this post was submitted on 01 Sep 2023
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That's a lie capitalism has sold us to justify it's value system.
Remember how Soviet workers would smuggle parts out of their jobs to reuse themselves? There was a job field filled by babushkas that would inspect workers before they left. Is that the fault of capitalism? I know the people at the top do it much worse, but humans naturally compete with each other.
People are capable of both competition and cooperation.
Capitalism goes out of the way to make the former a value.
Yes, greed is in our nature. But so is altruism. And the idea that people are just greedy by nature, and that all altruism has ulterior motivation, is something capitalists have actively encouraged to justify their values.
So yes, when it comes to greed in the West and how it's become a value rather than a sin (Jesus eye if the needle parable), I blame capitalism. Of course, if humans didn't have the capacity for greed capitalism wouldn't exist.
But to dismiss capitalism as a non-factor at this point in history because humans are greedy by nature, well, it's propaganda and not based on a modern scientific understanding of human nature.
Yeah that's fair. I think the truth is somewhere in the middle. We shouldn't rely on greed to make a system nor altruism alone. The difficult part is actually making a system that works.
The Buddhist economy is essentially a gift economy that has survived for 2500 years.
Shit, our genealogy is also basically a gift economy, and one much more ancient than Buddhism.
Which is my way of saying I think the system is in our nature. If we can learn to embrace life and stop being so terrified of our individual deaths.
The best systems happen organically after all. And without coercion.