I hate fuses. They just exist because electrical wiring apologists don't want you to know notice house fires. They tell you it's safe but fuses pretty much prove that's a lie.

Birdman, before you've said that you aren't an accelerationist.

Recently you've indicated otherwise - better to beat slaves, to let infection spread through the periphery.

What has changed your mind?

Apparently accelerationism has recently been adopted by white supremacists.

Not suggesting Birdman is one, even if his ideology bears a eurocentric value system. Namely a protestant-esque focus on labor and material as the primary terms of consideration, and its resultant terminological geophysical centrality ("periphery", "core").

This is not even worth responding to for how little sense it makes

i thought charities were good before birdman said all this stuff. i mean i always knew bill gates giving back a pittance was utter bs, but never thought of it like this for all charities. like replace bill gates with imperialism, and think of charities as imperialism giving back

maybe(almost certainly) i'm looking at this wrong, but aoc seems kinda similar. she is an imperialist, but giving back a pittance to the masses. like aoc is an imperialist supporting a system that exploits and steals wealth, but then wants to give a pittance more to the exploited

aoc, sanders, and the social democracy movements of welfare capitalism is merely the political expression of the labor aristocracy (well off workers living in the imperial core like the US) demanding a larger share of the profits exploited from the global south through imperialism. They demand this in various forms like healthcare, higher wages, universal basic income, free tuition, etc

part of imperialism is that a portion of what is exploited from the global south has to be given to workers at home to “bribe” them into supporting the imperialist plunder. And there will always be tensions between the labor aristocracy who want a bigger share (ie a larger bribe) and the imperialists who want to keep more for themselves (a smaller bribe)

however both the imperialists and the labor aristocracy have an interest in keeping the imperialist exploitation going

Seems like the baby and the bath water to me.

I not concerned about the fact that Doctors Without Borders is needed because of an imperfect (or worse) system. First, it is too small to perpetuate the status quo (though I expect you argue otherwise, and in good faith, I should add). Second, it helps people get medical care.

It just seems a bit extremist to embrace a viewpoint against something that is so rigid that even good things arising from it must be condemned because they only exist as byproduct of capitalism.

Should we stop giving to food banks and food drives because it reinforces the fact that goods are purchased by the people who benefit from capitalism and given to those who do not benefit?

If that is your position I get your convictions, but I don't get how they play out in practice in the real world.

If I held your convictions I would want to be pretty sure that stopping all charitable work would result (in the near future) some sort of revolution of sorts that would create the type of society I wanted.

Otherwise I would feel that I am deciding that starving people or withholding medical care from people is for their own good. And, that me deciding whether the fight for a better system versus people going hungry is just another version of the privileged deciding what is best for the disadvantaged.

birdman is saying that because capitalism exploits people, giving back to the people exploited is wrong and stupid...

it's like if i steal $100 from you, then give you back $1 every now and then

“Some ideas are so stupid that only intellectuals believe them.”

― George Orwell

That is exactly what I understood him to mean. I just don't agree that giving back is wrong, absent a better solution to the imbalance.

I would like to know how stopping donations/giving moves towards what Luckbox envisions as an ideal or better state.

look if you are too stupid to understand what I am saying, please just don't let it infect my words and beliefs

False dichotomy

use your time/energy/resources for things that will change the system that allows poverty, starvation, lack of healthcare, etc to exist in the first place

I literally just posted on the last page about the Free Breakfast Program and people are in here like "What birdman is saying is people should starve"

when mets and bobo are saying something, it's technically true that that means people are saying that thing but it's still misleading to state it that way

How about you do that and I give to the food bank? win win...

And no, I am not stating that you want people to starve. I am asking how you reconcile your case against charities, as on one hand you feel they perpetuate the bad parts of capitalism, but on the other hand none of us who do contribute should stop based on that alone.

I am not trying to paint you in a box. I just don't get an anti-charity stance.

AK, you keep voting and donating to food banks if that makes you feel good

AK it isn't your fault dude, you aren't on a high enough plane yet. I'm so woke I realized being alive is just something capitalism grants us just to keep us in line. I plan to kill myself tonight. Take that the man!

Look I get it, professional charities are always fronts to make money. They're essentially tax exempt business, who make more profits than a regular business because they scam people into literally giving them money. I get it, you hate them. Reasonable. But to then continue on and saying "even if they operate the way they are idealized they're still bad" is ridiculous. Can you not just admit your militant bias against capitalism got the better of you, you said something stupid... and move on?

OK

This is why blanket statements like "charities are scams" are, imo, not terribly useful.

From my point of view, we all, collectively and individually have an obligation to make the world better. Especially those of us who by accidents of fate, have ended up better off than the majority of the people living in the world.

To that end I believe in charitable giving, but I also don't pretend that it's enough, when what we need is real systemic change.

So I want to change the world. I want to change our economy and our system of government. But until we get there, I"m going to try to help alleviate the pain of where we are.

I think of it in terms of "what can i, personally do to effect change?" So I participate in a liberal women's book club about social and racial reforms. I support protestors with my dollars as I am in a highly vulnerable group and probably not a good candidate for protesting personally. I write letters to elected officials and attend online popups. I vote. I attend virtual speaking events sponsored by my public library on everything from minimum basic income proposals to Holocaust survivors. And i'm training to work in our terribly broken immigration system for people seeking asylum.

If any one has any other suggestions of ways I can help move society forward I would be very interested.

And then I give money and time to help alleviate at least a little of what I see wrong in the current system.

I currently target: help for my local humans, nationwide humans, international humans, and animal rights.

For local human beings I donate to an organization called Crosslines that provides breakfast and lunch to all comers 7 days per week. During the lunch hour they also allow anyone who wants a shower to take one. They run a thrift store with clothes, accessories, and furniture/household goods and people who qualify can also "shop" for free with coupons.

For national human beings I donate to food banks networks on an ongoing basis.

For international human beings I try to use the guidelines of getting the most bang for my giving dollars, as money can go much much further once we get outside of the U.S. I won't bore you all with this but you can pm if you're interested.

And 4 times per year I donate to animal activism and sanctuaries, which is a singularly ineffective way to make the world better as of right now, so I don't delegate a huge amount of my giving dollars to it, but it's important to me to acknowledge what farmed animals go through.

Over and over in this thread people keep making the perfect the enemy of the good. Doing ANYTHING still trumps doing NOTHING.

Most jobs and work is a scam (outside of desire to actually do the work). Everyone could work much less and have just as many needs filled.

If I donate I just do food and shelter crap mostly, except after the George floyd thing I gave to the bail fund to help appease my white guilt. It helped!

In the future lots of "work" will be eliminated. Parents will parent and not feel the need to both parent and be astrophysicist daytraders.