Wow, this one touched some nerves.
I’d recommend posting a tangentially political meme at some point on Lemmy.
The amount of people who will come out of the woodwork to tell you ‘don’t post this’ and ‘don’t make things political’ will really be eye opening.
People don’t want to address systemic issues and think not talking about them is a viable solution.
Just making comments about rich people and their taxes seems to do the same thing here.
Don’t even have to go THAT far, I get called a commie for saying a 40 hour work week should provide basic shelter these days. 🤷
If we want to live in boring reality, it doesn’t happen a LOT but way more than it should.
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I mean that was and is a basic communist agitating point, you might be closer to a communist than you think.
I don’t know if this is supposed to be snarky or not but I’ve accepted a while ago that I’m definitely some version of “leftist.”
I don’t see myself that way necessarily but capitalists are drawing their line in the sand so far to the right that it is what it is lmao
It was meant to be snarky as in laughing with you not at you.
Gotcha. I’ve always seen myself as a centrist, not particularly anti capitalist, just into safety nets and less car centric infrastructure.
Nowadays I get called a commie for talking about public transit, I’m a commie for the work comment, list goes on. I don’t buy into your red scare bs guys, if that stuff makes me a commie then I’m a commie les fuckin gooooooo
We do want adress systematic issues, just in the right communities. When i visis memes i wanna see funny memes. In dankmemes i wanna see dank memes. In NCD i wanna see non credible military stuff.
That’s the issue
this was a funny meme to me thanks
Yeah, because we don’t particularly fancy being lectured by teenagers on the Internet.
How is a meme a lecture?
It’s not, this just isn’t a meme
Where are all of you “NoT a MeMe” types when lazy fascist shit gets posted? 🤔
I mean… I’m a capitalist who doesn’t defend billionaires and also doesn’t feel left out… ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
Right? There are pros and cons with every system. People disagree based on value judgements not based on misinterpretation of facts. People in their echo chambers will have you believe that everyone on the other side of the political spectrum all thinks the same way “the same people who say X also say Y!” Rarely is that the case. Most people are actually centrists who have their own independent beliefs on a wide range of topics.
Not everyone on my side of the political Spectrum thinks the same way. But if you are pro capitalist. You simply aren’t thinking. Capital, markets, and currency. All existed before capitalism. The only thing capitalism did was justify the wealth and power of the wealthy and Powerful Beyond being simply born to wealthy powerful people. Now you get to be a wealthy powerful person by having capital. Which ironically just so happens to be most common among people born too powerful people. New boss same as the old boss. Funny how that works.
I hate capitalism, I just don’t know of a better alternative. Nordic socialism is just capitalism with a big government. Soviet socialism failed miserably (it turns out, it is very hard to plan an economy). I have never heard a solid plan for communism that works on a national scale, never mind a plan for transitioning to such a society.
On the other hand, capitalism works reasonably well most of the time and we can just fix issues with it when they crop up (and we have a big backlog of issues to fix).
Soviet socialism failed miserably (it turns out, it is very hard to plan an economy).
Did you actually check? Because based on a bunch of metrics I saw the USSR did pretty well compared to the feudalism that came before it and the capitalist “democracy” that came after its illegal and undemocratic dissolution.
Capitalism does not work reasonably well most the time. Unchecked it leads to countless busts and Booms that leave the average person destitute. You really should look into the history of the early 20th century. The only reason we even still have capitalism. Is because of two massive world wars. Slaughtering and grinding up many tens of millions of people. As well as passage of basic Social Security nets. We’ve largely at least abandoned the spirit of. If if not in practice as well.
Capitalism has been a failure at every level. Constantly. That isn’t a justification or Praise of leninism. There’s a lot of other ideologies on the Socialist side Beyond leninism. And they don’t require large National level government. Look into them sometime.
Is there any system that is more fair and/or gives you more freedom? I havent found any.
