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It would be really great for someone to demystify the actual process of how money gets turned into political power in the United States, because ever since I was first politically aware I've never seen it done. Higher campaign finances correlate with electoral victory, sure, but they don't determine it. Especially since Citizens United, it's easy to draw the conclusion that money simply facilitates already-effective campaigns. Congressional votes line up more with the political views of the wealthy rather than America polled at large, but 50.7% of the country voted for the explicitly pro-business party in 2014, not even allowing themselves the chance to get hoodwinked. Is campaign money responsible for brainwashing the masses into voting for racist, sexist homophobes? Or is it that they see some benefit for themselves in voting against minorities and women instead of for a party nominally interested in reducing income inequality? Does the Democratic congressional voting record really differ from their voting base, taking into account that American households making over $100,000 are around 26% of the electorate? How much is comfortable dysfunction, and how much is human design? If it's outright corruption (through job promises, since funding and gifts are heavily scrutinized), surely some light can be shed on post-Hill employment statistics, something more than a handful of high-profile names. Naked plutocracy, false consciousness, the iron triangle, the revolving door. I used to believe that all of this added up into some figure which explained the persistence of the "dictatorship of the bourgeoisie" in the face of popular movements. The fact that liberal democracy doesn't seem to reflect the will of the majority is a deep question, but these ideologies that neatly divide the world into two diametrically opposed camps, with a clearly defined and absolute enemy, have only ever provided emotional release, never answers, or actionable plans.
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May 16, 2016 01:45
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That's the most disingenuous Rosa Luxembourg murdering poo poo I've ever heard. Straight up all you have done is say you think XYZ political analysis is wrong, but instead of demonstrating why the ideas you mention are wrong and giving some examples, you just try and give yourself credibility by claiming to have once believed in them. The shallowness of your position is revealed not only in you doing that but that it's in combination with you you advocating the liberal worldview that Marxism critiqued in the first place. "nuh uh" is not an argument, dude.
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May 16, 2016 01:56
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Marx was smart but his analysis makes no sense since it neglects every other form of social stratification. Okay bye!
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May 16, 2016 02:12
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I'm not even making an argument, HorseLord. Those are genuine questions that I've never found a satisfying answer to, followed by a conclusion drawn from my continued ignorance.
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May 16, 2016 02:12
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Philip Rivers posted:Marx was smart but his analysis makes no sense since it neglects every other form of social stratification. Okay bye! He took it into account, then dismissed it because he could see the forest for the trees.
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May 16, 2016 02:21
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HorseLord posted:Is your conception of the marxist idea of bourgeois power seriously "There is a grand council of capitalists who meet up secretly" I think some people who are reacting against society's propaganda actually bought a core part of. They realize correctly that society isn't what the 5th grade textbook said it was but for some reason still think it ought to be and think there is an answer for why it isn't.
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May 16, 2016 03:27
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Ormi posted:It would be really great for someone to demystify the actual process of how money gets turned into political power in the United States, because ever since I was first politically aware I've never seen it done. Because wealth buys control of information, wealth sets the agenda, wealth funds persuasion. Yes it is theoretically possible for people to oppose the narrative driven by wealth, but our entire society is filled to the brim with subtle hints to tell you otherwise. What do you want? To be Rich? Well paid? Good job? Nice house? Nice car? To own material goods? To get promoted to a position of power? How do you go about that? You work harder than others, you get a better education, you show your boss you should be promoted, you participate in the system that exists as is. You do not try to change that system, because society is filled with things that make that seem hard, while promising you that if you just produce for the benefit of the wealthy, you will be rewarded for it. We, as a society, don't even conceive that the notion of a profit margin is a bad thing. We don't think landlording is utterly abhorrent. We believe that having money justifies taking money from other people. That is literally a foundation of our society. That kind of ideological inertia transcends politics, it shapes the very fabric of society, but in a political sense it translates into resistance to the notion of equal wealth distribution. Why should people pay high taxes? Why should people get for free what I had to work for? Am I not a better person because I have wealth? Do I not deserve more than others? The power of wealth in our society is that it has convinced everybody else that the desirable thing is not to destroy wealth, and make everyone equal, but to simply become the wealthy one. The problem is not inequality, it's that you are not on the top. To meaningfully challenge plutocracy you need to reject that premise, and all of society is ordered to prevent you from doing so, because everyone buys into that one big lie. There doesn't need to be an organized cabal of rich people perpetuating it, each individual rich person can simply expend their resources to perpetuate it, and then the not so rich can say "One day, I may be rich too! So I should support rich people because that will be me in future!" And then the poor can be told that all wealth comes from the rich, and that rich people need greater freedom so that they can create wealth for the poor. There isn't any great overarching plan, we simply live in a society that is built around the worship of power and wealth, and with a little help from those who control information, that idea is perpetuated. OwlFancier fucked around with this message at 03:31 on May 16, 2016 |
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May 16, 2016 03:27
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Philip Rivers posted:Marx was smart but his analysis makes no sense since it neglects every other form of social stratification. Okay bye! It doesn't, though. If you had read Marx you would know that it does not.
