Asklemmy

Getting rid of apathy is the most important step. Too many people say "I'm not interested in politics".

Politics is everything, it shouldn't be considered as a legitimate choice to stay away from it.

I can respect that y'all kind of hate my kind here and I'm going to use this comment to share only the most unobjectionable works that even the most anticommunist liberal should find completely and utterly appealing

Fully Automated Luxury Communism is a book about how we have all of the tools at our disposal right now to automate at least 50% of the work that we have to do to stay alive, and thus get rid of that work as a tool of coercion and exertion of power.

How Capitalism Ends is about how the power got to the concentrations it has today, where we can expect it to go by extrapolating that tendency, why there was no other way it could have gone, and what we can do now to start building the next thing.

These are two very good and easy starts to starting to think about this problem. I'm happy to field questions about the works or anything else related.

According to Walter Scheidel's The Great Leveler: Violence and the History of Inequality from the Stone Age to the Twenty-First Century, the answer is revolutionary violence.

It's a fascinating read. I very much recommend the chapter covering the Black Plague. Seems rather relevant nowadays.

Employers lost no time pressuring the authorities to curb the rising cost of labor. Less than a year after the arrival of the Black Death in England, in June 1349, the crown passed the Ordinance of Laborers:

Since a great part of the population, and especially workers and employees (“servants”), has now died in this pestilence many people, observing the needs of masters and the shortage of employees, are refusing to work unless they are paid an excessive salary. . . . We have ordained that every man or woman in our realm of England, whether free or unfree, who is physically fit and below the age of sixty, not living by trade and exercising a particular craft, and not having private means of land of their own upon which they need to work, and not working for someone else, shall, if offered employment consonant with their status, be obliged to accept the employment offered, and they should be paid only the fees, liveries, payments or salaries which were usually paid in the part of the country where they are working in the twentieth year of our reign [1346] or in some other appropriate year five or six years ago. . . . No one should pay or promise wages, liveries, payments or salaries greater than those defined above under pain of paying twice whatever he paid or promised to anyone who feels himself harmed by it. . . . Artisans and labourers ought not to receive for their labour and craft more money than they could have expected to receive in the said twentieth year or other appropriate year, in the place where they happen to be working; and if anyone takes more, let him be committed to gaol.

The actual effect of these ordinances appears to have been modest. Just two years later, another decree, the Statute of Labourers of 1351, complained that said employees, having no regard to the said ordinance but rather to their own ease and exceptional greed, withdraw themselves to work for great men and others, unless they are paid livery and wages double or treble what they were accustomed to receive in the said twentieth year and earlier, to the great damage of the great men and the impoverishing of all the Commons and sought to remedy this failure with ever more detailed restrictions and penalties. Within a generation, however, these measures had failed.

NoBoDy WanTs tO WoRk!!! lol.

"Alpha psychopaths in power", as you describe them, have always, and still, understand that their power exists entirely at the whim of the masses.

And so conjuring an excuse has preoccupied them since at least the dawn of history. "Ordained by god" was the go-to for several mellenia.

Now, it seems the tactic is just to manufacture division within the working class. Racism, ideological boogeymen (SOCIALISTS!!), xenophobia, rural/urban friction, and increasingly gender/sexuality, sexism... ANY way you can slice the common man into two segments and convince them that the OTHER side is bent on their destruction.

It's great because it's a machine that feeds itself. You see the two lines of people screaming at eachother, they manifest through their hatred the threat the other side fears.

As soon as the "betas", as you put it, stop fighting themselves, it's game over.

The solution is probably the least likely thing, though. People, even a small dedicated number of them, who can resist the urge to dunk on their ethically inferior "opponents", and instead treat their "enemies" with dignity... who can view "the other" as a valuable human temporarily on the wrong side of an issue, then things can change. Daryl Davis (the black dude who keeps flipping KKK members) has it figured out.

It sucks because we have an example of how to do it (Daryl), but it's hard. It's slow. It isn't funny, and it isn't sexy. It demands so much more from you than taking a quick snipe and returning to your own echo chamber for accolades.

So yeah. The answer is plain, but our society does not actually value the efforts or skills that permit it. Possibly also by design of the ruling class.

