Capitalism Killed The Earth

[DanieRains]

There.

I have the courage to just say it.

I am not a socialist, but I know what fire is, and what happens when the ice melts.

[Cetacea]

1. Unlimited growth!

The first blue ocean event in the arctic summer can happen as soon as next year. There is an estimated 50 gigatons of methane under the ice waiting to be liberated. That methane alone could raise temperatures by half a degree C in a matter of weeks. SO many tipping points have already been passed. Positive self-reinforcing positive feedback loops will speed up the process. Extinction is on the table.

[Klaralven]

2. Russia and China under socialism both went from backward agrarian societies to industrial economies

In both cases there was heavy emphasis on things like coal and iron or mining, oil production, etc to build heavy industry and produce arms.

I don't think there is any evidence that socialism results in less exploitation of natural resources than capitalism.

The growth of economies is driven by the growth of population and the demand of the people to be supplied with more stuff.

[DanieRains]

3. Replace Capitalism With Stewardship

Before it's too late.

[Klaralven]

5. To do that you would need Facism

It would require a governing elite capable of defining what stewardship is and an authoritarian government powerful enough to impose it contrary to the natural inclinations of the population to have more kids and consume more stuff.

[gab13by13]

4. Crony capitalism killed the earth.

I still remember how I religiously watched Dylan Ratigan passionately expose crony capitalism on MSNBC. MSNBC immediately fired him. All of cable news is right wing because it controls what narratives are allowed on air.

[DanieRains]

13. Agreed

Wouldn't want billionaires paying for their corporations pollution.

[Hortensis]

6. Courage or ...? That's way too simplistic.

For just one of a bunch of other factors independent of economic system: Every time a source of greater energy was developed, the number of lives the additional ENERGY supported soared because of the additional production it made possible. (Think more and better food, bedding, shelter...)

Since you know what fire is, maybe imagine humans arrested at the level of fire. Whether their village economies were socialist or capitalist would have been irrelevant as they huddled around the fire in their huts against the cold. Either way, their numbers were kept low and also their lifespans, and their impact on the environment relatively minimal.

A statement that coal killed the earth would be way too simplistic to accept as truth also, but at least it'd be on a more accurate track.

Btw, when yearning for socialism, ALWAYS remember that all the people in our world now would be in that world also. Anyone care to imagine how Kevin McCarthy and his buds would operate after taking over the committee running a tire manufacturing collective? Or what energy source they would choose to boost their communal income?

It's the people.

[gab13by13]

8. You are describing communism not Socialism.

[Hortensis]

10. Socialism involves collective ownership of the means of production.

No collective ownership? It's some other socioeconomic system. NOT socialism.

Btw, there are different degrees of socialism. Communism is a very strong form of socialism with very strong centralized control and all production collectively owned and run, replacing capitalism, as we saw with the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics before it collapsed.

Democratic socialism is imagined as a kinder, gentler form with more local control and, supposedly, people retaining the ability to vote to get rid of it if they decided they didn't like it. Btw, a lot of people don't realize this, but DS involves the necessity of collective ownership of all industries; but since making it happen at once is impossible (that would require violent revolution), they advocate moving toward that ideal over time as people get used to it, industry by industry.

No European nations are socialist. They're all capitalism based. Some have socialIZED some public services, varying from country to country. In the US, so far the VA is our one big socialized public service; it's socialized because the VA owns its own facilities and is the employer of those who work in them (means of production), and of course it's nonprofit. (Medicare in contrast is for-profit, capitalism based.)

[RVN VET71]

11. More precisely, communists dictatorships

Communism, coming out of Marxism, leaves itself wide open for totalitarianism, but I don’t think Marx advocated totalitarianism. I could be wrong about that.

But Soviet communism -- not capitalism -- destroyed the Aral Sea. So it’s not only capitalism, but power that is killing us. Power in the hands of people who would always choose a larger yacht over life-saving aid for indigent children. Power, whether wielded by a GOP capitalist or a CCCP communist -- or a syndicate from in the PRC.

The central problem is that humans are just not able to resist the allure of exercising their power, and too often the allure is riches and status (which is actually more power).

[Hortensis]

18. As you say. But we CAN successfully regulate capitalism, as

the father of capitalism, Adam Smith, explained would always be absolutely necessary.

