Opinion
Idealistic No More
Kind of a Big Deal
April 30, 2007 - 11:00pm
First, the obligatory (and corny) shout-outs: to everyone at The Sun — especially Carlos, Olivia, Erica, Jonny, Michael and Rebecca. To everyone in the activist community here in Ithaca — especially my ISO comrades. To anyone who’s ever taken the time to help me develop a column, edit or deal with the political fallout — especially Bekah, Kristen and David. And finally to anyone who’s taken the time to read my column over the past year — thank you and keep fighting!
Imagine no possessions/ I wonder if you can/ No need for greed or hunger/
A brotherhood of man.
These days, wishing for a better world seems limited to a traditional playing of John Lennon’s classic during a sports montage at the Olympics. Too often, people are considered idealistic — and thus unrealistic — if they seek to change the world. This type of thinking is said to be reserved for the impractical dreamer, the naive college student.
Sun Podcast: A podcast is available for this column. Click here to listen to or to download it.
For the vast majority of ordinary people, the world today is not one that we can accept, let alone be proud of. The world is filled with injustice: war, poverty, racism and sexism abound. Now, we cannot simply wish for these problems to go away — that would truly be idealism at its worst. In order to find a way to solve these problems, we must look beyond the mere symptoms of them to the cause.
And at the base of so many of these problem is one system: capitalism. To many readers, this may seem too broad a generalization. Although I stand by my original assertion, it is certainly ambitious to prove it in around 900 words.
However, at its essence, capitalism is simple. It is a system defined by its ability to provide for the few at the expense of the many. Although defenders of capitalism refer to this simply as “competition,” it takes a truly atrocious form in reality. The facts speak for themselves: In the U.S. alone, 34.6 million Americans lived below the poverty line in 2002, 8.5 million of whom held jobs, according to Americans for Democratic Action. At the same time, CEO pay has increased by 300 percent over the last 15 years. Beyond that, more than a third of the world’s people live on less than two dollars per day. This is not a case of some having a lot while others have little. This is the minority having a lot because the majority has so little.
Consider this: according to the United Nations Development Program, we could meet the basic needs of the entire world — food, shelter, clean water, basic medical care and primary education. The cost: an additional $80 billion per year — a tiny sum when you consider the 2005 U.S. defense budget was $500 billion. Thus, despite the concerns of “scarcity” we hear in Econ 101, we no longer live in a time where we do not have enough to provide for all our people. Instead, we live in time where the political-economic system we live under prevents us from distributing these resources in any remotely equitable way.
Any why does this minority have so much? We’ve all been told its because they have worked hard to achieve it — in this country, the myth is encompassed in “the American dream.” In reality, social mobility is a utter rarity in the United States, as fictional as the Horatio Alger stories that fed the dream to so many. Those who are able to rise out of poverty and obtain economic success are the rare exception, not the rule. Success in capitalism is akin to winning the lottery — a few can win only because so many play and lose. In reality, our multi-millionaires and multi-billionaires are wealthy not because of what they produce, but simply because of what they own. While the rich own the instruments of production — the factories, the raw materials — it is the rest of us who actually produce the goods and services that we need to survive — those who grow our food, who produce our goods and who teach our children.
Alongside this obscene wealth is poverty. One particularly heinous facet of capitalism is the creation of the “working poor” — a term describing those individuals who have jobs, but are paid so poorly they are unable to provide for themselves or their families. This is not a small section of our population, considering that a Jobs with Justice study found that 74 percent of jobs with the highest growth in the 1990s paid less than a living wage. How is this justice?
But poverty is not the only outcome of capitalism. Even a cursory glance at the U.S.’s foreign interventions in the past few decades clearly show that our government is concerned about expanding its empire and maintaining its geo-political dominance. Make no mistake — these forays benefit only those in the ruling elite of our country. At the same time, domestic funding for education and health care are cut to pay for our interventions abroad.
