Capitalism is not in crisis... Capitalism IS crisis!

[Orwellian_Ghost]

While we must choose between extortionate rents and sleeping rough, houses, buildings and land are left empty and disused for years.

While we must choose between shit jobs that pay crumbs or sign on and beg for 40 pounds a week, some bankers retire on a £700,000 a year pension.

While we produce, they profit.

Everyday, everywhere, our power and dignity are being destroyed.

But when we see an empty building in which we want to live and create, we occupy it; When we want to create spaces to challenge Racism, Sexism, Economic Slavery and all oppressive systems, we do it (or at least we try!); When we want to have fun and put banners up, we do it; When we decide to feed people for free using the waste of Capitalism, we do it. Despite all they tell us, we can and will empower ourselves!

And what is their solution to the disgusting mess they've created? They come into our city for their useless G20 spectacle and pretend they're gonna solve a crisis that they're responsible for in the first place.

http://london.indymedia.org.uk/articles/948

[knowbody0]

1. soon we will all know this

and we will forge together to create our own new world order.

peace

[MellowDem]

3. Welcome to the new world order...

same as the old world order... I believe you are setting yourself up for disappointment.

[livefreest]

2. how did we go back to serfdom? to proletariate of the end of 19th century?

was forced labor not abolished but slowly extended to all? ok i'm depressing myself now. but how did it happen?

[Xipe Totec]

4. What we have is Scamitalism

I'm still waiting for the real thing.

[Loge23]

5. What will it take?

I am not a proponent of violence, however any of us who have had to deal with these pigs - or their apparatus' (health care anyone?) can relate to being driven to a near-violent state.
They thumb their gilded noses at us. They curse us. They hem and haw at the sight of us in their little worlds. We are their slaves, their workers, their enablers. We take the crumbs for lack of anything better. And we seethe.
It is clear to all that if we let them off the hook this time, that the dye will be cast forever - or at least until a more enlightened and more active generation stands up against the machine.
They have stolen our pensions and they will keep at it until they get Social Security and more exemptions taxation, which is apparently just for us to pay.
They have no fear and they shouldn't. We won't hurt them. We won't come for them. We won't drag them out their ivory towers to face the crowds.
It is no longer just radicals that are at the boiling point. The working class is looking for a leader and when, and if, that person comes, things could get interesting.

[sunwyn]

7. A Government that resembles the Lives of the People

What is and has been missing is a leader who will stand up and give us a government that resembles the lives of the people it serves. The corruption of the bureaucracy now is such that the people who write the tax laws can't even follow them. Deregulation of the financial industry created the false illusion of "wealth" that was safe for big corporations to invest the pension funds of its workers into numbers that were lies. We have made the system of laws so complicated that hard work is punished and incompetence is rewarded. I'm not really sure about anyone else, but that was not what I was taught to be the American system of government. A government of the people, by the people, for the people should more closely resemble the lives of the people who have pledged their lives and sacred honors to preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States of America. All of us need to take a look in the mirror and decide if we have the courage to have a government that resembles our lives, or the lives of those who have created this mess!

[TBF]

9. "The working class is looking for a leader" -

You're quite right that they're robbing us blind, and we must make sure we understand who "they" are. "They" are the owners & everyone working on behalf of them (ie Congress). "We" are the workers. The people who get up every day and go to work because we have to. We're seeing a lot of "middle class" losing their 401ks, losing their jobs. For some people figuring out they are not the owners will be the first step in progress forward.

If we stand up together we will find that someone amongst us is quite capable to lead, but standing strong together rather than waiting for a magical leader is the first step. There are many more of us than them, and as we realize this we can truly change the dynamics.

[arcadian]

6. They Live

[defendandprotect]

8. Capitalism is crime . . . . .

Unregulated capitalism is merely organized crime ---

It's a ridiculous "King-of-the-Hill System" intended to move the wealth

and natural resources from the many to the few -- and it does that quite successfully!!

[pnutbutr]

10. it's amusing to

hear people people put down capitalism when they don't actually understand it but think they do. It seems to always go back to they have I don't which is just jealousy at it's root.

