#Democracy at work

[anteroom-of-death]

Would anyone out here be interested in one day me writing a reader x Gideon Shepherd song fic set to 'Put Me in a Movie' ??

#personal #the devil's hour #peter capaldi #Gideon shepherd #hes so brutal and ugh #feels like sugar in me #yY #poll time #democracy at work #fic writing #hes so fine #jsyk

[conflictgoblin]

#leftism #anti capitalism #unionize #democracy at work #anarchism #blair mountain #working poor #working class

[thelxiepia]

#democracy at work

[eggohomestylecunt]

#poll #polls #vanilla extract #democracy at work #not exactly popular enough on here to get this to spread but let's see what happens anyway #not 'extractly' if you catch my cringe

[theculturedmarxist]

#democracy at work #richard d wolff #elections #Youtube

[defensefilms]

A Brief Appreciation Of Richard Wolff

When I was younger, I remember attempting to explain to an entire classroom of stoners, how it was impossible to solve a lot of the problems of the wider world in our current dominant economic system.

I didn’t quite have the dialouge to explain how we were hindered by an economic system that doesn’t prioritize any of the things that actually benefit the people in it.

Among the many difficulties of articulating that, is the fact that there aren’t many solutions or alternatives that are discussed in the open.

 Whether it be in mainstream media, academia, or by the politicians of almost any country in the world. All these supposed cornerstones institutions, which supposedly exist to guide their country’s, and concern themselves with the well-being of it’s populous, and none are interested in looking at alternatives to an economic system that does not help to accomplish any of it’s people’s goals.

Guys like Richard Wolff are the kinds of speakers that help with that.

Surely, among the most important speakers of our lifetime and a staunch anti-capitalist and as the years have gone, Richard’s works seem to hit closer and closer to home regarding what is looking more and more like the downfall of an economic system that is so obsessed with growth, it has begun eating itself.

This is what I struggled to explain to my peers as a youth.

Does capitalism solve any of socitey’s major issues?

Starvation and malnutrition? Nah

Does it help house all people ? Nah, and in a lot of situations, like what you see in countries like Finland, is that it’s governments that end homelessness in their respective countries. On top of thar, I hate to break it to you, but housing poor people, isn’t profitable, so the real estate tycoons don’t even tangentially help with that.

What about unemployment?

I mean businesses and industries compensating workers and thus being able to increase profits, expand operations and hire more workers, is supposed to be this magic pill that ends unemployent, right? That way the existence of several large enterprises spread out across industries throughout the economy is supposed to solve that probelm right?

Only it doesn’t, because no one hires more workers than what they need, because that just bad business, and employing people isn’t the point of business, being profitable is.

Here’s the real twist though, through years of schooling, you’ve already been conditioned to believe that a lot of the things you have as recourse and protection are bad for you, or not in your personal interest.

For instance, do you want better conditions at work? Would be a whole lot easier if you could hold the people in charge accountable, kind of like what a union is supposed to do.

Only wait, you don’t believe in unions do you?.

In 2022, I no longer roll my eyes in despair, being stuck trying to explain this, while also not having any sources of information or media to help my case. In 2022, I can finally let go of feeling like the only man on earth that sees this bullshit.

Richard Wolff’s work undertakes the daunting task of undoing years and generations of misinformation and miseducation regarding an economic system that is the only thing people have ever known, and on top of that, contending with misappropriations like “Marxists want to take your property”.

What Richard Wolff’s work does is peel back at layers worth of information noise, that really came about in the 1950′s, back when capitalism had to protect itself against Soviet communism.

Most of what you believe about Marxism, socialism and stateism, were ideas first created during that time. Ideas created at a time when both capitalist and communist powers utilized propaganda to ensure their people didn’t consider alternatives.

What you missed in all that though, is that niether capitalism nor communism arbitrates or advocates for the workers owning the means of production and keeping the proceeds from what they create.

Among the most helpful of the ideas of which Wolff is a big proponent of, is that of worker-owned co-ops.

A worker owned co-op is the idea or structure, by which each and every worker of a company being entitled to an equal share of the profits, where as in a normal company structure only the ownership are entiled to a share of the proceeds.