Liquid democracy is a proposed way to do a direct democracy in a large country. It's only been tried on very small scales (Google used it to decide which food to get for their cafeterias), so we don't really know if it would work, but I like the idea.

I'd point out that there are countries which don't have much corruption or governmental malfeasance. Nordic countries tend to score very well on the Corruption Perception Index, and also have good social safety nets and governments that (generally, for the most part) serve the people. They're all small countries, though -- I suspect that politics becomes an increasingly dirty business the more power a country has.

If you haven't already, you might want to look into selectorate theory. It essentially shows not only how the psychopaths at the top stay in power, but also why attempts to reform the system often result in a new crop of rulers who are just as bad or worse than those they replaced. (c.f. Cromwell's revolt, French Revolution, Russian Revolution). A proponent of selectorate theory would argue that the solution is not to remove the psychopaths -- it's to create a system where things in a politician's selfish interest happen to line up with things that benefit the people. It's excellently summed up by this video.

In terms of curtailing corporate power from the top down, studying the history of U.S. antitrust law would be a good place to start. Extra Credits has a good series about it.

One reform method that has worked before is unionization. The vast majority of worker protections came about because of labour action. Unions are a lot weaker than they used to be, but it doesn't have to stay that way. If you can, unionizing your workplace is probably the most impactful action you could take to improve the existing system.

If your tastes are more radical, you could also consider mutual aid societies. A robust one could conceivably Theseus its way into failing institutions, or evolve into a provisional government if everything collapses.

Stop caring about intentions. Stop giving the stupid a free pass. Treat stupidity as a type of malice, and act accordingly.

I believe that this alone should be enough to address the sykos on power. Easier said than done.

Begin teaching media literacy and critical thinking skills in schools.

Guillotine all the billionaires and redistribute all their wealth. That's an important first step

The fact that a vast majority will ignore this discussion, is the same reason why most people will not organise towards a cause.

I have little hope in individuals.

I believe that the massive scale of corruption that exists within the capitalist system necessitates rebuilding from the ground up. Part of the solution is going to be intentional communities (I hope anyway) where we’re building communities with the intention of solving some of these large scale problems (scarcity, pollution, racial injustice, etc) in the community. There’s a collection of already existing communities on ic.org where you can find resources on how to build a community or where to find them. There’s every flavor of community whether you’re looking for a commune, a spiritual community, an eco-friendly community, permaculture, etc.

Organize labor.

Evolve labor strikes from the dark ages with guerilla tactics.

In every company I've ever consulted for, there were bottlenecks where a handful of people in key roles not showing up to work would tank the entire operation.

Why the hell are we still striking with everyone walking out instead of everyone clocking in and getting paid and funneling money to keep key roles empty as the coffers burn while revenue drops and payroll still runs?

Why are strikes so often per-company (or worst per-store) instead of per-industry?

In the digital age organization is theoretically much easier than it has ever been.

And yet labor is still playing with the 1920s playbook while corporate is hiring specialized modern talent to combat it.

What about seizing the means of production?

Look at the actors strike, whining about studios using AI to replace them.

Why the hell aren't the actor unions building their own AI platform for generative performances? It'd unquestionably be a better product working with talent than competitors ostracized by talent. Reminds me of when the MPAA fought against Napster instead of embracing the tides of change and as a result missed the boat on owning digital distribution platforms to Apple and others.

But no. People are scared of change and cling to the status quo even when that isn't working very well for them.

Embrace change. Focus on progress. Evolve.

If the masses can do that faster and better than the boardroom (which really shouldn't be that hard as those guys suck at embracing progress and abandoning status quo), then the masses are going to be holding the bag at the end of the changes coming.

If the masses can't organize enough to stay ahead...

Well, we should probably all learn to enjoy eating cardboard and watching the world burn around us.

If CBT and DBT were taught to kids in school... man, what a change that would make. To be taught at a young age how to control thoughts, cope with stress, face emotions, communicate effectively.

Have y'll tried letting the smart people make decisions?

This is a question too complex for a Lemmy thread, here are some thoughts.

1. Being a net positive will make things better, per difinition. That's what everyone of us can do, regardless of what you are doing. Of course this requires a reasonable process of deciding what's right, so take a look at the next point.