On a hypothetically completely free capitalist market, I can sell and buy whatever I wish and the value that I get when selling directly correlates to the value I’m bringing to the buyer. If I generated a lot of value, I have more capital so I can also buy more value using that capital. Sounds fantastic in theory.
Are you though?
Do you own the means of production and employ people to operate it, paying them a fraction of the value their labor produces?
Are you able to live comfortably without working for the foreseeable future? Do you exert outsized control over municipal, regional and state government far beyond your “vote” if you live in a place that claims to be a democracy? Does that control come from your power over the means of production that you control?
Supporting a society controlled by the people described above does not make you a capitalist, being one of the people described above does.
Are you able to live comfortably without working for the foreseeable future?
I’m pretty sure that’s just a strawman version of capitalism. Plenty of capitalists who had their life’s work taken during a communist revolution and were at best told they could come back as a manager worked plenty hard. Didn’t save them.
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may i see them?
The dictionaries say otherwise. But sure, if “capitalist” just means a person thats very succesful and uses their power for the bad, then they are obviously not good to society but that doesnt make the system of capitalism any worse…
I don’t think you’re being disingenuous here and English is a crazy language, so here’s the definition google came up with:
noun: capitalist; plural noun: capitalists a wealthy person who uses money to invest in trade and industry for profit in accordance with the principles of capitalism.
In the sentence
I’m a capitalist who doesn’t defend billionaires and also doesn’t feel left out…
The word capitalist is a noun.
But even if you were to pull up a dictionary definition of the word that says otherwise, in the context of the economic and political system of capitalism there’s three hundred years of writing that define capitalists under capitalism as various groups of bourgeoisie.
I think we can dispense with petty arguments over the dictionary definitions of words given what we’re discussing. If it will make you feel better I can refer to capitalists as flying purple people eaters.
you forgot to show the adjective definition, which is what he is using in his sentence. and you are the one dispensing in petty arguments by continueing the arguement unti you get final say.
Alright, Im fine with that definition, thanks for clarifying that.
However, if I invest part of my money (eg. into stocks or ETFs) as you do if you want to start saving money, that would make me a capitalist, wouldnt it? Your previous comment kind of made it seem like all capitalists are evil and rich af…
I think if we just go by that dictionary definition, you being a wealthy person who invests in trade and industry to make a profit in accordance with the principles of capitalism would by definition make you “rich af” and would align your interests against those of the people whose labor allows trade and industrial production.
The people whose labor allows trade and industrial production want to get the highest pay and best living conditions possible, you, as a wealthy investor in the concerns that employ and pay them want the most profit possible. The raw materials of trade and production are fixed quantities so any profit must come from paying the worker less than their labor produces.
Does that make you evil? I don’t know.
You used the example of an etf and I wanna talk about stock and securities trading briefly. A person with enough money can invest it in the market in such a way that it causes huge changes and can basically write their own ticket. Small time (retail, if you’re familiar with the lingo) investors take on quite a bit more risk and while they might hope their bag goes up or down they don’t generally have any control or say over what happens to laborers or industries and certainly not any power to control markets.
There’s an argument to be made that the move to replace pensions with invested retirement funds was explicitly intended to align retail investors and working people with the interests of the very capitalists who needed them to accept lower wages and reduced benefits, but this tea…
I do take issue with using dictionary definitions though, because they tend to be truncated and devoid of the background and context that allow for understanding and use of words in conversation or correspondence. This one, for example doesn’t explain what the principles of capitalism are, only that they must exist because capitalists are people who invest according to them. This definition doesn’t even describe capitalists as a class, which is fundamental to understanding the overwhelming majority of ink spilled in the last few centuries about them and the system they are in control of!
Im not wealthy by any means, though the wealth cant be the deciding factor, can it?
If Im a student with a savings plan (one where you put aside money every month and invest it [not sure if thats the correct Engkish term]) so it grows over time, am I a capitalist in your opinion?
The raw materials of trade and production are fixed quantities so any profit must come from paying the worker less than their labor produces.
