how this is not the clear-cut stripping of the forest from the land [ WHERE NOTHING WILL BURN BECAUSE NOTHING IS LEFT TO CATCH FIRE ]? The current corporate system is nothing less than the systematic denuding of our moral and social systems afforded to us as a people by the people and for the people! peace AtomicZ...
AtomicZ, you mistake my approval of protection for approval of sentience. I agree that people should be protected from the greed of other people - which is why corporations were created in the first place (protecting business owners from massive banks that would strip them of everything they have earned in their lives.)
A corporation's definition can be changed. It doesn't have to be a menacing hound in the darkness, but a grand protector that guards our doorways.
I DO NOT believe corporations should be granted rights and personhood.
I DO NOT believe corporations are evil - the people who run them and who lust for power and money are evil.
I DO believe in the good corporations provide - protecting their owners from PERSONAL financial downfall. A business and a person are two different things, right? So why should a person and his/her family suffer just because a business fails? [In other words, if a business fails it should just fail, it shouldn't take down the owner - OR THE TAX PAYER - with it.]
Well put and I venture to say your position is the core of what a new legalese should redefine as the corporate shell & that corporate shell should never be tweaked to do the damage we are now living through - but you know & I know if we allow something on top of allowing "personhood" [ we agree - bad very bad ] it will not work on the levels necessary to change this fiasco... When "personhood" was passed a hundred or so years ago - it worked just fine but the length of time and the legal protuberances extended therein are outdated / dangerous & too expensive to tweak anymore [ it must be completely scrapped ] We need [ hell must have ] a brand new model ... I want to believe this #OWS movement will spark a long debate that will awaken the 99% with eyes wide open to the graft and greed that is strangling all of us here. Stimulate our laws to redesign protections equally when balanced as acts of commerce on the moral social fabric we are all a part of. peace AtomicZ...
Corporations are people. Human nature is good. Obviously they aren't evil.
Thoreau; it is a mistake to assume that corporations are people. It is an assumption many people are making these days because of the extensive rights given to corporate entities. A corporation is nothing more than a means for people to make a living and provide a product or service. While corporations are by and large given many more rights than people - this is not the corporation's fault, it is the people who gave the corporation rights.
The nature of mankind cannot be classified as good or evil because neither exist - good and evil are simply quantifiers and labels that people have given to thoughts and actions to define social mores and acceptable behavior.
The nature of humans is to exist.
The nature of corporations is to protect.
Human beings, in all cultures, go through rituals, rights, and biologically drive action in order to procreate and permit the survival of the species. That is the nature of humans.
Corporations are created to protect the private property of the owners and investors. There is nothing good OR evil about corporations as good and evil are only labels we can give ourselves because the idea of a true good or a true evil is purely a human ideal.
So no, corporations are not evil. They don't think or act. But they aren't good either; and they certainly aren't people. (What defines us as human? As a person? Can a corporation possible meet all of those requirements? If not, then they are only "people" because they are being named as so, not because they actually are.)
I'm impressed with your response to my tongue-in-cheek response.
I've been debating recently as to whether The Constant Gardener might be my favorite movie.
My observations in the natural world seem to suggest that human nature is neither good nor neutral, but I appreciated your point of view.
Thoreau, I apologize. My ability to detect sarcasm from strangers over the internet is undeveloped as of yet. Perhaps a "haha" would have been in order.
And now I'm not sure whether you're joking about the movie, either; as I've never heard of it and I'm unsure of it's relation to this topic.
Thank you for clarifying (had you truly believed corporations are people I would have continued to wonder what on earth you are doing on this forum!)
In the movie, the name of the corporation (big pharma company) is "Three Bees". Thought that was what your username was based on.
I'm a fan of subtlety, which doesn't translate well on the internet, but it makes me laugh anyway, so I like it.
Apology rejected, as it's not necessary. Like I said, I enjoyed your post, regardless. I can appreciate a functioning brain.
Thoreau,
I'm a big fan of Henry David myself; his purveyance of nature-induced curiosity to generations is admirable.
I will probably not rest until I've seen The Constant Gardner now, thank you. <mock anger>
Before I reveal myself as the immature 24-year-old woman with too much sugar in my bloodstream (oops) I will be heading to bed. Good evening to you, Thoreau.
Yeah, Big fan.
The Constant Gardener is amazing. Angry now but thanking me later.
Ha! You're a little to formal and proper to be 24 years old. You gotta settle down. It's just an internet forum. ha ha (there ya go).
If you watch the movie anytime soon, I'd love to know what you think. Night.
Thoreau,
Being formal and proper is a rarity. Furthermore, I have three very young, impressionable children in my home; children I would like to watch grow into caring, responsible, polite adults.
If I go around acting like a fool or "trolling" about whether it be online or in my home life what kind of example would I be setting for them?
I made the decision to become a parent and even if I'm only on this forum after they've been laid to rest for the evening I should still conduct myself in a respectful manner. After all, being two-faced is just as bad as being a straight-forward liar. If they ever happen across this forum they will know I was respectful and convicted.
All I can hope for is my children will have a better future than my own; and if that means being a little too formal and proper for a 24-year-old, well, I can handle that.
Since I've canceled my Netflix subscription and I refuse to shop at the pit of doom that is Wal*Mart I'll have to look elsewhere for The Constant Gardner. I'll be keeping my eyes on the look out.
No real good suggestions for ya, on where to get the movie.
Ha. Alright. You were supposed to see the "ha ha" at the end of the sentence up there! I wouldn't dissuade you from behaving in a way that you want to pass down to your children. That's admirable and that's the way it should be. Peeps should be willing to set the example they want to see. More power to ya. Keep up the good work!