This is an answer to a comment posted by John (nsemn8r):
John (nsemn8r) wrote:
I knew you'd disagree with me regarding the free market - it's OK; I spoke out of anger, not
sense.
Ron Allen answers:
I can sense your frustration and your anger when reading your posts.
Imagine, if you will, the considerable disappointments, and the intense exasperation felt for a
very long time by philosophical socialists, philosophical communists, philosophical
democrats, philosophical libertarians, philosophical anarchists, and philosophical republicans
when they observe and experience so much unnecessary human misery, so much pointless
pain, so much purposeless suffering, so much excessive poverty, so many unjustifiable wars,
and so many abortive struggles. It is no wonder that humanistic and optimistic philosophers
and poets are so often exposed to deep melancholy, pessimism, depression, and despair.
These contemplative intellectuals, these reflective scholars, journalists, essayists, novelists,
playwrights, etc. know there is a way out of this unnatural world we have created, that we can
create a much better world in which to live, work, love, and play together. But, there are just too
many people who do not care about a better world, who have no hope in this life, and who fear
radical change.
John (nsemn8r) wrote:
But when prices are manipulated to the degree that we see, I question the meaning of "free":
free to do exactly WHAT? Granted; it's not called a "fair" market.
Ron Allen answers:
In our capitalist free-market system, freedom is the freedom to compete, the freedom of capital
to compete with capital, of labor to compete with labor, and of capital to compete with labor, etc.
Bourgeous freedom is freedom of competition, freedom of aggression, freedom for the
ambitious, freedom for adversarial struggle. It is a piratical freedom; it is a freedom to plunder,
to exploit, to take what you can. It is freedom within the context of Thomas Hobbes' bellum
omnium in omnes. Capitalism assumes that human life and human society is a war of all
against all. The ideology of capitalism is a worldview which sees the war of every man against
every man as natural, and normal; that human freedom itself is necessarily and eternally a
competitive, adversarial, cutthroat, dog-eat-dog, and conflictive freedom.
Socialists believe in freedom; but socialists do not believe that human beings are naturally,
normally, or necessarily prejudicial, unsympathetic, or hostile towards each other. There may
be some indifference, or some disinterest in the welfare of strangers; but socialists believe
that human beings are social beings (which is why socialism is called socialism), that
although we exist as individuals, yet we survive and we thrive as organic and organized human
communities.
John (nsemn8r) wrote:
My medical conditions are some of the more costly; thus I'm a prime example of the worst the
insurance companies have to offer, in a capitalist society. I'm not typical, but it's still
unacceptable.
Ron Allen anwers:
It is unacceptable that profits have priority over people, that the fitness and vigour of capital has
first place over the health and well-being of a person. But, in capitalism, profits are the prime
concern of every business enterprise; profits are the most important consideration. For the
capitalistic hospital, like every other capitalistic business, the maximization of profits is the
primary issue, because profits nourish, reinforce, and reproduce capital. For a capitalistic
insurance company, the same is true. Profits feed capital, money sustains and maintains
capital. And because there is competition between capitals, profits must be maximized in
order fortify and strengthen one competitive player against every other ambitious challenger.
John (nsemn8r) wrote:
Racism is a form of genetic screening; so is this. I was born this way; nothing I could ever do to
change it. If there was, I'd have done it. Long ago.
I understand that the US government has a semi-frequent habit of paying farmers to NOT grow
anything, or to store their goods, rather than bring them to market, to artificially raise product
prices by creating phony shortages. While the world starves, the food basket to the world stores
it's food until it rots, to insure greater profits. I have no words for this behavior.
Ron Allen answers:
Government got this idea from business, which creates shortages by reducing production, or
by stockpiling products in warehouses, in order to artificially minimize supplies, which serves
to artfully maximize demand, which justifies arbitrary price increases, which intensifies profit
taking.
An apologist for capitalism may see your experiences are anecdotal, or as atypical. What I see
is the logic of capital, and the insanity of capitalism at work in your situation. I believe that when
hospital customers, or consumers of medical care are well served, this is perhaps a very
fortunate and truly felicitous wonder to witness. I have had some good luck, so far. But I have
heard some horror stories over the years from co-workers and from family and friends. I just
tell them that it's the nature of the beast.
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