Comments by "DeoMachina" (@DeoMachina) on "ContraPoints"
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Nothing is perfect or can be implemented correctly. You're talking about some theoretical, ideal version of capitalism, and you're the ONLY one using this definition. The rest of us are out here using the real definition, the one that corresponds to something that exists.
Also pretty weird that you'd argue against the natural progression away from capitalism by saying "It hasn't already happened yet so its bad" Like...what?
Also resorting to flat-out lies..is a concession. You're admitting that you have nothing here. "Immense benefits to everyone involved", like the people starving to death because they cannot afford to live in a society where extortion is the norm? Where most people in poverty have jobs and SHOULD be able to afford to live? What IS their benefit?
Speaking of monopolies, you're aware that free-trade societies move towards monopolies regardless if governments get involved or not right? Did Microsoft achieve dominance with state assistance? No, they just bought the competition. Notice how 50 years ago there were so many more companies than there are now? Half a dozen boardrooms now own 100% of the media produced in your country. Monopolies aren't great, but capitalism creates them too.
How come paying taxes is violence, yet jacking up the prices to cull the poor isn't? They're both legal, they both happen...so why is only the one you don't like violence?
As for the NHS, no you really don't know what I'm on about. I made that clear at the start. Incase you didn't know, the ruling party do not believe in socialised healthcare. So when put in charge of it, they proceeded to sell off and dismantle the institution, all while making themselves significant amounts of money in the process. And then you come along and say "oh it's because socialised medicine is bad", despite the frequent rebuttals I offered.
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If you think Hong Kong and early USA are "good" examples, there is a high probability you are a sociopath. In Hong Kong TODAY, people are sleeping in tiny cages because they cannot afford rent. The early days of the USA is maybe the worst example you could have chosen, with absolutely zero rights for workers, they were overworked, underpaid and lived lives of absolute misery. Sure there was profit, but like I said if that's your measure than you might simply not have the mental faculties to understand what I'm talking about.
What you're talking about IS impossible to achieve. Want to know what happened to the early USA? The state evolved and got bigger. You're basically telling tadpoles "No guys, just stay as you are! There's millions of tadpoles in the world after all". That's why this IS capitalism, this is where that path leads. This isn't a flaw of implementation, this is necessarily the result of little to no state control, and freedom of enterprise. There are no other ways this could have ended up.
If you're going to deny that Microsoft was a monopoly, then I'm just going to ignore that paragraph. It's not up for debate. Their market share was one of the highest ever, the entire industry was geared to providing for one company.
In regard to taxes, it's fair to say that use of coercion is violence. However your attempt at a counterargument is to simply deny that violence you're ok with is happening. But you know that it is happening, you simply don't care. My sociopath theory is actually looking like it could be the truth. Your response to the fact that people are having to choose between rent and medical care is "Oh, but companies aren't trying to kill you! They're just out to make money!" Like..you think that's a justification? People are dying in the streets because of this.
At this point you need to stop contradicting me concerning the whys and hows of a country you know nothing about, a health organisation you have done zero reading on run by a government you haven't even heard of. You're clearly not interested in actual facts, and I am certainly not interested in your hypotheticals.
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Oh, you actually wanted to know about my level of wealth and standard of living? It's not just a rhetorical question? Why? If I said I was actually dirt poor, would that alone change your mind? Of course not, you already knew poor people exist. And if I said I was middle-class, would you take that as some kind of point scored on your behalf? By the sounds of it yes, you seem to actually believe that my being comfortable means that it doesn't matter that millions of people in my country are not. And that's so absolutely bizarre I don't think it deserves a serious answer. So we won't be distracted by that red herring.
"Poverty will always exist" Does that justify making it worse? Just because a few thousand people are poor, does that make it okay to let 300000 become poor? No, you're not even making an argument here. I'm telling you that poverty is getting worse and your response is "poor people exist, yes". You realise how close that is to a concession, yeah?
I actually haven't advocated murder or theft at all, you made that up. You just decided to tell a lie, as if I wouldn't notice. Am I really going to get a moral lecture from a liar? Because I don't really feel like listening.
You're going on and on about "true capitalism", as if it could ever be brought about. Those 'cronies' you talk about don't want it to exist, and they can pay lots of money to make sure it never exists. So what are you gonna do? Kill them?
