not to mention all the progress traps capitalism stepped into

  • Earthwormjim91@lemmy.world
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    20 hours ago

    It’s not capitalism per se. It’s the lazy, stupid populace that allows the system of regulatory capture we have.

    The fossil fuel industry also gets a metric fuck ton of tax payer funded subsidies. That’s not capitalism. That’s a quasi state economy.

    In a true capitalist system, we’d see more competitive forms of energy taking off, like solar and wind which are cheaper than fossil fuels at this point. But because the government keeps fossil fuels going, we’re not getting off them.

    • Napster153@lemmy.world
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      9 hours ago

      The word 'competition" here is the trap.

      Competition encourages you to seek every loophole and exploit to keep ahead, even if it means kneecapping yourself in the long term. It’s no different than an athelete drugging themselves up for the Olympic Gold Medal just to end up hospitalised for the rest of their lives.

      Regulations are just another barrier to be bypassed under the law of competition. Why? Because optimising fun out of the equation is the meta.

    • KyuubiNoKitsune@lemmy.blahaj.zone
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      18 hours ago

      I think it’s inevitable of any human system that it eventually is undermined by greed and selfishness. Some systems are just more prone to it.

      • Malyca@lemmy.zip
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        17 hours ago

        If a system were to work, it would have a way to deal with the psychopaths and other cluster b folks. It’s always been us vs them, throughout history.

      • Earthwormjim91@lemmy.world
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        17 hours ago

        By voting. The US has set term lengths at every level. If the leaders are not fulfilling their job properly, they get fired.

        For representatives it’s every two years.

        That requires having an informed and active constituency though, which we do not have.

        • pleiades@lemmy.ml
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          12 hours ago

          And what happens when the elections are not-so-subtly influenced by corporate lobbyists and whoever has more money to spend on campaigning?

        • Leon@pawb.social
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          16 hours ago

          And it will never happen because the people who control the resources also control the narrative. They promote their candidates, who change the laws in their favour, and progressively make things worse for your average person.

          The system you describe is a pipe dream, and it’s a nice dream, but it’s not reflective of the world we live in today.