2. Think. To think is naturally the greatest skill of any human. Our intelligence has been key since we started civilisation. Think about everything, be critical about any ideas. Only ideas supported by facts can be good ideas. This is how you find the stuff that makes your life worse. Does your city need to be designed like this? Does a omnipotent being make sense? Do I need to slack off today?

3. Unrelated, but working together with others is beneficial to everyone. Cooperation is what got us so fary and what will bring us beyond the stars. One thing I want to point out specifically is that world federalism, albeit hard to achieve, is a worthwhile end goal.

make public transport better (pls metro in Tallinn)

I think the best anyone can do is try to make life as good as possible in their mini sphere of influence, their personal bubble of friends and relationships. If everyone did that, society would be better. I'm not sure what to do about psychopaths in power. Maybe deal with the psychopaths in your personal world or aim to reduce your own personal behavior that's harmful to others?

Take good care of yourself and always claim the rest you need - don't let anyone call you lazy, disabled or mentally ill for working during as many hours of the day as you want. Being productive is not a virtue.

After you have spent enough time resting: support your local mutual aid circle, or (help) create one. Use your talents and skills to help and support others in your community as much as you can afford. Try and work without participation from the existing authorities (not always possible, but at least don't seek their support unless you have to), basically create your own self-government infrastructure within the crumbling ruins of the old society - like a new tree growing in a hollow stump.

We gotta bring in the new world order.

You could be also interested in democratic confederalism, however I don't know how does the curdish reality look like.

I'm currently taking a class about this (kinda). The current system, which is, in the states, neoliberal capitalism (redundancy for clarity) encourages people to act immorally, or more accurately under a set of morals that justifies those actions. A different system can encourage a different set of actions to get success, and a different set of morals to justify those actions. This is a large part of politics. The other part is praxis, or getting that in place. I'm not going to share the set of theory I believe in, but rather common ways people try to impose their desired version of society.

One way is through the current system, even if you want to completely change it. This is what the class I am talking about. You identify who has power, why they act the way they do, and how you can get them to enact your policies, or at least gain power yourself. This method falls under a lot of criticism, as it stands to reason that a system built by those in power cannot overthrow them. You can't use the master's tools against him.

The other way is revolution, but that has its own problems. It is hard to convince people to completely change everything, and when it does happen, it often happens in the best way possible for those who have power. It also isn't any more moral than the other options, but that is the nature of changing an immoral system. Welcome to politics.

Disclaimer: I'm by no means an expert, as I am just getting into political theory, both in my own studies and formal education.

Morality is shaped by your material conditions, that is, the society, culture, religion, thinkers etc. that comprise the place you were born and taught, calling the bourgeoisie immoral psychopaths doesn't really do anything. The way to deal with this is to toss morality aside and see the relations of power for what they are, exploitation of a class by another, as have happened for basically the entirety of human history.

This claims for a solution then, ending the exploitation which necessitates ending the division of classes by preventing that a ruling class comes to existence. This is basically the premise to communism.

The problem with waiting for the current system do collapse is that Capitalism has shown to be much more resilient than expected. The contradictions of capital are intensifying still to this day and more and more people are noticing it, but it is to be expected that the capitalists will do anything they can to keep the machine working.

Trying to change the system from within doesn't really work, like you said, the ruling class is not gonna let their power get taken way. One example of this is what happened on Chile with elected socialist president Salvador Allende 50 years ago.

A change this big in society doesn't happen peacefully, it will need a full out revolution that will lead to "injuries". It is unfortunate and me and, I think, everyone would like it to not be this way, but it is.

Here are some resources for anyone that wants to start learning:

In English:

Socialism for Absolute Beginners by Second Thought

Why Social Democracy Isn't Good Enough by Second Thought

Will Life Be Better Under Socialism? by Hakim

"Socialism always fails" is a stupid argument by Hakim

How Capitalism sells poverty as modesty & why equality isn't a practical goal. by Yugopinik

https://dessalines.github.io/essays/

In Portuguese (subbed in english):

Comunismo: princípios básicos e guia de leitura / Communism: basic principles and reading guide by História Pública