- Capitalism and Alternatives -

bring me my horse and carriage my good man!

Posted by: Gee ( si, victorian britain, apparently ) on April 06, 1999 at 13:45:00:

In Reply to: More on Gee's community posted by Samuel Day Fassbinder on April 06, 1999 at 11:06:37:

: SDF: While at the same time you have nothing to say about impoverishment. What gives the impression that you don't care is that your ideal period of history was Victorian England

is it?

: The "free market" is not automatically going to give these millions something to trade.

But their nature as reasoning humans does. They can work and learn. It may seem terribly unfair to have to struggle to work into a position of having enough bread to live. It is 'unfair' in some ways, but that is not carte blanche to bleed those who have more.

: SDF: Maybe one of the main reasons is that if people are conditioned to believe in the "free market,"

Ive never believed in the 'conditioned masses' arguments because masses are not masses, theyre individuals and each one I meet has divergent beliefs about a given subject.

: they're likely to believe that charity is an unnecessary expense

additional expense you might say. I think a dynamic exists where the "we'll take care of it" message given by so called nanny-state governmens leads to people thinking they have, via tax, already given more that enough.

: So have you been to the slums of Sao Paulo to help those less fortunate? My guess is that you would be overwhelmed by the chaos.

I expect I'd get lost and maybe into some dangerous situation. How would that change what I have said?

The 'practical answer' is not a dismissal out of hand, its an evaluation within the context of the the time frames and extents od damage.

: SDF: So who holds that as his "sole goal"? All I've ever been arguing is that humanity would be happier and live longer if it made a SMALLER dent upon its planet.

The extent to which the dent should be smaller is the inconclusive area.


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