Just when you think capitalism can’t sink any lower…

“The need of a constantly expanding market for its products chases the bourgeoisie over the entire surface of the globe. It must nestle everywhere, settle everywhere, establish connections everywhere.”

Despite the fact that Marx first wrote about the concept of “commodification” one and a half centuries ago, it is only in the last 25 years or so that the term has come into popularity (leave it to liberals to ‘borrow’ one of Marx’s ideas 125 years after the fact and then call it their own and praise themselves for their magnificent brilliance).

But, given that new items are being commodified at alarming rates, maybe liberals can be forgiven for coming slightly late to the party.

There are countless examples of items which have become, as of late, owned and thus commodified by corporations.  Two examples include: Human and animal genomes which are now owned by corporations every time a new discovery is made; Fox News successfully countered a court case challenging their right to own the phrase “Fair and Balanced”; and the song ‘happy birthday’, to which every sung performance must be met with royalties to the song’s owners, as Girl Scouts of America learned the hard way.

There is nothing particularly new or secretive about this development.  However, when I learned of this new development in commodification, I was at a loss for words:

Marketing a product that claims to connect one to God is nothing new.  The Catholic Church practiced something more or less similar to this for hundreds of years under their practice of the ‘buying of indulgences‘.

But actually copyrighting the phrase “Believe in God”?  Chutzpah, pure chutzpah.

Propaganda in Action: More anti-Chavez attacks dressed up as “news”

From Reuters:

CARACAS (Reuters) – A video of a Gucci- and Louis Vuitton-clad politician attacking capitalism then struggling to explain how his luxurious clothes square with his socialist beliefs has become an instant YouTube hit in Venezuela.

Venezuelan Interior Minister Pedro Carreno was momentarily at a loss for words when a journalist interrupted his speech and asked if it was not contradictory to criticize capitalism while wearing Gucci shoes and a tie made by Parisian luxury goods maker Louis Vuitton.

“I don’t, uh … I … of course,” stammered Carreno on Tuesday before regaining his composure. “It’s not contradictory because I would like Venezuela to produce all this so I could buy stuff produced here instead of 95 percent of what we consume being imported.”

The video clip (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aDsdXkY4UlE) had been viewed more than 15,000 times on Thursday, a day after it was posted on the YouTube Web site.

Despite the best efforts of left-wing President Hugo Chavez to instill austere socialist values in its people, the oil-rich South American nation remains attached to consumerism.

This article makes several uncritical assertions which deserve some attention.

First,

“A video of a Gucci- and Louis Vuitton-clad politician attacking capitalism… has become an instant YouTube hit…. [having] been viewed more than 15,000 times on Thursday.”

This reads as if it was written by somebody like my co-worker who is not familiar with Youtube and thus calls it “The Youtube”.  Anybody conversant in the social video site would know receiving 15,000 hits nowhere near qualifies a video as being ‘a hit’.  Just to demonstrate this fact, I’ve highlighted the most popular videos on Youtube today in green:

So the this putative Youtube “hit” has received less than 4% of the hits of a Brittany spears music video and a video of a guy holding his camera sideways.  Hmm……  Do I smell a Hollywood deal in the making?  If you accept that 15,000 views does not an internet sensation make, then one must ask oneself:  irrespective of all other charges in this piece, what is the newsworthiness of this story in the first place?

Second,

The article asserts that there is something hypocritical or unsavoury about a politician who’s well dressed yet attacks capitalism and advocates for the poor.  Besides being an ad hominem attack (which we seem to be seeing a lot more of these days when it comes to socialists), this seems to suggest that Minister Pedro Carreno is somehow less hypocritical or less unsavoury than a politician who’s well dressed and working to ensure that he gets to keep all the capital he’s accumulated while the poor can do without government assistance and just pick themselves up by their bootstraps.

