Political Crossfire Forums

I'm fine with calling it fascism, if you prefer.

I think what you would call capitalism I would call individual enterprise, which falls under the rubric of an individual right, if you ask me. As a member of the human community you have the right to what you can produce from the commons. If you make, say, fine gunstocks from wood harvested in the forest and observe the rules designed to preserve the common resource, I don't mind if you trade some for a package or two from BC.

Now if you declare that you own the forest, and force everyone who makes their living there to work for you cutting all of the trees down to make as many cheap ass gun stocks as possible, and you had a state apparatus to force people to do what you want, well, lets just call that fascism. lol How's that?

Well, I think there is an important distinction between personal and private property that most people don't recognize. Personal property is any property that someone may have and use to produce for their own use. It starts becoming private property when an inordinate share, beyond what is required for one's personal use, is controlled by a single individual. The community associated with a particular resource should participate and decide what is the appropriate allotment for each stakeholder in the resource.

If the resource was a mine, for example, the miners would collectively decided what fair remuneration for each miner would be. If the resource was the prairie, the farming community would collectively decide what share of land each stakeholder would have. If the resource for a software development firm the stakeholders should decide what the remuneration should be.

The social pattern would be a federated system of interest groups, rather than political units like city, county, and state. The federated union of gunstock craftsman, and the foresters union might be the social groups you most closely work with to accomplish your goals, which in such a system would be far more likely to be aligned with the goals of your community since you would be a self managing direct participant in the productive activity that would be the lifeblood of the community instead of some interchangeable cog down at the plant who might be laid off at any time so his job can be shipped to a cheaper slave labor market.

Not that it requires a vote, private property shouldn't exist at all because it gives an individual or individuals power over other individuals. When these organizations get large enough they form the very infrastructure of society and have the power to affect individuals in many different ways that the individual has no control over.

For example, look at the public relations industry created by Edward Bernays, it gives private capital the power to effect the psychological state of an entire society against their will and without their input. Most individuals are perfectly unaware of this subtle coercive factor in their lives. Most individual family farmers have neither the means nor the inclination to perpetrate such a dastardly plot. The tobacco industry? Well, you know all about that I'm sure. They put shit in their products that make people addicted to them, is that really the kind of entity that you want shaping society to it's will?

That is the effect of absolute power absolutely corrupting human society. Individuals that are equal and accountable to one another will not do that to one another. The social consequences are way too devastating. Much of the activity corporate america engages in is insulating themselves from this type of scrutiny because the effect can be so devastating that even the most powerful organizations can fall prey to this sort of misstep. If equal social relations exist most people tend to behave civilly.

Any society can fall into a state of power corruption as you describe.

And once again,if you examine all you have said, you will see that it is the state that makes it possible. It is not capitalism. It's like saying that guns cause mass murders when it is murderers that caused mass murders.

It is the state that limits competition in a lucrative market that allows the biggest to become bigger. However, do keep in mind, there will always be a 'biggest'. there is no society that can prevent that.

I am aware of bernays. governments use the technique.

and kindly I ask you, do not accuse me of wanting all that has been wrong. I am not guilty of that or of wanting the same.

Your solution is not the only one in which people can or will be civil. It's not even proven that it will. Only that you think it will.