The finished product is worth more than what their labour produces, otherwise they could just sell the product themselves. Because the organization, strategy, marketing and the needed capital for all of that are values in itself.
A quick question about that trading example, as far as I know market manipulation is illegal so using that to your advantage wouldnt worky right?
According to the goofy dictionary definition were working with, wealth is a requirement.
That definition doesn’t talk about the relationship between wealth and extracted profits because getting to the bottom of that relationship ultimately ties the two together. There’s no space to explain that if you own productive capital, you’re by definition wealthy.
If we wanted to examine your retail investment portfolio under a broader definition, you could possibly be considered the most petit-ist of bourgeoise under some circumstances, but generally if you have to work for a wage or are expecting to have to work for a wage once your education is over then you’re not a capitalist. Participating in the securities market doesn’t change your relationship to the means of production.
If you made your living as a securities trader, that might be a different story.
I’m not sure what you’re saying about the labor and selling it themselves, but the organization, strategy and marketing are all labor that went into the production of the goods. The capital in the form of facilities and equipment are fixed costs like the raw materials used in production, so any profit from the sale is necessarily coming out of the value of the labor.
Good to know that market manipulation is illegal, surely there’s no examples of markets being manipulated in our recent memory!
You’re a capitalist? How much capital do you own?
Well, a lot less after January of 2021… I was at 4.3 mil, and lost about 1.2 mil. (starting from less than zero, first child was born on Medicaid).
Sounds like you’re just petite bourgeoisie
Grew up on a farm, had no help, just decided to go get what I wanted like literally any and all Americans can. Like I said, first kid was born on Medicaid, we were on welfare for a couple years… Got a full time job at best buy… worked through community college, got off welfare… Took me about 11 years to get that first nice paycheck job where it takes others 4…but, that’s ok. Can’t control everything in life, live and learn.
Just use the available programs, and get off of them as soon as possible so you can start contributing more than you took from them. It’s pretty easy if you just do it as a matter of principle. I received, now I give back. Once I’ve returned some orders of magnitude of what supported me, I can focus on what I leave behind.
The fact that it was harder for me than it is for others doesn’t make me bitter or anything… I’ll just make it easier for my kids on the next go-round. It’s all good.
I think you took a statement about your class position as an insult. But I want to clarify, if you stopped working tomorrow would you have enough income for the rest of your life? If not, youre a member of the proletariat. If you could, youre petite bourgeoisie. You operate under capitalist logic but don’t have enough power to actually exercise control over the wider context your business exists in. You would be a small fish at the mercy of being eaten by larger fish. Better to not live in a system where anyone is a fish.
The volume of anti-capitalist and pro-China rhetoric on Lemmy is disconcerting. It makes me appreciate how good other platforms are at moderating state generated garbage.
You’ve left an anti-China warmongering echo chamber for a place where moderation isn’t predicated on silencing dissent against the west. The people you describe as ‘pro-China’ bots have plenty of issues with Chinese policy decisions. Accepting that the USA and capitalism more generally are evil forces in world politics are not state generated.
I’ve found that if you block content from hexbear.net, that stuff drops off dramatically.
If you support capitalism, then yes, you defend billionaires.
If that were the case (which it isnt) I dont see a problem defending billionaires (and on the side also everybody’s freedom and justice)…
You can’t defend billionaires and justice at the same time
Why not? Capitalism is the most fair system to me.
What is the metric for fairness here? And what version of ‘capitalism’ are we talking about?
Fairness is subjective. To me it means: everyone is free to do what they like WITHOUT invading anybody elses freedom; if a person performs well, they should be rewarded well; everyone should have the same initial possibilities in life.
The version of capitalism I was talking about is capitalism with a regulated market. Basic needs should be covered (except if you refuse to contributr anything at all). Im pretty happy with the “social market economy” in Germany where I currently live.
everyone is free to do what they like WITHOUT invading anybody elses freedom
But how am I gonna get someone to work for me without invading their freedom to choose to do what they want?
