@Sanzibir, as you might be aware. . .
Sunstone, the primary problem with your response to my post is that you are taking my Devil's Advocacy more seriously than I am myself.
See, the way I see my own post is somewhat similar to the Taoist Zhuang Tzu's parable of Robber Chih, in which Zhuang Tzu presented Robber Chih as fitting the definition of a virtuous Confucian despite simultaneously being a vicious bandit leader.
So when you say something like:
This is hardly community-mindedness in most people's books.
My only thought is: Of course!! And Robber Chih's generosity is hardly generosity in most people's books, but it is generosity none-the-less.
I'll continue to address this with the same level of irreverence and lacking total seriousness.
Obviously, capitalism promotes a sort of tribalism in which the corporation is one tribe and its competitors are other tribes. If you do not see that, then how is it possible to justify capitalism on the grounds that capitalist businesses ever seek to compete by producing better and better goods and services at lower and lower prices? By what mechanism would they be market driven if they did not need to compete?
See part of the problem here is you seem to think, from what I have underlined above, I have an interest in "justifying capitalism". Which is not my interest. My only interest is in that indulging that Devil's Advocate side of myself that wishes to present the obvious fact that these virtues are promoted in a capitalist society. Try not to approach my words as a defense of capitalism, I'm only trying to take the position here that capitalism promotes the virtues you said it did not. And
only that position, since that's the only thing that strikes me as amusing to discuss.
Just because capitalism involves competition, doesn't mean that it doesn't also involve cooperation. Inevitably, every society you can come up with will emphasize a mix of cooperation and competition.
But in capitalism, only competition with the people offering the same services as you is a competition you need to have.
And in fact, you
need to cooperate with people. The voluntary transaction of goods is quite literally the cornerstone of the entire economic theory. You
need to cooperate with a person to make a trade or deal. Cooperation, not competition, is the very cornerstone of the system.
And it's not purely tribalistic in the sense of inter-company cooperation. You need to cooperate with as many people as possible to sell as many things as possible. You need to cooperate with the outgroup consumers to make any money.
So of course a capitalist society must by necessity value this trait.
You are using "consideration" here in a limited case scenario.
You are doing the same.
Everyone does, I suspect.
Where is the "consideration" when an unregulated or poorly regulated capitalist business discoverers it can reduced costs by dumping industrial waste into a nearby river relied on by hundreds of thousands of people downstream of it for their drinking water?
Well they're going out of business as soon as
that story breaks, so they aren't very good capitalists.
One would think that would be a violation of the people downriver's property rights, so under a capitalist system, this theoretical company has violated the capitalist values of private property.
Where is the "consideration" when a capitalist business discovers it can increase shareholder value by offshoring legions of jobs to China?
What are ya, some kinda bigot?
This theoretical business goes out of its way to provide jobs for hardworking Chinese people, and you think it's a bad thing?
Why? Because some Americans could have those jobs instead?
So you're saying that Americans should get jobs before Chinese?
That sounds like you're the one lacking consideration of others to me.
It also sounds like you're the tribalistic one here to me.
Among other things (see above), I would hardly call a conscious attempt to build one's customer base through a bit of insincere solicitude to be evidence of genuine compassion and/or kindness.
Well in that argumentation one could argue that
no compassion is genuine compassion or kindness.
You can see plenty of edgelords on the interwebs making just that same argument you are making to assert there is no "genuine" compassion or kindness.
So I see no reason to repeat their arguments here.
Again, see above. What corporation, for instance, is going to go out of business rather than ship jobs out of a community and to a foreign country if their finances require it?
Into a
different community??
What are you saying?? "Oh no, poor brown people have jobs now when we could have proper white Americans benefiting instead!!" Why are Indian communities less valuable in your eyes than American ones??
Now I know that's not what you're saying, don't worry.
But it sounds a little silly to me that you ask me to treat privileged Westerners as somehow more
innately deserving of jobs than the less fortunate citizens of the world who, frankly, need those jobs more than you people living in
privileged wellfare states do.
It's basically just blind tribalism. I wonder if you can see the innate silliness in people who make the argument that people in other countries somehow don't
deserve jobs.
To add to that, what business if faced with a competitor that can produce their goods at a quarter of their cost by shipping jobs to China does not at least seriously consider shipping their own jobs to China? And is even seriously considering such a thing "generosity"?
Seriously, why are you soooo racist against the Chinese?? What did they ever do to you??
Why is providing employment to 'Muricans
generous but providing employment to Chinese not so??
I know you probably aren't actually racist, but this idea that "giving jobs only to Americans" is somehow a position of
compassion and
generosity is flat-out ridiculous and humorous to me.
No, it's not. Your position is blind tribalistic nativism. Compassion, generosity, and kindness,
only to the in-group nation, and denying those things to foreigners. Sorry, but I don't view what you describe as
genuine compassion.
