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A Practical Utopian’s Guide To The Coming Collapse: David Graeber On "The Phenomenon Of Bull$hit Jobs

Tyler Durden's picture




 

Submitted by Mike Krieger via Liberty Blitzkrieg blog,

Graeber’s argument is similar to one he made in a 2013 article called “On the Phenomenon of Bullshit Jobs”, in which he argued that, in 1930, economist John Maynard Keynes predicted that by the end of the century technology would have advanced sufficiently that in countries such as the UK and the US we’d be on 15-hour weeks. “In technological terms, we are quite capable of this. And yet it didn’t happen. Instead, technology has been marshalled, if anything, to figure out ways to make us all work more. Huge swaths of people, in Europe and North America in particular, spend their entire working lives performing tasks they believe to be unnecessary. The moral and spiritual damage that comes from this situation is profound. It is a scar across our collective soul. Yet virtually no one talks about it.”

 

But what happened between the Apollo moon landing and now? Graeber’s theory is that in the late 1960s and early 1970s there was mounting fear about a society of hippie proles with too much time on their hands. “The ruling class had a freak out about robots replacing all the workers. There was a general feeling that ‘My God, if it’s bad now with the hippies, imagine what it’ll be like if the entire working class becomes unemployed.’ You never know how conscious it was but decisions were made about research priorities.” Consider, he suggests, medicine and the life sciences since the late 1960s. “Cancer? No, that’s still here.” Instead, the most dramatic breakthroughs have been with drugs such as Ritalin, Zoloft and Prozac – all of which, Graeber writes, are “tailor-made, one might say, so that these new professional demands don’t drive us completely, dysfunctionally, crazy”

 

Graeber believes that since the 1970s there has been a shift from technologies based on realising alternative futures to investment technologies that favoured labour discipline and social control. Hence the internet. “The control is so ubiquitous that we don’t see it.” We don’t see, either, how the threat of violence underpins society, he claims. “The rarity with which the truncheons appear just helps to make violence harder to see,” he writes.

 

– From the Guardian article: David Graeber: ‘So Many People Spend Their Working Lives Doing Jobs They Think are Unnecessary’

Embarrassingly, it was only very recently that I became familiar with the writings of David Graeber, an author, anthropologist and professor at the London School of Economics. I read a decent amount, and very few writers connect with me in the way Mr. Graeber does. Of course, I don’t agree with everything he says (if you ever find yourself in total agreement with someone else there’s a problem), but I promise he will make you think. That’s worth a lot in the propagandized and dumbed down culture we inhabit.

About a month ago, I read an extremely thought provoking excerpt from his 2013 book, The Democracy Project: A History, a Crisis, a Movement. The piece was titled, A Practical Utopian’s Guide to the Coming Collapse, and I strongly suggest you read it.

Immediately after I read that, I  found him on Twitter and began following. Today, I came across a profile of him published by the Guardian, and I was once again reminded of how much I enjoy his thought process. So much so, that I decided to dedicate an entire post to him and encourage all of you to explore his work. Here are some excerpts from the Guardian article:

A few years ago David Graeber’s mother had a series of strokes. Social workers advised him that, in order to pay for the home care she needed, he should apply for Medicaid, the US government health insurance programme for people on low incomes. So he did, only to be sucked into a vortex of form filling and humiliation familiar to anyone who’s ever been embroiled in bureaucratic procedures.

 

At one point, the application was held up because someone at the Department of Motor Vehicles had put down his given name as “Daid”; at another, because someone at Verizon had spelled his surname “Grueber”. Graeber made matters worse by printing his name on the line clearly marked “signature” on one of the forms. Steeped in Kafka, Catch-22 and David Foster Wallace’s The Pale King, Graeber was alive to all the hellish ironies of the situation but that didn’t make it any easier to bear. “We spend so much of our time filling in forms,” he says.

 

“The average American waits six months of her life waiting for the lights to change. If so, how many years of our life do we spend doing paperwork?”

 

The matter became academic, because Graeber’s mother died before she got Medicaid. But the form-filling ordeal stayed with him. “Having spent much of my life leading a fairly bohemian existence, comparatively insulated from this sort of thing, I found myself asking: is this what ordinary life, for most people, is really like?

 

Capitalism isn’t supposed to create meaningless positions. The last thing a profit-seeking firm is going to do is shell out money to workers they don’t really need to employ. Still, somehow, it happens.”

This is a very important point. How does this happen? My answer is that our political and economic system is in fact a centrally planned oligarchy masquerading as a free market.

Graeber’s argument is similar to one he made in a 2013 article called “On the Phenomenon of Bullshit Jobs”, in which he argued that, in 1930, economist John Maynard Keynes predicted that by the end of the century technology would have advanced sufficiently that in countries such as the UK and the US we’d be on 15-hour weeks. “In technological terms, we are quite capable of this. And yet it didn’t happen. Instead, technology has been marshalled, if anything, to figure out ways to make us all work more. Huge swaths of people, in Europe and North America in particular, spend their entire working lives performing tasks they believe to be unnecessary. The moral and spiritual damage that comes from this situation is profound. It is a scar across our collective soul. Yet virtually no one talks about it.”

 

But what happened between the Apollo moon landing and now? Graeber’s theory is that in the late 1960s and early 1970s there was mounting fear about a society of hippie proles with too much time on their hands. “The ruling class had a freak out about robots replacing all the workers. There was a general feeling that ‘My God, if it’s bad now with the hippies, imagine what it’ll be like if the entire working class becomes unemployed.’ You never know how conscious it was but decisions were made about research priorities.” Consider, he suggests, medicine and the life sciences since the late 1960s. “Cancer? No, that’s still here.” Instead, the most dramatic breakthroughs have been with drugs such as Ritalin, Zoloft and Prozac – all of which, Graeber writes, are “tailor-made, one might say, so that these new professional demands don’t drive us completely, dysfunctionally, crazy”

 

Graeber believes that since the 1970s there has been a shift from technologies based on realising alternative futures to investment technologies that favoured labour discipline and social control. Hence the internet. “The control is so ubiquitous that we don’t see it.” We don’t see, either, how the threat of violence underpins society, he claims. “The rarity with which the truncheons appear just helps to make violence harder to see,” he writes.

 

He quotes with approval the anarchist collective Crimethinc: “Putting yourself in new situations constantly is the only way to ensure that you make your decisions unencumbered by the nature of habit, law, custom or prejudice – and it’s up to you to create the situations.” Academia was, he muses, once a haven for oddballs – it was one of the reasons he went into it. “It was a place of refuge. Not any more. Now, if you can’t act a little like a professional executive, you can kiss goodbye to the idea of an academic career.”

 

Why is that so terrible? “It means we’re taking a very large percentage of the greatest creative talent in our society and telling them to go to hell … The eccentrics have been drummed out of all institutions.” Well, perhaps not all of them. “I am an offbeat person. I am one of those guys who wouldn’t be allowed in the academy these days.” Indeed, he claims to have been blackballed by the American academy and found refuge in Britain. In 2005, he went on a year’s sabbatical from Yale, “and did a lot of direct action and was in the media”. When he returned he was, he says, snubbed by colleagues and did not have his contract renewed. Why? Partly, he believes, because his countercultural activities were an embarrassment to Yale.

 

His publications include Fragments of an Anarchist Anthropology (2004), in which he laid out his vision of how society might be organised on less alienating lines, and Direct Action: An Ethnography (2009), a study of the global justice movement. In 2013, he wrote his most popularly political book yet, The Democracy Project. “I wanted it to be called ‘As if We Were Already Free’,” he tells me. “And the publishers laughed at me – a subjunctive in the title!” But it was Debt: The First 5,000 Years, published in 2011, that made him famous and has drawn praise from the likes of Thomas Piketty and Russell Brand. Financial Times journalist and fellow anthropologist Gillian Tett argued that the book was “not just thought-provoking but exceedingly timely”, not least, no doubt, because in it Graeber called for a biblical-style “jubilee”, meaning a wiping out of sovereign and consumer debts.

 

At the end of The Utopia of Rules, Graeber distinguishes between play and games – the former involving free?form creativity, the latter requiring participants to abide by rules. While there is pleasure in the latter (it is, to quote from the subtitle of the book, one of the secret joys of bureaucracy), it is the former that excites him as an antidote to our form?filling red-taped society.

 

He is suggesting that, instead of being rule-following economic drones of capitalism, we are essentially playful. The most basic level of being is play rather than economics, fun rather than rules, goofing around rather than filling in forms. Graeber himself certainly seems to be having more fun than seems proper for a respected professor.

David Graeber’s latest book was recently published and is titled, The Utopia of Rules.

*  *  *

For related articles, see:

Ex-CIA Officer Claims that Open Source Revolution is About to Overthrow Global Oligarchy

Networks vs. Hierarchies: Which Will Win? Niall Furguson Weighs In.

The Comcast/Time Warner Merger and the War Between Centralization and Decentralization

 

 

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Wed, 04/22/2015 - 22:38 | 6020727 The_Prisoner
The_Prisoner's picture

Great post.

The western model is dying.

Wed, 04/22/2015 - 23:06 | 6020790 junction
junction's picture

Boring.  If you print your name in the line requiring your signature, you deserve whatever is coming to you.

Wed, 04/22/2015 - 23:09 | 6020797 Mr Pink
Mr Pink's picture

Stopped reading at "moon landing"

Wed, 04/22/2015 - 23:13 | 6020804 TeamDepends
TeamDepends's picture

Kubrick was GOOD.

Thu, 04/23/2015 - 00:41 | 6020955 Anusocracy
Anusocracy's picture

“Civilization is the process of setting man free from men.”

- Ayn Rand (1944)

Thu, 04/23/2015 - 01:05 | 6020981 TeamDepends
TeamDepends's picture

Never let a Cabala Zio princess tell you what Civilization is.
-TeamDepends (Now)
For you francis

Thu, 04/23/2015 - 01:10 | 6021004 Anusocracy
Anusocracy's picture

I never let someone who can't recognize truth tell me what to do.

Thu, 04/23/2015 - 02:12 | 6021059 w a l k - a w a y
w a l k - a w a y's picture

 “Civilization is the process of setting man free from men.”

 

Ha, good luck!