In fact, we don’t even need to go as far as the Venezuela opposition to find examples of this former type of politician, we in the West, and especially our American neighbours, have plenty of home-grown examples.  While I despise comparing John Edwards to the genuinely progressive Bolivarian Revolution, a fair example could be made that Edwards has likewise been criticized for his luxurious living while using working-class rhetoric while others such as Mitt Romney who’s net worth tops $200 million (USD) and former presidential candidate Steve Forbes who’s net worth is $500 million (USD) both can advocate tax cuts or even a flat tax while not being subjected to similar charges of unsavouryness or hypocrisy.

Now, to be fair, while I support the Bolivarian Revolution, it should be pointed out that this is does not exactly live up to the Paris Commune ideal that Marx praised wherein the maximum salary available to a Commune official was 6000 Francs per year (although, in honesty, I haven’t the slightest clue what that would work out to in today’s currency after inflation).  But the point still stands that the argument made by Reuters is untenable.

Third,

The article asserts that “despite the best efforts of left-wing President Hugo Chavez to instill austere socialist values in its people, the oil-rich South American nation remains attached to consumerism.”

This is misleading on a few fronts.  First off, the socialist project is largely dealing with the horrible fact that workers don’t have enough money to feed themselves yet work in society only to have the surplus of their labour disproportionately usurped by a class of non-labourers.  Thus, socialism is not the same thing as anti-consumerism which is concerned primarily about people who buy too many things and are controlled by their desires for conspicuous and fashionable consumption.

Second of all, this quotation attempts to suggest that the left-wing drive in Venezuela is being directed by Chavez in a top-down fashion.  While Chavez’s Bolivarian Revolution is not nearly grassroots enough for my liking, it is nevertheless a complete distortion of the situation to say that it is Chavez who is making, or attempting to make a receptive public embrace socialist values.  Clearly, if the socialist drive was coming from Chavez and not the populace, then when Chavez was removed from power in the 2002 coup, the public would have either rejoiced or proven apathetic instead of the amazing popular uprising we actually witnessed to restore Chavez.

Why capitalism can’t continue forever and why socialism will prevail

From Bolivian President Evo Morales’ recent speech to the United Nations (the text of which has never been seen in the mainstream media).

“It is important that we learn lessons from some sectors, from some regions. Let me avail myself of this opportunity: I come from a culture based on peace, from a lifestyle based on equality, of living not only in solidarity with all people, but also living in harmony with Mother Earth. For the indigenous movement, land cannot be a commodity; it is a mother that gives us life, so how could we convert it into a commodity as the western model does?

This is a profound lesson which we must learn in order to resolve the problems of humanity that are being discussed here, climate change and pollution. Where does this pollution come from? It comes from, and is generated by, the unsustainable development of a system which destroys the planet: in other words, capitalism.

I want to use this opportunity to call on sectors, groups and nations to abandon luxury, to abandon over-consumption, to think not only about money but about life, to not only think about accumulating capital but to think in wider terms about humanity. Only then can we begin to solve the root causes of these problems facing humanity. “

Hat tip to our good comrade Ian Angus who runs the fantastic ecosocialist blog “Climate and Capitalism“. He published the full text of Morales’ speech.

~

See also:

All that glitters is not golden

An apology is owed…

Support for capitalist parties in Canada

Is socialism violent or is liberalism hypocritical?: Dispelling the myths of socialism – PART I

Is Capitalism Justified?: Dispelling the myths of socialism – PART II

All that glitters is not golden

Manitoba’s “Golden Boy”:  The unintentional symbol for what’s wrong with Canada.

First, before going on from that incendiary statement, I should begin with the obligatory statements to prevent too much hate mail:   I’ve spent several summers in Manitoba and have visited the province many times throughout my childhood and I really do like most of the Manitobans I have encountered.