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May 16, 2016 03:32
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OwlFancier posted:Because wealth buys control of information, wealth sets the agenda, wealth funds persuasion. My post above was referring exactly to this.
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May 16, 2016 03:40
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Is your alternative proposal that things just aren't and to shrug your shoulders?
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May 16, 2016 03:41
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OwlFancier posted:The power of wealth in our society is that it has convinced everybody else that the desirable thing is not to destroy wealth, and make everyone equal, but to simply become the wealthy one. The problem is not inequality, it's that you are not on the top. This is a particularly vulgar version of the false consciousness narrative, and the critical flaw with it is that it isn't true. The majority of Americans support policies designed to reduce income inequality and believe it to be a bad thing. The gap is even more drastic when surveying low-income Americans.
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May 16, 2016 03:45
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And yet they do not vote for it? Also that report you linked doesn't seem to support your argument very well. "The federal government has gone too far in regulating business and interfering with the free enterprise system 69% 65% support" "Boo regulations getting in the way of wealth creators!" Massive support for reduced business regulation. Hahaha only 60% of people support the concept of progressive taxation. 23% support for a property tax, 17% support for a capital gains tax hahahahaha. Yeah that report is great it basically says Americans hate taxes. It's fairly standard liberalism, wring hands a lot and talk about how important it is to look after people but jesus christ don't ask me to make any sort of material sacrifice for it. OwlFancier fucked around with this message at 03:56 on May 16, 2016 |
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May 16, 2016 03:46
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OwlFancier posted:Is your alternative proposal that things just aren't and to shrug your shoulders? My proposal is that you live in reality. The problems your'e talking about are endemic to human society and have transcended political systems, economic systems, culture and time. There isn't evidence in the historical record of our species that the problems of power imbalance are going to be eliminated by changing the legality of certain classes of ownership.
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May 16, 2016 03:57
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asdf32 posted:My proposal is that you live in reality. The problems your'e talking about are endemic to human society and have transcended political systems, economic systems, culture and time. There isn't evidence in the historical record of our species that the problems of power imbalance are going to be eliminated by changing the legality of certain classes of ownership. My god I hadn't realized that until you said it. It's not like anyone ever suggested that a popular movement inspired by anger at the exploitation of the poor by the wealthy would be necessary in order to instate a lasting change in a society. That would be crazy.
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May 16, 2016 04:03
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asdf32 you really have a knack for dismissing incredibly complex subjects - entire fields of human endeavour with millions of participants even - with extremely simplistic, short and arrogant statements. It makes me wonder what you're even in this thread for, because your personal philosophy is as rigid as it is small, and you actively resist learning about what you dismiss.
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May 16, 2016 04:04
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OwlFancier posted:And yet they do not vote for it? It's actually support for increased business regulation under each category, excepting small businesses. It's a combination of both positive and negative respondents. Also, you misinterpreted the captial gains tax numbers as %favoring, but they're the mean preferred rates of the wealthy, the general public wasn't surveyed in those categories. Property taxes are at 23% for use over other forms of taxes, such as corporate income taxes, not that they shouldn't exist at all. Please take the time to read thoroughly. Ormi fucked around with this message at 04:12 on May 16, 2016 |
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May 16, 2016 04:06
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I got the last bit actually, just didn't care much. My argument stands, you can say you support justice all you want but the state of the country manifestly proves that people don't actually support it enough to act on it. Put up or shut up. What people say they support is utterly irrelevant.
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May 16, 2016 04:10
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I agree. Hence, the question of why such a huge portion of the American electorate continues to vote for xenophobic white straight male supremacists is important. Based on the surveys, we can guess that it isn't because they're all suffering from cognitive dissonance about their economic self-interest.
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May 16, 2016 04:16
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Er, why not? There is a very significant difference between "something should be done" and "I should do something" I'm sure a great many people will support helping others in a vacuum, and very few will support helping others with their own money. They would prefer to vote for what they think will make them better off, and nobody else.
