Veganarchist Values, Morals, Tenets

Values and Morals are the priorities one puts upon life. It is a person's general direction, and consequently can function as the collective measure of the true worth of a society. Beyond technology, wealth, and power, there is what those are all used for; and that intent of an individual or a group is what is most important, in the end.

When someone is born into a society, they generally adopt and adhere to the general values and morals of that society. Throughout human history, the idea of having two sets of moral or values was seen by the Establishment, particularly the Church (and State, when they were united) as being a direct threat to its existence. Though times are more tolerant at present, at least superficially, in a very real way this was a correct assessment. This multiculturalism and allowance for free thought allows one, in theory anyone, to free oneself from the shackles of thought control.

Still, uncommon willpower and time to discern the situation of society and this that of the of slavery within our own value systems is required; this greatly impedes the great impoverished masses from realizing this, or being able to act upon it, being weighted down with the load of labor and subsistence life, and also due to their often de-facto imposed isolation from the wider world. Ironically, it is generally up to people of wealth, power, and relative leisure to catalyze social change. However, the Upper Class is usually so inundated with propaganda and pleasure that they usually do not want to, or know how, to work for revolutionary change, with some notable exceptions; and even if they do, they are usually the moderating influences on such revolutionary activity. So this leaves one group: the middle, given just enough to be free, but not enough to be serfs once more. Generally, it has been people in the upper-lower to upper-middle classes in developed countries that has produced meaningful revolutionary leadership; generally people that actually, comparative to most, appear to benefit from the Establishment's system. It is from this group that I come, and from this group that I think will come the leaders of Veganarchism: those people with the opportunity to help others understand, with the revolutionary capital, so to speak, to "invest" in a revolution which will create a better future for all; even the now poorest of the poor, to the richest of the ruling class.

Those who dissent from the mainstream are varied: one of these groups, however small, is composed of the Veganarchist movement. Parts of this ideology are shared and practiced by a lot of people; it's just that only a few that recognize their connection, and practice all of them.

The central tenets of Veganarchism are as follows:

• There is an Establishment which is a parasite upon Humanity, having corrupted its society so as to keep it from evolving to a more humane, progressive, and advanced state.
• This Establishment is the dominant force in human society, and maintains homeostasis and thus its existence by maintaining the status quo, whatever the cost to humanity, by manipulating all people to its agenda of self-preservation.
• This Establishment must be destroyed, and can only be done so by the simple act of people recognizing the previous two tenets, and working to make a new society free of this parasite. The Establishment is already losing ground gradually due to a general trend towards higher technology and (most importantly) the application of such higher technologies towards the furtherment of a more humane society.
• The Establishment and Humanity cannot coexist for much longer. The Establishment must be destroyed soon, for we are reaching a point of no return for our society in many aspects, amongst them environmental and technological: we must find a way to reorganize society that will permit us to have a reasonable chance at our continued existence as a species without destroying ourselves.

The Central Values of Veganarchist adherents are as follows:

• Veganarchists are engaged in a Five-Part Struggle against the Establishment: Political, Economic, Egalitarian, Environmental, and Belief. Others are engaged in less comprehensive struggles, or none at all, and should be "upgraded" to the Five-Part Struggle. All Humanity is our potential ally, and we work for even the benefit of our self-proclaimed opponents.
• Veganarchists practice universal love and forgiveness for all people; retribution is not an option, no matter how heinous an individual or a group's crimes. All people deserve to be put upon the path of righteousness, however much we may dislike them personally, or their choices morally.
• Veganarchists, accordingly, do not commit violence, whenever it can be avoided, against any sentient being. A cow, a horse, a dog, and even the tiniest insect are innocent; . We don't walk around trying not step on bacteria; but if something has a brain to feel its own demise, it should certainly be spared if reasonably possible. Certainly a Veganarchist would never support the mass organized killing of human beings in wars, or animals in factory farms; they are appalling injustices.
• Veganarchists maintain their beliefs, even when it is hard to keep from not dissenting. Never keep your mouth bound shut; only maintain a kind tone and peaceful intent. Individualism and confrontation do not mean anger and violence.
• Veganarchists try to keep from falling into despair over the subject of how backward the world may seem to them. Depression leads to anger, anger leads to violence. In addition, it drives others away from looking at the philosophy. We try to keep an upbeat, optimistic, and positive tone to our thoughts and words as much as possible.
• Veganarchists want to have fun. This is, I think, the most important tenet. We aren't a bunch of armchair revolutionaries idly hypothesizing about the inevitable proletariat revolt of retribution against the ruling class, that we will never live to see: on the contrary, we want to participate in a revolution in how we think about others, and how we run our world. We want to love, and be loved, we want to see the whole world mature, we want to live our lives, we want to be a creative factor of this new world we're going to create. And we want, most of all, for you to join us of your own volition. We want you to choose love over hate, individuality over obedience, empathy over callous ignorance, and become a stronger, healthier, happier, more loved and loving human being, an adult worthy of inheriting with us what is an all too childish world.