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If coercion exists in a capitalistic society, then it is necessarily part of the capitalistic system. It's not like we're able to opt out.
And I don't think you understand, the government is intentionally sabotaging the NHS. It was previously of a very high quality and had been for decades. You might argue that if healthcare was always private they wouldn't be able to, and you'd be correct, but by the same token it's capitalism that incentivises this campaign in the first place.
You're still dead wrong about private over public by the way, the old social housing schemes in the UK were far superior to any private equivilent you'll find today for similar money, and I've already provided other examples. Depending on what sector you work in, you would not believe some of the bizarre and inefficient mechanisms employed by private companies. You might ask "Well, why would a private company stand to lose profit like that?" and the answer is the same for public organisations: People simply not caring, or getting paid anyway. Industries I've worked in used to be infamously inefficient, because the profit margins were wide enough that nobody thought it was worth taking care of.
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By resorting to lying, you might as well just type "Yeah you're right sorry man", because that's all I can interpret from this delusional post.
Lennon was not reporting on things that were public knowledge. The identities of the people going into that trial were secret for a reason. They did not check this prior to filming, nor could they reasonably guarantee that they could keep it that way. You are lying.
This is not a left-leaning country, and it never has been. You cannot blame the left alone for PC culture. You cannot even demonstrate that it's as bad as you say it is. Notice how all the whinging about PC culture is coming from far-right publications? What, you think that's a coincidence? They're liars.
"They" didn't take immigration too far. But some newspapers said that they did. Not our fault you're stupid enough to have believed them.
But if the masses wanted to stop immigration, why didn't they vote for parties that would stop immigration? This is a democracy, why do your needs hijack the needs of the majority? Vote BNP if you care so much about it. Until then, it's not your call to make.
If you think a non-existent "left" is to blame for extremism, you're wrong. Nobody wakes up and says "Wow, those people are pretty left-wing, guess I better join a neo-nazi gang!". That's ridiculous.
You're lying again, left-wing politicians all over denounce riots, violence and intimidation. You're making this up, you are a liar.
You keep banging on about the failure of the left, how old are you? There's hasn't been a left in decades. You've never seen the left in action. This, ALL of this, is the product of the right-wing.
You demand we give conspiracy theorists and people who call for genocide some kind of platform, as if there's some kind of compromise that can be made here. There isn't, that's like asking me to choose a hand to be amputated. The answer is "Neither".
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IQ cannot be measured. Want to know how I know? Because I know what the Q stands for.
This is irrelevant though, the fact remains that inequality would still exist even if there were no trait differences, because capitalism requires them to exist.
Poverty still existed in places where the market was free, there's absolutely nothing preventing anybody from going through the same motions we have in today's capitalist societies. If a few particuarly skilled people get rich and purchase the means of production of something everybody needs, and puts the prices up because they can, everybody else gets poorer.
By the way, suggesting that coercion is consent is completely disgusting, and you do not get to talk to me about morality because of this.
(Here's an edit for a question I missed)
For the deaths attributed to capitalism, see events like the opium wars, the exploitation of newly-discovered countries for profit, going to war against Iran four times just to sell oil, the genocide and removal of native populations, and we might as well throw climate change in there too while we're at it.
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-Correct, you didn't say shut up. I'm paraphrasing, but you clearly believe that people shouldn't be saying the things Contra is saying. So, yeah. Nice one, you pointed out that my quote was not a real quote. As if that was somehow in question? Hey, here's an idea, how about you stop embarrassing yourself with bizarre comparisons, and I'll quit pointing them out?
Nothing I said implies a "for us or against us" mentality, you made that up. Congrats, most of your post is attacking a position I never took. Did I say deranged? Institutionalised might be a better word.
"No invention required", no, you definitely made up an anecdote where you compared Contra to somebody that ignores the plight of the needy, despite having no evidence to support that this is a fair character judgement. The fact that wounded soldiers overcome their losses is so completely seperate to the topic at hand, it's legitimately concerning that you're even coming back to double down on it. Like...if what you just wrote seems reasonable in your head, you have serious issues. Get help.
Seriously, your response to "that's not a fair call to make" is "NooOooo you idiot liberal, I've REALLY met vets that improved themselves!!"? Are you drinking right now?
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Pretty weird how you brag about having a 'coherent world view' when you contradict yourself. You oppose all violence and coercion, yet you're happy to have laws and jails and mental asylums? What are laws, if not simply "things you want"?
