RE: Give A Damn
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Of course I don't believe this applies to me, as I'm sure you think this doesn't apply to you; we've been taught manners, to care about our neighbors and to plan ahead for our futures, haven't we? But that's just the point: we don't even realize that we don't give a damn. Not really.
I agree with this fully, its sad how many excuses we all use to ignore the constant onslaught of atrocities that are going on in the world. Many of them propagated by what ever government we are a part of. We get so bogged down in the relatively tiny disturbances of our own world that we're too tired to think of anything else.
We take comfort in the lack of caring of those around us, and when we get called out on it, throw our hands up in the air and say what do you want me to do about it. I won't say that nobody cares enough, maybe that's true, but if they are they went off to doctors without borders or some similar organization.
The sad thing is, there's what, 1000? 10,000? fuck lets go all out say there are 100,000 people who collectively rule the entire planet. There are 8 billion people on this planet, that's still 80,000 citizens to every world leader. We absolutely could change things if we gave enough of a damn.
let the company be owned by all who work there. Let everyone who actually works there make the decisions in a democratic way. If the workers decide, you can be damn sure they'll protect their children and not dump the waste in the river.
While this is true, I don't think that is the best solution forward. Capitalism gets a lot of well deserved hate, but most of the innovations we have today are a direct result of capitalism. That form of competition is a great thing, Giving a damn or not, the world is better then it was in the past. Greedy bastards seeking profit are responsible for life easing technology, and life saving medicines. This kind of competition is a good thing and should be kept going in my opinion.
What's important is for the people to take the reins and stop corporations from massing untold power. To give a damn about the people that capitalism leaves in the dirt, and to take a tiny fraction of profits from the uber rich to pay for it all. I don't really care if rich people exist so long as the poorest still have all their needs met.
The problem with socialism (at least the way I see it) is in getting the start up funds to create innovative technologies. We have private companies researching everything from rocket launches to brain implants, these are things that took a massive amount of start up funds and had an equally massive amount of risks. I don't see us having these things if we decided on a socialist system. It works great for ventures that are certainly profitable with an achievable start up fund, but its a serious cliff to climb for serious innovations.
Definitely curious in hearing what you have to say about that though.
Thanks for responding @its-kino ! I really appreciate it :-)
So, I hear this all the time and it never seizes to amaze me. I'll give another explanation of what drives innovation, and maybe it'll blow your mind: free time. Yes, that's right: free time drives innovation. Give people the time and freedom to pursue their true interests (not money), and they'll come up with the best ideas, innovations and products. Capitalism drives innovation only in so far as it grows profits, which means that there's no money for real research and development. There's a lot of innovation in marketing, not so much in real technology. Electric cars have been around since the 1890s. That's just one example, but the real innovation is done with people with a lot of time on their hands and who do not have to worry about cost-caps or profit-margins.
Furthermore, corporations are risk-averse. They don't take risks. Here's a quote from an article you may want to read:
The cost of innovation is socialized, paid for with tax dollars, and mostly done in universities and the army. An Iphone is chuck-full of technologies invented in universities and the army, right up to that magnificent touch-screen. Really, you've got it all wrong, as do most people unfortunately. Most people do really believe in that story about the best baker out-competing lesser bakers. The only problem is that the best baker is just the one who innovates for cost-efficiency and marketing, not necessarily the one that bakes the best bread.
And it's even worse than that: we make worse products on purpose; that's called "planned obsolescense". It's better to sell the same product twice instead of just once. Ever heard about the centennial Light or the Light Bulb Conspiracy?
I hope the above has taken away some of those reservations; innovation comes from outside of the economy. Economy is just a set of agreements about how we transform nature into the products we need, there's no big mystery there, despite what economists want you to believe about that.
Yes, and democracy is the way to do it. But there has to be both political and economical democracy, or it'll never work.
This is definitely a fair argument. I can't say you have completely convinced me, but you have given me a lot to think about. Thanks a lot.