 

Does a child not have as much right to privacy and freedom from parental conditioning as the parents expect for themselves? It is one of the most fundamental problems facing humanity today. The future depends on how we solve it. ~ lede, Chapter 3 | Conditioning, from the book of children


Don't hold your breath waiting for children to become free of parental conditioning!

Thu, 04/23/2015 - 05:50 | 6021180 RafterManFMJ
RafterManFMJ's picture

I'm sure the "Report From Iron Mountain" had quite a lot to do with the decisions to enslave rather than free the people.

When the robots finally do become ubiquitous, then comes the depopulation events.

Thu, 04/23/2015 - 07:44 | 6021279 SWRichmond
SWRichmond's picture

It's readily apparent that the bureacratic state forces the creation of tens of millions of make-work regulatory and compliance jobs, all non-productive, mostly comfortable office jobs, mostly employing women who can work in climate-controlled indoor conditions and go out to lunch, not one of them actually making a goddamned thing.  All of these "employees" can be counted on to vote for the furtherance of the bureacratic state upon which their jobs and survival depends.

Government hires the regulators, and private companies hire compliance people to protect them from the regulators.  but it would be easy to make all of those positions simply go away, and product prices would fall dramatically, raising everyone's standards of living.

I think often about the shit we could be making if we weren't wasting so much money on government bullshit.

Thu, 04/23/2015 - 08:08 | 6021319 Captain Willard
Captain Willard's picture

True. But if all these regulators lost their jobs, they would be un-employable in the private sector. Then they would either work as baristas at Starbuckx or stay home.

In a way, Graber misses his own point. The truly productive as massively productive, enabling a free-shit army and an army of surplus bureaucrats to survive.

These vast productivity-generated resources are aimed at maintaining State power, not at enabling the productive to have fun.

Thu, 04/23/2015 - 10:02 | 6021755 forexskin
forexskin's picture

if they produce nothing, having them sit home without the burden of paying them, moving them, etc, just removes the cost of their unproductivity from the economy. consider it a malinvestment fixed, freeing them and the resources they mis-consume to do something more productive.

net positive

your last two points are spot on.

Thu, 04/23/2015 - 10:41 | 6021970 csmith
csmith's picture

"...consider it a malinvestment fixed,"

 

This is correct in practical economic terms, but practical politics says that these people will have a voice. And they will use that voice to demand a standard of living far above that which is commensurate with their production. 

Thu, 04/23/2015 - 10:51 | 6022022 forexskin
forexskin's picture

unfortunately true, but something that can't last forever, won't

i've said for years that this house of cards only falls when people are hungry in the streets. any idea when that happens?

Thu, 04/23/2015 - 08:10 | 6021322 kaiserhoff
kaiserhoff's picture

This Commie fool doesn't care to notice he is talking about GOVERNMENT jobs,

and yes it is pointless tyranny.

Thu, 04/23/2015 - 08:18 | 6021345 MonetaryApostate
MonetaryApostate's picture

I see the validity of your assertions, the problems is the divide & conquer strategy has worked too well, and Americans nor Europeans can seem to unite on anything unless it's something along the lines of their burning hatred for the Elite or those of the ultimate greedy race.  Like the article above, who stops to think of the controlling factors the elite place into it all?  Sure, the article points out some of it, but they aren't by far reaching into the greed which ultimately is the #1 contributing factor all of our problems, and yes that applies to almost everything in life.  People want so much, whether they can afford it or not, that doesn't apparently stop them, so the system was designed to profit off of people "needing" and "wanting", it's the entire fabric of our society it seems...  We could be lame and blame it on all sorts of things, but ultimately the problems lay within the social makeup of who we are as individuals, the collective will by no means come together without truth, whether it be to rage against the elite, the system, or whatever, it matters not, truth has to be the guide.

While I enjoyed this article, I still felt like it was ignoring the heart of the issues.

 

 

Thu, 04/23/2015 - 09:19 | 6021583 zuuma
zuuma's picture

"The western model is dying"

I don't know T.P...

Maybe what is really happening is that the Western Model is simply being revealed.

It always had a shiny, good-looking skin, but a rotten core and a few worms in it.

 

I was just reading some old  Appleton's Journal articles from the 1870's that I found in a bound volume.

Sort of like a reader's digest of its day. The delcarations of moral decay and the imminent collapse of western civilization that I read could have been written yesterday. I could just cut and paste 'em.  (Except I'd need a scissors & actual glue to do it)

Same ol stuff: the bankers are all theives, government is corrupt, youth are worthless, various world leaders are a$$monkeys, etc. 

The big money argument was gold vs. silver. Not paper vs. metal.  The money was good, then. Just not enough of it.

The only article that wasn't relevant was fretting about what we would do with all the horse poo as the populations of our cities continued to grow exponentially.

The world is the same as it ever was.

 

Thu, 04/23/2015 - 10:10 | 6021803 forexskin
forexskin's picture

revealed?

the success of the western model is that its based on principles. critics pointing out its flaws are usually pointing to the deviation from the principles - and of course, one key principle being freedom of speech ideally encourages the system to be self correcting.

of course, this self correction sometimes approaches a cataclysm, where the corrupt elite are overthrown, and a renewal based on a return to the best of our core principles comes about.

the real concern of this age is that best expressed by Orwell, where the elite manage to capture the system in such a way that the worst kind of human flaws are ensconced in a permanent elite - power for its own sake - a boot on a human face - forever.

Thu, 04/23/2015 - 10:25 | 6021892 messymerry
messymerry's picture

The world is the same as it ever was.

Not exactly. The cycles we all discuss here take the form of a driven oscillation. Driven by the twin chimeras of population growth and technological advancement these natural human cycles get bigger with each iteration. We are now on the vertical part of both of these exponential curves. At some point we WILL have a collective collapse with all the attendant chaos.

Gird your loins and sharpen your sword,,,

;-D

Thu, 04/23/2015 - 10:21 | 6021870 t0mmyBerg
t0mmyBerg's picture

thats funny

Thu, 04/23/2015 - 01:12 | 6021007 Stanley Kubrick
Stanley Kubrick's picture

Kubrick agrees.

Thu, 04/23/2015 - 01:16 | 6021011 TeamDepends
TeamDepends's picture

Do we all have afros in Heaven?

Wed, 04/22/2015 - 23:14 | 6020806 847328_3527
847328_3527's picture

So you really beleive we actually landed on the Moon?

Wed, 04/22/2015 - 23:29 | 6020837 Karl-Hungus
Karl-Hungus's picture

haha as soon as I read that line, I knew this would come up rather quickly down here. As soon as anyone mentions moon landing...

(no, I don't believe it, I just find it amusing how much people love to argue about it)

Wed, 04/22/2015 - 23:34 | 6020851 Mr Pink
Mr Pink's picture

The funny part is no one is arguing!

Wed, 04/22/2015 - 23:55 | 6020892 Condition 1SQ
Condition 1SQ's picture

Ok, I'll bite.  I thought all of those photographic inconsistencies had been explained with raytacing?

Thu, 04/23/2015 - 03:39 | 6021121 Keyser
Keyser's picture

It was one of those moments where you lose faith in authority, like when as a child you discover that Santa Claus and the Tooth Fairy are not real... I remember watching the moon landing in July, 1969 and being very proud...  Then to learn decades later that it was a Hollyweird production just added to my mistrust of the system... 

 

Thu, 04/23/2015 - 04:43 | 6021129 w a l k - a w a y
w a l k - a w a y's picture

 "It was one of those moments where you lose faith in authority"

 

Want to go deeper down the rabbit hole?

 

Was JFK killed because of his interest in aliens? Secret memo shows president demanded UFO files 10 days before death.

An uncovered letter written by John F Kennedy to the head of the CIA shows that the president demanded to be shown highly confidential documents about UFOs 10 days before his assassination.

The secret memo is one of two letters written by JFK asking for information about the paranormal on November 12 1963, which have been released by the CIA for the first time.

Author William Lester said the CIA released the documents to him under the Freedom of Information Act after he made a request while researching his new book 'A Celebration of Freedom: JFK and the New Frontier.'

 

Kennedy’s Last Stand: Roots of JFK Assassination lie in what he saw in 1945

In the summer of 1945, John F. Kennedy was a guest of Navy Secretary James Forrestal in a post-war tour of Germany. Kennedy personally witnessed technological secrets that have still not been disclosed to the general public. These secrets stemmed from technologies that Nazi Germany had acquired from around the world, and were attempting to develop for their weapons programs.

 

Did Space Aliens Kill President Kennedy?

A new book on UFOs and U.S. Presidents has created quite a stir with sensational headlines about an alien connection to the JFK assassination by several mainstream U.S. news media sources. The New York Post led the charge on March 22 with the headline: “Aliens killed Kennedy! And other wild tales of UFOs vs. the USA.”  The Business Standard followed up today with the headline: “Aliens planned John F. Kennedy’s assassination, claims author.” So did space aliens really kill President Kennedy?

Thu, 04/23/2015 - 06:26 | 6021192 whoflungdung
whoflungdung's picture
Who Killed James Forrestal? Was There A Cover-up?

 

http://www.stevequayle.com/index.php?s=96

Thu, 04/23/2015 - 00:31 | 6020940 cheech_wizard
cheech_wizard's picture

beleive?

Thu, 04/23/2015 - 00:43 | 6020964 Anusocracy
Anusocracy's picture

Although "we" didn't land on the moon, I am quite certain a small number of men did.

Thu, 04/23/2015 - 06:37 | 6021195 Cloud9.5
Cloud9.5's picture

Yes. Had it been a lie, the Russians would never have let us get away with it.  It was however the highpoint of our civilization.  We have not been back nor will we.

Thu, 04/23/2015 - 08:49 | 6021455 MonetaryApostate
MonetaryApostate's picture

Here's a more intriguing subject...

Why did the Air Force send up all of those (100s?) RFID sattellites?

If the future is RFID (which the Air Force apparently believes so), then what does that mean for society?

Moreover, what about RFID implants, there seems to be a lot of "conspiracies" revolving around them & cashless societies as well, so is anyone paying attention to now rather then debating history & hoaxs?

 

Thu, 04/23/2015 - 10:45 | 6021994 csmith
csmith's picture

The point is that going to the moon was a very real endeavor. We've been filling out forms ever since.