The dirty little secret of capitalism? Divide and conquer. The best way to prevent workers from recognizing that they are the ones producing the wealth, and therefore should control it, is to ensure they are segregated by hatred. Dividing workers on any and every basis possible — race, sex, religion, immigration status — ensures the capitalists a docile working class.
We can no longer accept capitalism as the status quo. The time to change things is running out, as this system driven by profits is rapidly destroying the lives and livelihoods of millions of people, while propelling our environment toward utter destruction.
As generations of the past have done, we need to stand up and demand a system that puts people over profit. And we must use the only power we have: our numbers. Through mass demonstrations and strikes, we will collectively make our voices heard and forge a new world. We will fight for human need, not corporate greed. A better world is possible!
Laura Taylor is a senior in the School of Industrial and Labor Relations. She can be contacted at lat34@cornell.edu. Kind of a Big Deal appeared Tuesdays.
First, the obligatory (and corny) shout-outs: to everyone at The Sun — especially Carlos, Olivia, Erica, Jonny, Michael and Rebecca. To everyone in the activist community here in Ithaca — especially my ISO comrades. To anyone who’s ever taken the time to help me develop a column, edit or deal with the political fallout — especially Bekah, Kristen and David. And finally to anyone who’s taken the time to read my column over the past year — thank you and keep fighting!
Imagine no possessions/ I wonder if you can/ No need for greed or hunger/
A brotherhood of man.
These days, wishing for a better world seems limited to a traditional playing of John Lennon’s classic during a sports montage at the Olympics. Too often, people are considered idealistic — and thus unrealistic — if they seek to change the world. This type of thinking is said to be reserved for the impractical dreamer, the naive college student.Sun Podcast: A podcast is available for this column. Click here to listen to or to download it.
For the vast majority of ordinary people, the world today is not one that we can accept, let alone be proud of. The world is filled with injustice: war, poverty, racism and sexism abound. Now, we cannot simply wish for these problems to go away — that would truly be idealism at its worst. In order to find a way to solve these problems, we must look beyond the mere symptoms of them to the cause.
And at the base of so many of these problem is one system: capitalism. To many readers, this may seem too broad a generalization. Although I stand by my original assertion, it is certainly ambitious to prove it in around 900 words.
However, at its essence, capitalism is simple. It is a system defined by its ability to provide for the few at the expense of the many. Although defenders of capitalism refer to this simply as “competition,” it takes a truly atrocious form in reality. The facts speak for themselves: In the U.S. alone, 34.6 million Americans lived below the poverty line in 2002, 8.5 million of whom held jobs, according to Americans for Democratic Action. At the same time, CEO pay has increased by 300 percent over the last 15 years. Beyond that, more than a third of the world’s people live on less than two dollars per day. This is not a case of some having a lot while others have little. This is the minority having a lot because the majority has so little.
Consider this: according to the United Nations Development Program, we could meet the basic needs of the entire world — food, shelter, clean water, basic medical care and primary education. The cost: an additional $80 billion per year — a tiny sum when you consider the 2005 U.S. defense budget was $500 billion. Thus, despite the concerns of “scarcity” we hear in Econ 101, we no longer live in a time where we do not have enough to provide for all our people. Instead, we live in time where the political-economic system we live under prevents us from distributing these resources in any remotely equitable way.
Any why does this minority have so much? We’ve all been told its because they have worked hard to achieve it — in this country, the myth is encompassed in “the American dream.” In reality, social mobility is a utter rarity in the United States, as fictional as the Horatio Alger stories that fed the dream to so many. Those who are able to rise out of poverty and obtain economic success are the rare exception, not the rule. Success in capitalism is akin to winning the lottery — a few can win only because so many play and lose. In reality, our multi-millionaires and multi-billionaires are wealthy not because of what they produce, but simply because of what they own. While the rich own the instruments of production — the factories, the raw materials — it is the rest of us who actually produce the goods and services that we need to survive — those who grow our food, who produce our goods and who teach our children.