If you think this stuff is pie in the sky, you need to wake up and smell the coffee.

The old capitalist structure and the businessman that built their fortunes in it, are failing everyday people, and alternatives aren’t an idea to be tried at a more opportune time, they are a neccesity right now, and people worldwide are noticing.

An article by the Labour Research Service about a printing company in Cape Town, South Africa, named the Finger Printing Co-operatice Ltd, that had to improvise when their printing machine (thier means of production) was siezed.

Of all the countries in the world, none are a better place to export the idea of worker owned co-operatives, than South Africa.

We have a large agricultural sector, mining and farming sectors, as well as manufacturing, but most importantly, we have people, the most important resource there is, is the human resources.

Allowing workers to collaborate to firstly own the materials, equipment and instruments they would need to do this work, and then share in the profits of whatever goods they create, services they provide, or whatever raw materials they mine/farm. 

This may be the best way to reach down to a sector of the economy that is even below the small businessman.

In short, South Africa is tailor made for worker owned co-operatives, and as stated in the Labour Research Service’s artice, the country already has a history of worker owned co-ops, going back to the 1980′s when manufacturing plants wouldn’t hire union employees.

Wolfe’s contributions to articulating the need for an alternate economic system have helped greatly in helping understand how the goverments, business and globalism have all created an economic system that only helps those at the top.

This was, and still is, no easy feat.

A lot of academic speakers that speak against capitalism, must couch their commentary or risk being seen as a pariah, a social miscrient, or a derelict. Sufficient to say speaking this way of the reality that is all anyone has ever known, comes at the risk of being discredited to no end.

This doesn’t deter Wolf at all.

He makes no bones about what the problem is, or what he is speaking against. This is not the academic who will leave breadcrumbs without being explicit about it. Wolfe’s approach is too straighforward for that, and he acknowledges that the workplace being where people spend most of the time, automatically makes it a hub of political activity.

That’s a very unpopular message, not just among the business class, but probably among segment of regular working people, who are discouraged, and even intimidated by speaking against thier work lives, the economic system and how our lives revolve around chasing money.

As global economics clamp down harder and put the costs back on to consumers, by far the hardest work there is, is letting people know there is a problem and for which the people will need to create  and implement alternatives.

Thankless work.

And it’s the reason why Richard Wolff is by far the most important speaker of his time.

#richard wolf #capitalism #anti capitalism #socialism #worker owned co-op #the gravel institute #democracy now #democracy at work #second thoughts #hasanabi #the young turks #sam seder #kyle kulinski #tim black #george monbiot #shark3ozero #chris smalls #joshua fluke #worker owned #richard wolff

[sistersatan]

#Capitalism #Democracy at work #economy #Philosophy #political #Sister Satan #Socialism #video #youtube #politics #housing #affordable housing #broken #professor Harvey #Anti-capitalist chronicles

[lazyhomestay]

*hey, it's for aspiration, not actual outcome

#tf nobel laureates #shockwave could've gotten all 6 #give the cat some credit #he handed over a working democracy and a viable economy #which he virtually built from scratch in 3 years #took george washington 4 years #it's going to take a while for ppl to recognize TC's cultural impact #ANODE HAS CURED DEATH #it started with the peace one #idw shockwave #idw tarantulas #tf anode #idw brainstorm #perceptor #sky-byte #megatron #starscream #idw transformers #maccadam

[captainkirkk]

Concept: One of the Bat kids starts a "Let us kill the Joker" petition on change.org and every single person in Gotham signs it except for Bruce Wayne

#yes this was inspired by the latest mbmbam episode #i just Cannot get the image of the bat kids arguing and someone whipping out a signed petition #and shouting ITS WHAT THE PEOPLE WANT #ITS DEMOCRACY AT WORK #hsjdjsksk #my posts #dc #batfamily #batman #dc headcanons

[archiephd]

So long as the political and economic system remains intact, voter enfranchisement, though perhaps resisted by overt white supremacists, is still welcomed so long as nothing about the overall political arrangement fundamentally changes. The facade of political equality can occur under violent occupation, but liberation cannot be found in the occupier’s ballot box. In the context of settler colonialism voting is the “civic duty” of maintaining our own oppression. It is intrinsically bound to a strategy of extinguishing our cultural identities and autonomy.

