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[LordBucket]

When I have issues with the wealthy, it's not with the fact that they have power, it's with the fact that many of them are horrifically misusing it to the plain and obvious detriment of many, many other people. That? That pisses me off

But again, that is the nature of money. It's not possible to acquire wealth without somebody else no longer having that wealth. If you give me $100, you no longer have the $100.

If one person acquires millions of dollars...by definition somebody else has to not have those millions of dollars. But, that person probably didn't hurt or compell anyone to give them those millions of dollars. Everyone who gave them that money parted with it willingly.

The problem is the bolded part. What we're seeing is that all that decadence is rarefying the resource situation; concentrating material power (via wealth, goods, etc., so forth) into an increasingly small percentage of the overall population. That is bad, from a moral perspective (they're basically stealing -- or if you prefer, obtaining a disproportionate amount of -- resources from the overall pool, which is immoral because it worsens the overall situation) and from a societal perspective (it's unsustainable and causes escalating social unrest, because the 'have-nots' grow larger). It's bad business, really.

There is no stealing here. If you pay $600 for an ipad, or $100 for a nice shirt, you willingly gave away that money.

It's silly to complain about corporations and rich people having lots of money...when you're the one giving it to them.

It also silly to complain about how they spend that money once you give it to them. When your company gives you a paycheck, they don't set rules or expectations for how you should spend it. They don't demand that you give it to the poor, or spend it on things that benefit society or the world. Why should you expect the corporations you give that money back to to spend it the way you want them to spend it?

No, the obvious thing for them to spend it on is the acquisition of more power. And if you're happily giving away your power, your resources, and your time for money just so you can give that money back to them for goods that you produced for them...why should you expect corporations to stop you?

[Eagle_eye]

People shouldn't be punished because they don't understand something. Most people in the US don't understand that currency is illusory. That's not their fault. Not everyone is highly intelligent, not everyone grows up in an environment that fosters deep though and skepticism, not everyone has the luxury of significant spare time. The fact that everything they do is voluntary doesn't matter. They don't have all the information, and for the most part, that's entirely beyond their control. If you're working multiple jobs just to keep your family afloat, have a high school education and your main source of information is Fox, it's going to be very difficult to make rational decisions.

[LordBucket]

All the things you listed aren't signs of wealth so much as stuff you need in order to live. You will die without food. No access to clean water is a serious health hazard. Having no shelter is a quick way to die

So yeah, since those things are actually basic needs, I feel everybody deserves them, because nobody deserves to die because their lives' basic needs aren't met. These are things you really can't do without. Having them isn't really a sign of wealth. Considering that it is, it's scary : it basically means living is a luxury and that you should feel privileged for being able to.

Power doesn't see it that way. Power is completely impartial and cares not one tiny bit whether you or anybody else starves or freezes to death. The ability to feed yourself is power. The ability to put a roof over your head is power. The ability to procure gold chandeliers encrusted with diamonds is power.

There's no basis upon which to draw an arbitrary line between "power needed to survive" and "power to do anything else."

Power doesn't work that way.

Being able to feed yourself is totally different from, say, owning an ipad,

To you, maybe. To a $100 bill, or the strength to lift a weight, or the knowledge to grow food...there is no difference. Power cares not how it is used.

those things are actually basic needs, I feel everybody deserves them, because
nobody deserves to die because their lives' basic needs aren't met.

Your feelings have no effect on the nature of power. You might "feel bad" if a 10,000 pound truck crushes you to death. Nevertheless, the force of the truck may be sufficient to kill you.

You might "feel" that people deserve to have basic needs met. Your feelings have no bearing on the reality of whether those needs are, or are not met. But if you choose to use power for the purpose of feeding someone, or keeping them warm, then they will be fed and warm, regardless of your feelings on the matter.

Power is completely and totally impartial. It is unproductive to attempt to assert your own "feelings" about how things "should" be while ignoring the nature of power.

[MorleyDev]

"I used to think money equalled power too, when I was young. I've learnt a lot since then. You know what does equal power? Power. Power equals power. Crazy, huh? But the type of power? Doesn't matter as much as you'd think. It turns out everything is oddly balanced. Weird, but true. So Uncle MorleyDev, what's the moral of the story? A big pile of money isn't enough when the other guy has a big pile of money and the resolve to manipulate and take all you love with just his words."

"If someone builds a business and spreads their company with an iron fist for thirty long years, and then gets cancer and dies, what do you think he's going to remember as he lays dying? All the people he hurt and crushed to get where he was? No, that he got to live like a god for three decades. Sure the ending sucked, but you can't have everything."


*cough*

[LordBucket]

People shouldn't be punished because they don't understand something.

How about try to rephrase that statement without the word "should."

