RE: Facts About Consolidation of Corporate Power - Wealth Inequality And Its Negative Impact On Society
The big question - and the answer to it - that could likely result in better ideas is "why is that that a problem?"
See I don't think that capitalism, or money, is the root of any evil whatsoever. But it is a great concept to build better things upon; And to this day, however bad certain aspects of society have gotten, it has helped us be better off even in those areas than we used to be decades or centuries ago.
Back when I was a socialist I would have looked at something like this and suggested that the government must be made to do something about it, but nowadays I'm not quiet as quick to suggest we change this specific aspect at all. Even at this point, as a Cooperative Agorist I obviously want to make the world a better place in all ways, but I'm also not even slightly interested in having a state take such meassures.
However, with a state government already in place, people are still more than capable of making society dramatically better without engaging in such government. -- And we are slowly getting there; we are slowly changing society, mainly via the commoditization risk. The state obviously slows it down, but with further decentralization they can't really stop it how hard they try. It won't stop with internet subscriptions, bitcoin, catbonds and steemit. There will be more developed meshnetworks, more stable cryptocurrencies, unemployment bonds, synereo/steemit 2.0. etc.
A decentralized cooperative (as a piece of, or as an anarcho-capitalist micro society) that can deliver even a universal income (if that's what's in demand) is not at all an unthinkable possibility anymore. Absolutely not. But let's not make ourselves more dependant on the governments we already have in place. Not even where I live, in Sweden - and though I consider it better than for example the US -, has that ever really been a successfull route to go.
Hey,
I don't recognise concept of evil or good. It is arbitrary and definition changes according to culture, just like beauty.
I only recognise what is sustainable and what is not. Capitalism is an obsolete system, no longer relevant to current times. It is also unsustainable.
https://steemit.com/anarchism/@logic/the-venus-project-and-resource-based-economy-transformation-towards-truly-anarchistic-social-system
It would seem you're a subjectivist, similar to Fresco.
"Evil" and "good" are as proper as -- and only of any meaning or importance if recognized as -- constructive and destructive in regard to (the quality of ones) life.
Your idea of what is "sustainable" is equally arbitrary to "good" and "bad" and though definitions may change over time, what is logical -- the existence of causality -- doesn't; as I'm sure you know. And language must adjust according to this reality in order to be of any value.
I disagree about what "Capitalism" even is, so we could only end up disagreeing about the rest. But I guess this is not the forum to ramble on about that for several hundred sentences back and forth. I'll try to write a blog post about the matter at some point in the future.
As it comes to the Venus Project, I've always found many aspects of it fascinating and very much worth supporting. I just wouldn't want to live there myself, due to the inherent risks of centralization becoming state enforced. Also, it would seem that even though ambitious as the project is (and to be honest a little crazy as it's creator, Fresco, is) noone still has even bothered to properly adress the calcualtion problem, many years later.
This seems not just slightly diheartening to me, but actually rather a big problem as it suggests a lack of constructive criticizm within the movement.
As a cooperative agorist, I'm very close to the Venus Projects, or the syndicalist, kind of thinking.But I'm not an anti-capitalist anymore and I don't defend the behaviour of extorting business owners due to their financial "agression", so to speak, which sadly many syndicalists do.
Thank you for writing though, I've actually enjoyed quiet a bit of it so far. It doesn't hurt listening to people who are of a different mind than your own, in fact anything else would be rather pointless wouldn't it ;-)
Cool comment and interesting point of view. Let me know about your blog post.
About TVP. RBE has no state as there is no such thing as authority and hierarchy there. Not sure where your opinion came from. Nothing is also enforced there. It is voluntary system. Centralisation there, refers to management of Earth's resources and production not human affairs. It is emerging system, not established like state systems. The only authority in this system are laws on nature. All systems, we have tried so far, failed (including anarchistic), because they aren't based in science and respect for natural laws. Specifically, they completely ignore the science of human behaviour.
Thanks, I'll let you know when I get to it.
My opinion about the TVP is not due to them having any expressed want to be a state, but rather due to the inherent problems I see what the kind of centralization and abandonment of money that they propose.
The way I see it, TVP indeed ignores the laws of economics. The calculation problem being the tip of the iceberg.
Apart from that I consider the idea of "property" and self-ownership to be critically important for human beings. At least for myself, as a capitalist, that would be enough to cause me to reject the project in its current state.
If a group of anarcho-capitalists could come up with something similar (provided it was otherwise equally well constructed and not just some utopic pipe dream) and base it on capitalist economics, then I would be thoroughly intrigued.