[情けない]

Originally Posted by toolbandfan

So Capitalism has no ties with our government in this country, huh. Pretty much any other type of economic system could be spoken of in the same way.

wut

[toolbandfan]

You're saying capitalism hasn't failed at all, but "ignorant pols" have screwed it up, even though capitalism is greatly tied into the political landscape to begin with anyways.

[情けない]

So how is that not pols screwing it up? Crony capitalism and capitalism are not the same.

[rnauman821]

Originally Posted by 情けない

Capitalism hasn't failed, except for when ignorant pols manage to screw things up (and then blame them for being screwed up, lol). I'd love to see your definition of the "failure" of capitalism and see you attempt to explain how it wasn't tied to government intervention.

Really? If you let capitalism run and run by itself without any government regulation or supervision... It will eventually devour itself. The issue is that greed eventually pushes competitive ability out of the market. You end up with several large conglomerates who smother the small bits below them. The small business has no place to compete among giants without ANY government intervention.

What are you talking about? They wouldn't be following it correctly (at least according to the actual doctrine of most major world religions) if they did either of those two things you described. Religion is not flawed, human nature is flawed and results in what you described. The question is not what has religion done to man, but rather what has man done to religion.

Christianity states I can stone a woman who sleeps with a man outside of marriage, it also says I can have multiple wives, that I can own slaves, and that ethnic cleansing is alright if done in the name of god.

The Koran states pretty much the same **** in different words.

In red.

[Tuff]

Originally Posted by rnauman821

Religions are flawed in the basis that people pick and choose which doctrine to follow. They will hide behind it when they persecute others, yet when they aren't following it... it suddenly becomes up to interpretation.

Bingo.

Not to mention they control thought and people begin to lose the ability to think for themselves because a magical book tells them certain things are true.
It always amazed me that we need proper evidence in a court of law to convict someone of a crime, but when it comes to religion, no actual evidence of the same caliber is needed and people just blindly believe because others (usually family) tell them it is real and they have to follow.

[StellarKnight]

Originally Posted by 情けない

I'd love to see your definition of the "failure" of capitalism and see you attempt to explain how it wasn't tied to government intervention.

Slavery

[rnauman821]

Originally Posted by StellarKnight

Slavery

.

[StellarKnight]

I should preface my post by stating that slavery isn't "the" problem with capitalism, but rather, a problem which was further perpetuated by capitalism (which illuminates "the" problem with capitalism, I suppose).

I should further preface this post by stating that no, I am not a dirty communist; I just recognize a shortcoming of the system.

[情けない]

Originally Posted by StellarKnight

I should preface my post by stating that slavery isn't "the" problem with capitalism, but rather, a problem which was further perpetuated by capitalism (which illuminates "the" problem with capitalism, I suppose).

I should further preface this post by stating that no, I am not a dirty communist; I just recognize a shortcoming of the system.

But slavery is not economically viable with very few exceptions. Even if legalized tomorrow, I doubt it would catch on.

But that aside, slavery has nothing to do with the form of government as a whole, and has been practiced in most civilizations over the years. It's not unique to or a result of capitalism, it's a result of the lack of a civil society with guaranteed rights, which is the system in which true, free capitalism can be practiced.

[StellarKnight]

Originally Posted by 情けない

But slavery is not economically viable with very few exceptions. Even if legalized tomorrow, I doubt it would catch on.

Do expand on this. How could it not be economically viable? You're essentially eliminating a variable cost (or at least diminishing it greatly). Doesn't the fact that it has "been practiced in most civilizations over the years" tend to lead to the conclusion that it is economically viable?

Originally Posted by 情けない

It's not unique to or a result of capitalism

I didn't claim that it was unique to capitalism, merely that capitalism doesn't seem to create any disincentive for its practice.

Originally Posted by 情けない

it's a result of the lack of a civil society with guaranteed rights, which is the system in which true, free capitalism can be practiced.

That's kind of a cop-out because it's along the same line of reasoning of "well, REAL communism has never been practiced;" it fails to address the real world application of the system because you're pretending that the theoretical/sterile version is attainable. If capitalism doesn't have any inherent value judgments (as has been advanced previously), then the general idea of "guaranteed rights" shouldn't be part and parcel of a true capitalist system.