[_The Earthling_]

Re: Thanksgiving Day: Let's Be Thankful for Billionaires

Have you ever done something and ended up saying "Wow, that was worth the work I put in. Actually, it was MORE than worth the work I put in!" That's profit. That's "exploitation". If what you make is worth more than the effort it took, you become a leader in capitalism. Then more and more people join you in producing things worth more than the effort they took to make.

He's not going to "get" this abstract stuff, and he probably also doesn't know or care what shirtwaists are. We have to speak about things he understands.

Take Polish porn. You take sex, something people will do for free, and you do it in front of a camera that you already have. No costs, little effort, and yet you end up with something valuable - Polish porn. That's profit. When you hear the word "profit", think Polish porn.

In fact, it's so profitable that you download it for free, yet they still keep making more. So if you like free stuff, support capitalism.

If you've ever done something and then said "What a waste of time, all that effort and now I've got nothing to show for it" - that's a lack of profit. In capitalism you are kept safely out of the way. In leftist systems, you end up in charge of something, and now you're wasting other people's effort and leaving nothing to show for it.

Communist countries never made porn, Cuba and North Korea don't even have camgirls. But imagine if you made a porn movie where you had fat ugly Americans screwing in swamp while mosquito bite them. Lots of effort for a useless product. That's unprofitable activity.

[Red Army]

Re: What does exploitation mean? A commie VS cappie debate.

It is evident to me that nobody here understand Marx, and that includes my friend Peter.First of all, exploitation occurs. It is when you produce something for others. And it happens both in Capitalist and Communist societies. And it is ok that it happens. It is the effect of working.


Problem is who gets the profit of this exploitation.


For example: when in a hypothetic communist Arab country, some workers go everday to the oil exploitation, and make billions a day in profit, you are not expecting that they get billions every day, aren't you? If so, no worker would want to work in a, let's say, shoe shop, for cents a day. This would create a new class of uber rich, while mantaining the rest of society in poverty.


So who gets the benefits of exploitation is the real question. In capitalist countries, it is the owner of the company. Mostly other companies (investments firms) but also mom & pops who own little business are getting more than what they work for, if they have employees.


In bureaucratic pseudo communist countries, the bureaucrats get it. Like the Castro in Cuba, and the CP in China.


In a communist society, the profit is evenly divided among all the society and becomes common property, and workers together decide the destination of it.


But exploitation occurs in every society there is.


Even Sundar Pichai is exploited by Google, and you would not tell by the car(s) he drives.

[Jeb Stuart Thurmond]

Re: What does exploitation mean? A commie VS cappie debate.

...some workers go everday to the oil exploitation, and make billions a day in profit, you are not expecting that they get billions every day, aren't you?

Lots of oil workers basically do, judging by how local separatist movements always pop up the moment a place strikes oil. Scotland, Texas, Alberta, those are just the ones that came to mind.

I wonder if the "resource curse" is not a real thing, it's just that when you have oil, you also usually need a dictatorship ruthless enough to crush the inevitable separatists.

That's politics for you. Politics makes people dumb. Dumb dumb politics. Which brings us to...

In a communist society, the profit is...common property, and workers together decide the destination of it.

Have you ever watched what happens when multiple people must together decide the destination of ANYTHING?

Politics. Politics. Politics.

We need less politics, not more.

When you have needs that you want satisfied, where do you go for quicker results? City hall or a shopping mall? Pennsylvania Avenue or a hipster boutique street?

Under communism this store would actually be black market. Which is not as cool as it sounds.

Which would you rather be doing? Browsing Che Gevera t-shirts on Amazon with one-click same-day shipping, or trying to convince a Texan roughneck that no, he didn't actually put that oil in the ground himself?

Just another day in paradise.

90% of politics consists of people complaining about the state of politics. 90% of commerce consists of people contently buying things they judge to be worth the money - and the other 10% consists of rants ending with "...and that's why I'm going to do business with someone else". You can't do that in politics, the only other viable political party is at least as bad.

Consider that an average grocery store in a capitalist country has 40,000 items, for sale every day.

Now imagine if instead of that, we voted every 2 years on what everybody will eat for breakfast. There's only two parties: the burnt-toast party and the cold gruel party.

That's the difference between commerce and politics. That is why we want as much of life as possible to be moved from the realm of politics to the realm of commerce, and not the other way around.

[Jeb Stuart Thurmond]

Re: What does exploitation mean? A commie VS cappie debate.

That's the difference between commerce and politics. That is why we want as much of life to be moved from the realm of politics to the realm of commerce, and not the other way around.

The Spectator talks about another "magic quality of business. It is the only area of human activity where you get paid to change your mind.

In politics, in punditry, in academia, there is great value attached to consistency. Changing your mind risks loss of face. Your ability to deliver plausible generalizations counts for a lot. There is social pressure to adopt the dominant frame of thought....

[Commerce] actively rewards heterogeneity of thought. The more prevalent a belief is among your competitors, the greater the gains to be had from disproving it. When everyone else zigs, it pays to zag."