Thu, 04/23/2015 - 12:04 | 6022355 plane jain
plane jain's picture

That is the same opinion as my college astronomy professor. As far as it being real he mentioned the reflectors placed on the moon used by observatories.

He spent most of a lecture talking about what an exceptional undertaking it was and that the rockets that were used have just been left to rust, and that we could not easily repeat the expedition today.

Thu, 04/23/2015 - 08:58 | 6021491 Fukushima Fricassee
Fukushima Fricassee's picture

I would give that about a 70/30 but am 100% sure Mooch nas a dick.

Wed, 04/22/2015 - 23:55 | 6020891 Radical Marijuana
Radical Marijuana's picture

I did not balk at the phrase "the Apollo moon landing" because I thought it was merely being used as a well-known time line marker, rather than an assertion regarding that there actually were such events.

My personal pet theory is that the public space program has been a front for a secret space program. However, of course, I have no first-hand knowledge about any of that, and tend to intuitively not trust those who claim that they do. One thing that I do believe is that, after watching several documentaries and reading a couple of books on the subject, the "evidence" for the Apollo Moon Landings appears to be full of contradictions, which have never been explained to my satisfaction.

That is the last of the various "conspiracy theories" which I would like to accept. However, there are plenty of good reasons to be extremely suspicious of all the contradictions in the "evidence" of the landings. Tragically, in an extremely perverse way, it EXPLAINS a lot more to think that those were somewhat faked, than those those were totally real. For instance, every time one hears an argument that starts off by saying "if we could land on the moon, then why can not we do X" ... the actual answers to that question may well be because civilization is almost totally controlled by systems of backing up lies with violence, where those lies are different at every level.

(See my comment below regarding how many different levels of such lies there may well be ...)

Thu, 04/23/2015 - 08:35 | 6020910 Ignatius
Ignatius's picture

Apollo landed on the moon.  How do I know?  I saw it on TV.

Jokes aside, I actually do believe 'we' landed on the moon, but I also believe 9/11, AKA... "Air Force Failure Day," is a big fat lie.

Thu, 04/23/2015 - 00:07 | 6020911 Condition 1SQ
Condition 1SQ's picture

What would you say is the strongest piece of evidence pointing towards the moon landing being a hoax?

Thu, 04/23/2015 - 00:49 | 6020975 Radical Marijuana
Radical Marijuana's picture

Use an internet search engine to look at the overwhelming abundance of information ... The things that I remember most are the photographic "evidence" being full of contradictions ... none of which should be there, if the landings were not some degree of a hoax. One can easily spend tens, if not hundreds of hours, examining that "evidence." Furthermore, one can also observe the degree to which NASA has not adequately responded to any of the points regarding those apparent contradictions in the official "evidence" of the alleged landings.

OVERALL, I would say that after one recognizes the degree to which lies backed by violence are controlling other aspects of our civilization, then one also becomes more willing to consider that almost everything else is like that! After one recognized that there are some other obvious examples of how our civilization has been controlled by Huge Lies, backed by Lots of Violence, one then becomes more and more willing to consider other examples where that may well also be the case.

Thu, 04/23/2015 - 01:56 | 6021043 UncleChopChop
UncleChopChop's picture

not sure why the downvotes - i thought it was generally well put. i don't know much about the moon-landing, but i know a lot about the cognitive dissonance most people exhibit on a daily basis, and how frustrating it can be for those who are aware of it.

'i dont trust politicians or the government!' comes out of their mouths one moment, the next it's "we should FORCE people to be vaccinated!! the government tells me so!" or "those darm 'truthers' are crazy!!"

it's almost like one big psyop to drive people with half a brain insane. 

but all in all.. you're right.. once you see some huge lies for what they are, it stands to reason to question everything. the fact that being inquisitive regarding certain 'taboo' subjects generates such scorm speaks more to the successful programming done to inculcate the masses in group hypnosis than anything else.

Thu, 04/23/2015 - 03:04 | 6021088 neidermeyer
neidermeyer's picture

As someone who witnessed 2 Saturn V launches from the VIP grandstands and lived on the space coast I can assure you that you can't fake it.  NASA won't respond to your "evidence" because that would only encourage you ... and the evidence is not credible... You're asking them to argue with you over a real event is just silly. If someone wanted to argue with you about what you ate for breakfast what would your response be? You know you had Cap'n Crunch with milk but they're telling you that you ate a peanut butter and banana sandwich... What's the point of even acknowleging them?

Thu, 04/23/2015 - 05:14 | 6021156 w a l k - a w a y
w a l k - a w a y's picture

 "As someone who witnessed 2 Saturn V launches..."

 

Nobody denies Saturn V rocket launches with Apollo capsules on top.

The idea being the capsules never left earth orbit.

Thu, 04/23/2015 - 15:12 | 6023214 Radical Marijuana
Radical Marijuana's picture

I agree, w a l k - a w a y.

Since I have spent some time looking into the issue, I continue to find that those who have devoted much of their lives to that research have more plausible arguments than those who dismiss them. I find that the counter-arguments to the criticisms of the view that something about the Moon Landings is fishy and stinks are better, point by point, than those who resort to ad hominem to justify NASA not responding. (Of course, it also contributes to my skepticism to look deeper into the history of NASA itself.)

What I have found is that the "evidence" for the moon landings is full of contradictions, none of which should be there, and none of which have been satisfactorily explained ...

I am NOT asserting that I know what "the truth" may be ...

But nevertheless:

Civilization IS controlled by lies, and,

those lies are different at every level.

Thu, 04/23/2015 - 06:43 | 6021199 Money_for_Nothing
Money_for_Nothing's picture

There was a TV special a long time ago (30 years?) that discussed the issues of the moon landing. One of the speakers was (the famous) Jack Anderson. Needless to say he convinced me that all the moon photos and movies were fake. That program has never been shown again. An internet search will not unearth it. One with the same name nominally proving that the photos are real regularly shows up on cable TV.

Thu, 04/23/2015 - 01:35 | 6020993 Anusocracy
Anusocracy's picture

That people who are stupid enough to believe government is necessary are stupid enough to believe the lunar landing is a hoax.

There's a shithouse load of people that stupid.

Thu, 04/23/2015 - 07:06 | 6021205 cheech_wizard
cheech_wizard's picture

And apparently far too many of them lurk here and salivate like a Pavlovian dog whenever certain phrases are uttered.

So it was necessary to fake a moon landing not once but 6 times? Why stop at 6? Why not 1, or 5?

Of course there is also this for those that apparently still practice Neo-Luddism.

Anyone on Earth with an appropriate laser and telescope system can bounce laser beams off three retroreflector arrays left on the Moon by Apollo 11, 14 and 15, verifying deployment of the Lunar Laser Ranging Experiment at historically documented Apollo Moon landing sites and so proving equipment constructed on Earth was successfully transported to the surface of the Moon.

Perhaps these people that believe the moon landing was faked need to contact the following co-conspirators...

Here is a list of most of the observatories that fire lasers to the Apollo Laser Reflectors;

• Starfire, Albuquerque Starfire Optical Range, Albuquerque, NM 7884
• TLRS-3, Arequipa, Peru 7403
• Fixed System at Balkhash, Kazakhstan 1869
• Fixed System at Beijing, Peoples Republic of China 7249
• Fixed System at Borowiec, Poland 7811
• Fixed System at Cagliari, Italy 7548
• Fixed System at Changchun, Peoples Republic of China 7237
• Fixed System at Dunaovcy, Ukraine 1866
• Fixed System at Evpatoria, Ukraine 1867
• Fixed System at Grasse, France 7835
• Fixed System at Graz, Austria 7839
• 48-inch, Greenbelt GGAO, GSFC, Greenbelt, MD 7106
• MOBLAS-6, Greenbelt GGAO, GSFC, Greenbelt, MD 7918
• MOBLAS-7, Greenbelt GGAO, GSFC, Greenbelt, MD 7105
• HOLLAS, Haleakala Lure Obs., Mount Haleakala, Maui, HI 7210
• Fixed System at Helwan, Egypt 7831
• Fixed System at Herstmonceux Royal Greenwich Obs., Great Britain 7840
• Fixed System at Katzively, Crimea, Ukraine 1893
• Fixed System at Komsomolsk-Na-Amure, Russia 1868
• Fixed System at Maidanak, Uzbekistan 1863
• Fixed System at Maidanak Maidanak, Uzbekistan 1864
• SAO-1, Matera, Italy 7939
• MLRS, McDonald Observatory, Fort Davis, TX 7080
• Fixed System at Mendeleevo, Russia 1870
• Fixed System at Metsahovi Kirkkonummi, Finland 7805
• MOBLAS-4, Monument Peak Mount Laguna, CA 7110
• NLRS, Orroral Valley, Australia 7843
• Fixed System at Potsdam, Germany 7836
• MOBLAS-8, Quincy, CA 7109
• Fixed System at Riga, Latvia 1884
• SALRO, Riyadh, Saudi Arabia TBD
• Fixed System at San Fernando, Spain 7824
• Fixed System at Santiago de Cuba, Cuba 1953
• Fixed System at Sarapul, Russia 1871
• Fixed System at Shanghai Obs., Peoples Republic of China 7837
• Fixed System at Simeiz, Ukraine 1873
• Fixed System at Simosato Hydrographic Observatory, Japan 7838
• Fixed System at Tokyo, Japan 7308
• WLRS, Wettzell, Germany 8834
• Fixed System at Wuhan, Peoples Republic of China 7236
• MOBLAS-5, Yarragadee, Australia 7090
• Fixed System at Zimmerwald Bern, Switzerland 7810
• TLRS-1 Mobile system in Europe
• TLRS-2 NASA mobile system in South America
• TLRS-4 NASA mobile system in North America
• MTLRS-1 IfAG mobile system in Europe
• MTLRS-2 DELFT mobile system in Europe
• HTLRS Mobile system in Japan

Standard Disclaimer: Or it was aliens... /s

Thu, 04/23/2015 - 08:16 | 6021335 Ignatius
Ignatius's picture

One of the many important points, cheech-wizard, nice list.

"Fake moon landings..." are psyop.