Spreading Veganarchism

Some will say we, the Veganarchists, will spread like a virus. Like a disease we will corrupt the minds of the gullible and weak-minded, but will eventually be stamped out by the good forces of strong will and emotional knee-jerk reactionary stagnation.

In reality, we are not the disease. We are the cure.

We are the cure for a dying cancer patient in all of us, of all of us. We are the antidote for all the ills of society, and we are evolving faster than the disease is. For we are movement, to the old stagnation; we are the education to the old ignorance. And we are the collective to the old selfish.

We do not corrupt minds; we enlighten them. Unlike the Establishment which will seek to, and already does so effortlessly, demonize or ridicule us, we do not impose our views on others. We convince them, through reasoned debate, rational argument, constructive criticism. We teach those who are not privileged to understand the world as we do, and listen to what they, the students, have to say. We teach them peer-to-peer, with humility and patience. And, eventually, they understand.

And when they understand, we arm them. Not with guns or knives, but with words and insight: things far more dangerous, profound, and capable.

And they will seek out new students, to teach them what they have learned. And so on.

And so the world shall change dramatically. Through kindness and commonality, humility and humanity. All for one, one being all.

Veganarchist Manifesto

Veganarchism.

What does this word mean? It means to be able to see clearly through the illusions and around the distractions that society has erected against its constituents. The Establishment might be regarded as a being unto its own, separate from the humans which make it up; it makes surprising attempts to survive against the inevitable waves of change and societal progression. In general, its attempts consist of stopping individuals from realizing the Truth. The Truth is that there is a struggle between their current societal Establishment and the Emergent philosophy, and that they are far better off supporting Emergence, which is Societal Progression.

Thus, it means to understand Unity of Struggle. Unity of Struggle is the understanding that the progressive cause has many fronts of struggle, many conflicts all ongoing simultaneously, and the reason progressive causes have been held off for so long is twofold. First, that people do not understand the struggle and are manipulated by the powerful Establishment into detracting from progressive causes that would benefit them and the whole society. Second, that these progressive causes do not largely unite and make a coordinated educational and advocacy effort on all fronts simultaneously. This division is fostered by the Establishment to keep the. However, bit by bit, Society has been progressing since the European Renaissance of the 1500s. Unfortunately, Establishment practices have simultaneously moved from undesirable to wildly unsustainable.

It means to understand the Establishment. The Establishment is not a conspiracy of the elite, or any individuals plotting total world domination. The Establishment is a separate entity from any human being; it is the tendency for human society to work against itself and preserve the status quo policies, practices, and worldviews, personified. It is a result of the "societal glue" of human conformism magnified to problematic levels by lack of education and awareness, combined with artificial Establishment interference.

Finally, it is to understand that societal understanding and progression is not a fixed goal. It is constantly evolving, changing to look for "the next big thing", so to speak. What I believe to be what we should strive for on the very fringe of societal struggle will, with any luck, be the reality of a future generation's world; and they will strive for further societal development that we cannot even imagine.

Is Veganarchism a worthy cause?

Yes, it is. Through planning, the awareness of Veganarchism will lead to a better world for all through Emergent philosophy's planned societal progression. Everyone will be freer, more involved in society, happier, and healthier, all by many degrees, when my personal understanding of Veganarchism is implemented.

But what is it?

Veganarchism is a philosophy of universal community of all human beings, compassion for all living things, and global solidarity against the Establishment. A few key ideas punctuate this:

• Unity of Five-Fold Struggle: Political, Economic, Egalitarian, Environmental, Belief. Veganarchists know these by heart: they are the Five Arenas of Struggle, all of which are interconnected. All areas of our ailing society are ill, and all deserve attention. To go into depth about why this is, would demand a book: one that I'm writing right now.
• Universal Love: It may sound "hippie", or "cliche", but that does not mean it is a stupid thing. Love everyone, forgive everything, and work to make the world a better place. Let go of all your attachments but the ones you really ought to treasure, and build new love with new people every day. Live to harbor no hate, no disdain, no despair. Life is too short.
• Speak Up, Out, Forward: Never keep silent when injustice is being committed. However, never hurt another being if you can help it: As a Veganarchist, you work for every person, every animal that can think or feel. You do not wish vengance, only virtue. Similarly, keep your tongue as kind and civil as is possible, to everyone. Educate firmly, but politely.

How, then, may Veganarchism's ideals be implemented?

