Economic Morality

               Capitalists accuse Socialism of being immoral system in which people are forced to give money to those that do not have it. While Socialists also claim capitalism is immoral in that it creates extreme amounts of wealth for a small group of people while the majority live in increasingly impoverished standards. How can an economic system be moral or immoral, they are not human beings who can make a choice in the matter so how is that possible? I liken it to my days working in a laboratory. When someone had an infection we would swab the area and take that specimen and plate it. The only job of the plate was to be a suitable environment for bacteria to grow. So if the patient swabbed had an infection it would show after growing on this plate. Economic systems are no different, they are suitable environments for certain mentalities to grow. Capitalism grows selfishness. This is why so many people in the United States are opposed to socialized medicine, because they do not feel as if they should pay for the medical needs of anyone else. So those that can't afford medical care end up going without.

                 The strangest thing to me is that so many in the United States consider themselves Christian and are at the same time complaining about helping the least of their people. Is it necessary to force a Christian to help others? It certainly should not be, Christians should want to help and should be happy that everyone has access to medical care.

                 So capitalism is a suitable environment for selfishness. While the upper 1% have gotten more and more rich, the other 99% have become increasingly poor. But this selfishness is not just grown amongst the 1%, it is like a virus and has spread to everyone else. As the wage gap increases and things get more difficult I suspect this selfishness will increase, an every man for himself sort of mentality. People will look out for their own selves more and more. At some point this has to end. We will likely see more of our youth look at our current system in bewilderment and realize it is inhumane and selfish. I can only hope that the more selfish people become, the closer they will come to realizing this is wrong and change.

                So if capitalism grows selfishness what then does socialism grow? Socialism can only grow a love and respect for our fellow man. If our country became socialist tomorrow I can bet there would be quite a bit of opposition and negativity as there would be a lot of people losing out on their billions of dollars they rake in from the medical system or the for profit anything else this country has. But eventually that would wither away as people realized that things like socialized medicine actually save the country money and that it is far more humane of a system than capitalism. In socialism there is a Christian like morality in which we take care of one another, where we do not leave our brothers and sisters behind because they are economically worse off. In socialism we invest in all our youth rather than leave them behind to become a statistic and become eaten alive by the streets.

               What grows moral behavior? Socialism. If you believe that socialism is forced charity then you must ask yourself this question "Why do I need to be "forced" to give to charity?" 

If only...

If every Christian were truly a Christian, then every Christian would be a socialist. 

Idols of Capitalism

                 Capitalism has many means with which to control and subjugate a population. At worst it uses physical force through military and or police forces, at best it uses very powerful but subtle propaganda. You can read Noam Chomsky "Manufacturing Consent" for more on that. This is about the idols which keep capitalism afloat and able to run on fumes for such a long time. That idol is hope. The idea that one day you will hit it big in hollywood or win the lottery. And the idols it uses are blasted to us through the media. Famous and rich people who have made it. And often these people tend to be simple, simple enough for us to believe that we are more sophisticated and therefore can do much better than them.

                  The greater the divide between rich in poor the more idols capitalism needs to seduce the people into thinking they will be the next big thing, or that they will strike it rich in some magical way. This is how capitalism survives, a magical dream like fairy tale that if you work hard enough, you too will be rich and famous. Our society is full of rich and famous people, and many famous for no good reason. And we are constantly updated about their lives and what they are doing. We are so enveloped in our envy for these people and their lives that we even allow them to influence our culture. Its a drug, or as Marx may say it is an opium of the masses for more dangerous or subversive than any religion.

                 Even as our capitalist system disintegrates into monopoly capitalism and the gap between rich and poor grows wider, people are still unwilling to confront the system. They are unwilling to stand up and say enough. Why? Because this hope exists that one day they too will be a millionaire and live large and worry free. Some people want this life so badly they don't even wait, they take on debt to accrue material things to make it look like they "made it." They create this facade so that others may look at them in awe and admiration, when in reality they have chained themselves with debt. They have made themselves slave, they have willingly taken on a master to attain this "good life." So we wonder, why don't people stand up? The idol of capitalism, hope, ensures that things can go really awry, that the system can continue to suck the people dry and they won't do a thing about it. Topple the idols, you have nothing to lose but your chains!