Elaborate and explain

  • MTK@lemmy.world
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    2 days ago

    I mean… Look around? Maybe billionaire is a new thing, but it is just modern royalty. We still have kings, they just got better PR.

  • surph_ninja@lemmy.world
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    2 days ago

    The billionaires, by convincing people the rich have a monopoly on violence.

    But if anything sparks collective violence, the rich are overthrown within a month.

    • Zachariah@lemmy.world
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      4 days ago

      That’s because—for many reasons—there are way too many non-billionaires on team billionaire.

      • SkaraBrae@lemmy.world
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        4 days ago

        I worked with a guy that proudly proclaimed that he voted for the right because they looked after the rich.

        He was not rich, but he purchased lottery tickets weekly and stated he’d rather get screwed while poor than pay more tax if he, some day, became rich.

        And that was the day I realised that we’re fucked.

          • madcaesar@lemmy.world
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            3 days ago

            I don’t, I feel like moron / stupid just doesn’t cut it for idiots like this. I honestly don’t know of an adjective the fully encapsulates the stupidty, childishness, and naivite of a regular person aligning with the super rich.

            • anomnom@sh.itjust.works
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              3 days ago

              Corporate brainwashed, delusional, desperate, uneducated, lazy, close-minded, coping human?

              The media is pushing “answer a few questions, or spin a wheel, and get rich”, and “sing in your car, then get famous on Idol” and getting huge ratings. Same way we got this fucking President. Corporate brainwashing.

  • Sam_Bass@lemmy.world
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    2 days ago

    Assuming the 8b were all of the same mind, they would win. But we all know there are quite a few that the billionaires could buy to fight for them

  • angrystego@lemmy.world
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    2 days ago

    Tje billionaires are winning now and the reasons are obvious.

    The 8 billion are unable to think clearly, identify problems and organize. The billionaires are focused on their goals and super influential. They’re able to buy loyality of the key less fortunate people and enforce loyality of others. They can also buy media to influence thinking of the masses.

    If it was just about numbers, the billionaires would lose. But it’s not.

  • Emil_Zatopek1982@lemmy.world
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    2 days ago

    Just stop believing that those 3000 are billionaires. If 8 billion people say “No, you are not rich” those fuckers become poor. Money is a religion.

  • breecher@sh.itjust.works
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    3 days ago

    Unfortunately that is not how the figures really are. Way too many of those 8 billions will willingly simp and fight the rest of us in the name of those billionaires.

  • JeSuisUnHombre@lemmy.zip
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    4 days ago

    If we decide money no longer matters it’d be petty easy to eliminate them all. If we continue to let money run our lives then it’ll continue to be pretty easy for the people with money to keep all their power.

    • UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world
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      4 days ago

      If we decide money no longer matters it’d be petty easy to eliminate them all

      Okay, but then where will I get my passive income? I worked 40 years in the shit and rusty needles mine to build up a big enough nest egg to get passive income. Now I’m too full of staff infections and lacerated limbs and shit lung to work anymore.

      I can’t afford not to make the next guy work himself to death in the shit rust needle mine.

      • John Richard@lemmy.world
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        4 days ago

        No one needs to work in a shit rust needle mine. Without money you would have community helping & taking care of you based on your needs & listening to your ideas. You would take as much as you need but as little as you can to live happily & work to contribute back.

    • blarghly@lemmy.world
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      4 days ago

      I mean… money does matter. It matters to the individual because it is how they pay their bills, and it matters to all of humanity because it is how we are able to take coordinated action despite the lack of any central organizer.

      • JeSuisUnHombre@lemmy.zip
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        4 days ago

        Taking money out of the picture would also take bills out of the picture. And humanity absolutely has the ability to coordinate action without money at least as well (if not better) than how it is now, the only difference is it would be harder for individuals to be the sole coordinator. Money, and who has it, is our current central organizer and will continue to burn the planet if we fail to take away its power.

        • agamemnonymous@sh.itjust.works
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          4 days ago

          humanity absolutely has the ability to coordinate action without money at least as well (if not better) than how it is now

          That’s a huge claim, you need to support that.

            • agamemnonymous@sh.itjust.works
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              3 days ago

              The huge claim is the present tense, “has the ability”. It’s not a huge claim to say that humanity has the potential to one day transcend money, but that wasn’t the claim. Humanity has a long road before that’s possible, it does not presently have the ability to continue to function if we just snapped our fingers tomorrow and eliminated money.

              An “ability” is not a vague notion bolstered by historical curiosities. An “ability” involves a detailed, immediately actionable plan that can be implemented in the modern economic landscape without destroying crucial productivity.

