In my opinion, oppression is coming whether we like it or not. The resource depletion and overconsumption of global capitalism is destroying our ecosystems. We can choose degrowth and a planned economy under socialism, or continued environmental damage under fascism. Our current way of living is unsustainable. We need to read up and understand the choices, or the decisions for our futures will be made for us.
What we need is a culture shift, not oppression. I refuse to believe mankind is not capable of improving their collective behavior except under threat of violence - In fact, I think such violence would be counterproductive if the goal is to live in harmony with planetary limits. Degrowth cannot be imposed. Society must want it. Stop being mindless consumers. We can’t make that happen by the barrel of a gun. Can’t you see the contradiction?
Climate change will not afford us the time to shift culturally. Soon, agricultural failures, floods, droughts and mass migration are going to tax resources. We need to study and understand these disparate systems to navigate the coming crises. We’re not going to do it, but I like to think positively.
Suffering can be alleviated but not eliminated. I talk about oppression, which is domination of one group over another, with violence. This happens in fascism but historically also with (ML) communism. I’m saying that using the power of the state to FORCE people to change their ways, will be counterproductive. I’m on board with degrowth, but something positive must replace the consumerism.
The miscommunication is your misunderstanding of the word oppression in relation to ML. I’m talking about a specific problem with the ML “solution” to climate change. I don’t have all the answers, but I know ML only makes things worse for everyone.
I would rather live under a Marxist-Leninist government with a planned economy that gives us a chance to mitigate climate catastrophe. The current capitalist governments aren’t even bothered by climate change. You’ve invented a boogeyman in Marxist-Leninism so that you don’t have to confront the current crisis of capitalism. When the world crumbles with overconsumption from capitalism, will your last words be, “At least we didn’t try the disastrous Marxist-Leninism?”
It’s about harm reduction and the lesser- evil. 👿 Capitalism is the greater harm to the planet. Socialism/Anarchism/Marxist-Leninism involve planned economies that can help us transition to more sustainable energy systems. It’s pragmatism.
I feel like the poster didn’t mean to infer American capitalism is so great we need a wall to slow people down from entering while communism is so shitty they need a wall to prevent people from escaping.
It’s a strangely pro American capitalism meme for lemmy.
There’s also the walls around most Palestinian settlements, the wall that the Dominican Republic is building to stop Haitians from fleeing their country, the walls (fences with barbed wire) in Hungary…
Yeah. My country used to be a capitalist dictatorship in the 60s-80s and it very, very much kept people who disliked it from escaping it, and then tortured them for being “unpatriotic”. And as ICastFist mentioned, there are several other capitalist and even “democratic” countries out there that very much build walls to keep people from leaving, too.
I initially assumed this meme was criticizing capitalism due to pointing out how the rich plunder and oppress the poor (i.e. the US with Latin America, and Europe with Africa and the Middle East), then hoard the profits for themselves while propping up walls to prevent anyone from the places they exploited from getting to also share and experience their wealth and safety nets (i.e. America’s border wall with Mexico, and Europe sinking refugee boats while fanning fascism to pin economic issues on the migrants rather than the capitalists themselves), but reading the OP’s replies it seems the meme was actually made in defense of capitalism…?
Honestly, between this and the “you’d be morally obligated to vote for 99% Hitler” nonsense, neoliberals seem to be really, really bad at defending their own ideology, lol
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