So, now that that’s out of the way, it is truly remarkable how Manitoba’s “Golden Boy” — their beloved statue and unofficial symbol of the province — can have so much symbolism for Canada which exists at multiple levels without having been intentionally designed.  Regardless, much of this symbolism is, shall we say, not something to be admired or celebrated as many are wont to do and, as such, is worth a critical look at.  The unintentional and profoundly unflattering symbolism of “Golden Boy” exists at three different levels.

Symbolic item #1: “Golden Boy” isn’t gold at all.

Yes, that’s right, “Golden Boy” is only gilded gold made using much the same technique ancient counterfeiters used to pass bronze or lead or non-gold coins off as gold ones.

When you think about it, it’s a fitting symbolic equivalent to the country which considers itself so superior to the United States; which claims itself to be ‘golden’ and as pristine as the untouched snow when, in actuality, we generally actively support the U.S. in their emperial adventures…. so long as we get to preserve our illusions of golden purity.

In Iraq, the Chretien Liberals helped out by sending a fleet into the Persian Gulf to assist the overtaxed American fleets with patrols.  But the list goes on.  Afghanistan.  The U.S.’s illegal war in Kosovo.  Haiti (historically and currently).  Yep, we’re just about as ‘golden’ as “Golden Boy”.

Symbolic item #2: “Golden Boy” represents Mercury — the Roman god of trade, profit and commerce.

Yes, “Golden Boy” is in the end merely a statue designed to glorify and pay tribute to our society’s new gods: trade, profit, commerce and — since the root word of ‘Mercury’ is related to the root word of ‘merchandise’ — consumerism.

But, while we glorify trade, profit and commerce, there were even segments of ancient Roman society who were not so easily fooled.  In the ruins of ancient Pompeii, on the other hand, we see murals such as the one depicted left, which show the god Mercury depicted with an unusually large phallus which, contrary to in our culture, had a profoundly undesirable quality.  Under this particular mural there was profanity written which was directed towards the god of trade and commerce.  I won’t relay what the profanity said, but it doesn’t take much to imagine what the jist of it is.

Also of note is that this particular depiction of Mercury, by employing the large phallus, might have also been a reference to prostitution as paintings of phalluses often pointed (literally) the way towards the prostitution sectors of the city for tourists.  Interestingly, since Poet Langston Hughes famously called America a prostitute in his poem Columbia (“Columbia, my dear girl, / You really haven’t been a virgin for so long / It’s ludicrous to keep up the pretext”), it does not take a huge leap of reason to see that so too can Canada be considered to have prostituted herself towards the ends of capitalism, trade, profit and commerce.

Symbolic item #3: “Golden Boy” is rotting from the inside

For those of you who were in Manitoba around 2002, you’ll remember that “Golden Boy” had to be taken down because he was literally rotting from the inside out.  What is more, if you followed the much-reported (at least in the province of Manitoba) story of his ‘repair’, an interesting fact was revealed after he was returned to his perch atop the legislature building:  the ‘repair’ is only going to last for about 20 years before he’s completely rotted out again.

This is especially prophetic when one considers that, as economic analysts have recently noted, since the American economy — the engine which fuels North American capitalism — is anemic, but the stock markets are on the rise artificially through increased money flow, we are perhaps heading towards a 1929, Great Depression-style collapse sooner rather than later.  Add to that the fact that credit card debts are increasing at alarming rates and we can see that our deficit-financed consumerist lifestyle truly is rotting from the inside out.

But here’s where the ironic symbolism of “Golden Boy’s” rot jumps to another level:  It was discovered in 2002, when “Golden Boy” was taken down, that much of the rotting experienced by the statue was caused by the electrical wiring leading to his torch.  Since the torch represents the torch/flame of knowledge and the quest for learning, this discovery reminded me of Voltaire’s Bastards by John Ralston Saul.   In this work, Saul argues that the kind of knowledge which has come to be rewarded in modern Western capitalist civilization is an exploitative, power-seeking and ultimately corrupting knowledge. 

