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Friday, November 13, 2015

Socialism Versus Capitalism According to the Onion

via The Onion:


It's never a good idea to nitpick a joke, but the premise here seems to be that "fuck you" is a "spot-on" summation of human behavior. Needless to say, the Onion wouldn't be the endlessly entertaining and insightful publication it is if that were not true all too often, but it should be no less needless to say that were it true all or even most of the time then society would not function sustainably enough to keep the Onion -- and other, less vital institutions -- a going concern in the first place. It is also worth noting that the misquotation of the Louis Blanc slogan popularized by Marx ("to each according to their needs") are hard to square with the benefits actually properly attributed to socialism two lines later. Also worth a reminder: the "Mine, mine, mine!" of capitalism involves wealth redistribution no less than socialist equity does, there is no "natural" distribution capitalism honors more than socialism does. As for the assertion that both work "in theory," I agree with what I am reading as the insinuation that neither does in practice.

2 comments:

jimf said...

> the premise here seems to be that "fuck you" is a "spot-on"
> summation of human behavior. . . needless to say that were
> it true all or even most of the time then society would not
> function sustainably enough to keep the Onion -- and other,
> less vital institutions -- a going concern in the first place.

Well, it's complicated. There are certainly "fuck you" personalities, and
they sometimes go far, and loom very large when they do.
(We're all descended from Genghis Khan, they say. ;-> ).
It's also true that human society contains an incredible
amount of cooperation (all the more fine-grained
because of language). The mix varies from culture to culture,
and historical era to historical era.

Come to the dinner gong
The table is laden high
Fat bellies and hungry little ones
Tuck your napkins in
And take your share
Some get the gravy
And some get the gristle
Some get the marrow bone
And some get nothing
Though there's plenty to spare

-- Joni Mitchell, "Banquet"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z1EVlcdZIvU

jimf said...

Here's something amusing:

National Geographic [The Psychopath's daily routine 2014]
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bzkpBFt9pLQ
(9:14/1:02:55)
-----------------
And Clive Boddy saw it all coming. A few years before the
financial collapse, he began hearing that some bank
executives went so far as to use Bob Hare's Psychopath Check List
to recruit employees.

"Presumably that was because they thought those new employees
would be cutthroat and ruthless towards their competitors.
The danger, of course, is that they're cutthroat and ruthless
towards the bank that employs them as well. It's like saying
criminals are good at guarding Fort Knox, guarding the gold,
guarding the crown jewels. The outcome would be inevitable,
that the gold would go missing, the jewels would be stolen."
====

(Cf.
Did Psychopaths Take Over Wall Street Asylum?
http://www.bloombergview.com/articles/2012-01-03/did-psychopaths-take-over-wall-street-asylum-commentary-by-william-cohan )

The comments earlier in the film that "psychopaths see themselves as
being at the top of the food chain, with the rest of us serving as
lunch" brings to mind a very (darkly) funny video made by Canadian
science fiction author Peter Watts:

Vampires: Biology and Evolution (Part 1)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3WdCvGDpM9k&list=PL30ED0756E00786E2

F.U. for Prime Minister. F.U. for President. ;->
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=17uvKIAuVbU