Forum Post: Mad about Citizens United?
Posted 13 years ago on Oct. 17, 2011, 2:11 p.m. EST by hairlessOrphan
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Check this out.
Try to ignore that it's from Huffington Post. The summary:
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"Supreme Court To Rule On Corporate Personhood For Crimes Against Humanity"
The case, Kiobel v. Royal Dutch Petroleum, arises out of a suit by a dozen Nigerian plaintiffs claiming that Royal Dutch and two of its Shell Oil subsidiaries worked with the Nigerian government to torture and extrajudicially execute individuals protesting against the companies' oil exploration.
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In Kiobel, the 2nd Circuit Court of Appeals held, by a 2-1 vote, that only natural persons, and not corporations, may be held liable under the ATS [Alien Tort Statute]. "Corporate liability is not discernible" under the ATS, wrote the majority, because "no corporation has ever been subject to any form of liability (whether civil or criminal) under the customary international law of human rights."
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http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/10/17/supreme-court_n_1015953.html
Get it? Citizens United ruled that corporations are entitled to human rights protections as a person. Now Kiobel is questioning whether corporations are "subject to any form of liability" for human rights violations.
In my humble, individual opinion, it should be the reverse. Corporations should not be afforded protections, but should be held liable for abuses. It's not because I'm mad at corporations and want to punish them. It's because I believe we should prioritize protecting human beings over corporations; I believe we are fundamentally a human society, not a society of abstractions. But I'll leave it to you to decide what makes moral, ethical, and philosophical sense.
Corporations: because none of us is as cruel as all of us. Nor as unaccountable.
Just leave the corps alone, meanie. Stomping all over their liberties like this is disgraceful. Let them be FREEEE!!!
Let me clarify: I am a big BIG fan of laughing about the absurdity of the situation. Big ups to you guys on that. I, too, am holding my head in my hands and kekekekeke.
But we can't stop at the laughter. While we stood by laughing, the Supreme Court ruled on Citizens United, and they did it with a straight face.
What can we do this time around, so we don't repeat our mistake of hapless complacency? Can we turn this tide?
Not when this movement is working at cross-purposes, which is all I see (here, at least). Libertarians are for Citizens United and unlimited free speech, including money as free speech, and including corporations in the definition of people with the right to free speech.
This is all becoming about smaller government. The anti-corruption ideas are losing ground it seems. How can we, as a movement, push for change on something like this with such a muddled message and ideology?
After hearing about the strong Ron Paul turnout in San Francisco and Orlando on Saturday, I'm really unsure how to proceed.
I think in the broader sense we need to get people on-the-ground aware that in concentrating on one battle site, they are pissing away the broader front. I don't know if they have an internet working group or outreach or strategy, but they need one. They need it bad.
But for those of us who are, let's say, more aware of the dangers of this kind of legal precedent, how do we raise awareness?
The Work does not need to be limited to declarations from the drum circle at the park, does it? If we have to wait for them, then we need to start pressuring them to move faster.
The whole concept of organization/strategy is being met with distrust. Part of it is the fact that we do have a strong anarchistic bent, and part is planned mind games from what I can tell. I think, in that this has opened some eyes as to the status quo being unsustainable, OWS is on balance still a positive force in the direction we'd like to see things move.
But it is not likely to drive change on any particular issue. We'll have to use more traditional political channels for that, while pointing to OWS as a sign of WHY it's important that the status quo be overturned. IMO that's what MoveOn and similar would probably like to do, but are being demonized.