BonesOfTheMoonEvery day.
I’m too broke to worry about much more then working enough to feed myself and afford my shitty apartment for another month.
So what your saying is the system is working as intended.
Oh well, at least frogurt is still relatively cheap.
The frogurt is capitalist
That’s bad.
It also comes in plant-based varieties!
That’s worse.
The plants contain potassium benzoate!
That’s… Well, there’s not any hard evidence that it’s bad but political lobbyists put it on the label so that consumers would have to pay more for the “natural” version.
Yes, this is absolute madness.
And not the fun weekend bender kind I haven’t had time for in years due to capitalist exploitation.
Yeah. Your free time is very limited by the fact you live under capitalism and not magic fairy dust.
I mean, compared to all the other economic systems, capitalism provides more leisure time. But compared to magical fantasy circumstances, capitalism’s a drag.
LucidlethargyNever heard of Europe, eh?
Communism limits free time, too. You still have to work under that system. And pay bills. You have to pay for childcare, dental work, travel, food, housing, and just about everything else. Except medicine. But you have to wait for that, and have no choice in who you see.
squid_slimeDepending entirely on the form of communism. Right now the worlds richest 400 have a combined wealth amounting near 7 trillion. In a communist society world wide we could distribute that wealth globally to install water infrastructure, food infrastructure, vaccinate everyone and still have change in the bank to support other large projects.
And this is speaking purely finance. Here in the up we have more than enough empty home to house all of our homeless.
The amount we work to the resources produced are wildly high, we could work a lot less if not for the bosses ever demanding more.
Well, I am referring to actual communism, not the fantasy kind.
Wealth distribution is not equal under communism. Most is owned by the state, the privileged class still exists. The underprivileged class also exists.
Communism tends to be inefficient and less productive than capitalism, so a lot less is produced. This is demonstrated time and again. People just don’t have a personal motivation to increases production for the state. Distribution is also inefficient. Historically it leads to hunger because central planning is less effective than a decentralized system where individuals are able to make decisions.
So while I agree that the current level of wealth inequality is not good, communism is certainly not the solution. All it does is change where the lines of inequality are drawn. It usually kills a few million people for no good reason, too.
Given that we now have a track record of communism, it’s hard to imagine why anyone would choose it.
well i say if we can go from feudalism to mercantilism to capitalism then why not capitalism to socialism to communism? its again distributing power from the top to the lower status classes, we saw similar in feudalism to mercantilism.
Wealth distribution is not equal under communism. Most is owned by the state, the privileged class still exists. The underprivileged class also exists.
- wealth distribution should be equal under communism, wealth not being equal means we must do better. we don’t look at corrupt corporations and think "to bad its fucked best not make any more"
- in socialism most would be own a distributed by the state. communism is worker lead.
- in socialism the unprivileged class gets lifted through the transitional period. class distinctions are to be removed through the transitional period leading to a classless communist society.
Communism tends to be inefficient and less productive than capitalism, so a lot less is produced. This is demonstrated time and again. People just don’t have a personal motivation to increases production for the state. Distribution is also inefficient. Historically it leads to hunger because central planning is less effective than a decentralized system where individuals are able to make decisions.
- i cant argue communism and its efficiency as i have yet to see it but i am sure socialism can be made to be more efficient. being from the UK and having the carcass of what was once our publicly owned NHS i know that after WW2 under a Labour government we saw the NHS rise from nothing within 3 years, Labour at the time were socialist. the NHS was revolutionary at the time. we also had a massive housing boom.
So while I agree that the current level of wealth inequality is not good, communism is certainly not the solution. All it does is change where the lines of inequality are drawn. It usually kills a few million people for no good reason, too. so your a reformist?
Are you familiar with twentieth century Chinese or Soviet history? If you are impressed by communism, you really should read up on what happened in nations that implemented it, or attempted to implement it, in the last hundred years.
Communism doesn’t redistribute power to the lower classes. It redistributes power to the Communist Party members - usually an inner circle. The people who are running the massive government that is required to operate a nation with all the central planning that communism requires. The new privileged class becomes the top technocrats and their families.
It’s impossible for wealth distribution to be equal. Wealth is not just money, it is also assets. Say you strip all the assets away from people - let’s say housing - and redistribute it. OK - Now everyone has a house. But all houses are not created equal. Some houses are nicer than others. Some locations are nicer than others. Everyone will want to move into the nicest house in the nicest city, but obviously they can’t all fit. So what do you do? Someone has to work on the farm and grow wheat. How do you force people to work on a collective farm? What about people who don’t want to work? Do they get the same housing as the workers who contribute to society? Even if you house everyone, including providing free housing for those who won’t pay, what about the people who don’t WANT to live in a house? Do you force them to live in a detention center? What about their kids? They keep having more kids… Do you forcibly sterilize them, or do you put their kids into an orphanage, hoping that the state can do a better job raising workers than their lazy parents? And then, what about the homeless? The people who actually prefer living outside? Obviously if they refuse to live in their house, they have fewer assets than others. Now your society isn’t equal anymore, it’s just made some changes in who have wealth.