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May 16, 2016 04:21
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Ormi posted:I agree. Hence, the question of why such a huge portion of the American electorate continues to vote for xenophobic white straight male supremacists is important. Based on the surveys, we can guess that it isn't because they're all suffering from cognitive dissonance about their economic self-interest.
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May 16, 2016 04:27
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The US incarceration rate today is 1 in 100 people, the highest in the world. Most of the prisoners are ethnic minorities. At its highest, it was 0.8 per 100 people in the USSR. The US secret police spies on literally every citizen without warrant. The surveillance apparatus of the US wiretaps and records every single communication you will ever have. The KGB never came close to anything like this. The harshest and most degrading labor in the US is performed by a class of workers who are given zero citizen rights and regularly endure forced deportations. US police routinely carries out executions of minorities in the streets of their own communities summarily, in peacetime, without any presumption of innocence, and in complete impunity. Secret prisons, indefinite arbitrary detention and brutal torture/execution, etc. Permanent war against an abstract concept, serving as justification for mass killings abroad. This is all just about the recent years of US repression. Go back a bit further to the time when the USSR was still around and then in the US you'll find a history of stuff like internment camps, military operations and bombings against own civilians, mass scientific experimentation on minorities, murder of political dissidents, apartheid laws, use of nuclear weapons against foreign civilians, denial of the right to vote for women & racial minorities, genocidal violence, etc
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May 16, 2016 05:13
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OwlFancier posted:They would prefer to vote for what they think will make them better off, and nobody else. Yes, of course. This is it, this is xenophobic white straight male supremacy. That is what they're voting for, because they view prosperity as zero-sum. They would also accept direct government assistance, provided it were racially encoded, as they did in the New Deal coaliation, and you can hear murmurs of this among Trump supporters today. 386-SX 25Mhz VGA posted:Many who might vote against this are systematically disenfranchised through a number of laws designed to keep the vote out of the hands of disproportionately poor/minority populations, and the remainder of the vote is tilted to support existing power structures through the design of the Senate, through House gerrymandering, and through enormous public relations campaigns. This is like basic poo poo, jesus Right. The US doesn't have proportional representation, and different geographical areas wield disproportionate political power. This is what allowed the Republicans to take 30 extra seats instead of a perfect split down the middle, with 50.7 of the vote, from 16% of the voting age population. This is a huge problem, as is voter suppression. But they don't point to a United States that has its democratic process entirely in the hands of a plutocratic minority. 2014 turnout was 36%; how much of the loss was apathy, and how much was suppression?
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May 16, 2016 06:36
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Ormi posted:2014 turnout was 36%; how much of the loss was apathy, and how much was suppression?
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May 16, 2016 06:50
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Bob le Moche posted:The US secret police spies on literally every citizen without warrant. The surveillance apparatus of the US wiretaps and records every single communication you will ever have. The KGB never came close to anything like this. And yet we feel like it's self-evidently the case that government is less intrusive. Perhaps there's more to it?
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May 16, 2016 07:00
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Disinterested posted:And yet we feel like it's self-evidently the case that government is less intrusive. Perhaps there's more to it?
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May 16, 2016 07:03
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Ormi posted:It would be really great for someone to demystify the actual process of how money gets turned into political power in the United States, because ever since I was first politically aware I've never seen it done. Higher campaign finances correlate with electoral victory, sure, but they don't determine it. Especially since Citizens United, it's easy to draw the conclusion that money simply facilitates already-effective campaigns. Congressional votes line up more with the political views of the wealthy rather than America polled at large, but 50.7% of the country voted for the explicitly pro-business party in 2014, not even allowing themselves the chance to get hoodwinked. Is campaign money responsible for brainwashing the masses into voting for racist, sexist homophobes? Or is it that they see some benefit for themselves in voting against minorities and women instead of for a party nominally interested in reducing income inequality? Does the Democratic congressional voting record really differ from their voting base, taking into account that American households making over $100,000 are around 26% of the electorate? How much is comfortable dysfunction, and how much is human design? If it's outright corruption (through job promises, since funding and gifts are heavily scrutinized), surely some light can be shed on post-Hill employment statistics, something more than a handful of high-profile names. why would socialism require a grand conspiracy against it as a core part of its ideology?