Saul writes “Knowledge became the currency of power… The most common characteristics of our elites are cynicism, rhetoric and the worship of both ambition and power.”

In short, the only kind of ‘knowledge’ “Golden Boy” — the god of trade, profit and commerce — is capable of giving, is a corruptive knowledge which, ultimately, is mercinary since it is not coupled with other human virtues such as Rousseauian pity or Socratic civic duty.

On the futility of governing pop-culture

Who ever said capitalists were intelligent?

McDonald’s and a cabal of capitalists have been pushing the Oxford English Dictionary for some time now to remove its official listing of the word “McJob” in their publication.  But, AFP wires are now reporting that that’s not enough for McDonalds et al.  They now are seeking to actually ‘flip’ the definition of McJob (an irony in and of itself) from it’s current definition of:

“an unstimulating, low-paid job with few prospects, esp. one created by the expansion of the service sector.”

And they want the new definition in the Oxford English Dictionary to read something along the lines of:

“a job that is stimulating, rewarding and offers genuine opportunities for career progression.”

Now, it is no secret that capital has for years saught to subsume pop-culture and trends under its aegis.  However, what McDonald’s et al are ignoring is the fact that to the extent that capital succeeds in this goal, it does so not by dictating and governing from above what ‘popular’ ought to look like, but by so-called “cool hunting” and the subsuming of what is already pre-existingly popular into a corporate programme.

When capital or any heirarchical structure attempts to artificially manufacture from scratch what ought to be ‘popular’, the results are often ridiculous (and painful) as demonstrated by this ad by the Dairy Farmers of Ontario:  

(WARNING:  For those of you who don’t live in Ontario or who have never seen this ad, I must caution you – watching this may cause seizures, dimensia, decreased IQ and/or temporary insanity.  Proceed at own risk!) 

The capitalists seeking to change the definition of ‘McJob’ therefore are ignorant of two things.  First, obviously, the Oxford English Dictionary does not, like the ‘Newspeak’ dictionary makers in Orwell’s 1984, actually make-up definitions and construct the English language.  It merely reflects the pre-existing usage of the English language.

And second: you may be able to co-opt culture jamming, as the raging success of MTV and “cool hunting” demonstrates, but you cannot govern popular culture from above as these executives are foolishly attempting to do with “McJob”.

As insipid and asinine as many of us may consider the bulk of pop-culture to be, it nevertheless is one of the very few phenomena (along side activism and dissent) in our culture which finds its genesis in genuinely grassroots movements.

And that is a dynamic power which no capitalist and no government can either suppress or govern.

An apology is owed…

This is an absolutely fantastic quote and a great quote for any progressive person who wants to throw something back at liberals when they turn their noses up at us.

“When capital and the ruling classes apologise for: Colonialism, the 14 hour day, class privilege, the 7 day working week, children in coalmines, the opium wars, the massacre of the Paris Commune, slavery, the Spanish-American War, the Boer War, starvation, apartheid, anti-union laws, the First World War, Flanders, trench warfare, mustard gas, aerial bombing, the Soviet Intervention, the Armenian Genocide, chemical weapons, fascism, the Great Depression, hunger marches, Nazism, the Spanish Civil War, militarism, Asbestosis, radiation death, the Massacre of Nanking, the Second World War, Belsen, Dresden, Hiroshima, Racism, The Mafia, nuclear weapons, the Korean War, DDT, McCarthyism, production lines, blacklists, Thalidomide, the rape of the Third World, poverty, the arms race, plastic surgery, the electric chair, environmental degradation, the Vietnam War, the military suppression of Greece, India, Malaya, Indonesia, Chile, El Salvador, Nicaragua, Panama and Turkey, the Gulf War, trade in human body parts, malnutrition, Exxon Valdez, deforestation, organized crime, the Heroin and Cocain trade, tuberculosis, the destruction of the Ozone Layer, cancer, exploitation of labour and the deaths of 50,000,000 Communists and trade unionists in this century alone, then — and only then — will I consider apologising for the errors of socialism.” (from: the Communist Party of Australia)

There’s a great pic to go with this quote that I’ve just added to the Paulitics Political Images resource (along with a bunch of other additions).