[...]

Since we cannot expect those selected to rule in this system to make decisions that benefit our lands and peoples, we have to do it ourselves. Direct action, or the unmediated expression of individual or collective desire, has always been the most effective means by which we change the conditions of our communities. What do we get out of voting that we cannot directly provide for ourselves and our people? What ways can we organize and make decisions that are in harmony with our diverse lifeways? What ways can the immense amount of material resources and energy focused on persuading people to vote be redirected into services and support that we actually need? What ways can we direct our energy, individually and collectively, into efforts that have immediate impact in our lives and the lives of those around us? This is not only a moral but a practical position and so we embrace our contradictions. We’re not rallying for a perfect prescription for “decolonization” or a multitude of Indigenous Nationalisms, but for a great undoing of the settler colonial project that comprises the United States of America so that we may restore healthy and just relations with Mother Earth and all her beings. Our tendency is towards autonomous anti-colonial struggles that intervene and attack the critical infrastructure that the U.S. and its institutions rest on. Interestingly enough, these are the areas of our homelands under greatest threat by resource colonialism. This is where the system is most prone to rupture, it’s the fragility of colonial power. Our enemies are only as powerful as the infrastructure that sustains them. The brutal result of forced assimilation is that we know our enemies better than they know themselves. What strategies and actions can we devise to make it impossible for this system to govern on stolen land? We aren’t advocating for a state-based solution, redwashed European politic, or some other colonial fantasy of “utopia.” In our rejection of the abstraction of settler colonialism, we don’t aim to seize colonial state power but to abolish it. We seek nothing but total liberation.

Voting Is Not Harm Reduction - An Indigenous Perspective

#indigenous action #2024 elections #voting #on one hand i think if one opponent is a mask off fascist white people have an obligation to vote against them As The Least We Can Do #but if that's all we're doing? that and bullying other people who see a futility in participating in a colonial institution of 'democracy'? #sorry but um. shut the fuck up #if we spent half as much energy on direct action to support each other in ways that help people REGARDLESS of who wins what election #as we did on yelling at Other Leftists about voting i think we would get a hell of a lot more actual shit done #and sure as hell help more actual real life people who we claim to be helping by yelling at other people to vote #i'm talking to me here like #our current blue harm reduction candidate actively supporting a genocide should make you feel like maybe this shit doesn't fucking work #because it doesn't <3 #harm reduction as the least we can do needs to be a call to action via vote AND actual action or it's not a call to anything at all #the least we can do needs to be motivating AND convicting #it's the least we can do so fucking do it. it's the least we can do so if that's All you do sit the hell down or stand the fuck up #for people who the status quo serves it needs to be the ballot AND the bullet or our ballot means fuck all for real liberation

[queerism1969]

#socialism #anti capitalism #marxism #communism #leftism #anarchism #left wing #eat the rich #fuck capitalism #working class #capitalism #current events #democratic party #democracy #democrats #democritus #democrazia

[sapphixxx]

Signalis, Authority, and History

There's a level of nuance to how Signalis presents the violence of the authority of the nation that doesn't call attention to itself but which I really appreciate. Which is basically just, all the officers and cops and spies who make life hell for people like the Gestalt mine workers, Ariane, and the Itou family--we get little glimpses into who they are in Adler and Kolibri's diaries and despite the propaganda and the authoritative tone they take in official communications, for the most part they don't seem to actually be particularly invested in the hard line of national ideology. They uphold it though, viciously, both because things were worse under imperial rule (we don't get hard details on what it was like but it's mentioned in passing enough that I believe it) and because they're scared that if they don't they will be decommissioned and easily replaced. They are literally stamped out of a production line after all. There's a subtext of well, if I don't do it my replacement will anyway and I'm not trying to die so what's the point of rocking the boat?

I think Kolibri stands out to me most clearly on this because in communications from the block warden regarding Ariane there is emphasis put on how it is unacceptable and suspicious that she should be so interested and invested in art and literature that does not serve the purpose of furthering the goals of the nation. But we know that Kolibris themselves are bookworms, Adlers are fiends for stimulating experiences, and both get miserable FAST when deprived of art and puzzles and entertainment and hobbies. Y'know, just like anyone. Far be it from being a paragon of The Nation only interested in productive labor, we are reminded that the block warden, too, hates this shitty town and wants to transfer but is denied. They're hypocrites, but not monsters, nor brainwashed puppets of the state.

