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"Is Capitalism NECESSARILY Racist?"

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On 8/15/2020 at 12:39 PM, Eiuol said:

As far as exploitation goes, there isn't anything to say except that I think it's insane that profit is viewed as exploitive by definition.

That's what "exploitation" means to a communist.  There's nothing more to it than profit + moral disgust.  You can go through any communist screed and simply replace the term "exploitation" with any synonym for trade or exchange and the meanings remain precisely the same - but without any connotations of malevolence.

The root problem with this piece is the flat refusal to distinguish the power of money from the power of a gun.  It's not the problem I personally find most offensive (that would be the suggestion that everyone with dark skin is somehow a victim of the modern free market, literally incapable of fending for themselves unless their white-skinned superiors take pity on the poor ol' darkies) but that's the most fundamental problem.

On 8/15/2020 at 2:45 PM, Eiuol said:

In a way, no Marxist would try to find the essentials of some concept. That's just not how their philosophical system would work.

In another sense, she could say:."it doesn't matter what the essence is, because exploitation and expropriation are inherent in the system; capitalism will always eat itself from the inside out". Even the essence of something can be harmed or hindered by some nonfundamental characteristic of that something.

Yeah.  Any point which should be logically argued out is simply assumed (or defined by fiat), after which the rest of the essay is filled with potemkin arguments against straw men.

 

On 8/18/2020 at 9:20 AM, StrictlyLogical said:

To assume racism only takes that form, no matter where or when capitalism is instituted, is to attribute an intrinsic hierarchy of domination (implicitly, an intrinsic imbalance of capability, intellect, merit) of whites over blacks which is a highly racist idea.

I'm telling you, man.  The "antiracists" are just a new flavor of white supremacists with guilty consciences.

 

There was this debate I saw a few years ago, over the propriety of affirmative action, which has always stuck with me.  After being told over and over again that he was a racist and a white supremacist, the man arguing against affirmative action finally asked why a raw, unvarnished meritocracy would be racist.

Pro:  "Because then white people would end up filling all the positions of power."

Con:  "No, no; we're only talking about talent.  Why would it be racist to hire for those positions exclusively on the basis of merit?"

Pro:  "Because if it's by merit then white, heterosexual men will always win."

Con:  "Oh my god - you're the white supremacist, here!"

Pro:  "What?  No; that's ridiculous.  What are you talking about?"

Con:  "Yes, you are the white supremacist; you just feel badly for being one!"

 

That's the essence of this phenomenon.  They're not even black supremacists; they truly believe that all talent, intelligence and power lies with those who have light skin.  They're just morally opposed to power or talent, as such.

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On 8/19/2020 at 6:07 AM, StrictlyLogical said:

I suppose this is either shockingly obvious or astonishingly erroneous.  In either case, I need reevaluate my use of time and my hierarchy of values. 

I thought it was pretty good.  Here's that debate I mentioned:

The bit about "a white supremacist with a guilty conscience" happens about 27 or 28 minutes in.

 

P.S:

 

If you're wondering whether I'm saying that the author of this article has precisely the same white supremacist complex as the man in my video - yes, I am.  They stand for the same ideas for the same reasons; the guy in the video is far less eloquent about it (I don't think the author would ever be caught admitting to her white supremacy) but it is essentially the same thing.

And the only difference between this type of white supremacy and the usual one (the guys with the Nazi tattoos who run around screaming about "white power") is that this variety thinks that being powerful is necessarily to be morally evil.

 

There are a few new twists on the barnyard collectivism we can see here.  But it's not an essentially new species.

Edited by Harrison Danneskjold
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On 4/8/2022 at 11:43 AM, SardonicIconoclast said:

Harrison makes the bold claim that BLM is a white supremacist faction hell bent on taking rights away from white people.

Damn straight.  I can quote you any contemporary article which advocates precisely that (most recently with Jon Stewart).  In fact, why don't we make it fun and have YOU pick the article, and if it does in fact advocate for the guilty white supremacy I speak of then I'll tell you precisely where and how?