Alongside this obscene wealth is poverty. One particularly heinous facet of capitalism is the creation of the “working poor” — a term describing those individuals who have jobs, but are paid so poorly they are unable to provide for themselves or their families. This is not a small section of our population, considering that a Jobs with Justice study found that 74 percent of jobs with the highest growth in the 1990s paid less than a living wage. How is this justice?
But poverty is not the only outcome of capitalism. Even a cursory glance at the U.S.’s foreign interventions in the past few decades clearly show that our government is concerned about expanding its empire and maintaining its geo-political dominance. Make no mistake — these forays benefit only those in the ruling elite of our country. At the same time, domestic funding for education and health care are cut to pay for our interventions abroad.
The dirty little secret of capitalism? Divide and conquer. The best way to prevent workers from recognizing that they are the ones producing the wealth, and therefore should control it, is to ensure they are segregated by hatred. Dividing workers on any and every basis possible — race, sex, religion, immigration status — ensures the capitalists a docile working class.
We can no longer accept capitalism as the status quo. The time to change things is running out, as this system driven by profits is rapidly destroying the lives and livelihoods of millions of people, while propelling our environment toward utter destruction.
As generations of the past have done, we need to stand up and demand a system that puts people over profit. And we must use the only power we have: our numbers. Through mass demonstrations and strikes, we will collectively make our voices heard and forge a new world. We will fight for human need, not corporate greed. A better world is possible!
Laura Taylor is a senior in the School of Industrial and Labor Relations. She can be contacted at lat34@cornell.edu. Kind of a Big Deal appeared Tuesdays.
lol
lol
The heart of the matter
What is the cause of the injustices you listed? I have a simple answer.
How about the frailty of the human heart?
While I sympathize with your portrayal of the problems we as a nation (and as a human people) face, I'm not sure the answer is "mobilize, demand change, etc. etc."
No system - capitalism, socialism, communism, anarchism, whatever - can change our imperfections. No top-down or bottom-up organization can force people to stop even everyday cruelty, much less cruelty on the scale of war.
Another revolution? What, THIS revolution is going to work, even though every other previous revolution has failed to produce a world without poverty, war, etc.? (By the way, your article failed to show how capitalism caused racism and sexism.) Why should I believe you that this time, oh yes this time! mass action will work, when mass action has lead to disaster or circuitously back to the status quo.
IMO the answer is in slow, progressive change. Every human heart needs to be changed for the better, and there is no quick fix for this. We need better education. We need to change our values. Most importantly, we need something to believe in. I hate to end on a pessimistic note, but it seems that the only progress we have made is a march away from belief and hope to one of extreme individualism and, eventually, nihilism.
I have no brilliant practical answer to the question, "How can we make our world better?" If I or anyone did, we'd be all set. But I surely know what the answer ISN'T.
Sweden anyone?
Question one: How exactly did capitalism cause every prejudice known to man? I just don't quite get how rich people are to blame for other people just being bad people?
Answer one: Capitalism didn't cause racism, sexism, etc. Some people are just jerks, plain and simple. And no I am not in the least bit wealthy. I get more federal aid than almost anyone on campus I am so un-wealthy. And by the way, the income gap can be solved within the capitalist system. You'd know that if you actually took ECON 101.
Question Two: Since you seem to hate our government, our military(even ROTC), people who think abortion is wrong, the NYPD, rich people, and our economy in general, WHY ARE YOU STILL HERE???? There are plenty of places you could go. How about Sweden? They have socialist programs. How about France? They all seem to hate the U.S. too. Hey you can even book your tickets on my website www.bentheredunthat.com. The ticket is about $1200.
If you don't like your situation, do something about it. Don't tell other people to do it for you.(especially since it will never happen.)
Answer two: Well... Why are you still here?
Divide and Conquer
"Some people are just jerks" is a convenient way of avoiding DOING anything about racism, sexism, and other forms of oppression. US capitalism used slave labor for startup capital. That hardly fits into your jerks/nice folks political theory. To contemporize: with the proposed "comprehensive immigration reforms" now in congress, the US government is again using racism to forward corporate interests in legalizing the status quo of exploiting immigrant labor. You need look no further than the vigilante nativist groups that are currently burgeoning because of the rhetoric around immigration to see that capitalism requires divisions in the working class to function. To theorize that jerks could exist in any kind of society misses the point entirely.