The monstrousness at play is not contained within any particular subset of evil individuals, or even an inherent universal force of evil contained in the broad notion of The Nation. There is no cosmic evil force that makes them all do these things to each other. The monstrousness is within the social systems, the mechanisms of how authority perpetuates on a structural procedural level, held in place by fear and tangible threats of violence, each link in the chain restraining the next through those threats out of fear that if they don't, then they'll be next. Regardless how many, if any, of those people in this chain are true dogmatic hardliners, they must act as such because failing to do so opens them up to danger.

Here then I think of the quote that is so prominent, "Great holes secretly are digged where earth’s pores ought to suffice, and things have learnt to walk that ought to crawl", from Lovecraft's The Festival. This is not just a chilling abstract visual that conveniently evokes a mineshaft-- in Lovecraft's story, this line refers to worms which ate the decomposing bodies of wizards whose wretched souls had remained after death, complete with the terrible powers they gained through contracts with demons. Those worms inherited both their power, and also the evil. The Nation, despite having overthrown the Empire, is built on imperial technology, in particular Replikas and bioresonance. So too, then, we can imply that The Nation inherited with those things some of the monstrousness of The Empire as well. There is no end of history, nor clean break with the past, no matter how violently it may seem to be rejected. That which remains from the past--and something inevitably always does--creates the present.

This is a game that is not shy about evoking East Germany. And I think all of this provides a sophisticated picture of repressive authority that we rarely see in fiction of the English speaking world, especially in games. The year the S23 incident takes place is notably 84, but, frankly, I find this to be more compelling and illustrative than 1984 (and I'm a librarian and have taught English classes so I get to say that). Orwell, let's be honest, presents a fairly one dimensional picture of authority, where people seize power and wield it against others out of seeming mustache twirling evil or malice.

Here though we get a more humanistic view. Authority did not come from nowhere and is not wielded arbitrarily out of gleeful cruelty or mindless brainwashed allegiance. People aren't "just following orders". Individuals have rich inner lives. They make decisions, and those decisions are based in the context they're in. Even the decision to carry repressive tools of the past into the present is a decision that was made strategically with the big picture in mind. Nobody woke up and decided to be evil that day. Everyone operates on self interest, and, we must assume, an earnest desire for things to get better. Even the [spoiler] program which served as an inspirational demonstration of The Nation's power, you can imagine the chain of officers and bureaucrats who genuinely wanted the people of the nation to believe in the future, to confidently trust that everyone was working together towards something great and beautiful. And, through a long chain of those people who couldn't say "No" without being decommissioned, we ended up with something unbelievably cruel.

We get to know Adler and Kolibri and the other officers not to say well they're human too, maybe it wasn't so bad that they condemned all those people to agonizing suffering, but to remember that if we keep looking for true monsters we will not find them. There are no monsters and there are no demons. There are only people making decisions. A better world is possible. A better world, where Adler is just a paper pusher who does puzzles after work instead of signing papers to authorize torture, where Kolibris are librarians instead of spies and cops, where EULEs can gossip and play piano and ARARs can do maintenance on facilities that don't contain torture rooms, is one that would not have led to the Ariane and Elster's tragic cycle and ultimate end.

Authority and its attendant cruelty is not contained, radiating forth from The Great Revolutionary and Her Daughter, it is within the social systems of control. When those two women die, that cruelty will continue so long as those social systems continue. Like Lovecraft's worms, no matter how long dead the evil of the past is, so long as it continues to be fed upon, that evil will not only remain, but evolve into something new in the present. A better world can't be achieved through the death of the old world alone, even if violent overthrow is warranted. There is no end of history. There is no clean break from the past.

"Men make their own history, but they do not make it as they please; they do not make it under self-selected circumstances, but under circumstances existing already, given and transmitted from the past. The tradition of all dead generations weighs like a nightmare on the brains of the living."