Thu, 04/23/2015 - 19:53 | 6024265 Radical Marijuana
Radical Marijuana's picture

I do not find those "laser bouncing" arguments sufficient in themselves to refute all the other contradictions in the photographic "evidence." I will not go into the details ... However, it is NOT necessary to jump to the conclusions that "laser bouncing" proves the human moon landings.

Remember, there are regularly military space operations, which are kept secret. Even IF there are laser reflectors on the moon, they did NOT have to be placed there directly by human moon landings.

In general, one of the most important principles of psyops are that the lies are different at every level. Hence, there could be psyops inside pysops, inside psyops ... I REPEAT, I am not saying that I know for sure what the truth is ... What I am saying is that the official "evidence" of the alleged moon landings is full of unexplained contradictions.

Thu, 04/23/2015 - 09:23 | 6021481 flapdoodle
flapdoodle's picture

Indeed, at a bare minimum, it needs to be in quotes as in "moon landing".

Interesting that the truth is starting to be allowed out into the general public (e.g. the movie "Interstellar" makes reference to it).

For me, losing the belief in the moon landing was a true watershed event in my view of the world... I even entertain the hope that it really *is* a false conspiracy theory and the moon landing really happened, but that childish dream is fading the more I read, and the more I integrate the past with what is happening now.

To me, the key is the lack of stars in the photographs. NASA could very easily have dedicated at least a couple of minutes to pointing one of those hassleblads up into the sky - even a single one, with blurred star trails, would have been spectacular.

But there was not even a single one, after what, four, five landings??

Sun, 04/26/2015 - 06:58 | 6030821 Abbie Normal
Abbie Normal's picture

To anyone with an automotive background, the lunar rover (or moon buggy) is the smoking gun.  It's built on a ladder-frame like most pickup trucks of that era, has four wheels and brakes, a steering rack, battery powered motor and transmission, and seating for two.  Anyone that has ever seen inside the lunar landing module knows how tight the space is in there, but we're supposed to believe that the entire components of the lunar rover fit inside the lunar module; and according to NASA, all of the lunar rover components were packed inside "two carry-on suitcases."  If that's not enough, there are some photographs of the lunar rover that show no sign of tire tracks near the wheels.  How did it move to that location, by levitation or an overhead crane?  As with most of the other unbelievable lunar tech, NASA's explanation is that they lost all of the original plans and equipment for the lunar rover.

Thu, 04/23/2015 - 06:38 | 6021196 doctor10
doctor10's picture

the bankers used the technology to turn humans into collateral.

A civil rights violation

Thu, 04/23/2015 - 08:51 | 6021466 MonetaryApostate
MonetaryApostate's picture

An interesting perspective, but I'd dare say that the overly bloated government just needed to blow some of the extremely excessive cash they seem to be so overly adept at acquiring...

Wed, 04/22/2015 - 22:44 | 6020729 LetThemEatRand
LetThemEatRand's picture

The thing about economics as a "science," is that it is totally flawed.  By and large, it fails to account for the fact that there is a group of sociopaths who desire to rule us.  Give us all the Star Trek model where humans don't have to work anymore (unlimited energy, machines that create things out of thin air), and the sociopaths would be quite unhappy and probably destroy the machines in order to make sure they have slaves.  The 800 people who own 50% of the world's wealth are not after more wealth.  Wealth is a means to an end.  We're the end.  Same reason Rand was wrong.  To the extent there is really a "productive class" apart from the sociopaths, the sociopaths will always find a way to destroy it if given the chance.

Wed, 04/22/2015 - 22:49 | 6020759 Osmium
Osmium's picture

Well, they have a machine to create unlimited fiat out of thin air,  They are still working on creating other things out of thin air.

Wed, 04/22/2015 - 23:26 | 6020832 Karl-Hungus
Karl-Hungus's picture

I agree with you LTER, but where do the sociopaths go to gain this control over us? the government. Sure, not all of them work in or for any govt, but they find ways to play puppet master to those that do. It draws them like moths to a flame. Getting rid of their power base is the key to freedom. Since getting rid of it isnt going to happen, doing everything we can to de-fang this monstrosity should be the goal.

Wed, 04/22/2015 - 23:49 | 6020875 LetThemEatRand
LetThemEatRand's picture

Sociopaths made their own governments and armies long before they had to buy elected versions.  This is really not a chicken and egg problem.  The sociopaths have been the problem since day one.  We The People have had minor victories since then, but few and far between.

Thu, 04/23/2015 - 00:39 | 6020950 Anusocracy
Anusocracy's picture

There have been apex predators within primate societies for millions of years. The alpha-male social hierarchy, ya think?

Government is the alpha-male hierarchy wedded to a chain of command structure. That is what rules the world and its success guarantees that there will be a more than sufficient number of psychopaths clamoring for a never ending history of death, destruction, slavery, and theft. That outcome reflects their innate behavior.

As long as government is successful at being evil, which apparently it is, it will continue to survive and prosper at everyone else's expense.

Thu, 04/23/2015 - 00:44 | 6020953 LetThemEatRand
LetThemEatRand's picture

I'm pretty sure you just made the argument that the Mob is bad only because there are corrupt cops.

I get your hatred of government.  But think for a moment who corrupts it.  Both are the problem. Not one, not the other.  Both.  There is no simple solution, which is why we're sitting here thousands of years after the dawn of civilization as we know it arguing about how to stop the ass raping.

Thu, 04/23/2015 - 01:21 | 6021016 Anusocracy
Anusocracy's picture

Who corrupts it?

The psychopaths that run it and the psychopaths that want it.

Both of those groups believe they have the right to force their will upon all others. Without them it would be voluntary.

Why do you want to force your will on others - a behavior shared by all criminals?

You seem to always avoid answering.

Thu, 04/23/2015 - 08:34 | 6021407 Ignatius
Ignatius's picture

Power vacuums always - ALWAYS - get filled.

One can be dictated to by ".gov" and/or one can be dictated to by ".bus."

Who was Henry Ford before he got really good at owning ($$) the production of cars, etc.?

My uncle worked for Ford Satelite Division spying on the Soviets.  Once one is intimately involved in the level of intelligence gathering that Ford was, then who is dictating to who?

The libertarian ethos - which I largely share - has one fatal flaw and that is that the ideal social structure espoused by its adherents has never existed in the history of Man.

Fri, 04/24/2015 - 03:35 | 6025191 Ghordius
Ghordius's picture

+1 "The libertarian ethos - which I largely share - has one fatal flaw and that is that the ideal social structure espoused by its adherents has never existed in the history of Man."

mostly because it's an utopian, radical and extreme ethos

which provides excellent criticism of existing orders, but little constructive help for alternatives

but mostly, it has been hijacked by US proponents of "Small Government" which use it as a pretense to get elected, and then go on for business as usual

btw, David Graeber himself in his excellent book about debt over the millennia actually points to the one period in history where something like Libertarianism was applied: the Indian Ocean at the time when Arab traders sailed back and forth across it, and Persian thinkers and philosophers set it's tone

yes, Free-Market-Ideology and Capitalism-Without-State are Arab/Persian inventions, taken up later by Adam Smith et al. Graeber wrote a few excellent chapters highlighting this little known fact

Thu, 04/23/2015 - 01:28 | 6021020 Anusocracy
Anusocracy's picture

"I'm pretty sure you just made the argument that the Mob is bad only because there are corrupt cops."

How in the hell did you reach that conclusion?

There is a simple solution. You live with government lovers, I'll live with freedom lovers, and never shall the twain meet.

Thu, 04/23/2015 - 02:33 | 6021072 stacking12321
stacking12321's picture

you sure can be pretty dumb, LTER.

no, not both.

only the government is a problem, only the government claims the right to commit acts of violence against you if you don't obey them.

people who are corrupt, you can choose to avoid them, and have nothing to do with them, and shoot them if they tresspass on your property and aggress against you. but with the government you have no such option, no possibility to defend yourself against them.

Thu, 04/23/2015 - 02:44 | 6021078 w a l k - a w a y
w a l k - a w a y's picture

 "only the government is a problem, only the government claims the right to commit acts of violence against you if you don't obey them."

 

yeah right ...

 

The child is being conditioned by the parents in ugly ways, and of course the child is helpless: he depends on the parents. He cannot rebel, he cannot escape, he cannot protect himself. He is absolutely vulnerable; hence he can be easily exploited.

 

Parental conditioning is the greatest slavery in the world. ~ Osho again, Chapter 3 | Conditioning

Thu, 04/23/2015 - 08:04 | 6021306 shovelhead
shovelhead's picture

Go mow the lawn.

Thu, 04/23/2015 - 09:23 | 6021596 Abaco
Abaco's picture

THat is just retarded.  It is no difference than some lazy ass sitting around lamenting that the people he wants to feed him are controlling because they want him to work. Rebelling against parents for controlling their children, whom they must provide food, shelter, and a clean ass, is just being detached from any sense of reality.

Thu, 04/23/2015 - 08:54 | 6021480 MonetaryApostate
MonetaryApostate's picture

Well Osmium, your freedom is found in realizing WE are the machine, the government is simply the central controller, and the banks, well they just keep accounting...  (Psst, there is no gold)

Wed, 04/22/2015 - 22:50 | 6020760 migra
migra's picture

"The Golden rule is, those who have the gold, rule." 

 

A really rich prick I use to know told me that line years ago. 

Thu, 04/23/2015 - 00:00 | 6020899 OldPhart
OldPhart's picture

"No good deed goes unpunished."

A mega-millionaire told me that.  Kind of like a play on the Peter Principle.  The biggest prick is always in charge.

Wed, 04/22/2015 - 22:53 | 6020765 The_Prisoner
The_Prisoner's picture

Absolutely right.

Plato's ruling philosopher kings (aka elite) must be imbued, a priory, with the sense of Noblesse Oblige.

Nobility must, necessarily, oblige, bitches!

By foregoing that, the elites automatically forego their right not to be torn to shreds.

Thu, 04/23/2015 - 02:11 | 6021057 hardmedicine
hardmedicine's picture

that CERTAINLY made me think  ... Thank you for that!

 

Thu, 04/23/2015 - 09:02 | 6021510 MonetaryApostate
MonetaryApostate's picture

I've seen Kings & Queens, but would you know a real king or queen if you seen one?

https://www.google.com/search?q=pope%27s+loyalty&espv=2&biw=1660&bih=818...