On 4/8/2022 at 11:43 AM, SardonicIconoclast said:

In reality the USA just got rid of its "anti white-slavery" laws on about 12 different state constitutions in the late 1990s. Those laws were technically unenforceable since 1965.. they were kept as a "protest" against the GREAT EVIL of white women being able to legally consent to sex and marriage with Black, Chinese, and Native American men.  Now that Black peeps finally started defending themselves and are fighting backin some cases, the "white extinction" victimhood cult has taken the nation by storm.  Their claim that Jews are replacing their good white Christian selves - is Hitler level White Cowardice.  He said the same thing in Mein Kampf. Race mixing was an obsession with the Nazis and the KKK.   You think the "Aryan Pride" (Christian Identity) peeps are small in number now?

I don't really give a damn about the repeal of whatever laws you're mentioning - because I don't give a damn about race.

 

From a genetic standpoint the children of interracial marriages are likely to be healthier than their monoracial counterparts, because the entire human species is remarkably inbred.  There is less genetic diversity between a black man and a white man than there is between any random pair of chimpanzees in any troop in Africa.

From a human rights perspective - who cares?  Even if the children of monoracial marriages might be less healthy than their interracial counterparts, I think that matter is between they and their doctors and absolutely nobody else.

Race-mixing is just not on my radar.  Nor will it ever be.

 

It's interesting that you speak of "Black peeps defending themselves" and imply that there are many Nazis throughout America, though.

There aren't many actual Nazis in America.  There are plenty of Communists, and even more people who are simply confused on the whole issue, but not many open Nazis.

And what do you mean about "Black peeps defending themselves"?  Do you mean the fiery but mostly peaceful summer of love; the summer of 2020, which only led to several billion dollars of uninsured property damage and only a few dozen human lives lost?

 

Remember in 2019 when Neonazis ran through the streets screaming about white power and chanting to kill all the non-whites, killed several dozen people and burned entire cities to the ground?  Wait - was that 2019 or 2018?

Wait - I know.  Was it about those two Neonazis who grabbed Jussie Smollett in the street one night, poured bleach on his head, screamed "this is MAGA country", put a noose around his neck and vanished into the night (because their skin color matched that of the night)?

Oh, wait, I know!  You're talking about that Anti-Fascist in portland who saw a random white stranger who happened to be wearing a MAGA hat, said "we got one here", ran up and shot him in the chest without so much as a howdy-do, right?

Maybe you're talking about Kyle Rittenhouse, who certainly mowed down hundreds of innocent black people (because the BLM riots mainly consisted of black people and not middle-class spoiled white brats who deserved a very good spanking).  Or maybe you're talking about the guy who drove his van into a Thanksgiving-day parade in Wisconsin shortly after Rittenhouse was acquitted, because he genuinely believed that all of his friends and neighbors were actual Nazis?  Because everyone on TV and in his personal life simply parroted that line over and over again without a single nanosecond of critical thought?

 

I'm confused now.  Could you please clarify what you mean by that?

 

On 4/8/2022 at 11:43 AM, SardonicIconoclast said:

Between 2010 and 2050, Jews will  indeed "replace" the existing populace of the planet by growing 2 million in number.  But compared ot the 748 million that Christians will grow in the same period, and the 1.3 billion Muslims.. I'de say the other two groups of Abrahamic asshats can weather the sturm.   I mean storm.  Next century won't be about that. It will be about India, China, and Russia taking their place as the leaders of the world, boosting their IQs with generation after generation of CRISPR babies, while the USA devolves  into a possible century long Civil War, nuking itself repeatedly until none of us remain alive.

With the exception of the "nuking itself until none of us remain alive" bit, the rest of that doesn't sound that bad?

 

As an atheist I think it would be better if more atheistic children were born, obviously.  But I'm not against the creation of new human beings, on principle, and maybe the Indians or the Chinese will manage to figure out the problems that we Westerners simply cannot at present?  That would be a good thing for absolutely everyone.

 

Quote

To match your over-generalization, I've noticed a good number of folks who make claims like "all leftists are communists"

are themselves victims of exploitation - in particular and by no fault of their own have suffered massive brain damage by way of lead poisoning.  IQ loss was estimated to be up to 6 points and for some, more than 7 points.

On 4/8/2022 at 11:43 AM, SardonicIconoclast said:

I should mention the rest of that stuff on lead:

  • Lead from gasoline blunted the IQ of about half the U.S. population, study says
  • Leaded gas was banned in 1996, but exposure to the poison cost people born before then several IQ points on average, researchers estimated.
  • For people born in the 1960s and the 1970s, when leaded gas consumption was skyrocketing, the IQ loss was estimated to be up to 6 points and for some, more than 7 points.

source:  During the 3rd-wave of the Red Scare, America's IQ plummeted

If this is directed at myself, I don't think you want to get into an IQ-measuring-contest with me.  Nor do I think you should start bragging about the cleanliness of Chinese air.  Let's just drop all of that right here and forget about it - okay?

