I mean like this: “Realized that most of these programs are not meant to help anyone, merely to control people and make them dependent. I was forced to reconsider everything I’d once believed. I developed a profound distrust of government regardless of the philosophy of the people in power. I remained a liberal on civil-rights issues, became a conservative on defense, and a semi-libertarian on all other matters.” - Dean Koontz. Am I wrong?

    • @kanzalibraryOP
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      21 year ago

      No, the question is for you.

      I’m anticorporate but not anticapitalist.

      That’s why I’m asking can you tell me the difference? I forgot to quote that words.

      • ℕ𝕖𝕞𝕠
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        41 year ago

        So, in a capitalist system, capital is considered a valid input to the production process worthy of a share of the revenue. I can give someone who wants to make geegaws $500 to start their geegaw business and the revenue from selling those geegaws will be split among paying for raw materials and workspace, labor to make and sell the geegaws, and those like me that invested capital. Under some other systems, only labor is rewarded (raw goods being the result of labor, of course).

        Under a corporate system, people can band together to form a company that becomes its own entity. The corporate entity owns the raw goods, the tools, the workspace, assumes the liability, collects the revenue. The revenue is split among paying for raw goods and labor, the continuation of the corporation, and profit. Profit can be disposed of in multiple ways; in a capitalist system it’s usually split among those that contributed capital. That’s not something I have a problem with.

        One problem is these meta-entities, which are not aligned with human interests, self-perpetuating and even expanding with the non-cost share of the revenue. They are all too often parasitic, and mankind’s primary predator.

        My other problem is the liability issue. If a corporation is responsible for an atrocity, it may be at most bankrupted and dissolved. But the humans who actually made the decisions leading to those atrocities are shielded from legal repurcussions by the artificial entity they created.