Wed, 04/22/2015 - 22:57 | 6020775 Kirk2NCC1701
Kirk2NCC1701's picture

+42.  One of your most insightful posts.

Wed, 04/22/2015 - 23:05 | 6020787 Niall Of The Ni...
Niall Of The Nine Hostages's picture

Far more likely the sociopaths would kill the rest of mankind. The proles would have outlived their usefulness to their masters except as sex slaves, once everything else was automated. Letting the proles live  would merely prolong their threat to the masters' rule.

Robots will make far better New Socialist Men than humans ever could.

Wed, 04/22/2015 - 23:16 | 6020811 the0ther
the0ther's picture

AYN RANDS VAGINA EJECTED DRY LEAVES AND TWIGS IN A FLOOD OF PUSSY JUICE AT THE VERY THOUGHT OF PSYCHOPATHS.

Search Google for the details written down in her diary.

Wed, 04/22/2015 - 23:30 | 6020828 petkovplamen
petkovplamen's picture

she also accepted SS and Medicare after getting cancer from all that smoking. She was also a carpet mucher, it's SO obvious!

Boy, watch the "Libertarians" vote down this post!!!!!!!!!!!

 

How dare I say soemthing bad about their God!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Wed, 04/22/2015 - 23:31 | 6020839 JimBowie1958
JimBowie1958's picture

I hope you manage to find your Zoloft soon before you hurt yourself.

Most of the Randists are atheists.

And I dont think any of tem particularly give a shit about what sexual fantasies you have about Ayn.

Wed, 04/22/2015 - 23:43 | 6020866 Condition 1SQ
Condition 1SQ's picture

Oh, I'm sure you have plenty of skeletons in your closet too, Corky.

Wed, 04/22/2015 - 23:24 | 6020829 TeamDepends
TeamDepends's picture

Not just sociopaths, but hobosexual, child-sacrificing, nepotistic, luciferian, owl-worshipping, ugly as sin mugwamps.

Thu, 04/23/2015 - 00:02 | 6020902 OldPhart
OldPhart's picture

Echh!!  Hobosexuals are disgusting!

Thu, 04/23/2015 - 00:46 | 6020973 Hobo Sapien
Hobo Sapien's picture

Hey now....

LOL

Thu, 04/23/2015 - 03:15 | 6021100 OldPhart
OldPhart's picture

Damn, have to upvote your ass..

Don't normally vote on ZH...butt......

Thu, 04/23/2015 - 08:03 | 6021302 Hobo Sapien
Hobo Sapien's picture

+1 thanks, I needed the laugh. =)

Thu, 04/23/2015 - 08:14 | 6021331 Jstanley011
Jstanley011's picture

Sheesh. Get a room.

Wed, 04/22/2015 - 23:28 | 6020835 Condition 1SQ
Condition 1SQ's picture

What exactly was Ayn Rand wrong about?  You're muddling two different issues.  Ayn Rand's philosophy was objectivism.  You're describing an oligarchy.  What connection are you trying to draw between the two?

Wed, 04/22/2015 - 23:43 | 6020858 LetThemEatRand
LetThemEatRand's picture

I'm not your downvote, but here's an example:

"A trader is a man who earns what he gets and does not give or take the undeserved. He does not treat men as masters or slaves, but as independent equals. He deals with men by means of a free, voluntary, unforced, uncoerced exchange—an exchange which benefits both parties by their own independent judgment. (“The Objectivist Ethics,” in The Virtue of Selfishness, pp. 34-35)"

Rand saw the world through the lense of like-minded thinkers.  She believed that if we removed government from the equation, the world would behave in a rational fashion of traders.  But this philosophy fails utterly to account for the sociopaths who already own most of the world, and who want slaves.  Not because they need them, not because they cannot hire servants, but because they simply want slaves.

It is also somewhat ironic that Rand did nothing in her life but write books.

Wed, 04/22/2015 - 23:53 | 6020880 Condition 1SQ
Condition 1SQ's picture

Well, two things.  First, writing books isn't necessarily non-productive work.  In her case, she influenced the thinking of generations of people.  Second, I don't think her philosophy is any less legitimate just because we're already subjugated by an oligarchy.  It would be like someone writing about the virtues of capitalism while suffering under the yoke of communism, or vice versa.  I don't think it's realistic to expect political writers to set out a sort of how-to guide on fixing the world as a whole.

I think there is an unfortunate tendency to focus on the person writing the message rather than the message itself.  People point to the constitution and say: "Well, it was written by a bunch of slave-owners who marry little girls and rape slaves."  Maybe that's true, but what of it?  Does that somehow detract from their message?  I don't think so.

Also, I'm not your downvote, either ..

Wed, 04/22/2015 - 23:55 | 6020890 Harbanger
Harbanger's picture

Regardless of what she lies about, I like to downvote Lola because she's a statist.  A Gov dependent that will have a very hard time adjusting to the future.

Thu, 04/23/2015 - 12:54 | 6022633 malek
malek's picture

Exactly!
When I read the article on David Graeber, I already thought to myself "oh, now all the statists at heart such as LTER, Ghordius, withGlee, and so on will come out of the woodwork and proclaim how they like and totally support Graeber, even though his ideas would lead to completely anti-statist outcomes.

Thu, 04/23/2015 - 06:55 | 6021211 Cloud9.5
Cloud9.5's picture

The truth or some aspect of it may come from any quarter.  One of the greatest tactics used by the prevaricators is to discredit the message by directing our attention to the messenger’s human failings.  Yes Jefferson was a slave holder with a yen for brown sugar.  Does that make the Declaration of Independence any less compelling?  He set a standard not at or below where we were but at the very top.   He could just as easily written that all white men are created equal and almost no one in his age would have said a word. Instead, knowing full well that many would accuse him of being a hypocrite, he wrote about what we ought to be not what we were. 

 

Will we ever be perfect?  No, we will not, but that does not mean that we should drop all standards and embrace the darker angels of our nature.  We have lost or way because we have embraced lawlessness and fraud as the new normal.

Thu, 04/23/2015 - 08:27 | 6021358 Jstanley011
Jstanley011's picture

Oh no, we can be perfect. Trust me. All we need are the proper rules set down by the government and backed the right incentives and penalties, which are administered by the best and brightest among us from the graduates of Harvard, and human perfection will become a reality. Either that, or else Nanny's gonna throw a hissy fit.

Wed, 04/22/2015 - 23:43 | 6020873 Harbanger
Harbanger's picture

Hi Lola. Marxism and your free ride is dead.  For the most part, ZH comments have been reduced to idiocracy.

Thu, 04/23/2015 - 00:00 | 6020895 Condition 1SQ
Condition 1SQ's picture

I must have missed Larry King Live.  Lola = LTER = gov't dependent ?

Thu, 04/23/2015 - 00:03 | 6020903 Harbanger
Harbanger's picture

Yes, I know her very well.   Lola and I have Argued over this same exact shit for a very long time now.

Thu, 04/23/2015 - 00:09 | 6020904 LetThemEatRand
LetThemEatRand's picture

Imagine for a moment that you are watching cable news, and the anchor disagrees with someone's philosophy.  I may be missing a few, but I am also female, gay, and Marxist.  Being a statist, Marxist, female gay on foodstamps, however, gives me a certain perspective that perhaps Harbanger has little of substance with which to answer my arguments.

Thu, 04/23/2015 - 00:11 | 6020915 Condition 1SQ
Condition 1SQ's picture

Marxism teaches that inequality creates antagonism, which is why it must be eliminated.  However, impsoing equality also creates antagonism.  No, I'm not the DV.

Thu, 04/23/2015 - 00:15 | 6020920 LetThemEatRand
LetThemEatRand's picture

Marx wrote some influential books, as did Rand.  Neither was right.  But some people only need to read what some guy writes on ZH to believe that another guy who criticizes Rand is a Marxist.  Harbanger wins the cable news award for the night.

Thu, 04/23/2015 - 09:29 | 6021629 flapdoodle
flapdoodle's picture

Sorry folks, but Marxism is just affirmative action for Jews.

Thu, 04/23/2015 - 12:57 | 6022646 malek
malek's picture

Stop posing LTER, you are a complete statist and will likely never be able to overcome that predisposition anymore.

Thu, 04/23/2015 - 00:17 | 6020922 Harbanger
Harbanger's picture

Lets talk about your ideology and what progress we should make, Lola.  Lets hear it!!!!  The Bitch is afraid to talk to me.

Thu, 04/23/2015 - 00:42 | 6020959 Harbanger
Harbanger's picture

NO CHALLENGE FROM LOLA?

WHAT HAPPENED TO FIGHT CLUB?

Thu, 04/23/2015 - 09:24 | 6021599 MonetaryApostate
MonetaryApostate's picture

The futility of your offering is asinine, the higher the dicussion goes into intellectual philosophy the more the BS meter begins to move towards the obscene.

Thu, 04/23/2015 - 08:42 | 6021436 Calmyourself
Calmyourself's picture

LTER your arguments from your penchant for estate taxes to level your perception of the playing field to unionization have been deconstructed for years around here..  Because you have adjusted your approach to seem reasonable makes no difference, some of us here know exactly what you are.

Say hi to Harry Reid for me..

Thu, 04/23/2015 - 12:58 | 6022650 malek
malek's picture

+1

Wed, 04/22/2015 - 23:53 | 6020885 Elliott Eldrich
Elliott Eldrich's picture

"Same reason Rand was wrong."

The biggest problem with Rand's writing, and the whole philosophy of objectivism, is that there is not only no room for compassion in it, but it actively attacks and disparages compassion. A philosophy that has no place for compassion is a fine philosophy for animals, but it is unfit for human contemplation. Compassion is a singular hallmark of the evolved, whether they be human, philosophy or society; the less compassionate, the less evolved, in every case.

Wed, 04/22/2015 - 23:58 | 6020896 TeamDepends
TeamDepends's picture

Materialist = Communist
Why is it moral to serve the happiness of others, but not your own.
-Alice Rosenbaum

Thu, 04/23/2015 - 00:28 | 6020935 Condition 1SQ
Condition 1SQ's picture

I am not an Objectivist, but I believe their rebuttal would be that compassion/altruism/herosim/etc are all selfish endeavors, physiologically speaking (chemicals, chemicals, chemicals).