I think you'll find that it comes to to roughly "gee, I'd prefer it if..." You're making a weak assertion about how you might personally prefer the world to be, rather than describing how the world actually is. This is unproductive.

They don't have all the information, and for the most part, that's entirely beyond their control. If you're working multiple jobs just
to keep your family afloat, have a high school education and your main source of information is Fox, it's going to be very difficult to make rational decisions.

Yes.

And if a bird flies into a wind turbine because they don't know any better, it will neverless be chopped to pieces regardless of our preferences on the matter. It's silly to complain about the people who do know and understand how these things work simply because it's inconvenient to those who don't.

To anyone who wishes to not be at the mercy of the rich, I advise you to stop whining and complaining about how "unfair" it is and try to understand how these things work. Otherwise you're in the same situation as a bird flying around oblivious to wind turbines. The rich aren't "out to get you" and people who put up wind turbine don't do it specifically to chop up birds. They have their own motivations. They might even care enough to put on a cover to reduce the chances that you fly in. But ultimately...if you fly into a wind turbine, you're the one who has to deal with the repercussions of that.
 
This is a society that uses money. Be ignorant of money at your own peril.

[MorleyDev]

The man with the apple trees has the best means to plant more trees. From them, he can control the access others have to the trees. Others can learn, but he can just offer more apples than they can grow themselves in a reasonable amount of time to enough people so they'll go around and hurt the others to create a tree empire.

He with the best swordsmanship can teach others in exchange for their food. He will always have more time to train than those he teaches, and so will always have the best chance to stay the best. He can offer extra tutelage for ganging up on and killing his rival swordsmen teachers instead of charging them in food.

Currency always exists, maybe not always as a physical good, but there's always a resource and the one with the most and/or best or who can achieve the most/best can always use human nature to ensure they stay on top. Fun fact, currency can have practicality and it doesn't help things: Japan once used rice as currency.

[LordBucket]

Nothing you've said is a suitable reponse to the line you're quoting.

[MorleyDev]

Nothing you've said is a suitable reponse to the line you're quoting.

Yeeeah I was more relevant when I started typing then I went off on making a general point about the nature of currency and power, how the innate nature of humanity gives the latter and this will lead to the former xD Left the quote in because I forgot to remove it after I went on my little tangent

[ECrownofFire]

-snip-

If you think the ONLY way to gain money is by exploiting other people, you need to go visit a farm, mine, power plant... or any fucking business that exists in the entire fucking world.

Money is not power, it is not limited to a hard cap like natural resources, it is nothing more than a representation of trade. It was created for and is used as a replacement for bartering where I might not necessarily want your chickens or other random things, and I don't really want my wealth dying off or rotting over time. Trade is defined as me giving you something and you giving me something, and we both benefit. Nobody willingly makes a trade that is unfavorable to them (ignorance of various factors notwithstanding). Labor is just one more thing that people trade.

Let's say Bob pays Alice to go mine some stuff for him, like iron. Bob gets the iron, Alice gets whatever salary they agree on. But Bob also supplies Alice with tools and organization, something that's difficult for one person to get on their own. Nobody wants to buy mining supplies for just one person. Unfortunately, Bob does not have anything to use that iron on. So he sells it to Carl, who happens to have a forge or something.

Carl pays Bob for some iron. Bob benefits, because what the hell is he supposed to do with raw iron? Carl benefits, because he can use that iron in his forge. So Bob pays Dennis for his labor in the forge. Bob provides a forge and a salary, and Dennis provides labor. Bob gets iron... railings, and Dennis gets money. Now he has these railings and nothing to do with them, so he sells them to Elizabeth.

And so on and so forth until somebody breaks something and wealth is lost, or whatever else may happen to remove wealth. Everybody gains money because of that initial investment into the iron mine. There is not a single person that lost money. In fact, every single person gained wealth. That is society, that is money, and that is trade.

[Frumple]

People shouldn't be punished because they don't understand something.

How about try to rephrase that statement without the word "should."

I think you'll find that it comes to to roughly "gee, I'd prefer it if..." You're making a weak assertion about how you might personally prefer the world to be, rather than describing how the world actually is. This is unproductive.

Naturalistic fallacy high-five! What is doesn't describe the should be! Discussion of the should be is one of the few ways to induce change that doesn't involve a great deal of violent revolution! That makes it pretty damn productive! Huzzah!

Relatively unproductive compared to murder, though, if that's what you're getting at.

To anyone who wishes to not be at the mercy of the rich, I advise you to stop whining and complaining about how "unfair" it is and try to understand how these things work. Otherwise you're in the same situation as a bird flying around oblivious to wind turbines. The rich aren't "out to get you" and people who put up wind turbine don't do it specifically to chop up birds. They have their own motivations. They might even care enough to put on a cover to reduce the chances that you fly in. But ultimately...if you fly into a wind turbine, you're the one who has to deal with the repercussions of that.
 
