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When capitalism has commodified everything, then all ingrediences for a revolution can be bought.
I think capitalism falls neatly into the concept of Moloch.
A lot of the commentators say Moloch represents capitalism. This is definitely a piece of it, even a big piece. But it doesn’t quite fit. Capitalism, whose fate is a cloud of sexless hydrogen? Capitalism in whom I am a consciousness without a body? Capitalism, therefore granite cocks?
I love SSC.
meta-capitalist game show idea:
you could do this in about any format. video, podcast, maybe even sets of still images.
The core concept is a bunch of ad reads for your sponsors. the sponsors are the contestants.
you use really good production values, but you get progressively edgier and more hostile to them as the season goes on. the prize is a free ad campaign for the last one to drop out/denounce you.
edit: alternatively, you create a weird contract, and use some sort of auction structure, where they each bid to the others to be the one who can drop out that episode. highest bidder wins and gets off the show, they all (along with some cut for the house, of course) split the money.
I…actually would enjoy that for a month. But I feel like whoever did it would eventually get lazy and comfortable from their riches, and so the advertisers would know what they’re getting into. Alternatively, the person making would NOT get lazy, and would go for really really controversial topics, like holocaust-denial, or promoting child-rape. So either way, viewers would leave. I don’t see a good middle-ground where it actually works.
okay, I edited in an alternate structure that might fix this. tell me you wouldn’t watch that, with stressed brand managers panicking over what they’ve gotten each other into?
like holocaust denial, or child-rape
yeah but nobody advertises to any sort of lefty, so those aren’t controversial among basically every company’s target market. I might be more likely to go for “glock: protecting trans kids since [year they were founded]” if I were trying to cause a problem for them.
but you don’t start off with that. you start off each season with stuff that’s on the edge side of what a company would actual buy from an ad agency. then you get more and more. until it’s paramilitaries marching blindfolded factory workers out into the jungle, then shooting them in the head, with full gore and horror and maybe one begging for their life. then a coca cola logo. coca cola: an american tradition.
What? These companies advertise to lefty-folks all the time!? They very much represent several different target-markets. Left-wing folks tend to have that middle-class to low-upper-class money. MAGAts are mostly in the lower-middle to low-class grouping, with a sprinkling of rich folks. Yeah, you can sell them some stuff, but how’s that My Pillow guy doing? lol.
As far as your Coke ad goes…okay, that’s the kind of dark where even educated folks would be confused. I’ve had this idea for a Fanta commercial where’s it’s just a bunch of Nazis marching lockstep to the “don’t you want to Fanta Fanta” song. I feel like it highlights history appropriately, and also hits Coke in the face. But overall, I feel like folks would still get bored of it…even if they got the jokes (which a lot of folks wouldn’t). No viewers, no bargaining-power with advertisers.
IBM: the machinery of government (and the various things they’ve enabled over the years) and just a really warm fuzzy folksy time lapse montage (mid-late season)
exxonmobil: burning tomorrow, today. slogan after a couple minutes of horrible disaster (natural and otherwise) footage and a park ranger drinking to forget, with a translucent exxon logo on screen. then you flash up the slogan at the end. (mid-late season)
it’s true, the coke idea could use some work, but these are all pretty rough.
Oh i know so many people who are into vanity. Everything goes as long as there’s no point in it.
This ties into the notion of interpassivity. This is when a piece of media perform an action for you (think interactivity, but exactly the opposite). An example is the laugh track on sitcoms. Another is the series or film performing your environmental or anti-capital activism for you. Frequently the bad guy is some big polluting corp, or some evil rich guy who wants to bulldoze the community center to put his Luxury Resort there. You watch the movie, feel all rebellious and sympathetic with the main characters, and go home feeling like you’ve done something, when in fact all you’ve done is feed Disney some more money. See also movies like triangle of sadness and the glass onion or whatever.
Mark Fischer’s capitalist realism explores this and similar ideas in a much more comprehensive and eloquent manner than I ever could. Give it a read, it’s quite short!
Thanks, I’ve been trying to remember this term and where I saw this concept for like 2 weeks!
Also, a related concept is recuperation:
The process by which ideas and actions deemed ‘radical’ or oppositional become commodified or absorbed into mainstream society and culture.
Think of the sterile critique of capitalism from the Fallout series (produced by Amazon).
I’ve been really interested in learning how to grow vegetables in my back garden. Somehow I just have this feeling that learning how to care about plants to make food (and not just because it flowers and looks pretty) will open my eyes to thinking about nature and the environment
At the moment, climate collapse is a conceptual issue to me in that “sure the days get warmer every year but it’s actually quite nice for me right now”, but I’m not as in tune with my environment to really notice how it’s impacting us.
Growing veg also feels like it has a higher pay off than just the cost price of a single unit of veg. There’s probably some nutritional benefit to it, knowledge etc that does beyond the price of buying an onion from the shop. I think getting in touch with this principle is the key to getting out of the ruthless capitalism structure
Basically, if we all just stopped buying shit and learnt how to fix and make shit ourselves our experiences of the things we attach ourselves to would be so much more authentic
You don’t have to buy doc martens because you feel like a rebel.