Hell no, man. No one will work at my shop if they’re allowed to do what they want.
Basic needs should be covered (except if you refuse to contributr anything at all).
Fuck yeah man! That’s how we do it! That’s what gets people working for me - the threat that not doing so will put ‘em on the street! That’s what I’m talkin’ about!
Counterpoint: Nope.
So, you support a system that inherently creates an upper class of obscenely rich people, yet are opposed to those people?
A system set up to enrich the owner of a business, while its workers lose out, creates exactly the people you claim not to defend.
No, I’m not opposed to them… I just don’t support them. They can support themselves, and I can support myself just fine. I make more money from them than I would without them, and they make money from me they wouldn’t have otherwise had my skillset to access easily.
I’ve never been forced to take any job… I just manage my skillset in such a way that makes it both rare and valuable. I’ve worn many hats over the years, and I just play the game instead of bitching about the rules Worked out great for me and my family so far. I’ll even have some to leave my kids so they don’t have as hard of a time reaching even higher than I have. That’s the whole point, for me: make my kids’ life better than mine, and I’ve done that so far.
No, I’m not opposed to them… I just don’t support them.
It doesn’t work like that. They are in power, and by not opposing them, you consent to their continued power.
I make more money from them than I would without them,
That isn’t even close to true. Capitalist extraction of surplus value is exactly how they make their profits. If they paid you the value you made them, they wouldn’t have a profit. If they weren’t there to extract that value, you and your fellow workers would make more - it’s basic mathematics.
and they make money from me they wouldn’t have otherwise had my skillset to access easily.
This part is true, yes.
I’ve never been forced to take any job…
So, you’re saying you’re able to retire right now and never work again?
I just play the game instead of bitching about the rules
That’s a slave mindset.
That’s the whole point, for me: make my kids’ life better than mine, and I’ve done that so far.
That’s cool you can think that small and that selfishly. Others, however, realise you could be living even better, and everyone else, including those with nothing, could have that standard of living, too, if we stop being complacent with mere crumbs.
That’s what you have. Mere crumbs of luxury. It’s great that you’re not on the street, but that is an incredibly low standard to have.
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Everyone time something controversial is posted, damn I missed out on all the discussion because Blahaj.zone defederated all these capitalist losers so I can just think about being trans and cracking jokes.
Honestly is this meme passes for controversial then the world has gotten a whole lot more lame.
Omg you are so right 😮💨
Blahaj zone also defeterated fascists, Tankies, etc! They’re based as hell!
politicalmemes
You are in this meme.
Yeah no shit it reads ‘lemmy’, everyone here is in this meme
Whoosh
you don’t know what that means
Supersonic BOOM - WHOOSH!
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Someone creating a specific community doesn’t add rules to existing general communities. You should start an apolitical memes community!
What? Using lemmy as intended and finding a community that fits my needs or starting my own?!
Then how will I inflict my will on all the people in existing communities as is my real intent?!
Where funny?
Here
Capitalists need workers to oppress. Without them, they would have nothing to give them a feeling of superiority. Mincing people into fertilizer would surely be a fun pastime for the rich, but it’s hardly a sustainable hobby
Capitalists don’t care about sustainability.
You have a rather one dimensional moustache twirling view of the world. Let me guess, communism is the one stop solves all problems in the world solution without any negative side effects?
You do understand that that is not how the world works, or for that matter, how anything works?
Seriously, your comment is plain nonsense. Yes, captialism has a shitload of issues. Yes, there are rich and abusive people out there. Yes, communism is responsible for countless millions of deaths and tortured…
Instead of making up weird fantasies, how about to try to come up with an idea that would actually make things better?
I missed the part where the person you’re replying to mentioned communism at all.
Don’t worry, The dude was just hurt that his world view was challenged and felt the need to strike out
If this one of the people the post mentions?
Neat! 📸
They would if those workers were trying to unionize.
Free Market Capitalism would bring back slavery if we let them.