As for the psychological or moral approach: choosing what you learn, what you eat, where you work, and what you do with your own body aren't options for the majority of the world's population. The only way we can gain control over those things that shape our ideas is by collective struggle. So let us not sit and contemplate the poison in our hearts, but instead stand together and take what's ours. To think you could, say, mitigate poverty or win back abortion rights by thinking pure thoughts borders on insanity.
We don't own morality; the people who own our schools, our media, our government, our means of production, and preach in our churches do. While it would be convenient to be able to whisper to the chaos butterfly and hope he changes some hearts, a far more realistic approach would be actively fighting for a better world. That means standing up against the institutions that use divisions to exploit all of us. In struggle, we can forge our own morality that abhors the divisions that keep us degraded, isolated, and cynical, and places the blame where it belongs: upon that small minority of people who benefit from our degradation.
A reply
"'Some people are just jerks' is a convenient way of avoiding DOING anything about racism, sexism, and other forms of oppression."
>>Evidence?
"US capitalism used slave labor for startup capital. That hardly fits into your jerks/nice folks political theory. To contemporize: with the proposed "comprehensive immigration reforms" now in congress, the US government is again using racism to forward corporate interests in legalizing the status quo of exploiting immigrant labor."
>>Circular logic. "Capitalism uses racism. Therefore, capitalism caused racism." Am I missing something?
P.S. Racism has existed for many years before the US was around. Let's not limit this discussion to the US, because as you would agree, the world =/= America.
"You need look no further than the vigilante nativist groups that are currently burgeoning because of the rhetoric around immigration to see that capitalism requires divisions in the working class to function."
>>Mmm...non sequitur here.
"To theorize that jerks could exist in any kind of society misses the point entirely."
>>The point was that BECAUSE of said "jerks," any social system will be inherently flawed. No social system will change this; it is a fundamental problem that needs to be taken into consideration. The question is thus: which system minimizes these flaws? This is certainly debatable.
"As for the psychological or moral approach: choosing what you learn, what you eat, where you work, and what you do with your own body aren't options for the majority of the world's population. The only way we can gain control over those things that shape our ideas is by collective struggle."
>>Who is "we?" Poor people? Working class? Americans? Non-americans? "Oppressed" peoples? Just who are the ones that need to unite here? Only those who have no choice in their lives?
"So let us not sit and contemplate the poison in our hearts, but instead stand together and take what's ours."
>>What, pray tell, is "ours?" And how do you know? How do you partition what is "ours" from what is not?
"To think you could, say, mitigate poverty or win back abortion rights by thinking pure thoughts borders on insanity."
>>Strawman. Who made this claim?
"We don't own morality; the people who own our schools, our media, our government, our means of production, and preach in our churches do."
>>Sounds like a conspiracy theory to me. I like to believe in an internal locus of control...
"While it would be convenient to be able to whisper to the chaos butterfly and hope he changes some hearts, a far more realistic approach would be actively fighting for a better world. That means standing up against the institutions that use divisions to exploit all of us."
>>Who ever suggested "whisper[ing] to the chaos butterfly?" And which institutions do we need to "stand up against?" Who decides which institutions stay and which go?
"In struggle, we can forge our own morality that abhors the divisions that keep us degraded, isolated, and cynical, and places the blame where it belongs: upon that small minority of people who benefit from our degradation."
>>How do we "forge our own morality," whatever that means? Please tell me how this new uprising, revolution, whatever will be any different than the previous ones. Can you ensure to me, 100% that some new d-bags won't just take power yet again? You can't. That's because there are "jerks" in the world, and you can't keep them out through some artificial system or through mindless platitudes about a "better world."