Thu, 04/23/2015 - 04:32 | 6021112 Global Observer
Global Observer's picture

So what's wrong with them (compassion/altruism/herosim/etc), from an Objectivist point of view since they are selfish endeavors and Objectivism promotes selfish endeavors?

Thu, 04/23/2015 - 08:48 | 6021456 Jstanley011
Jstanley011's picture

There you go, getting all logical and shit. Stop it.

Thu, 04/23/2015 - 15:26 | 6023257 Condition 1SQ
Condition 1SQ's picture

Nothing is wrong with them.  They're just lumped in with "selfish endeavors".

Thu, 04/23/2015 - 05:19 | 6021159 yourapostasy
yourapostasy's picture

There are problems with Objectivism, but to my understanding of it, this isn't one of them.

I didn't read any opposition to compassion the emotion itself, per se. Also, as long as your compassion resulted in action that was funded by your own individual resources and efforts, and/or the resources and efforts of like-minded who you voluntarily aligned with in a common purpose, you could give away your entire fortune and Objectivism wouldn't bat an eyelash. The key word is "voluntarily"; Objectivism drew the line in the sand when one person's compassion is used to justify the coercive cooption of another person's efforts and/or resources.

What you are likely conflating with compassion is Rand's polemics against altruism. If you accept the common definition as "the belief in or practice of disinterested and selfless concern for the well-being of others", then posit the following thought experiment. How many people would self-describe as altruistic if their altruistic actions could somehow be completely anonymous, and go entirely unnoticed in the world except for those directly affected?

Rand asserted that people who self-describe as altruistic all too often masquerade their true intentions for their altruistic actions. Most dangerous were the altruistic who exchange their altruistic actions for increased coercive power over others. In this, she was expressing in different ways the old admonition that "the road to hell is paved with good intentions"; this is also a warning against giving away power to sociopaths charming you with their altruistic camouflage.

Thu, 04/23/2015 - 08:17 | 6021342 Captain Willard
Captain Willard's picture

Well stated.

Thu, 04/23/2015 - 11:15 | 6022105 csmith
csmith's picture

Sorry, but when compassion encounters the sociopaths, it gets broken the same way rock breaks scissors. We're not far enough from the muck yet. You can't handle this basic truth.

Fri, 04/24/2015 - 00:49 | 6024998 malek
malek's picture

The funny thing is critics like you never point out the lacking true compassion of the leeches towards the producers, in Rand's writing.

I take it she only wanted somewhat a balance of compassion between groups, not demanded/forced "compassion" which is simply socialism.

Thu, 04/23/2015 - 01:07 | 6020957 Radical Marijuana
Radical Marijuana's picture

The psychopathic sociopaths who act as the predatory parasites should not be regarded by presuming that there is a fundamental dichotomy between them versus their productive prey. Governments exist because organized crime exists. It is not possible to stop governments from existing because it is not possible to stop organized crime from existing. Governments were created by the history of warfare, which was organized crime on larger and larger scales. The War Kings that survived through that made the sovereign states. Then the Fraud Kings applied the same methods of organized crime to the political processes in ways which enabled them to capture control over the powers of those governments, and thereby effectively privatized those public powers.

(See my recent comment under Exposed: The Real Market Manipulator Behind The Flash Crash)

Governments were always necessarily made and maintained by the operation of the principles and methods of organized crime. That is necessarily the case because as soon as one perceives human beings as separate from their environment, then they must operate as entropic pumps of energy flows. The SUBTRACTION of the part from the whole results in ROBBERY across the boundaries defined by that relative SUBTRACTION. Everyone has some power to rob, and some power to kill to back up that power to rob. Governments assembled and channeled those powers, while those who were the best at doing that most controlled those governments, which groups of the best organized gangsters currently happen to be the banksters.

"Citizens" are members of a military organization, or an organized crime gang, called their "country." However, too many of them have been brainwashed to become incompetent political idiots that do not want to understand those basic facts. Since politics is actually based on backing up lies with violence, the majority of people have adapted to that by not participating, as much as possible, although that only means that those Zombie Sheeple are being more and more fleeced to exhaustion, while being set up to be slaughtered.

One of the reasons why the psychopathic sociopaths are so socially successful is that the long history of triumphant organized crime has resulted in there being almost nothing to resist that but controlled opposition. That controlled opposition tends to promote false fundamental dichotomies, and the related impossible ideals, which actually make the opposite happen in the real world. Thus, most people do not understand that the combined money/murder systems are based on frauds by privately controlled banks being enforced by governments, while the few that do then still tend to promote bogus "solutions" which do not face the deeper reasons how and why money is necessarily measurement backed by murder.

There is nothing but the dynamic equilibria between different systems of organized lies operating robberies. The more that the biggest bullies, and their controlled opposition, are able to get away with deliberately ignoring and denying that, then the more unbalanced those dynamic equilibria become. Therefore, the genuine solutions are for everyone to become better at doing what the psychopathic sociopaths do. Bogus "solutions" recommend the impossible ideals that there should not be any such things done, or, at least, none that human beings are aware of operating.

Most of those few who recognize the central roles of those who have less compassion within the social control systems, which are actually based upon being able to back up lies with violence, STILL then tend to promote the impossible ideals that there should not be any human cultures operating artificial selection systems. Indeed, one of the strangest modes of thought that the controlled opposition groups think in bullshit ways are those whereby they assert that natural selection pressures were invented by the ruling classes, and otherwise would not exist. Rather, there were chronic political problems inherent in the nature of life, while the ruling classes developed expedient sets of solutions for those problems that benefited them. Intellectuals associated with the ruling classes did not make natural selection exist in ways which otherwise would have not existed at all. The intellectuals associated with the ruling classes only discovered and demonstrated the nature of natural selection pressures, in ways that the ruling classes were interested in understanding and benefiting from.

In fact, natural selection always existed. Natural selection was internalized as human intelligence, which then developed cultural systems of artificial selection, the first and foremost of which was warfare, as the oldest and best developed forms of social science and social engineering. Economics is a subset of militarism. That is why the history of warfare, whose successes were based upon deceits, was able to morph into the history of finance, whose successes were based on frauds.

Economics IS a "science" and a successful form of "social engineering" in the same ways that warfare IS. Of course, that is overflowing with paradoxes, since the social successes of those depends upon their ability to be deceitful and fraudulent. However, those phenomena can be understood in ways which are consistent with general energy systems. Indeed, both empirical and theoretically, both warfare and economics are quite consistent with the existence of militarism and economics, as those actually operate at the present time.

Hence, paradoxically, it is all too typical for most people to be insufficiently aware of the degree to which psychopathic sociopaths dominate every sociopolitical institution, as the best available professional liars and immaculate hypocrites, while the few people who do become more aware of that then still tend to stay within the same frame of reference of false fundamental dichotomies, to recommend bogus "solutions" based upon the impossible ideals of stopping natural selection from existing, which is what it would take to stop artificial selection from existing.

Essentially, the problems are that, after life exists, then death controls the development of that life. From a biological perspective, sex and death come as a package deal. From a sociological perspective, money and murder come as a package deal. Human cultures have recreated in the roles of specialized groups of people the niches that were taken by different species in other evolutionary ecologies. In that context, those people who were primarily culturally, but also somewhat genetically, selected to be the sociopathic psychopaths, developed their specializations of labour to become those who were able to operate the death control systems. The production of destruction controls production, and the most important form of human labour is when some human beings murder other human beings.

By and large, those who condemn the ways that the death controls are actually operated by the sociopathic psychopaths tend to never propose how to develop any better death controls. Hence, we continue to be stuck inside of civilizations which back up their debt controls with death controls, in ways which are most successfully based on the maximum possible frauds and deceits about themselves. Within that social situation, where civilization is controlled by those means, (governments as the biggest forms of organized crime, dominated by the best organized gangs of criminals) there continues to almost nothing else that is public significant than controlled opposition groups.

Hence, the controlled opposition views of the roles of the psychopathic sociopaths tend to mostly be from the perspective of the people who were more in the niches of the productive prey, than perceived from a more holistic overview, regarding the roles of the predatory parasites. Therefore, we continue to collectively be far, far away from being able to make greater use of information, enabling higher consciousness, regarding how to develop better systems of artificial selection that are consistent with natural selection imperatives. In my opinion, such a greater use of information, enabling higher consciousness, would tend to favour more compassion, and thus, tend to make the sociopathic psychopaths behave in less sick and insane ways.

Thu, 04/23/2015 - 08:50 | 6021465 Jstanley011
Jstanley011's picture

Wow. That was long.

Thu, 04/23/2015 - 08:08 | 6021318 ucde
ucde's picture

I like this comment.

It reminds me of an idea I saw elsewhere, which basically said that the whole pseudo-objective, pseudo-neutral narrative of political and social history, was based on the refusal to acknowledge the existence of sociopaths. 

Basically, its a "hear no evil, see no evil" mindset, we are supposed to play dumb, as to the intentions/feelings/thoughts of the people at the top of society's different ladders. 

This thinking took the view that once we acknowledge that people gravitating towards power are generally sociopaths, we understand that sickness is at the top of all human hierarchies -- and that this sickness has a natural tendency to become the controlling force of the hierarchy.

Once you understand that, all conventional/commonplace understandings of society are turned upside down, basically. 

Thu, 04/23/2015 - 10:51 | 6022020 csmith
csmith's picture

Is a person who spends all his time and energy ethically building a profitable and fully legal business, but has no friends, a sociopath?

Wed, 04/22/2015 - 22:39 | 6020730 FreeShitter
FreeShitter's picture

Ahhh the 70's...right when Dickhead NWO potus nixon took America off the Gold standard.

Wed, 04/22/2015 - 22:43 | 6020739 SHRAGS
SHRAGS's picture

Techno Utopia  & the future of work by Mark Stahlman circa 1997 WIRED magazine & the English Ideology

Wed, 04/22/2015 - 22:46 | 6020749 lunaticfringe
lunaticfringe's picture

What I wouldn't gladly give to get that old NWO dickhead over the new one.

