Resolved:
Capitalism Must Die
by C. A. Matthews
Most New Year’s resolutions aren’t kept for more than a month. Six weeks tops. Those resolutions to lose weight, get more exercise, quit bad-mouthing the boss behind his back will all be forgotten by the time Valentine’s Day rolls around. It doesn’t mean they aren’t noble goals. It just means we’re human, and we humans tend to forget things and move on to deal with other, more pressing challenges as time goes by.
There are some resolutions, however, that aren’t so quickly forgotten. This is one of them: Capitalism must die.
That capitalism, the corrupt economic system of dealing with each others’ basic needs, must go away for the good of all is a no-brainer. A heating planet inundated with greenhouse gases caused by ceaseless pollution to maintain growing profit margins for capitalists won't be able to sustain any of us forever. Haunting images of millions of our fellow human beings struggling to feed themselves and their loved ones isn’t something most moral individuals can ever forget. Driving by a person sleeping rough on a city sidewalk in the middle of a frigid winter isn’t something easily ignored.
At least it shouldn’t be.
You’d be amazed at how many Americans do just that—ignore the horrific suffering surrounding them like it’s an everyday occurrence of no consequence. Well, it is an everyday occurrence, as the number of homeless and hungry grows daily in the US, but it’s not an occurrence of no consequence that should be forgotten as easily as a New Year’s resolution to play more tennis or take up golf. The suffering of others should be seared into our minds, branded onto our subconscious, melded into what little conscience some of us still possess.
Why? Why should people living comfortable lives in comfortable homes with comfortable jobs and hobbies be forced to think of others who aren't as "blessed" as they are? Think about what happens to those who have plenty. They live their luxurious lifestyles in the midst of those who have little to nothing, those who live an evermore precarious existence. At some point something’s going to give—and a starving person with no place to call home and holes in their shoes has nothing left to lose.
That’s when the pitchforks and guillotines (or their modern equivalents) come out. That’s when things get extremely messy and not-so-pretty. It won’t be a casual day on the tennis court or a drinks at the club after a round of golf, in other words. People will get hurt. Badly hurt. Many will be killed.
“Sure,” you say. “I’ve got my AR-15 and plenty of ammo in the closet. I know the cops will always be on our side because I live in a gated mansion-fortress on the right side of town with those of my kind, the ones who always remember to tip their bodyguards and support the ever-increasing police-military industrial complex budget. We can ride out the invading storm of millions of malnourished, under-armed, tent city bums in our nuclear bunkers in New Zealand if we have to. What can the poor do to us, the rich, the powerful, the ones perpetually on top?”
What indeed. I’m sure King Louis and Marie Antoinette felt the same all the way up until the moment they heard a swoosh! and felt a bit of a breeze on the back of their necks.
That capitalism is failing and will fail isn’t even argued anymore by most economists. They just argue over the timing and the effects the turn-around to another system will bring to our society. A failed capitalist state can easily fall into a fascist dictatorship as it can transform into a more democratic, socialistic society.
Billionaire capitalists can use brute force to ensconce themselves and their corporations into the police-military-industrial complex and rule from there with an iron fist. The masses dying of disease, hunger, and as cannon-fodder in endless wars for oil, lithium, farmland, silicon chips (i.e., “resources”) is to be expected and actually is considered desirable by capitalists.
"Well, they (the poor, the disadvantaged) should hurry up and die and rid us of the surplus population," says Ebenezer Scrooge in Dickens' A Christmas Carol.
Sound familiar?
But a failed capitalist state doesn’t have to go that route if it’s directed toward a more peaceful and just path. One of the first and biggest steps those of us dedicated to end this unjust system must take is taking up the cause of peace. All wars—covert, overt, coups d'etat, civil wars, police violence against the public—must be stopped. It’s the only way to shut down the police-military industrial complex. If there is no need to build more weapons of death and no hunger for building more instruments of destruction, then resources wasted on such inhumane pursuits can be directed toward more constructive purposes.
You probably can name a few of those purposes: ending world hunger, ending homelessness, meeting the challenge of the climate crisis, extending health care and education to all in need…
If your New Year resolution is to help to bring about positive changes in the world, then join me and millions of others working for a day when capitalism and endless war is no more. March in the streets. Demand peace. Campaign to end suffering through meeting basic human needs. Share your knowledge and compassion with those unlike yourself.
Sure, your tennis courts or your golf courses might eventually become full of people not all one color or ethnic background, but it will at last reflect the magnificent diversity found on our planet Earth.
Related Links:
Free Audio Book--Confessions of an Economic Hitman by John Perkins https://youtu.be/ySefPIZaYT0
Free Book--War is a Racket by Major Gen. Smedley Butler https://ratical.org/ratville/CAH/warisaracket.html
Rage Against the War Machine -- Rally in Washington DC, February 19, 2023 https://rageagainstwar.com/
Defense Contractor Shares Surge as US Doubles NATO Arm Sales https://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2022/12/30/glzw-d30.html
On the Influence of Neo-Nazism in Ukraine https://scheerpost.com/2022/12/30/on-the-influence-of-neo-nazism-in-ukraine/
How the War in Ukraine Could Have Been Prevented Decades Ago https://scheerpost.com/2022/02/24/not-one-inch-eastward-how-the-war-in-ukraine-could-have-been-prevented-decades-ago/
The Understated Effects of Nuclear War on the World https://scheerpost.com/2022/08/15/the-understated-effects-of-nuclear-war-on-the-world/
The Boot https://bernie2016.blogspot.com/2022/08/the-boot.html
The Benefits of World Hunger https://bernie2016.blogspot.com/2022/07/the-benefits-of-world-hunger.html
The Business Model of Empire https://bernie2016.blogspot.com/2022/04/the-business-model-of-empire.html
I'm Sorry You Can't Afford to Be Alive https://bernie2016.blogspot.com/2021/08/im-sorry-you-cant-afford-to-be-alive.html
Exploited People https://bernie2016.blogspot.com/2022/01/exploited-people.html
Seen on Twitter:
Capitalism is evil. It's sucking the life out of our world and looks set to continue doing so until it's too late. We need to kill the disease before it kills us! #CapitalismKills
ReplyDeleteOur precious Earth can't stand any more take, take, take of natural resources with no giving back. A unipolar hegemony like the US starting endless wars to rob resources from our neighbors doesn't build trust and harmony among peoples. Capitalism truly is the worse pandemic of all time. The cure is socialism.
ReplyDelete