Really, all you write sounds very nice, and I wish we could have a world like this. But - how are we going to do this? We need a very thoughtful approach before we embark on something that could return to the status quo or, worse, make things even crappier.
Death to the Bourgeois!
Comrade Taylor,
The time for revolution is nigh. Our brothers across the globe have been oppressed for far too long. My iPod got stolen last week. What kind of a world do we live in when people are so desperate they need to STEAL a necessity like an iPod?!
And just last week I was trying to read Turn Left at Trillium between my Feminism and Gender lectures when some fascist came up to me and asked if I'd like to donate to the SALVATION ARMY.
Yeah right! Like I'm going to pay money to a blood-thirtsy ARMY. We should defund those frauds and give money to a CHARITY organization.
I yelled, "Get lost, FASCIST!"
There is a group of like-minded revolutionaries that meets on weekends. Meet us at Starbucks this Friday at 10 pm. We can discuss our plans for crushing those capitalist fat cats over double-tall mocha frappucinos. Make sure you are not followed and wear all black clothing. The password is "Sic Semper Tyrannis"
(p.s. afterward we'll totally have a crunk-fest at my apartment, LOL)
Sincerely,
Eric Fish
Man of the People
In Defense of Capitalism
Communism is nice and all, but frankly, it doesn't work. Right now, Capitalism, or some-form of social-Capitalism is the only system that really produces any meaningful results.
I think anyone that didn't fall asleep in their American history classes or their Economics classes knows that pure Capitalism is as bad as Communism...in that it doesn't work. Government intervention of some sort is necessary.
In and of itself, the current Capitalism concept of the West isn't at fault. It promotes individual efficiency and most importantly, gives people an incentive to do things they would not otherwise do. I'll give you an example...doctors. How many doctors out there are truly in it simply to help other people? If doctors were paid the same as sanitary engineers (garbagemen), do you think we would have as many people want to be doctors? I'll skip the introductory economics lesson, but I think you get the point.
Changing the system isn't the answer; people tried that in the last century, and the results weren't stellar. The key is utilize human greed towards beneficial projects. You want someone to provide education for poor people across the world? Justify to them in term of incentives. Make them understand that educating poor populations and empowering them with knowledge opens the way to jobs. And jobs bring income. And income brings demand for products. And boom! New market! And everyone likes new markets to sell stuff to.
The problem isn't Capitalism. The problem is in lack of education, lack of foresight, lack of corruption controls, etc. I assure, if you want to end poverty and utilize resources efficiently, better to fix the problems of the current system rather than bring in a whole new system...with it's own set of problems.
selfishness
the problem is not capitalism. It is selfishness. if you look at communistic countries that aimed at redistribution of wealth, the price is individual liberties, human rights, dignity, freedom of speech, freedom of religion.
we have the largest transfer of wealth going on with the social security payroll tax and medicare tax. We are providing billions of dollars to the elderly for income and health care.
Taylor's Swan Song? Be Still My Beating Heart.
Breathtaking. Simply breathtaking. I don't know how you manage to do it. Week in, week out, to come up with utterly absurd, factually challenged and borderline insane columns is a remarkable talent the likes of which Cornell may never see again.
Your diatribe against capitalism calls to mind the old aphorism about democracy, which I shall adapt to your topic: Capitalism is the worst economic system imaginable, except for all of the others. Need I remind you that, during the 20th century, capitalism was not the cause of approximately 100 million deaths through government action against its own people; socialism was.
After reading carefully your many articles over the course of the last year, your final grades are in, and they are nearly perfect:
Logic F
Economics F-
Statistics F
World History F
Government F
Marxism in America A+
smileyjr: Actually,
smileyjr: Actually, socialism wasn't the cause of approximately 100 million deaths, either. Stalinist communism, aka tyranny, was. Actually, come to think of it, so was Fascism. Anyway, socialism is the neat little system of government much of Europe has goin' on right now, where people are happy and get lots of vacation and free health care and stuff. It's sort of like a compromise between Capitalism and Communism. Just thought you'd like to know.