CAPITALISM MUST BE REGULATED TO WORK. Just as cars must have brakes and steering wheels to be cars. People who think unregulated capitalism is what capitalism is should have examined that Kool-Aid before chugging. If told cars don't have brakes and steering wheels, they'd have recognized that for the lie it is.

How many remember "We have to get off the backs of business"? Republicans especially chanted that mantra for years while the controls and protections our grandparents created were aggressively dismantled. But never asking what that would involve, while their own good incomes, benefits, rights, and protections were slashed.

(Again, any wonderful new democratic socialist state includes these people too. All of them.)

[slightlv]

7. I'm not against Capitalism

but I AM against Laissez-Faire Capitalism. We must have regulated capitalism for it to work for the good of all, including the planet. We had this at one time and it worked somewhat well... there have always been exceptions to the rule, unfortunately. Corruption has always existed. But when Reagan took over in the 1980's, corruption became the rule instead of the exception.

[gab13by13]

9. Crony capitalism,

Dylan Ratigan was exposing it.

[Irish_Dem]

12. Greed and corruption are killing humans on the earth.

The earth will be fine once the humans are gone.

[Buckeyeblue]

14. Yes. Greed is alwas present no matter what the ism...

And it's greed at all levels. I would say it's sad but the history of humans is so full of humans doing shitty things to other humans that I think that maybe it doesn't much matter.

When the last few people left are sitting around some make-shift fire, they will not be thinking about failed policies or the overwrought greed of humanity. They will simply be trying to stay warm and figuring out what they are going to eat next.

[Irish_Dem]

17. 6 million years of human evolution and we end by blowing up ourselves.

Right, given human nature, maybe it is not a bad thing.

[sir pball]

15. Let's be clear. The planet is not in jeopardy.

We are in jeopardy. We haven't got the power to destroy the planet – or to save it. But we might have the power to save ourselves.

[Irish_Dem]

19. Earth will be fine once the humans are gone.

[betsuni]

20. George Carlin: " The planet is fine, the people are fucked."

[Hortensis]

21. "Save the planet! What? Are these fucking people kidding me?

We don't even know how to take care of ourselves."

Of course feeding the eternal appetite for excuses for noninvolvement to the passive and disinterested made him a part of democracy's biggest problem. But I when I was young I thought he was a wise man. and he never really lost his disappointed idealist. Later he turned into our DIL's best friend's cousin, but he died before we got around to being in the same place at the same time. Darn.

"People are fucking nuts. This country is full of nitwits and assholes. You ever notice that? Nitwits, assholes, fuckups, scumbags, jerkoffs, and dipshits. And they all vote. In fact, sometimes you get the impression that they're the only ones who vote."

He cut out before the really good show.

[betsuni]

22. He never voted. Both sides guy. Anti-Democrats love to quote him.

But not when he mocks environmentalism or political correctness.

[brooklynite]

23. Earth wasn't dead the last time I checked.

[marie999]

24. The biggest problem creating climate change is there are too many people.

Eventually, because of climate change, the world's population will decrease sufficiently for the planet to regenerate.

[MineralMan]

25. That's a Vast Exaggeration.

In the first place, the Earth is not dead, nor is it even dying. It is changing, of course, but not dead.

In the second place, it is not capitalism that is destroying the environment. It is overpopulation of human beings that is doing that. They demand goods they need for survival and then some.

Capitalism is an economic system that works to provide those needs better than any other system, which is why it is successful. The results are bad, because there are too many human beings that require things, and capitalism is more than happy to produce those things, with the help of those very same human beings.

You need to rethink your statement, it seems to me, and recognize that you are also a human being who demands goods that are manufactured by others. That is what drives capitalism.

[EX500rider]

26. Are you under the impression that Communists countries were eco friendly?

Example:
It is important to note that nearly 2/3 of the overall reported radioactive waste was dumped by the Soviet Union in the form of six submarine reactors, the shielding assembly from the nuclear icebreaker reactor, and spent nuclear fuel.

http://large.stanford.edu/courses/2017/ph241/stevens2/

[Faux pas]

27. ...

Capitalism has killed just about everything and everyone. Kinda like "religion" has.

[Passenger]

28. Nope not dead yet. n/t