• @nutsack@lemmy.world
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    8 months ago

    saying “greed” in the context of capitalism makes no sense. the word doesn’t have meaning because the system is morally agnostic.

    edit: its a headless system optimized for profit accumulation as its sole parameter. there’s no systemic incentive for anyone to behave otherwise.

    • VenoraTheBarbarian
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      388 months ago

      What word do you prefer to use to describe people who hoard more wealth than they or their children can spend in a lifetime while the vast majority of workers are on the edge of financial ruin? Why can’t they be satisfied with just having one mega yacht? One giant mansion? If not “greed” what do you call it?

          • @NightAuthor@lemmy.world
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            18 months ago

            Are you being sarcastic? I’ve seen a lot of sarcasm in my days, and this looks a lot like that. Nah, who’d be sarcastic on the internet without a “/s“? Everyone would just assume you’re not being sarcastic, and then the whole conversation would devolve.

            Anyways, I’m not sure how neo-feudalism is charming. Could you expand on that a bit?

    • @4am@lemm.ee
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      228 months ago

      The system isn’t morally agnostic dumbass, it literally is greed. It was created for the purpose of greed and it continues funnel all the wealth to the greedy. Loopholes are found around all the rate limiters and speed governors that get designed into the law and federal agencies. They’re trying “company store” tactics again. Fucking child labor is back.

      “The system is morally agnostic” imagine the fucking Stockholm Syndrome (yes I’ve heard it’s not actually real stfu)

    • be_excellent_to_each_other
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      148 months ago

      the word doesn’t have meaning because the system is morally agnostic.

      The people at the top of it swimming in their Scrooge McDuck piles of money while the rest of us struggle seem pretty fucking greedy to me.

    • @orrk@lemmy.world
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      98 months ago

      there is no such thing as a morally agnostic system, you either agree with or disagree with the outcome of the economic system, it is moral or immoral.

    • @Aceticon@lemmy.world
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      48 months ago

      True, a system whose only imperative is personal upside maximization with no consideration for anybody else is morally agnostic if you put aside the moral dimensions of having no consideration for anybody else whilst acting for personal upside maximization.

      Same as murder being morally agnostic if you put aside the moral dimensions of killing another human being.

      Consider the possibility that you’re confusing familiarity, common use in your environment and even normalization of something with it actually being devoid of a moral component: just because people around you got used to act in some way without questioning such way of acting doesn’t mean it’s morally agnostic: after all, slavery too used to be normal.

    • @lolcatnip@reddthat.com
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      38 months ago

      So many people seem to have mistaken what you said for a defense of capitalism.

      I think a better way to say it is that greed isn’t a useful way to explain any particular thing that happens in a capitalist system, because everything that happens in capitalism is driven by greed. Saying one particular problem is caused by greed is like a doctor saying someone’s illness is a symptom of being alive; it’s true, but it explains nothing.