Forum Post: Please don't tell me that OWS is fighting to preserve every American's right to consume.
Posted 13 years ago on Oct. 25, 2011, 9:32 p.m. EST by nichole
(525)
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Because, if this is what this is all about, American liberals will once again save American capitalism and further the exploitation, enslavement, and genocide of billions worldwide.
At this point anything seems better than this shitty maniac depressive system.
I think it safe to assume many are conflicted on this, if nothing else. I for one would like to see a new era of reasonable prosperity that is at least partially based on massive investment in green energy and transportation (i.e. high-speed rail) infrastructure.
You're not going to win any arguments if you're thinking it's time for American socialism. My idealistic side wishes, but my pragmatic side knows we have to harness and direct capitalism as a force for good (or less evil, anyway).
No, socialism is enforced mediocrity and communism is enforced poverty. I'm still hopeful that capitalist initiative could perhaps provide answers to the most troubling issues we face. However, neoliberal policies seem to offer up everything to everyone, not sustainable, and this is certainly not a system (democracy?) we should be enforcing on others by the barrel of our guns (or whatever other implements of destruction our capitalist system has innovated).
You could almost define this movement - and this is true worldwide, American OWSers just don't know/understand it - as anti-neoliberal.
Most Americans have never even heard the term neoliberal. They don't understand it's the thing that basically unites every president since Reagan - the minor differences in their policies are made to seem profound when in reality they're all "free market" corporate shills selling out humanity for a buck.
Brilliant! Thank you! This "movement" cannot go anywhere until we understand our history (you forgot President Wilson) -- until we are able to locate the origins of the Occupiers' angst -- sources they still trust. And, this is where we could build a bridge between the Tea Partiers and OWS
I just wasted my little liberal history/neoliberalism mini-thesis (in 2 parts) on a troll, so I'll share with you:
http://occupywallst.org/forum/liberals-in-this-movement-need-to-come-out-and-uni/#comment-207061
http://occupywallst.org/forum/liberals-in-this-movement-need-to-come-out-and-uni/#comment-207136
Have you even gotten into Wilson, WWI, and the revolutionary forces that were suppressed? Blew my mind. Check out Dos Passos's U.S.A. trilogy. He was an anti-capitalist fellow traveler, always distrustful of communism, and after his friend, Jose Robles, was assassinated by the communists (he maintained) during the Spanish Civil War, he because a staunch anti-communist, McCarthyite, etc. My thesis maintains that he was always a conservative and that his resistance to U.S. entry into WWI and Wilson's policies could help us bridge this fabricated gap between American "conservatives" and "progressives".
Thanks, I will do some reading. :) I'm a pretty full-on progressive and have found a lot of common ground with the moral values (though not where it comes to preaching one particular source/religion) and even political positions of well-grounded, moderate traditional conservatives. Check out this post by a paleoconservative, for example:
http://occupywallst.org/forum/why-ows-needs-us-conservatives-and-how-you-can-att/
A lot of people seem to be figuring this out simultaneously. The forces that want to keep us divided are having a harder time...
Yes!!! I look forward to seeing more of your posts and future correspondence. I'm thinking (hoping) that more and more people refuse to be conquered by this fabricated divide. We can't afford to continue on this path. I'm not too keen on this 99% jingoism, especially because the people stating this still believe that anyone labeled conservative is an enemy. How is this going to work? Hmmmm.
I agree. That said, I have a pretty big problem with the immoral/anti-altruism section of the right - hard libertarian and objectivist followers of Ayn Rand, Ron Paul, Mises, Hayek, Friedman, etc... I think government can be and has been a force for good in this country and is our only available leverage against corporations/the oligarchy. There are divides that can't be bridged IMO.
wow. idealism is good for a sense of direction but unless you have found a way to live in cartoon land, even socialism to it's extreme includes consumer products. this is how you have a roof over your head, clean teeth and shoes. do you wipe with your hand? capitalism is based on personal responsibility for what you consume rather than the government deciding for you. Cuba up until about 5 years ago was the best example of pure socialism. are you going to tell me capitalism caused them to live like sh!t for almost 50 years? what you fail to articulate are the words greed and corruption.
I don't believe that the greed and corruption you mention has reached the conscious level of those we deem greedy and corrupt.
you are probably right. it's probably not very apparent to some of those being protested to see at first the long term effects of over borrowing. can you describe why an economy with an extended credit sheet is bad? aside from the obvious crooks that have been in the news, if the economy was not structured the way it has been, would not have collapsed like it did. the reason credit has been tightened and is always in the news is because typical [ loans = new cash into the economy = inflation > $value ] see how that works? wages are not structured at any level to keep pace with inflation. all businesses adjust for inflation at least a couple of times a year. this is the unfair advantage built into the current economic system we have now.
Your mention of "long-term effects" is clutch. Everyone now, top to bottom, has been thinking in terms of short-term interests. Every American -- we have no sense of time -- has been living simply to maintain the status quo and hold the inevitable at bay.
lol, i know right.
I think that's exactly what we're all against. Consumerism is what the bankers and mega-corps want us to do: live content little lives on WalMart careers, pay ass-out for insurance, and borrow and shop like our lives depend on it. We are here to stand up against that.
I agree with this.
Seems to me that many have reached the tipping point simply because they are not able to consume as they had in the past. So, they regain that "right" and all is fine? At least that's the sense I'm getting. Is this all self interest? and restoring the middle (consumer) class? I also get very little sense that American Occupiers are connected to the rest of the world in any way. I agree, OWS is a positive development -- that is, as long as this is not about furthering American's ability to consume without giving much thought to the world outside.