Words like overworked and underpaid are not arbitrary, they can be objective.
The employees at Amazon who reguarly collapse at work are being overworked, you have no rebuttal for that claim.
People the world over are working as much as they can, yet they still can't make rent. That's being underpaid. This is objective, you have no comeback for this. You can bleat "find another job" like it's some kind of mantra to protect you from reality, but it rings hollow. Even you understand why you're wrong, you're just pretending. And it's obvious. When the alternative is death, it's not a free choice. It is coercion. You have failed to even attempt to argue against this point.
Calling the USA at any point in history "socialist" is a lie, you know you're lying so I don't need to bother writing a rebuttal for that.
Denying Microsoft had a monopoly is a sign you've never actually looked up what the word "monopoly" means, consider at least researching the next subject you want to embarrass yourself about.
Interesting you'd make an anology about 100 people in the jungle, because what capitalism has brought is: One person that owns all the trees, while the others have no homes because they can't own any trees. Sure, that one guy might have wormed his way into his position by consensus, but that doesn't mean the other 99 aren't dying of exposure. It doesn't mean they were not tricked. You seem to think that because that one guy never personally killed anybody, everybody else should die before he loses so much as a twig. Unsustainable, indefensible. Fucking weird too, considering you're one of the 99 dying guys. Like, you're batting for a team that will never sign you. Why?
The last paragraph really is the end, the sad thing is that I've hardly done any actual arguing here, you're the one discrediting yourself. You clearly have never attempted to enter a career, and you have no sympathy for those that do. You're a child with little or no work experience, and so I think you're just done, dude. You're trying to lecture adults about something you've never seen. Like...stop.
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I mean, I was trying to be nice by dropping a hint about the 'Q' in 'IQ', but it looks like I'll have to be explicit:
The stands for Quotient. It's not a measurment of anything, by definition. It's logically impossible.
Capitalism can pull people out of poverty, yes, but it also maintains poverty and plunges people into poverty.
You think I'm whining about relative inequality, but I'm actually complaining that people who have fulltime jobs cannot afford a home, food and fuel all at once. And these people are growing in number.
Like, what more are you going to ask of them? They are following all the rules, working hard, sometimes too hard, and they cannot afford to live.
While capitalism does not necessarily require coercion, you cannot deny that exploitation and coercion go hand-in-hand with capitalism. I can't think of a single contract I was 100% happy to sign, but I signed them all because the alternative would be to have no electricity, no job, no education and nowhere to live. The alternative is death.
>private businesses cannot go to war
What do you think PMC stands for?
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Citing Peterson is essentially a concession, so we'll drop that for now. Suffice it to say you're not equpped for that discussion. And as I said above it is irrelevant to the point that you have conveniently stopped talking about.
You keep blaming poor people for being poor, why is that? They're not the ones who decide how much they should earn. You keep trying to suggest that they're violent, or addicts, or unable to make smart descisions about where to spend their money. Anything except the actual cause. Weird how you also blame government intervention, but you just can't help yourself from characterising those in poverty as necessarily bad people. You're revealing more about your true beliefs than you realise. Maybe you don't even know these are your beliefs yet.
'Poverty is relative' is irrelevant, a little less filler please.
Not only does UK welfare fail to provide enough money for people, the UK welfare system is designed to punish the poor and make it difficult to stay in receipt of their payments. The UK government has already spent hundreds of millions of pounds on fighting legal battles against people who had every right to claim welfare, yet were denied it for spurious or false reasons. I bring this up because it is the pro-capitalists who are responsible for this. People who claim to believe that capitalism will uplift the poor. Well, we can see it getting worse, not better.
Claiming capitalists all want peace and consent is a bold lie, especially since the system necessarily eliminates the least profitable means of production. Being moral is less profitable, so a company that pushes the boundries makes more money. Given enough time, it becomes the new standard practice. You can't just say "Well that's not capitalism", any more than you can say that a fruit is not part of a tree.
Again you blame the victims of exploitation for being exploited. Interesting that you decry people for being selfish and self-centred for complaining about contracts, but what are they actually complaining about? That's right, contracts that were written by selfish, self-centred bosses. You cannot have this both ways. Either accept that exploitation is built into the system, or take back what you said about those who point it out.
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