Fun with google

I recently came across two interesting posts which both used google in what I considered to be an ingenious fashion to demonstrate interesting points about the superficiality of our society and the marginalization of women in dialogue.

First, Uncorrected proofs had a post last week on using google to discern the “he”/”she” ratio of a given website or blog.  The idea, borrowed from Philipp Lenssen (here), in my mind is elegant in the simple and straightforward way in which it not only demonstrates, but quantifies, the marginalization of women in our discourse.

There are two ways of calculating the “he”/”she” ratio of a website or blog, you can use Lenssen’s application above, or you can do it manually via a google advanced search yourself.

Paulitics: Paul’s Socialist Investigations, has a “he”/”she” ratio of 59%/41%

As an interesting exercise, I decided to compare websites on both ends of the spectrum to see whether there’s a difference.

Le Revue Gauche “he”/”she” ratio = 83%/17%

Dr. Roy’s Thoughts “he”/”she” ratio = 81%/19%

Accidental Deliberations “he”/”she” ratio = 81%/19%

Stageleft “he”/”she” ratio = 77%/23%

Calgary Grit “he”/”she” ratio = 72%/28%

Jason Cherniak “he”/”she” ratio = 73%/27%

www.Conservative.ca “he”/”she” ratio = 86%/14%

www.Liberal.ca “he”/”she” ratio = 79%/21%

www.NDP.ca “he”/”she” ratio = 78%/22%

www.GreenParty.ca “he”/”she” ratio = 64%/36% (most “she” references refer to Elizabeth May)

News Media:

Far Right:

CanWest Global (Canada.com) “he”/”she” ratio = 76%/24%

Right-Wing:

CTV.ca “he”/”she” ratio = 72%/28%

Globe and Mail “he”/”she” ratio = 77%/23%

Centre-Left:

Toronto Star “he”/”she” ratio = 67%/33%

Left-Wing:

Democracy Now! “he”/”she” ratio = 48%/52%

——————————————————

Second, Surplus Value had an interesting post wherein google was used to attempt to quantify the value our society places on abstract concepts and then to rank-order these abstract terms in terms of their supposed ‘worth’.  I’ve added to the list linked to above in order to come up with a larger ranking of what we apparently value in our society:

1.  1,500,000,000 – Business
2.  1,360,000,000 – “Man” OR “Men”
3.  1,260,000,000 – TV
4.  1,100,000,000 – Music
5.  1,060,000,000 – Company
6.  976,000,000 – Life
7.  951,000,000 – Love
8.  892,000,000 – Sports
9.  826,000,000 – Family
10.  785,000,000 – Technology
11.  768,000,000 – Education
12.  702,000,000 – “Woman” OR “Women”
13.  670,000,000 – Money
14.  644,000,000 – Friends
15.  636,000,000 – Food
16.  575,000,000 – Beauty
17.  508,000,000 – Fitness
18.  441,000,000 – Hope
19.  414,000,000 – Sex
20.  313,000,000 – Success
21.  272,000,000 – Rich
22.  258,000,000 – Hate
23.  249,000,000 – Religion
24.  241,000,000 – Failure
25.  234,000,000 – Career
26.  231,000,000 – Politics
27.  204,000,000 – Meaning
28.  197,000,000 – Goals
29.  174,000,000 – Fear
30.  94,600,000 – Integrity
31.  55,000,000 – Happiness
32.  51,900,000 – Equality
33.  27,600,000 – Compassion
34.  6,980,000 – Fulfilment