              Resources have to be allocated. People need to accept the resource allocation method in order to contribute their labor to do things that must be done. Money is an imperfect solution. Eliminating money leads to reinventing it (e.g. “energy credits”), reverting to less efficient models (e.g. barter), developing a central planning body that replaces wealth corruption with administrative corruption, or widespread social loafing where nothing gets done.

              Without an actual plan of implementation that gains the trust of the workers, there is no “ability”, merely aspiration.

              • JeSuisUnHombre@lemmy.zip
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                3 days ago

                I disagree with a few points you bring up, but beyond those, it sounds like your biggest problem with my statement is in the semantics. I don’t find that to be very useful when obviously the logistics of such a system are complicated enough to warrant a whole doctorate degree. Comments on social media between strangers with no verifiable education isn’t really the place to harp on precise wording and definitions. I think it’s possible for humanity to coordinate without money. Is that better? Or do you still disagree?

                • agamemnonymous@sh.itjust.works
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                  3 days ago

                  Semantics are how we communicate ideas. If you change the semantic content, you change the idea.

                  I think it’s possible for humanity to coordinate without money.

                  Depends on what you mean by possible. At some point in the remote future? Sure, I agree. At the present time? I disagree. We’re not there yet, and you can’t just snap your fingers and change the fundamental beliefs, and logistics administration, of 8 billion people overnight. Best case scenario that’s a multi-generational endeavor.

                  We can get there one day, we can’t outlaw money tomorrow.

        • blarghly@lemmy.world
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          4 days ago

          And humanity absolutely has the ability to coordinate action without money

          Please provide a non-authoritatian answer that has scaled and has produced advanced technology like modern medical devices and telecommunications devices.

          • JeSuisUnHombre@lemmy.zip
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            4 days ago

            While you’re correct that there are no examples of such a society*, that isn’t because money is crucial to development. It’s because the time of technological breakthroughs happened in a global capitalist economy. Just because that’s the way history played out doesn’t mean that was the only way it could’ve. Money didn’t invent those things, people did. They had the time and resources to make that stuff happen. And yes, they got those resources via a moneyed economy, but that doesn’t mean those same people couldn’t have gotten the same time and resources had they existed within say a library economy.

            *

            Not exactly a perfect society (what is) but the Incas developed cutting edge technology for the time within a moneyless society https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inca_technology

            • blarghly@lemmy.world
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              3 days ago

              I apologize for not being clear in what I was asking for. I didnt mean that I wanted an example of a society that, say, developed MRI technology outside the capitalist framework. I simply wanted an example of a society which could produce and use an MRI without the use of money or authoritatian force. They can have access to all the underlying science and technological know-how. But they need to get someone to mine the iron ore that will be smelted to be turned into streel which will become a tool which will be used in the manufacture of an MRI machine… without paying them.

              Problem being - no one wants to mine iron ore. There are limits on how much prestige a society can distribute, and little will go to iron ore miners. The actual benefit of the labor is so far removed that the likelihood for personal gratitude from a beneficiary is vanishingly small - for example, someone who has a torn meniscus diagnosed with an MRI is unlikely to send the iron ore miner a personal thank you card. Of course, we could pay our miner in clothes and food and housing - but then we’ve just reinvented money but less efficient. Seeing no personal benefit to breaking his back every day in a dark hole, out miner would want to find something else to do with his time, resilting in no iron ore, and thus, no MRIs.

              But I mean, prove me wrong.

              • JeSuisUnHombre@lemmy.zip
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                3 days ago

                I would again point to the Incas as a decent example. Though I kind of want to pick at your use of “money or authoritarian forces”.

                Money is currently used as an authoritarian force. It’s given those with money restrictive control over our daily lives. Look at all the censorship by those who control the major websites and payment processors on the internet. Look at the who lobbied the creation of infrastructure that forces most every person in the states to own and maintain a car. Look at how they’re working on dismantling our public education system. Our police and military exist to protect those with money. This is how capitalism works. Despite some lofty ideas of peace liberty and democracy for all, when the system is based around money everything else will get compromised.

                • blarghly@lemmy.world
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                  3 days ago

                  I read up on the Inca. Interesting. But I’m still doubtful they could build an MRI - I want a modern example.

                  And I’m certainly no fan of the current system - it sounds like you’re describing America, and yes, America is a bit of a shit show at the moment. But we should also remember that Sweden’s strong social safety nets, Finland’s excellent education system, and the Netherlands’ transportation infrastructure all exist in societies which use money.

                  Meanwhile, I don’t think eliminating money would really solve the problems you are looking to solve. Power-hungry people will seek power regardless of the system they find themselves in. If they don’t become capitalists, they become high-ranking bureaucrats and politicians.