Well it can’t commodify me! Oh wait.
Sorry, I got myself worked up.
do you sell your labor on the job market?
Grr
minimalism is so funny to me.
Like you’re buying shit so you can not buy things? Yeah ok buddy.
That is fake minimalism. Minimalism in practice is donating stuff you don’t need and not buying stuff unless you truly need it and will use it.
yeah but people still call it minimalism, so is it minimalism, or is it minimalism. who fucking knows.
That is one side of it that people fall into. But another side is sometimes buying something additional will simplify your life then it makes sense. Not everyone is one pair clothing and everything fits in a bag. Something as simple as you and your SO deciding on the same shampoo to only have one bottle in the bathroom. This allows you to buy in bulk the ONE shampoo you need. Also one less item to keep track of, need shampoo? which kind?
Same with food storage containers. Might be best to throw away all the different kinds you have and buy ones where all the tops are the same. Yeah, I bought something additional it now takes “minimal” effort to find something to store food it. It’s more of an overall mindset to most people. It’s the constant asking yourself “Do I need this in my life?” as you start to figure out all your shit starts to own you. Organization (a lot of money spent here) is key to this as if you can’t find something in your home…do you really have it? Minimalists want streamlined processes or “OCD with purpose” as I like to call it. lol
at what point do you start hyper optimizing, and instead of buying normal shampoo, you buy in bulk, for like salons or something, but for your own personal use, or would that count as something other than minimalism?
Organization (a lot of money spent here) is key to this as if you can’t find something in your home…do you really have it? Minimalists want streamlined processes or “OCD with purpose” as I like to call it. lol
personally i’m not a minimalist, but i’m super big into effective organization and optimizing your workflow around yourself, a bit ADHD pilled perhaps, but i don’t necessarily think it’s minimalist, just optimalist i guess.
IDK the line of minimalism i think is heavily blurred these days, it’s not really clear where it begins, and where it ends.
If a system needs constant growth to survive it will eventually collapse.
Finally YOLO makes sense. Yes, capitalism indeed only lives once. It will have its lifetime, and then it will collapse and be done with. It will not come back, it will not be reborn.
So long as we stick with our distinctions of “Mine” and “Thine”, we will fall into a different sort of capitalism later down the road. In order to keep it away we need to stop looking at wealth as a virtue, but as something to give away.
You’re free to give away your wealth to me, if that’s what you mean.
Well, we’re leaving capitalism behind and switching back to feudalism. So I guess no more capitalism.
How much of this is capitalism, and how much of it is just trade?
Bazaars go back 5000 years, about 5000 years before capitalism. If you’ve ever been to a bazaar or a street market in a developing country, you know they’ll try to sell you anything and everything.
Control of media and governments is a feature of capitalism/corporatism
Bazaar folks can only sell when you’re physically there. The form of propaganda this post is referring to is more insidious.
Climate Change really picked up with the Industrial Revolution, alongside Capitalism. The M-C-M’ circuit of continuous money growth and rapid expansion of industry was the driving factor, not people simple trading. The obsession with commodifying things previously produced for use, rather than exchange, has had wide-reaching impact.
- Would the industrial revolution not have happened without capitalism?
- Would the world be a better place if it hadn’t happened? Would we be as technologically advanced as we are now? Would the internet be a thing already? Would all the science breakthroughs that happened at a greatly increased rate after trains across Europe improved (enabling better collaboration) have happened?
Yes, climate change is a huge problem, and yes, it probably wouldn’t be a thing if we still were limited to 18th century technology & lifestyle. But I doubt the world would be better this way.
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The Industrial Revolution could not have happened without Capitalism, IMO, as the increase in the factory model grew the M-C-M’ circuit and competition.
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No. Capitalism is a stage in history, and will be phased out like the iron and bronze ages, feudalism, etc.
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The world would absolutely be better if we hadn’t been ravaging the atmosphere and ecosystems for 300 years. Do you think cars, factories, the internet make the world a better place? For who? The people who own these things benefit while the rest of us clamour for space and calories. Fuck capitalism.
Technology advanced before capitalism for the few hundred thousand years or so that humans were around. Ingenuity and provenance - standing on the shoulders of giants, drives innovation, not free market competition. Capitalism or not, we would still have science. And without capitalism, I believe we would spend a fair bit more of our time on it, instead of chasing green bits of paper.Trains and yes, later also the internet, greatly increased the rate of scientific breakthrough due to much better communication and collaboration, so yes, I think they make the world a better place.
The rate at which technology improved skyrocketed after the industrial revolution. We certainly wouldn’t be as far as we are now.
Scientific breakthroughs include (but aren’t limited to) better healthcare, granting us the highest life expectancy humanity had ever had (79.4 m / 84.2 f in my country (2023), in 1800 it was 30 to 35 years).
The internet also plays a huge part in ensuring easy communication between citizens of different countries, preventing them from building unjustified hate on each other (that only works on groups of people you don’t know).