LOL as you type this on a electronic device that was made by capitalists.
My dude. The capitalists are not the people who made those devices. Workers made those things.
It was made by inventors and workers. The capitalists own the company. They don’t create.
You are not a capitalist.
“Capital”… You keep using that word but I do not think it means what you think it means.
What is it that Investors invest? Could it be capital? Investors also tend to have ownership of the company.
Funny I thought a good education was one of the benefits of communism.
And why should they? What makes investors special beyond “having lots of money”
Why should workers forfeit their labor at a fraction of its actual value to line the accounts of people who won the birth lottery?
Investors did not invent the product, they did not design it’s manufacturing process, they did not acquire materials or even the land upon which the factory is built. And yet, they reap all the profits.
There’s a simpler way
If you think “capitalism” just means that money exists, then you’ve completely misunderstood the concept
Communism is when no phone
We can have nice things without crushing levels of inequality orders of magnitude higher than humans have ever known at any point in history.
Absolutely you are 100% correct. However communism is not the answer.
And what is, O Wise One?
This is not the flex you think it is.
The best response. So common it’s hard to tell if it’s a real response people believe.
So everybody on Lemmy is non-capitalist is what you’re saying?
Does anyone here own capital? As in being haut bourgeoisie? Probably not.
If you support capitalism and you’re not a capitalist you’re just a bootlicker, not a capitalist.
How do you define “capital”? I own a paid-off vehicle. That’s my biggest single asset. Am I therefore evil? It’s parked in the garage of this home I rent. Used car market right now means it’s worth a bit more than it would be otherwise.
All this talk is highly dangerous us-vs-them, black-and-white divisive crap that isn’t going to go anywhere productive. Stop it. Grow up.
How do you define “capital”? I own a paid-off vehicle. That’s my biggest single asset. Am I therefore evil?
Oh my god, we aren’t coming for your toothbrush. The idea that owning anything makes you a capitalist is absurd. We are talking about businesses that alienate workers like yourself from their labor.
Oh, and I’m also a shareholder in my employer. Gasp.
And if you had enough shares to live off of you wouldn’t be renting. You’re a member of the proletariat, not even the petite bourgeoisie who still have more to gain by overthrowing capitalism.
All this talk is highly dangerous us-vs-them, black-and-white divisive crap that isn’t going to go anywhere productive. Stop it. Grow up.
Maybe instead of being afraid of shadows you should read what socialists actually believe. We believe that the means of production (aka your workplace) should be owned and managed by the workers (you) and not some board who see the business as a paycheck every month (and probably don’t understand how it actually functions) overseen by a democratic body to coordinate between businesses. We claim to live in a democracy but nowhere is this more evidently wrong then workplaces, which are almost always run as dictatorships…what little political agency employees exercise has to be won in conflict to the goals of the system.
We oppose land commodification. People, especially children and the elderly, should not be at risk of being evicted from where they live, and if they have income they should just contribute to the collective maintaining and construction of property which is generally 5 percent of income, not 1/3 of a paycheck like it is under capitalism with all the middlemen leeches.
You wouldn’t be any better off on a socialist system. The people at the top of the party would control everything and the working class would be even poorer than they are now. You’re just licking the left boot instead of the right one.
This is empirically untrue, but also just nonsense. Politicians do not have the same class relationship as capitalists with the proletariat.
Dang, for a moment I considered that you might have independent thoughts. This LemmtGradChatGPT BS ruined it.
Oh I’m sorry i didn’t realize there was empirical evidence for socialism. Please send me a link to some of these successful socialist societies.
Cuba, Vietnam, and Laos for starters China went from a century of humiliation to a superpower in less then a century thanks to socialism. The USSR was better than the feudalism before it or the dictatorships of the bourgeoisie that came after it by a wide margin. For a place much poorer than the US, they had similar nutrition, better education, more rights for women both legalistically and practically.
