Slavery is Capitalism perfected

[alfredo]

[BOG PERSON]

1. actually capitalism is an improvement on slavery

since maintaining a slave costs more to the owner than maintaining a worker

[Buzz Clik]

2. Er. Hm.

I don't think that's the argument being made.

[BainsBane]

10. That was Marx's argument

and, I believe, Adam Smiths.

[alfredo]

25. Capitalist earned and learned from slavery. The capitalist profited from products

produced under slavery.

Maybe it should be Capitalism is slavery perfected.

[WinkyDink]

3. "Bubba and I were saying this just the other day!": P. Deen.

[cthulu2016]

4. That seems precisely backward

Capitalism is slavery perfected.

A central insight of the early socialists was that urban wage slavery was a better deal for capital than chattel slavery because it does not require any investment of capital and a replaceable wage slave will do something a real slave cannot, which is work for below subsistence.

No start-up costs... low barriers to entry.

[geckosfeet]

5. I do believe that you are correct. Capitalism took a horrible practice and made it worse.

Or improved upon it depending on your perspective.

Capitalism is genius at exploiting raw materials, and that all we are to the capitalist machinery.

[galileoreloaded]

6. true. communism/hard socialism required a faux "leveling" of human desire

in order to maximize industrial output. make everybody happy, everybody has the same, define common goals, they work harder. the oligarchs are still managing the markets lol, and collecting the profits. that's what gets lost in all the bullshit.

capitalism just fits with how humans evolved better and yes, provided low barriers to entry whereas communism/socialism required large, expensive, and unwieldy bureaucracies and control apparatuses to affect.

[BOG PERSON]

7. the soviet worker was not known for his/her workaholism

stakhanovism must be placed w/in the context of the preparation for war during the '30s

in peacetime the soviet workplace was much more relaxed

[galileoreloaded]

8. thats the point.

predictable outputs were the goal.

few get rich overnight, but over time, with well defined inputs and controls, you can maximize worker efficiency and just add population to increase profits. this can be done via organic (birth) methods or merger and acquisition. (annexation)

the 130% rule can be greatly minimized.

everything you can grasp around you with your 5 senses is a business. everything. and every marketplace has rules.

[BOG PERSON]

9. it could be argued the soviet way

of doing things in a relatively chill way, while less *efficient*, was better suited to human nature, since ppl are actually pretty fragile and the prolonged stress of economic uncertainty is ruinous to our health (as the 2 million people who disappeared after the defeat of the soviet union testify to)

instead of whatever it is you're proposing.. full commoditization i guess?

[galileoreloaded]

11. full commoditization is kind.

managed markets are both forms of unstable wage slavery.

hell, its only been a hundred years or so since we lived past 55.

[HiPointDem]

17. transhumanism will solve those pesky problems of health and breakdown.

[leftstreet]

13. Yes, seniors on SS & Medicare are such fucking drones

Now, if the monies they received washed through a middleman first, for a skimming of some hefty profit, seniors would then be able to achieve their full individuality and happy joyjoy enlightenment



Jesus

Where do you people come up with this shit

[galileoreloaded]

14. dont get all wee-wee'd up now

i dont like either system of control, but i'm not hiding from them either.

[leftstreet]

18. You don't like Social Security and Medicare?

Wow

That's an unusual attitude

[galileoreloaded]

20. because thats what I said!

except it wasn't.

[BOG PERSON]

23. social insurance = herd-morality

[BOG PERSON]

19. "system of control"

maybe you just dont like having to live in a society

[Major Nikon]

22. Slaves are expensive to maintain. It's much more workable with government subsidies.

[BainsBane]

12. Marx would disagree

There has been an extensive debate among historians about the relationship between slavery and capitalism, with some (like Eric Williams and Fernando Novais) arguing that slavery was a stage of pre-capitalism in which the accumulation of capital through ship building and other industries associated with the slave trade paved the way for industrial capitalism. These arguments center around the idea that economies in the era of Atlantic slavery were known as slave systems because the dominant mode of production, or labor system, was slavery. Slavery eventually gave way to capitalism because the latter was more efficient and therefore more profitable for owners.

Now the dominant mode of production is free-wage labor, free in the sense that the coercion that compels one to work is entirely economic rather than extra-economic (like whipping or legal enslavement). Yet we still have more people enslaved that at any time in human history. The economies do not depend on slavery as they did in the era of the transatlantic slave trade, but that does nothing to mitigate the suffering of those who find themselves enslaved. The difference is that society no longer justifies slavery through ideological, religious, and judicial means. It also means those slaves are hidden from site. People who use slave labor (through prostitution, pornography, or purchasing garments, meat or produce generated by slaves) may not even be aware they are participating in the exploitation of slaves.

[galileoreloaded]

16. good point. but its even worse.

people don't realize that the entire system is control based and is defacto slavery. they completely inured to the system and they dont WANT to leave it. it comforts their hindbrain to be part of a horrible plan and a vicious herd, as long as its in the plan.

the good news is, if you can cast off your chains and don't get greedy, you can extract just what you need with clear head and conscious.

think Gervase' character in the "invention of lying".

[Duckwraps]

15. Nonsence, do your homework.

[Igel]

21. Seems a dubious proposition.

Slavery didn't lead to capitalism in any obvious way in many countries. It wasn't preceded by capitalism, so it's not like "capitalism" was perfected in slavery.

In the West it was transitional between feudalism and capitalism. It started and spread generations before capitalism really got started.

In the end, slaves were just regarded as things and not people because there was no third category. They were counted as "capital"--but particularly ineffective and inefficient capital. The American South would eventually have had a serious problem had they maintained slavery--and it was already showing by 1860, just as it was showing in Russia by the time they emancipated the serfs.

In some countries, the serf population was tied to the land and couldn't be sold except as part of the land. If you had land and no population, you'd usually find a way of buying serfs. In some cases you'd buy an estate and move the population discreetly between your lands. It was the same kind of "we're feudal, we're capitalistic, we're two-in-one." Capitalism was ultimately not compatible with serfs. Or slaves.

In Muslim territories there was extensive slavery. Who was enslaved rather depended on what people were across the border. I'm not sure you'd want to call any of those areas "capitalist"--they didn't naturally develop into or from capitalism. "Feudal" is a bit of a stretch for a while there, even with the felaheen.

[Rex]

24. Not true at all, if that was true we would all be working for free.

Huge hole in that argument.