What we need is an Intellectual Assault on all fronts. We need Debate Warriors to teach and reeducated indoctrinated Establishment slaves, and turn them into an army of organized, rebellious, free-thinking radicals. To do that, we need Freedom of Association and Freedom of Speech. The Internet is the best place for free-association, debate, and organization at this point; we must defended its independence and autonomy from the Establishment at all costs. It is our greatest asset. In a broader sense, we should defend these aforementioned two freedoms with all our strength. Without them, our movements become deeply inhibited and even completely ineffectual.

The Decentralization of the Veganarchist Movement is our greatest asset and detriment. It would be prudent to use beneficial aspects of both centralized and decentralized models, whilst discarding whatever negative attributes we can from both. An excellent term for the concept I am extrapolating towards is a "Leaderless Resistance". Look it up.

The Establishment is akin to a Hydra. There is a necessity for constant refutation and struggle by as many people as possible, and the relatively simultaneous defeat of all heads at once. We cannot simply postpone one struggle until another generation; History has shown us that our time is running short. We must end this current Establishment in all its forms and end this phase of Emergent Struggle with a conscious refutation of this incarnation of the Establishment.

We live in a profound generation. We may well be the last generation of this Establishment Phase; whether we choose to move into a new age of Emergence, or completely collapse upon our outdated institutions is up for debate. To quote a favorite literary character, "We will all soon have to make a choice between what is right, and what is easy,". Our comfortable childhoods, our free rides will soon end quite abruptly. We can take the reigns of responsibility for our society, or watch our Establishment slave master run all of us off the cliff, into the abyss, never to return.

The Tragedy of Nonconformism

It is extremely hard to run an effective counter-culture that will progress society from a design standpoint.

The main issue is that people are social animals. They tend to bind themselves to a movement; this is the "social glue" that allows societies to exist and function. However, it also stops critical thinking, as there is little incentive for people to think for themselves in such a situation, except in circumstances where their established worldview is completely and obviously refuted. Even then, some, often religious or political fundamentalists, will refuse to rethink their viewpoints.

This is how an Establishment system assimilates counter-cultures; it takes the minority, sweeps them into one "scene" (the punk scene, for example) or "party" (the Democratic party, for instance), and invariably ends up controlling that group. This is usually accomplished through corrupting or installing leaders of that group (bands or politicians), and using them to manipulate their sway over the group mentality and collective actions of the group at large to take what could be an effective means of societal progression into an excellent distraction from actual progressive causes or efforts, a lure for the well-meaning and unwary progressives towards a comfortable, unchallenging, and unproductive worldview. Before anyone realizes what's happened, it's simply indistinguishable in essential characteristics from the establishment.

In addition, a peculiar mechanic that seems almost stolen from ecosystem biology takes effect. In that science, it has been found that only 10% of energy in a lower level of a food chain is passed to the immediate higher level. Essentially, there is a law of exponentially (ten-fold, to be specific) diminishing returns when it comes to passing resources (energy, in this case) from prey to predator.

In our situation at hand, this can be applied to explain the lack of "counter-counter-cultures"; reactionaries to the rebellion. It should be assumed that for all the self-identified members of a particular counter-culture, an exponentially tinier minority will be knowledgeable about and refuse to be part of both the mainstream and counter-culture.

Generally, the people who do rebuke the rebellion and the mainstream will be either Apathists or Unionists. An Apathist will be completely indifferent to the struggles around them despite being moderately aware of them and potentially their unified nature. Rarer are the Unionists, who recognize the unity of all, or at least several, areas of struggle. Even rarer than the Unionists are the Veganarchists, who recognize the unity of all struggles.

What does it mean to be a Veganarchist? It means to have, first and foremost, lucidity. It means to take charge of your own ability to see through all the illusions and distract-tactics of the establishment to realize the broadness of the progressive struggle. This gives you strength, for without illusions the Establishment Society is weak and at a newly Progressive Humanity's mercy and service, as is right and natural and, unfortunately, as it has never been.

The conflicts you see as a Veganarchist are as follows.

First, the general conflict between Centralization and Decentralization. There is a balance that must be struck here, with egalitarian and democratic ideals being achieved simultaneously by complementing, instead of infringing upon, each other. This is the ages-old balance between "civil rights" and "majority rule"; in another sense, it is between anarchy and ochlocracy; and in other, it is between individualism and fascism.

Second, that equally broad struggle between Establishmentarianism and Emergence. There is a general struggle between comfortable stagnation and societal progression. Establishments rule the world today, and we see their effects in needless death and misery across the world, most obviously in physical terms but also in mental and psychological trauma that affects practically every single human being that is part of present-day society. While this provides excellent material for Salinger novels, it makes for poor societal planning and the mass execution of a great crime against humanity: wasting lives.