Oh, throw in east Germany too. Do you know what the Stasi did to the lgbt movement that they saw as subversive? Destroy it by ending discrimination against gay and trans people, including a massive education campaign to eradicate homophobia and transphobia and state funded gay bars. Compare that to how the US was treating gay people at the time.
Yes, I probably have assets valued at .5-1M that I’ve accumulated with my family.
Okay, that at most makes you petite bourgeoisie not haut bourgeoisie. But I’m guessing you can’t live off of your passive income so you’re still proletariat. You have more in common with the proletariat than not, and you have more to gain by overthrowing capitalism then preserving it.
👌👍
Keep moving those goal posts.
Yes, the goal posts of definitions created by a guy who has been dead for more than 100 years. Clarifying a misunderstanding on a basic concept of Marxist analysis of capitalism written more than 100 years ago is moving the goalposts.
Also, can you live entirely off your passive income? If not, youre not even petite bourgeoisie.
A large proportion of Lemmy are not pro-capitalist, yes.
Thats still very much generalizing. What this meme essentially says is that if you’re a capitalist, you’re not part of Lemmy.
On a seperate note, you cant possibly know how many people on Lemmy actually support capitalism or not. It has a left tendency, yes, but I bet the majority of Lemmx users do support caputalidm in some shape or form.
Does anyone here own capital? As in being haut bourgeoisie? Probably not.
If you support capitalism and you’re not a capitalist you’re just a bootlicker.
And you live on your own self-sustaining compound, posting from your open hardware, fabricated in free factories, Libre software OS and applications, with compost-generated power? Didn’t think so. Welcome to the gray zone bootlicker.
Never mind that not a single one of them pipes up when some lazy fascist bullshit gets posted here.
Only when it’s left of like 1990s Biden then they all lose their fuckin minds.
These capitalist and billionaire cocksuckers sure love socialism when they socialise their losses and fucking take our tax payer money to bail themselves out. if you’re working class and don’t support socialism, you should look into it more. Propaganda from these blood sucking billionaire ghouls have made most of us blind to the better life socialism can offer us.
That isnt socialism, thats the capitalist state doing its job of protecting capital. Socialism is when the proletariat own the means of production.
Yes i agree. Just pointing out the fact there’s no free market. When they lose, they still win by taking our hard earned money and using it to further their interests. I’d be happier if it were used for our welfare instead.
Id argue that the free market incentivizes the capture of politicians but I think we are on the same side here.
Fake. There are no women here.
I have moobs and long hair, just keep dancing bro.
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Yeah, and I am the real Tony Hawk!
Yes there are. Stop being weird. (Am woman)
Real. There are a few women here
I am just happy to be dancing for once.
holy shit can we see an actual meme on this instance?
Non-stop circle jerking
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Tell me how you don’t know the difference between corporatocracy and capitalism without telling me how you don’t know the difference between corporatocracy and capitalism.
They’re the same picture.
To expand…one of the biggest goals of a capitalist is increasing profit. What better way to do this than to take over and manipulate the government of whatever state you’re operating in to cut you special breaks? It’s the pinnacle of capitalist achievement.
You create laws to regulate it…the capitalists will manipulate them and control your government anyways.
You loosen regulations to “promote competition” or whatever excuse they use, and then there’s nothing stopping them from fucking you even harder. Capitalism and the state are always intertwined, one feeds off the other. Even the Soviet Union was sometimes said to be “state capitalist”, where basically the entire country was under control of one “corporation”.
One person has a limit to the complexity that they can control. You need the masses and a working state to control other billionaires. Only then will you be able reach new levels of complex production processes that allow to do new things.
Of course, for some it is fulfilling to just be at the top.
Tell us you love the taste of boot on your tongue without telling us you love the taste of boot on your tongue…
Capitalism is a good library, it’a the devs that implement it wrongly 😭
Capitalism can never work, because it’s self defeating. The point of capitalism is to maximize immediate profits, nothing else - as a result, it will gladly destroy its own means of growth if as a result instant profits increase.
Regulations, regulations, mors regulations!
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