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May 16, 2016 07:17
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icantfindaname posted:why would socialism require a grand conspiracy against it as a core part of its ideology? It doesn't. But the sentiment is held dearly by most abstentionist, anti-parliamentarian (revolutionary) tendencies. "If voting changed anything, they’d make it illegal," and such, applied to any liberal democratic context.
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May 16, 2016 08:17
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386-SX 25Mhz VGA posted:I wouldn't say that's self-evident, especially if you're black. It still wouldn't be exactly the same species of intrusiveness, would it, as, say, using a quarter of the national population as secret police informants.
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May 16, 2016 08:23
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Ormi posted:It doesn't. But the sentiment is held dearly by most abstentionist, anti-parliamentarian (revolutionary) tendencies. "If voting changed anything, they’d make it illegal," and such, applied to any liberal democratic context. fabianism FTW, imo
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May 16, 2016 08:30
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Disinterested posted:And yet we feel like it's self-evidently the case that government is less intrusive. Perhaps there's more to it? We accept all these atrocities from the US because we are brainwashed into passivity and submission, and because we belong to those who receive a number of privileges from the regime and have been trained to turn a blind eye to how other people have to live. Where does your conception of repression in the USSR come from? How did you form these ideas about it being "more intrusive"? Anyone who grew up in the West knows literally nothing at all about the USSR first-hand. Everything that we think we know has its origin in propaganda that's been force-fed to us since birth. We have zero actual information about the USSR that is not tainted by it being framed in cold war, us vs them, freedom and democracy vs evil empire terms. If it seems like the US repression is justified and normal, while the USSR repression is horrible and evil, it's literally just because we've all been taught to think that. The powerful US control apparatus is indeed very good at its job of producing obedient and loyal subjects. Bob le Moche fucked around with this message at 13:04 on May 16, 2016 |
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May 16, 2016 13:01
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Ormi posted:It doesn't. But the sentiment is held dearly by most abstentionist, anti-parliamentarian (revolutionary) tendencies. "If voting changed anything, they’d make it illegal," and such, applied to any liberal democratic context. One can consider that voting as it stands is largely useless, while still believing in the possibility of a democratic revolution. If you have enough popular support for a violent revolution, you have enough support for a non-violent one, and that may be a better first resort.
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May 16, 2016 13:16
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Philip Rivers posted:Marx was smart but his analysis makes no sense since it neglects every other form of social stratification. Okay bye! As well it should, because states and societies exist primarily to create and distribute wealth.
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May 16, 2016 13:18
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OwlFancier posted:One can consider that voting as it stands is largely useless, while still believing in the possibility of a democratic revolution. Once again Gandhi you fail to put it together in your mind that non-violent revolutions turn violent because the response of the bourgeoisie as a class, when their power is truly threatened, is to suppress the threat. Using violence. This has happened literally every single time. "Use violence vs not use violence" is not a choice you get to have, you will become violent to counter bourgeois violence or perish.
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May 16, 2016 15:25
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Bob le Moche posted:We accept all these atrocities from the US because we are brainwashed into passivity and submission, and because we belong to those who receive a number of privileges from the regime and have been trained to turn a blind eye to how other people have to live. How many millions of Americans have starved in the last 2 years as the government rejects outside food aid? Assuming you acknowledge the Holodomor of course.
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May 16, 2016 15:46
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This poster loves police brutality, but only when its against minorities!
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HorseLord posted:Once again Gandhi you fail to put it together in your mind that non-violent revolutions turn violent because the response of the bourgeoisie as a class, when their power is truly threatened, is to suppress the threat. Using violence. This has happened literally every single time. "Use violence vs not use violence" is not a choice you get to have, you will become violent to counter bourgeois violence or perish. If it comes to that then I accept it, providing you have sufficient popular support. Democratic self defence is still democratic. Using violence to seize the state with a minority of support in the hopes of using the apparatus of the state to gather majority support is what leads to the USSR, which I personally would prefer not to repeat. As always my objection is that if violence has to be your first resort,it probably won't help. OwlFancier fucked around with this message at 16:00 on May 16, 2016 |
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May 16, 2016 15:55
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OwlFancier posted:If it comes to that then I accept it, providing you have sufficient popular support. Democratic self defence is still democratic. Using violence to seize the state with a minority of support in the hopes of using the apparatus of the state to gather majority support is what leads to the USSR, which I personally would prefer not to repeat. Sounds legit, except that wasn't how the USSR came to be. Besides that, how do you propose that you as a hypothetical revolutionary party determine if you have majority support or not? Do you ask the people you want to overthrow to hold a referendum on whether most people would support a violent insurrection or what? DeusExMachinima posted:How many millions of Americans have starved in the last 2 years as the government rejects outside food aid? Imperial powers tend to starve their colonies rather than the metropole, so your question is both loaded and nonsensical.
