Capitalism and Firefly

POSTED BY: chrisisall
UPDATED: Tuesday, August 30, 2005 16:21
VIEWED: 10053
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EMBERS

Tuesday, August 9, 2005 7:52 PM

HKCavalier, I am impressed by your life-style,
but if you think you are in the majority in this country then it is you who needs to open your eyes to the reality.

And Rue, if one benefits from the infra-structure of a country which practices greed in it's dealings with the rest of the world,
then one should also take responsibility for it, IMO.
Just because I have never held a gun doesn't mean that I am not responsible for every shot taken by a member of our Armed Forces...one must either support the action or work to change it.
(that is a slightly different angle on the same question, I'm just saying that we ARE our government, and all the corporate interests which represent us over-seas).

Unless or until we are all willing to live a life of selfless denial like HKCavalier (and is that computer at the commune plugged into solar power too?) then I don't think we can pretend we are not benefiting from our Government's efforts to indulge us (do you know how much they pay for a gallon of petrol in Europe!?! We would have an over-throw of the government if they were to tax us half so much).

Obviously I'm taking an extreme position here, but I think it is a valid point. We cannot self-righteously stand here and insist we have over come all greed while we ignore those who are starving and dying around the world.

Join my crew: Fairfield Fireflies
http://browncoats.serenitymovie.com/serenity/index.html?fuseaction=gro
ups.main&searchby=F

SIGNYM

Tuesday, August 9, 2005 7:57 PM

Quote:
I would say that hogging the resources of Earth and destroying the enviornment is all greed...the by products of greed.

There's a difference between greed and carelessness. I don't see a lot of "greed" at the individual level. What I DO see is "greed" at the systemic level. But before I go off into left field, I'm going to have to read this entire thread.

OH, and BTW- I drive an energy-efficient car, I'm ALWAYS turning off lights, buy organic (when available), recycle and the best part.... I my job is mainly in the realm of reducing pollution!

HK- Some day I'd like to live in a commune too.

CHRISISALL

Tuesday, August 9, 2005 9:08 PM

Well, I got the smallest, most efficient gas car I could, my next will be a hybrid, I recycle glass, metal, and paper, and when I beat up bad guys, I use economy of motion to save energy...
I mean, I turn off lights I'm not using.
I even got me a newfangled washer/dryer combo unit that dries cloths through precipitation, it uses half the energy and water of a standard set.

Funny, I live pretty simply, yet I still feel like I have so much. I would love to live in a commune.

The bottom line is we can all do more to use less. I can't stand the packaging at supermarkets, such waste; I get as much as I can from local farmers. Not that I'm to be commended, on the contrary, I still waste too much.

Confessin' Chrisisall

EMBERS

Tuesday, August 9, 2005 9:16 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by SignyM:
There's a difference between greed and carelessness.

well call it what you will,
to get back to my original point:
I think people will be just as careless in 500 years as they are now.
I don't see people 'evolving' beyond =
the 'haves' (the members of the Alliance and/or the Federation) who are in power and enjoy the wealth and privileges of power,
and the 'have nots' (the Browncoats, the riff raff on the fringes of society struggling to keep flying).

note: my point was never that the Alliance/Federation/or the USA today is evil, I don't see 'greed' as evil, just human nature. Which is probably why you don't see any greed, because you don't see people as evil, just careless about the rest of humanity....

edited to add Chrisisall's confessions:

Quote:
Well, I got the smallest, most efficient gas car I could, my next will be a hybrid, I recycle glass, metal, and paper, and when I beat up bad guys, I use economy of motion to save energy...
I mean, I turn off lights I'm not using.
I even got me a newfangled washer/dryer combo unit that dries cloths through precipitation, it uses half the energy and water of a standard set.

Funny, I live pretty simply, yet I still feel like I have so much. I would love to live in a commune.

The bottom line is we can all do more to use less. I can't stand the packaging at supermarkets, such waste; I get as much as I can from local farmers. Not that I'm to be commended, on the contrary, I still waste too much.

LOL
that is kind of my situation:
I drive a small fuel efficient car, and the next will be a hybred
I have a special washer that uses less water and extracts the water after the rinse more efficiently so that drying time is less,
I live in an ashram, eat organic and recycle.
But I don't kid myself that it is enough.
No way am I giving up my air-conditioning
or my hot & cold running water.

I've traveled enough to know that US is not the only country that enjoys a comfortable life style.
I've traveled enough to have seen a lot of the poverty of those who make our clothes....
It is all pretty over-whelming.
Christ said there will always be poor,
and I'm afraid he is right.
Try as we might on an individual level we still enjoy a far more privileged life than most.
(in case you don't recognize it, that is liberal guilt talking)

HKCAVALIER

Tuesday, August 9, 2005 11:14 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by SignyM:
HK- Some day I'd like to live in a commune too.

What a bunch of commies! LOL!

Just to be clear, strictly speaking it ain't a full-on commune. I believe the term du jour is "intentional community." Everybody's got capitalistical jay-oh-bee's and I have no idea what anyone else makes at them (well, some idea). Grow a lot of our produce here (mmmmmmm, homegrown basil) but not all.

And hey, Embers, your position, if I may say so, sounds a tad perfectionistic. I don't have all the answers, but some of us have some of them. I have friends who do generate all their electricity at home. I ain't there yet, but that doesn't mean I'm killing the planet or waging a war of aggression overseas. On the other hand, it's fair to say that my self-sufficient friends are a little crazier than I am (no, really

). You just have to strike the right balance to suit yourself. And there's no need to feel guilty for benefiting from a system you were born into. Just do your part to improve things and try not to back-slide, y'know?