 

---

 

Fundamentally, you seem to think that I've actually been advocating for brazen white supremacy.  This may be a shortcoming in my attempts at sarcasm (I have been told that I'm sarcasm-impaired) but I wasn't nor would I.

What I've been attacking, and will continue to attack until the heat-death of the universe, is racism.  And the guilty form of white supremacy (which states that white people can't have any rights because if they do then they'll simply take over everything) is, among other things, extremely racist.

And although it declares all white people to be selfish, back-stabbing and morally inferior, it absolutely does not characterize us as helpless or weak.  The entire crux of the ideology is that we are stronger and smarter than anyone else, which is specifically why we must be restrained.

The intellectuals tell us that a good work ethic is white supremacy; non-whites simply cannot do it.  Showing up on time is white supremacy.  Obeying the law is white supremacy.  One article said that refraining from smoking crack while you are pregnant is white supremacy which we cannot expect black mothers to adhere to!

I'm sure the literal KKK would agree with that last bit - that black mothers physically cannot help themselves; they must smoke more crack.  The only difference between the current Grand Wizard and the author of that article is that one thinks that creating new crack babies is morally wrong, while the intellectual disagrees.

 

It's white supremacy with a guilty conscience.  Pure and simple.

Edited by Harrison Danneskjold
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17 hours ago, Harrison Danneskjold said:

The root problem with this piece is the flat refusal to distinguish the power of money from the power of a gun.  It's not the problem I personally find most offensive (that would be the suggestion that everyone with dark skin is somehow a victim of the modern free market, literally incapable of fending for themselves unless their white-skinned superiors take pity on the poor ol' darkies) but that's the most fundamental problem.

The idea that anti-racists are just as racist as White supremacists (through the "soft bigotry of low expectations") is a false equivalence between the far left and the far right. In real life, the far right are far more racist (with huge consequences to their actions, such as crack downs on immigration and opposition to globalism. Hate crimes are also a problem, but their probability is much smaller).

 

15 hours ago, Harrison Danneskjold said:

From a genetic standpoint the children of interracial marriages are likely to be healthier than their monoracial counterparts, because the entire human species is remarkably inbred.  There is less genetic diversity between a black man and a white man than there is between any random pair of chimpanzees in any troop in Africa.

Nah, chimps are probably more inbred than humans because their population is way less (high genetic distance between different populations of chimps could actually be suggestive of more inbreeding).

 

17 hours ago, Harrison Danneskjold said:

There was this debate I saw a few years ago, over the propriety of affirmative action, which has always stuck with me.  After being told over and over again that he was a racist and a white supremacist, the man arguing against affirmative action finally asked why a raw, unvarnished meritocracy would be racist.

Pro:  "Because then white people would end up filling all the positions of power."

Con:  "No, no; we're only talking about talent.  Why would it be racist to hire for those positions exclusively on the basis of merit?"

Pro:  "Because if it's by merit then white, heterosexual men will always win."

Con:  "Oh my god - you're the white supremacist, here!"

Pro:  "What?  No; that's ridiculous.  What are you talking about?"

Con:  "Yes, you are the white supremacist; you just feel badly for being one!"

 

That's the essence of this phenomenon.  They're not even black supremacists; they truly believe that all talent, intelligence and power lies with those who have light skin.  They're just morally opposed to power or talent, as such.

He's probably right. In a meritocratic system, based only on talent or merit, White men would probably come out on top. And no, this has nothing to do with genetics.