Wed, 04/22/2015 - 23:15 | 6020807 Kirk2NCC1701
Kirk2NCC1701's picture

Just think of what jobs will be needed when Feudalism 2.0 is officially revealed after the Reset. 

Wed, 04/22/2015 - 23:20 | 6020818 disabledvet
disabledvet's picture

To understand John D Rockefeller is to understand the greatest danger to capitalism is captialsim itself.

 

He DESPISED unbridled competition and spent his entire "capitalist existence" trying to create "largeness."

 

He had a powerful benefactor in a dude named JP Morgan.

 

They both harbored a great fear that has now been realized...namely a Government that sees "free markets" as the answer.

 

These are very forward thinking men indeed.

 

"Even today."

 

Obviously back then you could not exchange 35 dollars at the Bank and get "your gold." You could of course take the gold you dug out of the ground by your own hand and then go to a Government mint and have it assayed for a nominal fee.

 

This might not sound like much to some...

Thu, 04/23/2015 - 08:04 | 6021305 ucde
ucde's picture

good point. There is no guarantee that the powers that gain ascendency out of free market principles, will continue to respect free market principles, once they achieve power. 

In fact, in my view, history shows that its capitalists themselves that are the first to call for state intervention, once they are rich enough to capture the state. Just exactly as you said with Rockefeller. This is why we need Ethics, rather than a System. IMO.

Thu, 04/23/2015 - 09:24 | 6021605 mvsjcl
mvsjcl's picture

They were monopolists, DV.

Thu, 04/23/2015 - 12:53 | 6022631 spooz
spooz's picture

And the growth of monopolies was the result of deregulation fever, in the name of "free markets", beginning in the 1980s. 

"Basically, Americans let go of their suspicion of Big Business. By the 1980s, a fever for deregulation seized the country, which led to the shredding of laws that had kept monopolies in check. That, combined with a war against unions, a flurry of mergers and acquisitions and a growing use of patents among big corporations to thwart entrepreneurs and startups, has let loose some of the most monopolistic practices since Roosevelt’s trust busting. And the result is that fair competition has been squashed."

http://america.aljazeera.com/opinions/2014/9/back-to-the-futurewithmonop...

Wed, 04/22/2015 - 23:21 | 6020821 petkovplamen
petkovplamen's picture

WOW, and the light bulb went over his head!

Of course this so called "Capitalism" is carefully planned centralised system, it's SO obvious to somebody from the outside, somebody who cames from Communism! I KNEW this within 6 months of coming to USA!

Amerikanzi, you really ARE so deluded, it's NOT even funny!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Thu, 04/23/2015 - 12:09 | 6022396 Comte d'herblay
Comte d'herblay's picture

While you are mostly right, it is not CAREFULLY planned, centralized. The system is about as happenstance, as it can be.

Laws created willy-nilly based on campaign contributions paying for lobbyists to cajole, bribe, and threaten the crooks in the Senate and House, and every other part of government to pass or bypass some 'favored' law that enriches some company, individual, or country (like Israel which became our 51st state).

The human beans are deluded, and purposely distracted from looking too deeply into the workings of government.

But it is absurd so that is a little bit funny, or at least veers away from taking to the streets en masse in every major city and D.C. or assassinating some senior members.

Wed, 04/22/2015 - 23:31 | 6020844 Cityzerosix
Cityzerosix's picture

Triumph of the Will

Thu, 04/23/2015 - 00:25 | 6020852 Condition 1SQ
Condition 1SQ's picture

I always chuckle when futurists claim that "everyone will be out of work by <current year + 100>".  These waterheads always underestimate the human drive to compete for resources, which requires innovation.  If TPTB really, truly believed that there would be mass unemployment due to technology, then I'm actually optimistic that they will not remain in power for long.  It takes a special sort of elitist stupidity to adopt such reasoning.

 

Thu, 04/23/2015 - 00:25 | 6020929 Condition 1SQ
Condition 1SQ's picture

To put a finer point on it, it's the same old failed mentality stemming from central planners (oligarchy) using their combined brainpower to forecast the future.  Whether it's unemployment 100 years from now or how much the rubber, graphite and wood which goes into a pencil should cost.  It simply doesn't work.  No subset of experts is smarter than the collective intelligence of people engaging in commerce.

Wed, 04/22/2015 - 23:42 | 6020856 Radical Marijuana
Radical Marijuana's picture

My favourite

quote to cite:

"If history shows anything, it is that there’s no better way to justify relations founded on violence, to make such relations seem moral, than by reframing them in the language of debt — above all, because it immediately makes it seem that it’s the victim who’s doing something wrong."

-- David Graeber

In the context of the article above, my favourite:

“The control is so ubiquitous that we don’t see it.” We don’t see, either, how the threat of violence underpins society, he claims. “The rarity with which the truncheons appear just helps to make violence harder to see,” he writes.

Anyone who is a living member of the cannabis community has always been well aware of the integrated systems of legalized lies, backed by legalized violence, which surrounded them!  Indeed, anyone who was interested could discover the history of how hemp, the single best plant on the planet for people, for food, fiber, fun and medicine, was re-branded as "marijuana, which is almost as bad as murder," and then, Huge Lies were backed up by Lots of Violence for decade after decade, in ways which always deliberately ignored all rational evidence and logical arguments, including when governments paid for their own studies to investigate the issue of pot prohibition. Criminalizing the cultivation of cannabis was a cherry on top of the overall ways that Neolithic Civilizations have driven themselves to become criminally insane.

Of course, in the Bigger Picture, marijuana is a relatively trivial issue, when taken in isolation. But nevertheless, it continues to be the single simplest symbol, and the most extreme particular example of the general pattern of social facts, that civilization is based upon specialized minorities backing up lies with violence, in order to control much larger majorities, by keeping them ignorant and afraid. Indeed, the degree to which the ruling classes have waged war on the consciousness of those they ruled over goes as deep as one is able to travel through apparently infinite tunnels of deceits backed by destruction.

Like Krieger's opinion of Graeber, I would also agree "how much I enjoy his thought process."  However, of course, I feel that despite Graeber going deeper than most into the analysis of how civilizations have been controlled, he still does not go far enough ... In my view, it takes quite a bit more profound series of intellectual revolutions to better understand the how and why our society seems to have become terminally sick and insane, due to the degree to which being able to back up lies with violence IS able to control civilization, in each short-term increment, despite that violence never being able to make those lies stop being false, and therefore, society as a whole becomes more psychotic the more successful the social control mechanisms based on enforcing frauds become, by driving us towards the longer term paradoxes of final failures from too much social successes based on being able to continue to back up lies with violence, as the longer term consequences of doing that become runaway cognitive dissonance jangling louder and louder, regarding the degree to which the behaviors based upon that history become absurdly backwards.

In my view, it is vital to consider that there are integrated systems of organized crime, (i.e., our political and economic system is in fact a centrally planned oligarchy) surrounded by controlled opposition, which both stay within the same frame of reference, so that the "solutions" promoted by the controlled opposition groups to the social facts that governments have become the biggest forms of organized crime, controlled by the best organized gangs of criminals, continue to be based on impossible ideals, that actually cause the opposite to happen in the real world, since, after all, almost the only publicly significant "opposition" IS controlled by the biggest bullies, and therefore, also spouts the biggest bullies' bullshit world view.

As the sayings go: "I do not know who discovered water, but I am sure it was not a fish." AND "The fish rots from the head." The dominant natural languages and philosophy of science have been shaped for a long, long time to serve the interests of promoting the biggest bullies' bullshit world view. The vast majority of people never begin to appreciate that, while the few that do still tend to only do so on relatively superficial levels, and hence, tend to promote silly "solutions" to the problems which they only understand in relatively shallow ways.

I agree that Graeber's thoughts are more profound that most, and well worth considering. However, nothing I have read by him, nor the videos featuring him that I have watched, so far, indicated to me that he has gone through enough of the more profound paradigm shifts which I believe would be necessary to come to terms with the degree to which the world we live in has been controlled by backing up lies with violence so much, for so long! I do not see him as embracing the paradoxical ways that has manifested. Rather, he still seems like a reactionary revolutionary to me, as does almost everyone else who somewhat recognizes the degree to which the ruling classes wage war against those that they rule over, by backing up lies with violence, and being as deceitful and treacherous as possible.

I do not find Graeber's critiques of the crazy and corrupt cultural systems of artificial selection that have developed through human history to be rooted deep enough in a radical critique of the concepts of natural selection, out of which that emerged, as the history of successful warfare based on deceits, morphing into the history of successful finance based on frauds. But then, I am not aware of any publicly significant figure that goes through enough of those processes of embracing the deeper paradoxes regarding the ways that the combined money/murder systems necessarily operated.

Thu, 04/23/2015 - 09:11 | 6021552 cherokeepilot
cherokeepilot's picture

Great statement about hemp. 

"Indeed, anyone who was interested could discover the history of how hemp, the single best plant on the planet for people, for food, fiber, fun and medicine, was re-branded as "marijuana, which is almost as bad as murder,"

I live in Kentucky, a tobacco state.  A few years ago the government decided to change the rules that were in place which affected how farmers grew and sold tobacco.  The end result has been that a lot of farmers quit growing it as it was no longer profitable for them to do so.  The focus of these tobacco farmers has been to petition the legislature to allow the growing of hemp.  Hemp was a major Kentucky product before the so-called drug war, it grows well here.  The legislature decided to "look into" the viability of growing hemp in Kentucky to the point of having the University of Kentucky set up "experimental fields" to grow some hemp and develop the best methods of so doing. 

What a farce!!  There is a sign in front of the Jessamine county courthose that proclaimed Jessamine county as the "hemp growing capital of the world".  So even in view of the fact that hemp is similar to tobacco and that tobacco grew and grows quite well in Kentucky, a "study" must be done to see if hemp will do the same. 

Once this "study" is completed and the government decides that hemp should be allowed to be grown, the government will require that a permit be obtained by those wishing to grow it.

I doubt that anyone would smoke hemp since it is quite low in THC.

Thu, 04/23/2015 - 15:34 | 6023302 Radical Marijuana
Radical Marijuana's picture

"... hemp since it is quite low in THC."