This is a society that uses money. Be ignorant of money at your own peril.

So what do you suggest for people that have been dropped into a wind turbine pointing up after having their wings broken, which roughly describes the majority of the population? What about those that realize there isn't anything short of violence that can prevent them from falling into said turbine? Go for broke and start trying to murder the source of the problem physically destroy the turbine? Kill themselves before they fall in the turbine to experience the lesser suffering? Try to maybe angle themselves so the turbine maybe only rips off their limbs? What's your preferred solution there?

[Eagle_eye]

I don't see why you present destroy the wind turbine as a bad solution. Getting rid of the problem entirely should be the goal. A violent revolution is one way to do it, and though peaceful reform would obviously be preferable, it certainly doesn't seem like it's going to happen any time soon.

[LordBucket]

Naturalistic fallacy high-five! What is doesn't describe the should be!

Relatively unproductive compared to murder, though, if that's what you're getting at.

No, what I was getting at was that it's fairly pointless to sit around insisting that "it would be better if" things were different without being willing to take action to make things better. If person A asserts that it would be better if he didn't get killed by a car...and person B gets out of the way of the oncoming car...who's going to get the better result?

You've made a statement of preference. Ok. That's fine. But making statements of preference is unproductive compared to gaining understanding of a situation and acting in a manner likely to produce desireable results.

So what do you suggest for people that have been dropped into a wind turbine pointing up after having their wings broken, which roughly describes the majority of the population? What about those that realize there isn't anything short of violence that can prevent them from falling into said turbine? Go for broke and start trying to murder the source of the problem physically destroy the turbine? Kill themselves before they fall in the turbine to experience the lesser suffering? Try to maybe angle themselves so the turbine maybe only rips off their limbs?

What's your preferred solution there?

Don't fly into turbines.

Eagle_Eye, however, makes a valid point...working with our current metaphor...that some people don't know about turbines, don't see them, and simply don't know how to avoid flying into them. That's fine, that's reasonable...and I agreed with him when he said so.

I, therefore, attempt to educate people on the topic of turbines. Which, removing ourselves from the metaphor...is why I'm in this thread trying to explain to people about money and power rather than exploiting you for my own benefit. You now have the choice: will you continue complaining about how evil and immoral the rich are, or will you take the time to learn about wind turbines and stop flying into them?

[Frumple]

I don't see why you present destroy the wind turbine as a bad solution. Getting rid of the problem entirely should be the goal. A violent revolution is one way to do it, and though peaceful reform would obviously be preferable, it certainly doesn't seem like it's going to happen any time soon.

I present it as a bad solution because I kinda' see violent revolution as something one wants pretty hard to freaking avoid. Murder, violence, and societal destabilization are all pretty g'damn huge negatives.

Or to put it another way, if you have to resort to violence someone's already fucked up huge somewhere in there. There's nothing positive to that, only an amelioration of present negative (if that, if you're lucky.).

No, what I was getting at was that it's fairly pointless to sit around insisting that "it would be better if" things were different without being willing to take action to make things better. If person A asserts that it would be better if he didn't get killed by a car...and person B gets out of the way of the oncoming car...who's going to get the better result?

You've made a statement of preference. Ok. That's fine. But making statements of preference is unproductive compared to gaining understanding of a situation and acting in a manner likely to produce desireable results.

The rest of the statement, LB. Discussion and communication is part of getting out of the way of the bloody car. Not only does it not preclude taking other action, it's part of the necessary action needed to enact change without overt violence. You can see the above why trying to do that can be considered a good thing.

Don't fly into turbines.

... did you just not read the bits above "What's your preferred solution"? Some don't have that option. What then?

[Flying Dice]

Don't fly into turbines.

... did you just not read the bits above "What's your preferred solution"? Some don't have that option. What then?

Obviously they aren't fit for a social darwinist world order and should just go die quietly in an alley somewhere. After all, if they aren't a turbine they're clearly lazy and deserve to be trampled underfoot. Because as everyone knows anyone can achieve wealth and power as long as they're willing to try. It isn't as if there are societal conditions preventing the vast majority of people from doing much better than keeping themselves alive (if that), or in the case of the truly fortunate, gathering a few minor luxuries--just enough to keep them pacified and unwilling to work towards change.

[MetalSlimeHunt]

I expect if you asked slaves in the south whether they wanted to own slaves, most of them would say no.

Actually, the American Colonial Society "returned" a large number of former slaves to a small U.S. colony in Western Africa that was given nominal independence. The purpose of this was to return the "natural" balance of white men in Europe, black men in Africa, and Native Am- more white men in North America.

The important part is that this colony became Liberia, and the ex-slave population almost instantly enslaved the Africans living in that area.