cross-posted from: https://lemmy.dbzer0.com/post/13355449
Capitalism is a game where only a few people get to win.
We have also seen time and time again that it is a game that is able to manipulate and change whatever ideology or behaviour you have to work towards its own benefit.
So the only way to actually “win” is to not play the game.
Right now that seems impossible because it is a massive collective action problem, however this whole platform is a testament to show that it’s possible to overcome that kind of problem.
Reddit is a dominant platform that is starting to destroy itself. People are in turn finding alternatives such as Lemmy to satisfy the need that Reddit once did.
I view capitalism in the same way. It will never truly completely cease to exist (the same way Digg never truly died), but it can become irrelevant over time if we collectively decide to just use another system to satisfy the same needs that capitalism is satisfying today.
The one example that I can think of that tries to tackle this problem is the idea of free stores that are based on a gift economy. If more people decided to use this system instead of capitalism then capitalism will have less sway over people’s lives.
And in the end it doesn’t have to be specifically a free store that needs to be adopted by wider society but whatever it is does need to satisfy the same basic need that capitalism does in our current society.
I’m inclined to agree but I worry about capitalism’s vampiric ability to co-opt things. Sort of like how any country that tries to do socialism gets attacked by the US or suffers a coup at some point. Capitalists are so greedy that they’ll see people having fun without them and try to take a piece for themselves somehow, or find a way to make the population dependent on capital. (Just look at the IMF and Africa.)
That is sort of my point. If you play the game you are going to lose (in this case get co-opted) so you need to be able to not play the same game that they are.