[MD] Capitalism: A Question of Morality

[Case]

>[Dan]
>So you're not a true capitalist?
>
>[Case]
>Not by choice.

[Dan]
Really! Why not?

[Case]
I suppose the biggest reason is that it just in not in my nature. Pirsig
talks about Ruth Benedict in Lila and her book Patterns of Culture. The
point of Benedict's book was that, looked at from a certain perspective a
culture can be said to have or to favor particular personality styles. She
used the Apollonian, Dionysian and whatever else in a kind of Nietzchian
thing. But she said that when a culture inclines toward one style of another
it favors its members with the corresponding style and disfavors those who
personality types are of another sort.

Make no mistake I am a capitalist I have a retirement plan, I own some
property, I shop at WalMart to get the best price on cheap crap. But the
more specifically capitalist I have become in my life the creepier I have
felt. When I tried sales I always knew enough about the product to be able
to tell when my Customer could get a better deal somewhere else and my
inclination was to help them get the best deal. Or even at yards sales the
last vestige of the truly free market economy. I want to just get rid of
things or to give old toys and books away to children.

I am not rabid about this. I am not trying to overthrow the system. I have
no suggestion for and alternative, no plans to leave the country. I
generally do not get involved in discussions like this. But your specific
question is why I personally am not a capitalist by choice. This is a
different sort of question than is typically asked here.

So my first response is that it does not suit who I am. It makes me
uncomfortable to pursue my own interests at the expense of others. As a
result I am really bad at it. Anything else I could say would just be
rationalization of this innate prejudice.

>[Case]
>I believe the Sioux ran into the same problem when a team of surveyors came
>to South Dakota and said mind if we pass through we just want to put in a
>little bit of railroad track.

[Dan]
I guess they should have learned to be more successful negotiators.

[Case]
Looking at the history of European occupation of this hemisphere it would
seem that everything was tried from capitulation to outright hostility. In
the end the only thing that mattered was shear force and ruthlessness. The
natives never had a chance. But specifically with regard to attempted
negotiation, frequently when negotiations were held under the universal
white flag of truce the native leaders were simply taken into custody and
imprisoned. 

[Dan]
I think the MOQ would say that if a community doesn't change, it dies. I'm 
not saying no to change as you seem to infer, however. Change can be 
managed. If not, then it happens willy-nilly. That is what I'm against.

[Case]
I would say a society needs to adapt. Sometimes that means it needs to
change. Sometimes it needs to maintain the status quo. Change and adaptation
are not things societies tend to manage well. And I suspect that a society
that promotes rapid change is flirting with it own doom.