Entry 1415, on 2012-07-23 at 14:45:13 (Rating 4, Politics)
When the world becomes grossly unjust and the vast majority of people are exploited by a tiny fraction of the richest in society there will always be change. It has happened many times in the past: sometimes the outcome has been good and sometimes the new political system has been hardly better than the one it replaced. That's what history tells us, but many people ignore history, thinking that things will be somehow different "this time". But, of course, it never is.
As I said, in the past a major cause of revolution has been a tiny corrupt minority controlling the lives of the majority. Doesn't that sound very familiar? Doesn't it remind you of the 1% of the most immoral, greedy, uncaring people on the planet who currently own almost all the wealth and have most of the political control, yet make no real positive contribution to society as a whole?
A recent report found that the top 1% have 20 to 30 trillion dollars stashed away in foreign tax havens. That is a huge amount of money: equal to the combined economies of the US and several other leading countries. That's enough to easily solve all the world's problems with hunger. That's enough to invest in all the new advances we need to move away from the dangerous and inefficient technologies we currently have. That's enough to solve all the banking crises currently happening around the world today. And it's enough to benefit just about any other problem you care to name.
Yet even while this vast wealth exists the rest of us are being asked to economise for the "good of the economy" or for the "benefit of our country". It's all lies. There is no financial crisis, just a poor distribution of existing finance. The world is in trouble because the most corrupt people (generally those who end up with the most money) don't care if their actions result in death and misery around the world, they just want more money even though they couldn't possibly use what they already have.
So in most cases the capitalist system results in the worst type of people doing well. It actively encourages greed, immorality, and conceit. Even people like Bill Gates and Warren Buffett who do have a philanthropic angle to their activities can barely be excused. They gained those riches through dishonest means and giving a small part of that wealth away hardly improves their overall impact on the world.
Things are unlikely to improve through the usual political process so I think a revolution is the only likely outcome. I'm not sure what form that will take but it will happen. We know that from history. Would the former Soviet world have known it was about to collapse so totally? Would the Arab world have predicted the "Arab Spring" before it started? In general they wouldn't, and the western capitalist world won't see its downfall until it is too late either.
But there is an easy answer to the problem. All the richest people have to do is give up all their wealth apart from a few million for living expenses. Surely that should be enough, shouldn't it? Distributing the wealth would be difficult, of course, but whatever happens to it it couldn't possibly be worse than where it is now.
I would suggest a few trillion going to university research projects, a few trillion more going to famine relief projects, and a few trillion being used to help balance the budgets of countries who have been brought to ruin by the system which created the hidden wealth in the first place.
The rest could be invested in a new bank which would be based on honesty and moral principles (in other words, not any of the banks we already have) to provide a continuing source of income to the projects I mentioned above.
There you go, problem solved without the tedious need for any bloodshed, executions or anything else. Yeah I know, a lot of people would just love to mow down the world's bankers with a machine gun, but that's not nice! We need to try to hold the revolutionaries to a higher standard than those they take over from. The current world elite are responsible for most of the world's misery and death. The revolutionaries must do better. Bring on the revolution!
Comment 1 by Jim on 2012-07-31 at 14:54:13:
Perhaps OJB could comment on the outcome of many revolutions in the past which resulted in anarchy and violence. Be careful what you ask for because it might not be as good as you think.
Comment 2 by OJB on 2012-08-01 at 11:39:07:
Yes, I acknowledged that problem when I said "sometimes the new political system has been hardly better than the one it replaced". I accept that things don't always get better, but even in cases (like the French revolution) where the new regime initially perpetrated just about as many atrocities and injustices as the one it replaced, things did improve eventually and the society (for example, France) is now a moderately democratic and fair one.
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