This is why the clever-but-useless class attack the merchant class for being meanies - instead of trying to be polite and go along with the herd, business is all about standing out and zagging even though the current fashion is to zig.

[MitzaLizalor]

Re: What does exploitation mean? A commie VS cappie debate.

when in a hypothetic communist Arab country etc.

I'm not sure how hypothetical you're thinking of. The nearest thing would be the Ba'ath party wouldn't it? If it still exists. Iraq, Syria, Libya at one time, never did too well, oil notwithstanding. By my standards "not too well" barely scratches the surface. Horrendous catastrophic nightmare would be nearer the mark – but of course, you wake up from nightmares.

Did you notice in Brother Thurmond's post the following (10 second) excerpt?

What do you think happened to anyone thinking "it's right to rebel" under Mao's regime? Would you rather have been rebelling there or under Saddam or the current regime in Syria – the latter two being Ba'athist administrations?

[gamer4Christ]

Re: What does exploitation mean? A commie VS cappie debate.

Wow Jeb, seeing you debate is like the most epic boss battle ever, like someone made a 100 hour RPG which is just one amazing boss battle, going from world to world, form to form, the battle continuing through the item shop and you're buying herbs and blasting each other at the same time, has anyone every made a game like that? Someone has to make a game like that!

Also, your beard looks good.

By the way, can I have my antique Vita back?

[Jeb Stuart Thurmond]

Re: What does exploitation mean? A commie VS cappie debate.

90% of politics consists of people complaining about the state of politics. 90% of commerce consists of people contently buying things they judge to be worth the money - and the other 10% consists of rants ending with "...and that's why I'm going to do business with someone else". You can't do that in politics, the only other viable political party is at least as bad.

Consider that an average grocery store in a capitalist country has 40,000 items, for sale every day.

Now imagine if instead of that, we voted every 2 years on what everybody will eat for breakfast. There's only two parties: the burnt-toast party and the cold gruel party.

I've been plagiarized:

[_The Earthling_]

Re: What does exploitation mean? A commie VS cappie debate.

Dear _The Earthling_,

You have received an infraction at The Landover Baptist Church Forums.

Reason: Being almost entirely innocent of rhetorical accomplishment

I'm sorry, I can't hear you over the sound of the stuff you're saying.



.

[Jeb Stuart Thurmond]

Re: What does exploitation mean? A commie VS cappie debate.

You know what exploitation is? When you work hard to create a public event, you set up a stage, you get the microphone to stop squealing, you get a nice backdrop of young people who love going to rallies and hate going to voting booths....

...And then some vegan steals your event by grabbing your microphone and ranting about the evils of ice cream.

That is True Exploitation. Now, Let's compare the candidates to see who fights against exploitation the best:

Bernie: "How dare you take the fruits of my labor oh well I give up":

Joe B-B-B-Biden: *Sound of cats hissing and scratching*:

Donald Trump. *Exploiters don't even try*

[upchucker67]

Re: What does exploitation mean? A commie VS cappie debate.

*Off-topic hat on*

Hello Mr. Thurmond, sir, it's uncanny but I do believe we met once. Pittsburgh Amateur Models Convention? You might remember I won the Most Original award for my Noah's Ark out of toothpicks diorama. Nobody appreciated that I tried using ants as miniature people onboard, in fact, I think I got kicked out for it, otherwise we might have chatted longer. I think I found you in the members directory:

Small world huh? (Think you could help give me a leg up here? I've been floundering for the past while, as you know.)




*Off-topic hat off*

I don't really have an opinion on exploitation, sadly. I don't feel directly affected by this issue.

[sweetasstemplar]

Re: Thanksgiving Day: Let's Be Thankful for Billionaires

Yeah, capitalism never leaves people in poverty...


I guess Mumbai missed your memo on how great capitalism is for everyone?

Poverty cannot be eradicated; it is the nature of this world. Rather, the true believer must concern himself only with salvation, which is guaranteed by only the True Church of Peter, which is itself under a crisis to-day, for the clergy have taken a 180 degree turn to hereticism.


Pacem

[Dr Laurence Niles]

Re: Thanksgiving Day: Let's Be Thankful for Billionaires

Pacem

Please stop using this word. This site is for praising Jesus- not snide reference to the Hyperion Cantos


YIC

[Johny Joe Hold]

Re: What does exploitation mean? A commie VS cappie debate.

This is one of those threads where we all most have to say, "Stop. We only accept the truth here."

The truth is we True Christians are tight with Jesus. Jesus sees the American flag, capitalism and True Christians as one package. There is no room for experimentation like "progressive thinking" or leftist ideology. Forgetaboutit.

The word "exploitation" means falling to Satan.

[MitzaLizalor]

Re: Thanksgiving Day: Let's Be Thankful for Billionaires

Poverty cannot be eradicated; it is the nature of this world. Rather, the true believer must concern himself only with salvation, which is guaranteed by only the True Church of Peter, which is itself under a crisis to-day, for the clergy have taken a 180 degree turn to hereticism. Pacem

Christianity is the true Church of Jesus Christ, not Peter. You would need to provide evidence to support your claim. [Hint: there isn't any (-ed.)]