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May 16, 2016 16:14
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OwlFancier posted:If it comes to that then I accept it, providing you have sufficient popular support. Democratic self defence is still democratic. Using violence to seize the state with a minority of support in the hopes of using the apparatus of the state to gather majority support is what leads to the USSR, which I personally would prefer not to repeat. Actually the USSR came from a revolution that had majority support. Seriously, what the hell is wrong with you? Your conception of the Russian Revolution as a small group seizing power without any support is so absurdly wrong I don't really know where to start, because what you think happened bares no relation to reality, and is essentially a fictional event that only you know. I only know about the real historical event, the one that actually happened. And that one was when a government of worker's councils (let's call them soviets) was formed by the masses of citizens in parallel with the Tsarist and post Tsarist government it eventually did away with. And, surprise! The doing away with was resisted, with violence. HorseLord fucked around with this message at 16:28 on May 16, 2016 |
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May 16, 2016 16:18
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DeusExMachinima posted:How many millions of Americans have starved in the last 2 years as the government rejects outside food aid? Are you deliberately keeping it outside the time frame where natural disasters have occurred in the US because while Stalin was horrific during the Holodomor he was not the sole factor. Also the fact that a notable class of victim of the Holodomor were the kolkhozs, which were literally communist collectives. Stalin killing communists sure showed us that communism doesn't work!
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May 16, 2016 16:18
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HorseLord posted:Actually the USSR came from a revolution that had majority support. Seriously, what the hell is wrong with you? The February revolution yes, the October revolution led to Rosa Luxemburg's decrying of a revolution betrayed. Not to say that I would have sided with the Mensheviks. (I'd have killed Trotsky and Stalin and taken Russia for myself, mwahahahahaha)
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May 16, 2016 16:22
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Disinterested posted:It still wouldn't be exactly the same species of intrusiveness, would it, as, say, using a quarter of the national population as secret police informants. Ormi posted:It would be really great for someone to demystify the actual process of how money gets turned into political power in the United States, because ever since I was first politically aware I've never seen it done. Higher campaign finances correlate with electoral victory, sure, but they don't determine it. Especially since Citizens United, it's easy to draw the conclusion that money simply facilitates already-effective campaigns. Congressional votes line up more with the political views of the wealthy rather than America polled at large, but 50.7% of the country voted for the explicitly pro-business party in 2014, not even allowing themselves the chance to get hoodwinked. Is campaign money responsible for brainwashing the masses into voting for racist, sexist homophobes? Or is it that they see some benefit for themselves in voting against minorities and women instead of for a party nominally interested in reducing income inequality? Does the Democratic congressional voting record really differ from their voting base, taking into account that American households making over $100,000 are around 26% of the electorate? How much is comfortable dysfunction, and how much is human design? If it's outright corruption (through job promises, since funding and gifts are heavily scrutinized), surely some light can be shed on post-Hill employment statistics, something more than a handful of high-profile names. But more important than that, it's about what is seen as proper politics. Brainwashing, which isn't technically possible by the way, has intent behind it. That's not how marx saw the dictatorship of the bourgeoisie. https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1845/german-ideology/ch01b.htm posted:The ideas of the ruling class are in every epoch the ruling ideas, i.e. the class which is the ruling material force of society, is at the same time its ruling intellectual force. The class which has the means of material production at its disposal, has control at the same time over the means of mental production, so that thereby, generally speaking, the ideas of those who lack the means of mental production are subject to it. The ruling ideas are nothing more than the ideal expression of the dominant material relationships, the dominant material relationships grasped as ideas; hence of the relationships which make the one class the ruling one, therefore, the ideas of its dominance. The individuals composing the ruling class possess among other things consciousness, and therefore think. Insofar, therefore, as they rule as a class and determine the extent and compass of an epoch, it is self-evident that they do this in its whole range, hence among other things rule also as thinkers, as producers of ideas, and regulate the production and distribution of the ideas of their age: thus their ideas are the ruling ideas of the epoch. For instance, in an age and in a country where royal power, aristocracy, and bourgeoisie are contending for mastery and where, therefore, mastery is shared, the doctrine of the separation of powers proves to be the dominant idea and is expressed as an “eternal law.” rudatron fucked around with this message at 16:36 on May 16, 2016 |
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May 16, 2016 16:25
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