Karl Marx, The Eighteenth Brumaire of Louis Bonaparte

#Signalis #Didn't include everything because this is already very long #But there's a lot to add to this kind of reading from other former Eastern Bloc states that go beyond a kind of braindead #Simplistic Authoritarianism bad communism bad freedom good type of view common in the English speaking world #That go more into well what is authority and how does it work and how has it remained durable and violent before during and after the cold #The Romanian movie Bad Luck Banging is very good for this in expressing how things have been more similar than different #Under monarchy fascism communism and liberal democracy over the last 150 years there #replika joker voice maybe the real monster is SOCIETY #op #quality content

[caffeinewitchcraft]

For once I relate to US politicians because I too am eating popcorn and not doing anything productive

#amazing work #caffeine chatter #this is a joke #I believe in some politicians #like eat the rich #consume the flesh of those who profit off our country’s bloated carcass of a democracy #yada yada

[joyboythehopepunk]

the end of capitalism is impossible (no, it is nigh)

or at least that is what people think.

people can imagine the end of the world easier than the end of capitalism.

they cannot fathom a society that doesn't need money. where people create things and do jobs not only because they enjoy them, but because their needs are actually being met by the civilization they're in.

i don't think people realize the state of our world. well. maybe they do, but they don't think deeply on how unnecessary and destructive it all is.

we produce things - food, entertainment, even lives - which we immediately discard. i mean this very literally. people do in fact do this with children.

some people lack so much self awareness that they don't really think about what it means to bring a child into this world. somehow they've forgotten how shitty it was for them. somehow they've forgotten how hard it was for their parents. or how our world has gotten progressively worse.

the climate crisis has reached a tipping point. our governments have not as been as useful as they could be. our technology is mostly used for nonsense and not furthering humankind/the planet.

we could be so much more.

ofc i am a disabled trans man of color. i work to make a living. i have not been lucky enough to be born into a wealthy family. or even a family that is particularly loving, if i'm being honest.

but i have been blessed in other ways. just as i have been cursed in other ways. some of them are connected. like my intelligence is a blessing and curse. as is my physical beauty. as is my awareness of these matters. my calling too.. to be involved in the spiritual world and cultivation..

many people before me have seen ways to end capitalism. even now we have those solutions.

i can't imagine advanced aliens live the way we do. that they use their technology to destroy and take. to subvert their own kind.

but maybe in their past they were like that.

i just hope we can get to a future where we're beyond this

#hopepunk #anti work #anti capitalism #late stage capitalism #democracy #republic #america #civilization #human rights #civil rights #indigenous folx #indigenous people #first nations #capitalism #conspiracy #government #us government #politics #anarchy #anarchocommunism #idk what you would call it #whatever star trek has but BETTER #not so much more of the same #bc you can tell those who created could barely fathom a way people live without some organization #but that is different than being ruled

[void-thegod]

We should have councils of people who are the best in any given field of knowledge:

Science

Medicine

Politics

History

Psychology

Sexuality/Gender

Economy

Ecology

Etc

They will be diverse - of many ethnicities, religious, genders, and backgrounds.

Have these councils come to various conclusions about how to save humanity in the most rational way.

That means dealing with the ultra rich.

That means dealing with the super corrupt "democracy" we have that still oppresses minorities

That means dealing with the military and prison industrial complexes

That means dealing with Western (and other types) Imperialism

That means dealing with corporations

That means dealing with the environmental disasters we've wrought.

#solarpunk #hopepunk #new civilization #civilization #politics #anarchy #democracy #socialism #anti work #anti capitalism #universal healthcare #universal basic income #voidpunk #queer #lgbtq #history #humanity #science #human rights #capitalism #late stage capitalism #climate crisis

[mrpinchy]

Thanks for throwing third party voters under the bus like that, loooooooove to see it.

not sure which post this is about but 3rd party voters aint doin anyone any favors so you're welcome i guess

#with all my heart i wish democracy worked the way its supposed to #i fuckin wish just voting for the candidate you believe in was enough to make things happen #unfortunately all the political power in this country is divided into 2 shitty parties #no matter HOW MUCH i wish 3rd party had a chance it literally never will and that's BY DESIGN