I was arguing with a guy who claimed Africa’s poverty is to be blamed on the people of Africa because Europe has according to him left it alone for over 100 years now. He then hit me with the line ‘Capitalism isn’t a political system’.
edit: full comment below
The two economic systems: capitalism and political.
Just…
Someone post that tweet about Lenin and Stalin shooting everyone here.
Of course, explaining it away with a supposed “resource curse” makes so much more sense
in one of the most mineral rich places in the world
I am not very good at considering this and applying it in my own life but I wanted share Brandolini’s Law:
The amount of energy needed to refute bullshit is an order of magnitude bigger than that needed to produce it.
exactly
I’d never heard it called it that before today. TIL.
I’ve always referred to it by its alternative name the Bullshit Asymmetry Principal.
Good thing we automated the process of producing bullshit.
Has anyone tried saying, “prove that capitalism isn’t political” because it’s well established that money in politics is bad. Like these people could easily be forced to defend a position of “well okay there’s money in politics but it shouldn’t be” in which case, you’ve won because the only people who support taking money out of politics are socialists. This segues nicely into “how do you explain politicians self-identifying as capitalists” or talk about supreme court justices who self identify as pro-business.
Its so intellectually dishonest to act like social systems are completely separated, when even in the abstract its demonstrably false. People like to retreat to these broad axiomatic generalizations where basically any position can be defended, and I think the way to pin them down is to make them grapple with specificities, particularly where they concern people’s lived experiences, surveys and self-reports.
But ultimately, arguing with apologists is almost always a waste, they are defending an ontology, not seeking truth for its own sake. The greatest number of people will be convinced by work, by hope for something different. Forcing people to defend indefensible positions is a hoot, but I really wonder how many people are actually convinced 5 comments deep, I think usually if people are reading that far in they already agree with one of the two sides and are sort of engaging in the polemic by proxy. Granted, I am a prolific effort commenter but usually I’m doing this to improve my personal understanding, not engage in apologetics or propaganda which I’m not super interested in.
Debating online is probably more often than not, not worth it if your goal is to bring about political change but as you alluded to it can be of personal benefit, for a variety of reasons really.
It can also simply be kind of fun too lol. I try not to think too much about it and just be myself and keep in mind that something may come out of this that is not apparent, like a lot of little things can lead to big things - Debate 1000 unimportant, dumb weirdos and maybe you can out-debate some important not so dumb weirdo one day 🧐
Yeah I’m still on here writing loooong comments and replies (this is an alt account because my main instance is down half the time) and def learn a lot from other users as long as we can keep it good faith. It’s fun and challenging to have to like support a contentious point, and usually interesting to see how people respond. I wish I was as prolific of a writer as I was a commenter, but I have a hard time staying on topic in my writing and seeing my point through to the end as when I’m like talking to someone trying to get my point across.
there is a reason people say youtube comments should be avoided.
because Europe has according to him left it alone for over 100 years now.
I’ve actually seen people say something like this a few times quite recently, I think there is a trend lately of fascists telling people this to get them to view Africa’s general poverty as the result of them being an ‘inferior people’.
Yeah they’ve been saying this shit for a long time now, but I’ve never seen them claim that it’s been 100 years now because Nazis at least somewhat know what happened in the 40s
“100 years ago” was pre-WW2 and if you think Europe was out of Africa before WW2… what?
Where on earth did they get that fucking idea? Even the movies about colonial Africa are like “oh yes it was the war years” like what the fuck lol
democracy?
democracy of what ???If only there was a system that emphasised fighting corruption and encouraging more democratic participation instead of the opposite. Sadly there is no such system and no one has ever figured out a solution to the problems of our society so it is pointless to do anything about it.
Over 100 years? France owned Algeria like yesterday, look at any map
France still controls the currency in a lot of central Africa https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CFA_franc
“Besides I don’t think [a system with strong institutions and the proven ability to enforce laws for the public good] is better at all. The answer probably lies in strong institutions and the ability to enforce laws.”
Europe has according to him left it alone for over 100 years now
Even if one accepts their framing that doesn’t count neocolonialism, Algeria (for example) gained independence in 1962, less than 70 years ago.
strong institutions
what institutions should be strong I wonder
