Korean Job Discussion Forums

[BS.Dos.]

I've just noticed the G20 protests taking place in London this weekend and can't help thinking, somewhat cynically, that events such as this achieve very little. Correct me if I'm wrong, but I can't remember a single occasion in the last 20-years or so when a protest on a national/international scale had any discernible effect on the eventual outcome.

To that end, which do you feel carries the stronger potential for influencing change?

[Ya-ta Boy]

In this context, the only form of direct action I believe in is the ballot box. Demonstrations and protests are a legitimate form of public speech, serving an educational/informational purpose. That stops the moment rocks start flying and cars start burning. Democratic societies, and almost all the countries in the G20 are democratic societies, have the mechanisms in place to force change of policy peacefully. Direct action, as I see it, is elevating the individual to the position of tyrant--'my' judgement is superior to the group.

[Kikomom]

http://www.putpeoplefirst.org.uk/

[Gopher]

Niether. Multiple peaceful processes already exist to demand and/or contribute to the kind of change you want, whatever it may be, within the American political system.

This kind of "protest" nonsense, BS.Dos, cultivates and encourages nothing but reaction. It alienates almost everyone but the extremists who come back later and contextualize their nonsense within a gansta-rap video format...

Here is another version. Note that they oppose President B. Clinton, "the powerful people," "global corporations and banks," and they assert "the revolution starts now."

Clich�, clich�, and more clich�. Blah, blah, blah.

And as you ask: what do these democratically-illiterate rabble truly accomplish?

[RJjr]

Our forefathers who participated in the Boston Tea Party would probably be a lot prouder of them than they would of people like me who do nothing but bitch on the internet.

[Gopher]

[RJjr]

[Gopher]

RJjr: books. Read them. Start with, say, Eric Williams's classic, Capitalism and Slavery. Over sixty years old and still going...

[RJjr]

It was in a book, so it must be right!

If the author of Capitalism and Slavery said that trading rum for African human beings was capitalism, I can agree with him on that. But if he tried to explain the economic host/parasite relationship between slaves and slaveowners as capitalism, I would like for you to spill the Reader's Digest version, if you've even read the book yourself...

Dr. Walter Williams defines slavery as "the forcible use of one man's labor for the benefit of another." Isn't that what socialism is all about? Not that all socialism is slavery, but all slavery is very clearly socialist by its host/parasite fundamentals.

Dr. Williams also has stated, "Capitalism is relatively new in human history. Prior to capitalism, the way people amassed great wealth was by looting, plundering and enslaving their fellow man. Capitalism made it possible to become wealthy by serving your fellow man."

It's hard to argue against what Dr. Walter Williams says. He and his cousin Julius Erving are black Americans that have worked hard and amassed great amounts of wealth because of the part of the American economy that is capitalism.

They'll both have a little less wealth when they mail off their checks to the IRS on April 15th. Tim Geithner will see fit to hand over their hard-earned dollars to some of his white buddies who didn't earn and does not deserve the money. And that is not capitalism. It's socialism.

[Gopher]

RJjr: your information seems obsolete.

Andre Gunder Frank, building on Janet Abu-Lughod's work, has pushed "capitalism's" origins back five-thousand years.

Start with I. Wallerstein's world-systems theory. Then go to J. Abu-Lughod, Before European Hegemony: the World System AD 1250-1350 (New York: Oxford University Press, 1989). Then go to A. Gunder Frank, ReORIENT: Global Economy in the Asian Age (Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1998). Not only did Frank and his dependista followers err not so long ago, he said in this book before he died, but so did K. Marx re: capitalism and its origins. And badly.

No, I will not give you the so-called Readers-Digest version.

Have I read these books? Let me put it to you this way: I have a personally inscribed first-edition copy of Frank's ReORIENT, containing an inside joke from the man with respect to our argument re: the world-system model and pre-Hispanic Latin American history. Of course I have read and reread these books. Get real.

In any case, any news on any "direct actions" or protests, especially re: their effectiveness in changing anything at all...?

[ontheway]

[RJjr]

[Gopher]

Sorry to disappoint. But it is true. As everything, you may take it or leave it

[harlowethrombey]

Imagine a Michael Scott voice:

"have you ever thought about. . . Direct. . . Protests? Hmmmm? Bring the best of both together."

[mole]

Maybe I'm missing something in the translation.
Seems the masses are screaming FOR socialism?