The EU, the most successful peacekeeping project Europe had ever had, was born from a trade alliance for coal and steel (which ensured reliance on the other country between Germany and France, making it stupid for one to attack the other). That also wouldn’t be a thing with the industrial revolution.
I could list so many more things but my time is limited
The industrial revolution happened because of technological advances, not the other way around. The economic model changed because of basic human greed. Scientific breakthroughs happen with or without financial incentive because of basic human curiosity.
Yes, I agree technological advances and not capitalism are the reason for the industrial revolution, it also would have happened without capitalism.
But just like technological advances led to the industrial revolution, the industrial revolution led to more technological advances. Science is growing exponentially, and we’d for sure be worse off if we restricted scientific growth to a point that didn’t lead to the industrial revolution, preventing the innovations that resulted from it from happening.
You realise capitolism isnt the boogey man right, if you see problems with it then your problem lies with the consumer, nothing is sold until its bought.
Let me ask you, what mode of commerce should we all ascribe to?
Blaming victims existing within a system for the problems with the system is deflection, not a solution. The answer is socialism, ie gradually working towards a fully publicly owned and planned economy after a period of revolution.
Moreover, Capitalism isn’t just “markets.”
It wont work, but good luck.
Why not? It already works.
Do you understand the difference between capitalism and commerce? Using money for trade isn’t what makes capitalism what it is. Capitalism is, from wikipedia, “An economic system in which the means of production and distribution are privately or corporately owned and development occurs through the accumulation and reinvestment of profits gained in a free market” Capitalism means that I can own something I have nothing to do with and you have to pay me for the privilege of using it. When that thing is housing or food or medicine then I own you unless you want to die.
Capitalism means taking from the worker and giving to the ‘owner’. The problem is that work is real and ownership is a made up concept.
The more you learn about it the more you’ll understand how evil it is, I promise.
I think your whole first paragraph is just posturing, maybe i did speak incorrectly, i dont care.
In your economic system, if I make a machine that makes something, and sell it to a guy, what happens to that machine if what it makes is important or valuable?
Hello, different person here. It’s understandable that you’re confused by this tbh, but there are real proposals.
Broadly, there are two basic suggestions:
- All businesses would be nationalised. You would develop the machine as part of your job, or sell the rights to the government.
- There are still independent businesses like now, but they’re controlled by the people that work and use them. As a Kingdom is to a Democracy, an Owned Company is to a Participatory Company (Communists call them cooperatives, Corporatists call them corporations). The former country/company is controlled by the people that own it, whereas the latter is controlled by the people that are affected by its decisions (at least in theory). In real life people don’t really buy manufacturing machines, they do it through a company. So your sale would be the same, it’d just be to a different kind of company.
It’s not one or the other and they’re often combined.
It isn’t fair for a king to control an army and do what he likes with it, that’s dangerous. The army has to be controlled by the people of the nation. But, if you and your friends want to privately own guns, that’s fine. So long as you aren’t organising into a militia, it does little harm.
Critics say, likewise: if your machine is small, who cares. But if it’s sufficiently powerful, if it could concentrate wealth and power in your hands, create mass unemployment (maybe even allow you to wield military power): that’s harm. A machine like that should be controlled by the people.
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Hey, comrade, good comment! I want to offer that in my experience, Principles of Communism is clearer and more concise than the Manifesto, for someone entirely unaware. I also have an introductory Marxist-Leninist reading list I keep for easy sharing.
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I don’t really get it, are you calling me a commie in a deragatory way and downvoting me after you tried to spread Communist theory? I’m confused.
I’m some kinda new-wave radical centrist, can’t call myself one after reading your big book. I believe in a lot of the criticisms and measures, but I think LTV & Vanguardism are the literal dumbest shit ever. But good luck with them, and thanks for taking an interest.
Your question doesn’t make sense. Try rewriting it a little clearer.
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How are you making your machine? Does it literally create something from nothing? Why would what it creates have any value if it can be infinitely easily produced, even if important? If it obeys the laws of physics, why would you be able to compete with large, mass scale industry as a single person?
Your question largely doesn’t make any sense.
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Please elaborate on what you mean, your thought experiment made no sense. And yes, I’m a Communist, correct.
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Seems more like a dodge for you to avoid making an argument, but you do you. Don’t know what you mean by claiming I’m not a Communist, either, who counts as a Communist in your eyes?
Read this article, dude:
I haven’t played it, but is this disco elesium?
yep
Certified Mark Fisher moment.
Create a problem then sell the solution. Simple as
Sell the revolution.
How much would people pay for communism, how much for other forms of government?
Not the greatest dude, but had a sick quote that sums up this post:
“The Capitalists will sell us the rope with which we will hang them” - Vladimir Lenin
I also like “My death comes by a thousand cuts, and I paid for the knife” - Dopamine by The Arcadian Wild
To piggyback off your comment, a thread from Existential Comics:
I highly recommend reading this thread. If you want an intro Marxist-Leninist reading list, I made one you can check out here.
Make up your mind, 