Considering the case of India: most of the historical "talented" geniuses were Brahmins or other upper castes (who form around 5% of India's population). Bhaskara II (mathematics, 1100AD) was a Marathi Brahmin.  Subrahmanyan Chandrasekhar (astrophysics, Nobel Prize) was a Tamil Brahmin. Srinivasa Ramanujan was a Tamil Brahmin. Satyendra Nath Bose (boson-fermions,  Bose–Einstein condensate) was a  Bengali Kayastha (upper caste). C. V. Raman (Nobel Prize) was a Tamil Brahmin. Venkatraman Ramakrishnan (Nobel Prize) was a Tamil Brahmin. Rabindranath Tagore (Nobel Prize) was a Bengali Brahmin. Amartya Sen (Nobel Prize in Economics) was a Bengali Vaidya (upper caste). G. N. Ramachandran (Ramachandran plots) was a Tamil Brahmin. There are several other examples (and these people can all be from different ethnic groups in India, but still all magically happen to be upper caste/Brahmin). Tamil Brahmins form around 0.143% of India's population (if merit/talent had nothing to with caste privilege/history and was entirely due to genetics, Tamil Brahmins would have had a 1/10^9 [one in a billion] chance of winning 3 Nobel Prizes). Here is one article related to this.

This trend continues somewhat when it comes to Indians in the US (where there is no caste system): the CEOs of Adobe, Google, IBM, Microsoft and Twitter are all Brahmins (or other upper castes). Sundar Pichai is Tamil Brahmin. Kamala Harris's mother is also Tamil Brahmin. Assuming they are in that position on the basis of merit (selected by Americans who are mostly clueless about caste), their historical caste privilege influenced their talent/merit. Here is an article about this.

Aside from this, you could look at the test scores of people from different castes : upper castes score much better than lower castes. Both lower castes as well as Muslims (who form around 15% of India's population) perform worse on standardised tests (such as JEE) in India. If you were to judge them on talent/merit, they would be at the bottom. I'm not a Brahmin or White supremacist and do not believe in the caste system (or racial discrimination). However, the fact remains that, if you design a meritocratic system based purely on talent, White men would probably come out on top (and that has nothing to do with genetics). Also, not acknowledging that fact can perpetuate racism/ caste system. In India as well as outside, upper castes tend to achieve more than lower castes in completely meritorious settings. However, people who don't acknowledge that it's related to their historical caste privilege sometimes end up believing that upper castes are superior (I have met some Indians who believe that talent/merit have nothing to do with their caste privilege, that these people are more meritorious because of their caste and that upper castes are innately superior).

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16 hours ago, Harrison Danneskjold said:

And the guilty form of white supremacy (which states that white people can't have any rights because if they do then they'll simply take over everything) is, among other things, extremely racist.

And although it declares all white people to be selfish, back-stabbing and morally inferior, it absolutely does not characterize us as helpless or weak.  The entire crux of the ideology is that we are stronger and smarter than anyone else, which is specifically why we must be restrained.

The intellectuals tell us that a good work ethic is white supremacy; non-whites simply cannot do it.  Showing up on time is white supremacy.  Obeying the law is white supremacy.  One article said that refraining from smoking crack while you are pregnant is white supremacy which we cannot expect black mothers to adhere to!

You don't need to agree with people who make similar claims, but you should first try to understand the essentials of their argument. You think leftists are dumb enough to inadvertently claim that non-White people/lower castes are incapable? But that's not the argument they're actually making; it's simply a mischaracterization (not saying I agree with them, but you don't understand their argument).

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20 hours ago, Harrison Danneskjold said:

You can go through any communist screed and simply replace the term "exploitation" with any synonym for trade or exchange and the meanings remain precisely the same - but without any connotations of malevolence.

No you can't, Communists are not against trade, they are against profit. 

20 hours ago, Harrison Danneskjold said:

They're not even black supremacists; they truly believe that all talent, intelligence and power lies with those who have light skin. 

As murda said, you just don't understand the argument. It doesn't sound like you read the article in question either. They don't think that white people gained their power through something about their genetics. They think that many minorities have been denied what they deserve. The article goes further to suggest that capitalism, as developed by colonial powers, further denied these people what they deserve, which created a power differential. It's hard and nigh impossible to overcome someone who has gained power by destroying your livelihood and your rights. Where the story goes wrong, though, is blaming capitalism. 

3 hours ago, human_murda said:

However, people who don't acknowledge that it's related to their historical caste privilege sometimes end up believing that upper castes are superior (I have met some Indians who believe that talent/merit have nothing to do with their caste privilege, that these people are more meritorious because of their caste and that upper castes are innately superior).

Sometimes I find that many people who are not leftists do not care to talk about the nature of an existing social structure. Not to say that leftists have the proper analysis, but they shouldn't have the monopoly on discussing how social structures impact people. 

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