You can't use the progress of the last 3000 years as a measure of the progress of the next 3000 or even the next 100. Most of the global progress toward recongnizing human rights has happened in just the last century or so. People didn't even know what children were until Freud started paying attention. Of course, the destructive potential of the human endeavor has exponentiated as well. That's the fascinating thing about history: it's got momentum.

Firefly is what I call a cautionary tale and pretty gorram astute one at that. Joss is showing us where Capitalism will prolly take us in the long run; what I call endgame capitalism. The idea is to show us where we're headed so we can change direction before it's too late. I think a lot of us are pulling on the breaks.

HKCavalier

Hey, hey, hey, don't be mean. We don't have to be mean, because, remember, no matter where you go, there you are.

CHRISISALL

Tuesday, August 9, 2005 11:35 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by embers:
(in case you don't recognize it, that is liberal guilt talking)

It's only 'liberal guilt' if you walk around thinking that if you feel bad about it all the time, that somehow makes it better for those in need.
Otherwise I'd call it humanist humility.

Chrisisall

EMBERS

Wednesday, August 10, 2005 12:37 AM

Quote:
Originally posted by HKCavalier:
You can't use the progress of the last 3000 years as a measure of the progress of the next 3000 or even the next 100. Most of the global progress toward recongnizing human rights has happened in just the last century or so.

I'm sorry if I had been a bit snarky in my previous post,
you do make a very valid point here...
I'm afraid I've lost some of my optimism over the years, becoming a little bit cynical when I see the USofA guilty of torturing prisoners...

Quote:
Firefly is what I call a cautionary tale and pretty gorram astute one at that. Joss is showing us where Capitalism will prolly take us in the long run; what I call endgame capitalism. The idea is to show us where we're headed so we can change direction before it's too late. I think a lot of us are pulling on the breaks.

Joss' intentions are always make for an interesting discussion. In the commentary to 'Objects in Space' Joss seems to suggest that he is an existentialist,
but we know that at heart he DOES believe in noble ideals and family love and other warm fuzzies....
But here (like the Alliance is Communist or Facist debate) we find that both the optimists and pessimists can find a lot that speaks to them in 'Firefly'.
In the end it is the brilliance of the writing that we can be moved and up-lifted by this show,
without it seriously challenging our own POV.

I promise I'll try not to sound so jaded in the future

RUE

Wednesday, August 10, 2005 1:59 AM

Quote:
if one benefits from the infra-structure of a country which practices greed in it's dealings with the rest of the world, then one should also take responsibility for it, IMO.

I would GLADLY give up everything I have if it could make the world a fair place. And I do what I can as an individual and as a group member to try to change things.

But the most important thing to change is - a mind.

I wish I could explain how convinced I am that a society is the free choice of its members.
And when people come to a new realization, nothing can stand in the way.

Nearly everything I know I learned by the grace of others.

SERGEANTX

Wednesday, August 10, 2005 3:13 AM

I haven't really been following this thread lately, but it seems to be settling on the moral implications of capitalism, whether you can actually have a sane moral society under a free market in the long run. I think you can. But I'm pretty sure that the mess we have now won't improve unless we make some fairly radical changes, and soon.

For me, the malignancy on the free market is the corporation. Capitalism, and again I'm talking about my idyllic version of it, is completely centered on the decisions of individuals. A corporation isn't an individual. It will never hold the responsibility nor the accountability of an individual. Most of the injustices we've been discussing happen when those profiting from them are safely removed from those suffering them.

Modern corporations essentially exists as rogue states, people who combine their wealth and use it to buy influence and power that will further expand their wealth and influence.

All that said, I'm not sure where I stand these days. I've always supported the free market because I believe in a free society. If people don't have control over the fruits of their labor, other freedoms become superfluous. What I'd like to see, before we give up on free enterprise entirely, is to see if we can find some way to get rid of the current corporate model. I'm not sure what we'd replace it with, or even if it should be replaced.

The problem with giving up the corporation is, that it's largely responsible for the current position the US holds in the world. The multi-national corps, hosted by the US, have essentially established the world wide empire that our political ideology prohibits us. They move behind the scenes of every single US 'police action' or 'peace keeping' mission. Eagerly expanding their influence into the newly cleared 'markets'. Asking the US to turn its back on the corporation would basically be asking us to give up our super power status overnight. I'd be eager to do so myself, but I'm guessing a broad majority, liberals and conservatives alike would not.

Sorry for the rambling post. I know my thoughts weren't entirely clear. That's partially because I'm still a little in flux on the issue myself. Its also because I haven't slept much lately. I've been working on a midlife career change which has been an uphill battle. The good news is, I got the job. I'll be starting the 29th as a programmer for a software firm in Pennsylvania. The CEO is a Firefly fan!

SergeantX

"Dream a little dream or you can live a little dream. I'd rather live it, cause dreamers always chase but never get it." Aesop Rock

RUE

Wednesday, August 10, 2005 3:15 AM

So, it might take some imagination and a leap of faith, but if you can accept that things don't HAVE to be this way ... or some version of this way ... what would you pick?

Agrarian independence? Imagine a farm and home of your own. There are no fences around 'your land' - no one is going to take it away from you. You farm what you need, and some extra to trade and for security - things like drought do happen. Technology makes life easy, but you have only the technology you need. The land is open as far as they eye can see. And great herds still roam and flocks fly. You are secure in your ability to provide for yourself and your family.

Social cooperation? Your society knows that there is room for everyone. And that the most successful society is the one that includes all its members. So it strives to incorporate all by finding the ways each member can add to it, and by making a place for them to contribute.

Or something else?

Nearly everything I know I learned by the grace of others.

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