The highest concentration of the THC resins are found on the coverings called the bracs, that protect the immature seeds. The THC is a natural sun screen, like melanin in the skin of human beings. There is a very deep isomorphic analogy between the different kinds of hemp and the different kinds of human beings.

The kinds of industrial hemp that are being allowed back are "albino pot." Those breeds are generally inferior, and diminish the potential to cultivate cannabis, which should still be one of the biggest crops in the world.

Medical marijuana is "black pot" that is O.K., as long as it comes wrapped in the white lab coat of a doctor. So far, other forms of coloured cannabis are mostly still criminalized.

In general, pot prohibition is changing from having been like total slavery, to become more like segregation or apartheid. Pot prohibition is going through psychotic breakdowns ... The laws are NOT changing on the basis of more radical Hemp Truths, but rather, are changing in ways which compromise with the Old Lies.

Hemp should have always been a source of wealth. However, that was deliberately wiped out by those who wanted to make more profits from their monopolizations of inferior products. Overall, the banksters controlled governments, and those banksters benefited in every possible way from every evil thing that they could do, one of which was criminalizing cannabis. The banksters laundered the profits from the illegal drug trade, as well then had excuses to build a more fascist police force.

Wed, 04/22/2015 - 23:40 | 6020864 MEAN BUSINESS
MEAN BUSINESS's picture

No mention of David Graeber being a key figure initiating Occupy Wall Street

Thu, 04/23/2015 - 00:10 | 6020884 Dre4dwolf
Dre4dwolf's picture

Government regulation has created meaningless jobs, where everyone is forced to sit in a chair doing meaningless tasks to count meaningless money that is counterfeited in the trillions to pay meaningless taxes to prop up a meaningless system that promotes more growth in meaningless jobs that do nothing.

Its a vicsious cycle.

People just want to work and have purpose and work in an environment where they can feel fulfilled (creating real things).

People do not want to sit in a fucking office and punch keys into a computer filling out forms no one will read but some computer who processes all this shit and turns it against us.

 

Its all pointless and fruitless work.... government exists to make everyone perform useless tasks that do nothing but take up valuable time we could be productive with (actually changing the world).

 

 

Out of all the useless paper pushers in the world, the most egregious and disgusting are the assholes who run Workmans comp insurance, upwards of 29~35% of a wages (from people who actually work for a living) goes to a bunch of useless eaters who sit in an office and do nothing but make the lives of workers and business owners miserable.

There needs to be a law in place to limit how much $$$$$$ useless enterprises like workmans comp can charge as a base% , as it stands workmans comp is worse than credit card companies that charge 29.9999999% interest. . . . somehow a card you swipe with no effort can only by law take 29.999% but god forbid you work! some nobody who offers you little to nothing in return takes 35% of your labor lol. . .  what kind of PERVERSE system is that?

 

Its quite shocking, and workmans comp is just ONE example of how the world FUCKS people who work, Workmans compensation does anything BUT compensate workers, if anything its compensation from workers to useless eaters.

 

The world is setup as follows:

Man bakes a pie

Workmans comp does nothing (collects 35%)

Federal Government does nothing (collects 45%++)

Local Govt does nothing (collects 10~15%)

Man charges as much as he can to cover his costs +2~5% profit.

Man starves and keeps making more pies

The system is designed so that EVERYONE PROFITS OFF THE MANS LABOR EXCEPT THE MAN DOING THE WORK, ITS SLAVERY.

Fuck that system.

 

 

Go into NYSF (just one example)/Workmans Comp building in NY, its full of expensive marble trims/Granite walls/counters/Secret Service level security/Automatic Security door barriers state of the art bullshit. . . and a bunch of welfare queens in the back of an office window stealing your money.

Its a criminal enterprise , simple as that, a government protected criminal enterprise designed to fuck working americans, the proof of that is that the industry is monopolized (since govt props up only a few industry insiders).

The world needs to ease off the boot from the neck of the middle class or its going to find itself royally fucked in the long run.

 

99% of IRS enforcement is guaged against small business. . . while most of the billion dollar monstrosities that threaten the stability of the entire global marketplace . . . that only exist because of government intervention. . .  pay their billion dollar bribes to govt officials to keep the irs/other regulatory agencies off their backs. . .  bribes that small businesses can not hope to pay . . . 

 

Thu, 04/23/2015 - 00:35 | 6020944 Condition 1SQ
Condition 1SQ's picture

+9999

I've found that when people start businesses, their political slant swings Libertarian due to this horseshit.  Case in point, a close friend of mine owns a small craft brewery.  We share the same mailbox cluster in the industrial park, so I grab his mail too.  Literally every day there is a letter from the Department of Labor and Industry.  They have 5 employees.

Thu, 04/23/2015 - 01:40 | 6020976 Dre4dwolf
Dre4dwolf's picture

...

"If history shows anything, it is that there’s no better way to justify relations founded on violence, to make such relations seem moral, than by reframing them in the language of debt — above all, because it immediately makes it seem that it’s the victim who’s doing something wrong."

 

That^/This pretty much sums it up.

The people robbing you do so by saying you "owe" them, meanwhile these are the facts:

1) You never borrowed anything from "them"

2) They never "lent" anything to you.

3) The only reason you pay them is because government (the guy with the nuclear ICBM pointed at you) says there is some "law" that states you have to.

4) They don't even have to compete as an industry because government has granted them a monopoly.... so you endup paying someone who provides you with NOTHING in return. . . atleast if there was an actual industry and competition differnet insurance firms would try and provide some kind of "value" to make you choose them . . . but no . . . not workmans comp . . . nope, there is like no choice , no industry, just a centralized govt protected mafia that goes around telling people "they owe money" and that if they don't pay they will not be able to work.

 

So basically a monster is running around stealing money from companies, and if the companies don't pay they have to fire everyone who works for a living and shut down/change industries.

 

HOW CAN YOU OWE SOMETHING WHEN YOU NEVER BORROWED IT?

Everyone should refuse paying these criminals on the basis that they will only pay them if they admit that its not a debt but that its criminal extortion, put all the money in escrow and simply state "the money is your if you simply admit I do not "owe" you anything and that you are a government protected enterprise that is stealing from me.

If you are going to steal from us, HAVE THE BALLS to call it what it is you fucking cowards. The IRS operates the same way, somehow you "owe" them lol makes no sense... "owe" them for what? my balls?

http://new2.fjcdn.com/thumbnails/comments/Matheomaidana+rolled+a+random+...

Thu, 04/23/2015 - 02:57 | 6021079 spooz
spooz's picture

This guy was blathering on about Workman's Comp, which is run by individual states, not the DOL.

http://www.nfib.com/article/workers-compensation-laws-state-by-state-com...

Thu, 04/23/2015 - 03:08 | 6021083 spooz
spooz's picture

wtf are you blathering about? For 2014, Workman's Comp rates varied from a low of $.88 per $100 of payroll in North Dakota to a high of $3.48 per $100 in California.  Where do you get your ridiculous 29%-35%?  Do you know how to do math?

http://www.insurancejournal.com/news/national/2015/02/23/358401.htm

You sound pretty useless yourself, in that you are so out of touch with what the average worker has to deal with these days.

I guess you don't like the idea of compensating those useless worker units that get injured on the job, doing things like those oil & gas workers in the ZH story who are ending up dead because their employers were too cheap to use safety measures like respirators.

Thu, 04/23/2015 - 07:41 | 6021275 Comte d'herblay
Comte d&#039;herblay's picture

Like any other 'benefit' that can be extracted  from the tax system, there is a huge industry of fraudulent claims in WC.

The people I know who have successfully gamed the system are greater than the number I know who were actually hurt on the job.  Several of the scammers got injured at home, and managed to make it appear that it happened at work.

I don't know the exact or approximate figure of how much WC fraud is but you can go to the bank that a third of those claims are fraudulent.

That does not change the fact that he is wrong about the rate, and you are correct that WC is nowhere near his calculation.

 

Thu, 04/23/2015 - 11:53 | 6022274 spooz
spooz's picture

Agreed there are some scammers out there, just as there are in most programs that benefit the truly deserving majority.  I guess if we took some of the NSA Counterterrorism budget to do surveillance we could catch more of them.  Forget about the loss of civil liberties, guilty until proven innocent!

Good thing we can count on the Patriot Act to give us the tools:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/mcconnell-introduc...

Wed, 04/22/2015 - 23:56 | 6020894 kchrisc
kchrisc's picture

Very good article and good info for thought.

Liberty is a demand. Tyranny is submission.

Thu, 04/23/2015 - 00:08 | 6020913 luckylogger
luckylogger's picture

We would be at 15 hours a week. But the big boys took all the prfits from the production increase...

If it would have stayed on the same scale then he would have been right!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Thu, 04/23/2015 - 00:43 | 6020963 damicol
damicol's picture

Just stay anonymous and permanently on vacation, That way you never have to deal with bureaucracy. You evade it completely, And taxes

 

 

Thu, 04/23/2015 - 01:59 | 6021027 TheMerryPrankster
TheMerryPrankster's picture

The thing is, between cell phones and self driving cars, most people will give up all their freedoms to talk on the phone more.

Once self driven cars are ubiquitous, and they will be rapidly embraced and human driven cars will be outlawed in less than 10 years after the self driven car introduction, the population will be completely controlled.

if there is an insurrection or a bank run, your car won't start, if the police want to see you, your car will drive you to them, irregardless of your intended destination.

If they want a general curfew, your car won't start after 8 pm. And people will accept it because they are bound by silken ropes of technology instead of iron chains of tyranny.

and people will embrace it because they can text and surf the web in their cars, because most people are frankly morons who cannot understand the consequences of their own actions yet alone the consequences of technology, because they are maleducated,media saturated, propagandized, and bathed in a chemical cocktail in their food and water and hence apathetic, uncurious and unable to see simple problems let alone solve or avoid them.

most people are glad to be slaves as long as there is constant distraction so that they might not notice they are alive and will someday all too soon die.

 

Thu, 04/23/2015 - 02:44 | 6021077 cherry picker
cherry picker's picture

Not I

I won't go along with that program

For those of you who will let them do this

Subject yourselves to slaves of Techno/mechanical devices

You will have lost your soul

I decided to keep mine

Even if it is to hell, I will go.....

Do NOT follow this link or you will be banned from the site!