Yes, socialism can be made more efficient. The trick to it is my introducing a mix of capitalism so you have a mixed market economy. Like in China.
Am I a reformist? It depends on what you want to reform, and what kind of reform you’re talking about. I’d like to see more direct democracy, which I believe can be achieved in my home country through reforms. But in some other countries, it can only be achieved via revolution. For economic systems, a mix of capitalism and socialism seems to be the best thing we’ve found so far. No doubt a better economic system will be discovered someday. But it is not communism. Communism is too extreme. It’s not a good system, and it has failed everywhere it’s been tried.
FizzYou either find a way to cope or live your life worrying about something ultimately out of your control. As long as I’m voting and spending my money thoughtfully then I believe I’m doing enough.
Food insecurity is something outside of most people’s control, last I checked, humans can only cope without food for about a week before death sets in.
Then I guess they will live their life worrying about something outside their control and ultimately die.
God it must be blissful to live without any kind of empathy towards the struggles others go through.
is that what you think you’re doing? being empathetic? you are all making yourselves miserable and refusing to look at anything in a positive light. blame the system, blame the man, blame capitalism, fine - - what are you going to DO about it? fuck your empathy, do something or start living well
Bold of you to assume I just sit on lemmy all day posting memes. Actually join in a handful of volunteer service events throughout the year, some through work, other times personally. I also encourage others the vote for candidates who are more likely to bring about positive changes for our society.
So, yes I am being empathetic, and that empathy does actually drive me to take the steps I can take to make other people’s lives better. But at the end of the day, all of this work can very quickly be for naught unless we simultaneously fix the overarching systems in place that led to the unnecessary problems people suffer.
You try to help people locally - that’s great! I didn’t initially get that you were saying “Perspective isn’t enough.” Action is definitely important. When is it enough, though? (There’s always more people to help.) Can it *ever *be enough, without the shift in perspective alongside it?
Yeah I do help locally, I’m lucky enough that I have the means and ability to help others. But that still doesn’t change the fact that people can’t just cope and hope their way out of food insecurity. Plain and simple, every single one of us needs food, our bodies and minds will go through great lengths driving us to find food, we literally cannot turn off the neural pathways that tell us we’re hungry and that we need to eat. You can’t “positive thinking” your way put of an empty stomach while your body breaks itself down for energy.
It must be so tiring pretending to care about every single issue of the world. You must be a real white savor. I hope all the struggling people can hang on long enough for you to come save them.
I have empathy for others while understanding that their situation is outside of my control. I do small things like vote and help where I can but beyond that there is no point in harming your mental wellbeing when you are not in a position to help.
Good for you man. I hope you continue to participate without whining.
Why wouldn’t I be able to whine?
samus12345That’s how it always happens, unfortunately. “Then they came for me - and there was no one left to speak for me.”
It’s really not
Yeah standard of living overall is factually better than at any other point in the last few hundred years.
Medicine alone has made getting to or living past your mid-30’s far less hard or filled with pain - even for those in poverty.
And hell I’d argue that if the original commenter really believes it’s a dystopian shit-show…it’s crystal clear how to make your own lot better.
UnderpantsWeevilYeah standard of living overall is factually better than at any other point in the last few hundred years.
Really depends on who you are and where you live. I’m watching my Houston ISD getting torn apart before my eyes. Police were running around UH campus clubbing students and dragging them into squad cars just a few weeks ago. The derecho that blew through downtown blew out 5-10% of the windows in various buildings and knocked out the power for a few days. Electricity costs have doubled in the last ten years, while summer heat is up a sold five degrees Fahrenheit on average.
Is my standard of living better than it was for someone living in the city a generation ago? Doesn’t look like it. But hey, we’ve got weird new AI and the stock market is very up. Is it better than someone living in Houston in 1824? Yeah… I guess? But so much of that seems to hinge on having electricity and running water. And the more pipes keep bursting and lines keep getting knocked down, the less reliable these services seem.
SomeGuy69Not to forget, how we now “only” work 40h (for most people), but productivity went up and a lot of down times and social interaction in the past, were replaced by workload grind in a now stressful office environments.
we now “only” work 40h
That’s a deceptive estimate, as the number of employment hours worked across the household has jumped considerably higher. Two income families are the norm while children in low income households are routinely press-ganged into service - either as additional hires or as unpaid support for the primary worker (aiding parents as field workers while the field overseer turns a blind eye, for instance).
productivity went up and a lot of down times and social interaction in the past, were replaced by workload grind in a now stressful office environments.
Longer commutes, fewer public spaces and services, more haphazard schedules (more and more people working traditional “weekend” periods, particularly in retail, service, and transportation sectors), and more unreliable gig work. Absolutely.
