Is it worse or better than Surveillance Communism?
I haven't heard of "Surveillance Communism" as a developed distinct concept.
I guess if "capitalist mode of production absolutely good and communist mode of production absolutely bad" is taken as a given then the parent comment would be "facetious" as in dismissive of the article being discussed.
> According to The Oxford Handbook of Karl Marx, "Marx used many terms to refer to a post-capitalist society—positive humanism, socialism, Communism, realm of free individuality, free association of producers, etc. He used these terms completely interchangeably. The notion that "socialism" and "Communism" are distinct historical stages is alien to his work and only entered the lexicon of Marxism after his death".[36]
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marxism#Communism,_revolution_...
Within that framework, it sounds like surveillance capitalism is infinitely worse than surveillance communism, because the framework of surveillance capitalism exists only to exploit and commodify people, in order to sell them things. Or worse, commoditize them in order to sell "them," i.e. their data, to others whom the subjects of said surveillance never consented to share with.
OTOH, the hypothetical framework of surveillance communism would at least be intended to benefit society as a whole. I don't know if there's any contemporary thought on the matter, but Marx probably couldn't have conceived of the type of mass surveillance we have today, which means he probably wouldn't have understood the question straight away.
What country? Did you assume everyone visiting and commenting on this website live on one country?
I never assumed everyone, I am replying to pmiller2. And yes, I am assuming pmiller2 and I both live in the United States. There is a pretty good chance I am correct about that.
How fun are you at parties?
The relevance of the assumption is that I made the statement "the education in this country has failed us" - us being you and I. So the relevance is that we both live in the same country regardless of our race, gender identity, or sexuality. I am not how you managed to pull all of those things in.
If it is "tiring" to attempt to argue with me, it's because I don't fall for your pathetic rhetorical attempts to inflame, and you don't seem to be able to read what I said without making a straw man out of it. Name calling does not constitute argumentation. Do better, please, if you can.
BTW, I am a English native speaker. I truly wish I could get a refund on my English language instruction, and instead have had the luxury of being born somewhere civilized.
Surveillance communism used analog phone wiretaps and human agents, thus limiting the damage.
NOTE: I meant a Soviet-style "communism", and not the current label that's widely applied to anything, and certainly not a Chinese-style regime. Think USSR and DDR.
However, I fell into a trap: every time someone uses the loaded words like "capitalism" and "communism", it's safe to assume you are being manipulated, since the phenomenon needs to be clarified: is it an economic model, a model of government, or anything else.
I doubt China limits it's surveillance to wiretaps and human agents.
And whether or not you think China is not an implementation of communism, both their government and its subjects would largely disagree.
let's see 0 + 0...carry the 1....um I've arrived at 0.
Is quality healthcare tied to the economic engine of its country? How is universal health care in North Korea? Pretty good?
You're conflating separate issues and presenting them as indictments of capitalism. That is either deliberately disingenuous or horribly ignorant. Either way, I suggest you pick up a book other than A People's History of the United States.
UPDATE: Small addendum since you are confused as to what capitalism is. Your 14 year old nephew does own capital: their labor. Their ability, depending on labor laws in their state, allow them to offer that labor in whichever market or not. An option that would be deprived of them in a system that follows the prescriptions of "from each according to their ability, to each according to their needs."
Their labour is a factor of production but it is _not_ capital. Here is an introduction to the factors of production: https://www.wikiwand.com/en/Factors_of_production . (Notice that both in classical/liberal economics and marxist economics labour is distinct from capital)
> Their ability, depending on labor laws in their state, allow them to offer that labor in whichever market or not.
That is a commodity and _not_ capital and is normally discussed as the commodification of labour: https://www.wikiwand.com/en/Commodity (Addendum: there are many examples of regulated commodities like those containing tabacco and alcoholic beverages)
> An option that would be deprived of them in a system that follows the prescriptions of "from each according to their ability, to each according to their needs."
How so? They would still be able to labour (according to their ability) and would receive what they need (food, housing, medical treatment, education, entretainment, etc.) according to their need.
Even in a capitalist mode of production you cannot "choose" to labour in a particular employment. The employer would gauge ability and the most effective number of employees; Lets assume that hypothetical nephew doesn't know how to cook and wants to work as a chef in a gourmet restaurant or isn't a nuclear engineer/scientist and wants to work as a nuclear plant operator like a fellow named Simpson.
From unit 1.2:
> HUMAN CAPITAL[Many textbooks discuss “labor” instead of ‘human capital.” We use “human capital” because it involves much more than physical attributes and helps students focus on the reason why they are in school.]
Student's earliest exposure to formal economic education begins with definitions that deceive people into believing they are capitalists when they are in fact selling their labor power for wages.
[1] - https://www.ccee.org/wp-content/uploads/downloads/OTHER_PDFS...
BTW, the 9 point outline in that PDF is actually a good framework for understanding and learning to navigate a capitalist, market economy, so I wouldn't say it exactly makes your point.
Edit: Ah, ok, the indoctrination portion of the program comes a little later on in the file, lol. :P. Consider the last part of my last sentence withdrawn.
Now, back to the question I posed to you: did, or did not capitalist nations participate in wars of imperialism for the sake of economic expansion, which then resulted in people dying?
PS: I know damn well what capitalism is. It's private ownership of the means of production, along with a market based economy and enforcement of private property rights.
If you understood what capitalism was, or even basic economics, you would know that labor is one of the factors of production which is completely separate from capital. You also grossly mischaracterize how labor works in a socialist framework, again showing that you've never cracked a book other than maybe Friedman's Capitalism and Freedom.
Moreover, you have no literal idea what a capitalist is, either, so I'll tell you: a capitalist is one who generates his or her living solely or mostly off of capital. Capital is defined as "means of production," including land, tools, and other things besides labor and raw materials that allow for this thing we call "production" to happen.
And, I know you have this strange notion of the word "voluntary," whereby because I choose not to starve or freeze on the street, I have to live indoors, and, because I can't afford to buy my own home, I have to rent, yet you consider it "voluntary" that I have to agree to a coercive contractual agreement in order to have an extremely basic standard of living. This is laughable, and capitalism deserves all the jeers it gets for redefining common sense terms like this.
So, anyway, let's not continue to deflect, and return to. the main point: do you want to answer the question or not? Did capitalist nations participate in wars of imperialism for the sake of economic expansion, resulting in the death of even one human? One is greater than 0, after all, so, if you can acknowledge that, then we can begin a more thorough accounting of the deaths of capitalism.
The Bengal Famine killed over 10 million people[3].
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Famine_(Ireland)#Food_ex...
[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Famine_(Ireland)#Causes_...
[3] https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2014/7/17/1314447/-Capitali...