I'm an ass, I know, so no need to tell me.

[Romulox]

11. The only thing the "invisible hand" is competent at is bribing our politicians.

Your "free markets" are in ruins. :hi:

[pnutbutr]

13. that's what I'm talking about nt

[Romulox]

14. I'm probably "just jealous". LOL.

[pnutbutr]

15. more of the not understanding part

but the FR thing is a nice assumption and an easy way out isn't it?

[TBF]

17. Seriously?

The people who best understand capitalism are those who are born workers and fight against that oppression their entire lives.

[pnutbutr]

19. yeah

young masked anarchists understand capitalism. Excuse me while I :rofl: all over the place

[TBF]

20. If they're wearing masks why assume they're young?

And while we're at it youth bashing isn't really necessary. I'm pretty old now (or at least feel that way sometimes), in my early 40's, and I think I best understood capitalism when I learned about different economic systems as a middle school student. I immediately understood that people getting to the top meant that they had to step on other people to do so, no matter how nice they pretended to be about it, or how "legal" it was, or how accepted and revered by society.

And that's really all there is to it. Anything beyond that is rationalizing the oppression.

[scarletwoman]

24. Okay then. Tell us what capitalism is. Seriously, let's hear it. (nt)

[Djinn]

29. I'm very jealous

I've always wanted to take a more personal line in killing people for profit but the ruling class fuckers just wont let me sit at their table

"they hate us for our fiefdoms" :eyes:

[cali]

12. I'm a capitalist. off with my head.

I want strong reform including universal single payer healthcare, strong reform, and nationalization of certain narrow industries/utilities.

I believe in small business as an engine for a progressive economy and as an outlet for the creative impulse that's inherent in human beings.

[Orwellian_Ghost]

16. You're probably a socialist

Just still not able to admit it freely.

Solidarity with the poor of which I am one.

It's wealth that's the problem, poverty being it's offspring.

[cali]

18. Nah, I don't have much trouble speaking out.

And in my state of Vermont, being a socialist isn't frowned on. And no, sorry, I don't have a problem with wealth- as long as there's progressive taxation that keeps it somewhat in check.

[anaxarchos]

21. But, but... what will replace Capitalism?

The absence of Capitalism will replace Capitalism.

But, can't we design a system that "gives" us what Capitalism does?

Did you "design" this system? If so, you won't be "designing" any others. If not, what are you worried about? If "systems" are "designed", then those who design will design just fine... if they are not "designed", then there could be a fine for this kinda "design".

But what about the "giving" part?

What does Capitalism "give"? One hundred years ago, the vast majority owned their own ability to reproduce themselves. Today it is a tiny fraction. The absence of property for the many is the concentration of property for the few. In return, "independence" is traded out for "high wages"... for a time... only to be traded out again. Capital "takes"... that is its nature. Who is it that "gives"?

But, what about "human nature"? Will anyone "work" if they are not forced to?

"According to this... society ought long ago to have gone to the dogs through sheer idleness; for those of its members who work, acquire nothing, and those who acquire anything do not work."

It is the same question, repeated over and over again: "How can there be a slave without a slavemaster? How can there be a serf without a Lord?" Unfortunately, it is a house slave's question. There is more clarity for others.

[Hannah Bell]

31. "Communists have been reproached with the desire of abolishing

the right of personally acquiring property as the fruit of a man’s own labour, which property is alleged to be the groundwork of all personal freedom, activity and independence.

Hard-won, self-acquired, self-earned property! Do you mean the property of petty artisan and of the small peasant, a form of property that preceded the bourgeois form?

There is no need to abolish that; the development of industry has to a great extent already destroyed it, and is still destroying it daily."

[Vidar]

22. K&R.

[blindpig]

23. k&r n/t

[Occam Bandage]

25. Socialism and capitalism are not mutually exclusive. nt

[Orwellian_Ghost]

26. Yes, they are. n/t

[TBF]

27. How so? n/t

[maryf]

28. Kick

Error: you can only recommend threads which were started in the past 24 hours

[Djinn]

30. Kicking as well

because the 24 hour rule discriminates against those of us in more exotic timezones