People in the ukraine are like: man this is great, imagine living in the 30’s
Yeah, there are tons of things to make better and improve on, but things could be a lot freaking worse. (For more people, anyway, for too many people it’s already terrible currently, e.g. Gaza, Ukraine, Yemen, Haiti … )
The same people that quote that these are the least violent and most progressive times we live in will turn right around and say we’re in an ever increasing dystopian hellhole despite all the scientific evidence to the contrary.
They will continue to bemoan mainstream media and social media pushing propaganda on them they continue to link on THEIR better social media.
You’ll then be yelled at for Green washing and unironically saying that progressives are in the democratic party for a reason despite saying all politicians are the same from their useful idiot basements while pretending to be a Bernie Bro despite him endorsing Hilary, and Biden lol.
What would you have Bernie do after loosing his primary?
The point being that Hilary’s and Bernie’s platforms were near identical. They agreed and voted together on the same issues 94% of the time. More than any other candidate they had ever run with.
The progressive Democrats are not sure that different from mainstream Democrats not because they’re so far right like everyone loves to espouse but from a constant track record of Democrats regularly becoming more progressive.
Don’t believe bullshit internet memes and lies about centrist Democrats being far right. They’re not. They’re working in the framework of American culture and despite what everyone thinks is going to happen every time we get a forward thinking leader, the government is slow by design and quick changes are not reality for almost any government except dictatorships.
Having a benevolent dictatorship would be phenomenal. The form of government doesn’t matter as long as lives are being bettered. Representative Democracy tends to keep it from going full on off the rails in the span of a decade though.
The world looks like a horrible place, barely hanging on by a thread, until you step outside and see that society and the people in it are generally pretty chill.
Of course, that said, I don’t live in the states. Everything could be literally on fire there for all I know.
LaunchesKayaksIt’s a pleasant surprise every time I visit how chill the US is, you see so much news and fear mongering but it’s super friendly and nice everywhere I go.
Except now there’s nukes, end stage capitalism, and climate change… Sure up until like 100 years ago shit sucked hard for just about everyone, but at least there was no way they could literally end all life on earth
Even if we set out to do so we couldn’t end all life on earth (literally)
Lol, you high?
www.jamesmollison.com/where-children-sleep
We are privileged. Gratitude is hard.
We are, but also why can’t we make things better? Money is made up and billionaires hoard it all. They should be dangled over shark tanks until they fix everyone’s life.
Like I said, gratitude is hard.
I think maybe there’s a reason we’re not grateful. Maybe we need those emotions to motivate us.
I don’t think if I were grateful I’d bother finishing up my scifi novel or many other projects.
If you think anger and resentment are sources of motivation, you really need to try gratitude. Try it for a week. If it’s not working, you can go back to your old emotional diet.
I find gratitude incredibly draining because it’s artificial and also it seems oddly guilt based. I would rather frame things as giving myself credit. I got tasks done. I showed self discipline. Gratitude implies I was handed something on a plate.
You were handed many things on a plate… This planet, nature, air, our current level of science, technology, civilization, development, law and order, music, literature, even the very fact that you exist and are human. You did nothing to earn any of it. You may have bought your iPhone and paid for the internet service that you’re using, but they were not created for you, and you had no hand in their development.
You make it sound like some poor hardworking exploited person built the earth themselves out of some sort of clay and handed it to me for free.
You make it sound like another person’s labor is the only thing that deserves gratitude.
And no, I’m not suggesting you should be grateful to god. I’m an atheist.
I’m a nihilist. I wasn’t thinking of God.
IDK. I respect that gratitude works for others. I personally am not a fan because I feel we have the normal range of emotions for a good reason.
For example: Anger motivates us to leave an exploitative job or an abusive relationship. Gratitude might very well keep someone in that relationship or in a job where they end up herniating a disk…because instead of being angry enough to leave they tell themselves ‘I’m so lucky! Other people have it worse!’
I never suggested you should be grateful for everything and anything that happens to you. That’s really not necessary to practice gratitude on occasion. And your brain doesn’t automatically turn into mush that’s incapable of recognizing exploitation or injustice.
When you look for things to be angry about, when you look for things to be resentful about, you find them.
When you look for things to be satisfied with, when you look for things to be grateful for, you find them.
I found the opposite. I have achieved far, far more through practising gratitude, knowing my values and moving towards them rather than being pressure and goal oriented.
I went for a walk this morning, in a park near my house. It was cold and grey, so.i was grateful for my gloves and for the solitude. How good is it that I can go for a walk, in a park near my house? Hear birds, breathe air see trees, smell the frost? How good that there are parks, and birds, and it’s safe, and I can walk. I want to keep doing it. I’m grateful for that.
I don’t look for things to be either angry or grateful about I just get on with life. I respect that gratitude works for you. Personally I find forcing gratitude just drains me. I find I do best just accepting that sometimes I’m angry or stressed and that those are signs telling me something.
well said, keep saying it. there’s a really toxic attitude on this site that I’m starting to pick up on. everyone moralizing and externalizing their depression. it’s no wonder everyone is suicidal