Don’t end domination, change your position in it

I was visiting my cousin in Toronto recently and anybody familiar with the Toronto subway knows the plethora of advertising which nearly wallpapers all surfaces.  Most of the advertising was fairly standardly attempting, little by little, to instill various consumerist memes into my mind.  However one ad stood out in my mind.  It was a plain text poster for a credit and investment firm and it simply said:

“Rejoin the haves”

This is precisely the reason why capitalism as we practice it cannot succeed forever.  So, according to this ad, the goal you and I strive for should not be to stop or reduce or ameliorate the gut-wrenching, nausiating inequality which characterises our society but rather is merely to change our position within it.  Instead of being the oppressed and wishing to end all oppression, we ought to wish and hope and work for a time when we can be the oppressors.

This is a little bit like saying that the only real problem with spousal abuse is that I’m not the one who’s doing the beating.

The hypocrisy of anti-copyright campaigns

This video, which I’m sure we’ve all seen, is the crown jewel of the “respect copyrights” campaign.

The blatant hypocrisy of the companies and government agencies which sponsor either the MPAA or this campaign is far reaching to the very foundation of capitalism.

This video (and its campaign) has 2 premises both of which are either hypocritical or just plain stupid.

These premises are:

#1) what is illegal is also inherently morally wrong.

First, every thinking person knows that what is illegal or legal has no bearing on what is moral or immoral and this has been a known fact since the days of Plato.  Marxists believe that, while the practice of capitalism by definition is legal, it may still be immoral to allow people to starve to death and die all the while others go with too much food.  What’s more though, this argument can also be made from a right-wing point of view.  Right-wing, anti-abortion activists would argue (and they do frequently argue) that while abortions are legal, they are nonetheless immoral. 

So on this point, the anti-piracy campaign is just talking out of its ass because most politically engaged people on all sides of the political spectrum recognize the fact that the law does not equal morality.  So this premise is just plain stupid.

#2) You and I shouldn’t make our decision to share music based on a cost-benefit analysis.  We should make our decision not in terms of what is the best, most economical decision for us, but rather for what is the best for the industry.

Capitalism is based on the very idea of each person behaving in their own best interest through rational, cost-benefit analyses!!   That’s just how capitalism works. 

Union Carbide made a cost-benefit analysis and decided that if it just cut on safety measures and moved its operation to India, then it could save TONS of money even if it cost people their lives. The result: 20,000 people DEAD because of the Bhopal disaster caused by Union Carbide.

British Petrolium (BP) made a cost-benefit analysis to intentionally allow its pipelines in Alaska to corrode through sheer negligence because it knew that the resultant oil spill would hike up oil prices globally and net the company an overall profit even after paying for repairs.

Ford Motor Company learned in the early stages of production that its Pinto model would explode under certain circumstances and would be expected to kill  people.  Ford decided that it would cost more money to do an $11 repair on all of its models than it would to pay for lawyers to fight all the personal injury and wrongful death suits that would result from their car.

Chevrolet made basically the same decision with regards to their Malibu model.

Moreover, each of these 4 examples are just the really popular ones that have been published widely. Most cost-benefit analysis is so common that it doesn’t even get reported on. For instance, every single capitalist company makes decisions everyday on how low they can pay their workers — ex. “Is paying starvation wages worth the extra cost in lower employee retention and higher training costs?” etc… — in order to make a profit.

Using the biblical (and original) definition of hypocrite, we see that a hypocrite is somebody who imposes standards on others which they refuse to accept for themselves. So the very companies which support the MPAA in this campaign are by definition hypocrite since the very way they make money is founded upon the necessity of cost-benefit analyses while they advocate that we refrain from the same practice when it will cost them money.

If capitalism can use cost-benefit analyses at the cost of peoples LIVES in order to save money, then I sure as hell can use a cost-benefit analysis at the cost of their money.  And, what’s more, I won’t feel the slightest bit of guilt because of it. In fact, I’ll do you one better: taking money away from companies which can do such things is perhaps the most patriotic and beneficial act you can do while sitting at home in front of your computer!