Third, those all of the battlefields on which this war is waged. This means all of these: the Political, the Economic, the Religious, the Sexual, the Egalitarian, and the Environmental struggles. The Political struggle is one for democratic participation in society by all able human beings, equally; it is complemented by the Egalitarian struggle. The Economic struggle is one of bringing freedom from labor and equality in abundance to all human beings, and to a similar extent non-human animals. The Religious struggle is one of throwing off the harmful yoke of Theism, which is constantly an endorsement of the lie of a benevolent chauvanistic absolute dictatorship. This is a superstition that holds society back from the inevitable progress propelling it forward not unlike a dog being hung by a collar by a cruel human master; it will kill us if we do not release ourselves from the hand that chokes us. Perhaps at one time, the master was necessary to provide guidance in morality and a comforting, petting hand. But now there is absolutely no reason society cannot function on its own guidance, and every individual discover a far more fulfilling solace in the love of their community and scientific understanding of the universe.
The next struggle is the Sexual struggle. This is that of providing sexual equality and liberty to every adult human being, regardless of sexual inclination or gender. This comes from an understanding that what happens between consenting adults is no business of society at large, and in fact should be supported, if anything. This is related heavily to the Egalitarian struggle. The Egalitarian struggle is the struggle for the equality and freedom of all animal beings, in particular humans. The Sexual struggle is a subdivision thereof, and it is heavily related to the Political struggle. The Environmental struggle is that of maintaining a sustainable human society in terms of both internal societal dynamics and externally in terms of functioning without conflict in the greater biosphere.

The task of the Veganarchist is vast. And, because of the seeming impossible nature of their mission, many who would otherwise understand the struggle are Apathists instead, dissuaded by this. Even among the Veganarchists, extremely few have created or understood a remotely complete model of a new society and formulated or understood a plan on how to achieve that.

Fortunately, you're talking to one right now.

Reexamining Convention: Part Three - The Root of All Evil

Definitions

In this work, I will refer to various rather complex systems with single words. I will define them here to maximize clarity.

Monetary System - An economic system in which currency is used to represent value.


Currency - An artificial representation of value, physical or electronic.


Capitalism - I am referring to Free-Market capitalism when I reference it in this work. In a broader sense, I define Capitalism an economic system based on private, as opposed to state, ownership of capital. In the modern age, a capitalist economy must be a monetary system in order to function. Thus, the two are intertwined inextricably.

Socialism/Mercantilism -I define these as an economic system based primarily around public or state ownership of capital for forwarding the public welfare, or the state's welfare, respectively. As in modern capitalism and all other economic systems of this day and age, it must be a monetary system in order to function in the modern age.


Communism - Quite apart from Socialism, I define Communism as most would refer to "Pure Communism". This is the original, Marxist definition of Communism.
 

Section One - Production and Consumption in Capitalism


Capitalism functions on an ever-widening cycle of production and consumption, referred to as Cyclical Consumption. This forms the basis of the phenomenon called "Economic Growth"; it is essentially how much "stuff", a given society is producing. Economic Growth is vital for a monetary, capitalist economy's continued survival: they must either grow or die, because the profit motive will always drive an economy to expand to its greatest extent. This has immense ramifications for the society in question, because heightened production must always be accompanied with increased consumption, or an economic depression will ensue, which will reverse the growth gained in a very severe way.


There are three main consequences resulting from this motivation economic interests have to increase consumption.

Section Two - Delusions of Illusions


The first is materialism. Promoted through advertising in every avenue available to the elites, it helps keep people oblivious of what's really going on in the world.

Materialism is a distraction, like religion is, like politics is. They all synergistically react with each other to create imaginary conflicts that distract from the true issues, and as a bonus create mindless loyalties and divisions between people. This, in turn, creates neuroses and thus corrupt and criminal behavior: People kill for their religions and nations in war, steal things they don't need in order to further their social status, and anyone with an opinion is sucked into often bitter debates about things that really don't matter. Things like religious debates between theists of opposing traditions, Democrats and Republicans engaging in a debate about, well, anything, and Kanye West's latest shenanigans.

We talk about this, while billions suffer. While even we ourselves, the privileged and fortunate, suffer mental abuse and clandestine slavery.

Think about it. Does a nation really exist outside the minds of people? If nobody believes a religion, does it exist, either? They're all only tools to help organize our society: and they're now very old, outdated tools. We don't need nations, or politics, or religions to ensure our well-being. We need technology and sound economics.
Can the Vatican provide bread to the hungry? No. A farmer can. Can a politician build a road? No. An engineer can. Can a rich man sail a ship? No. A navigator can.
All of these people: politicians, priests, and the pecuniary-blessed, can ultimately do nothing to help society. They can only enslave it. This is because they are trained to be part of a system that is focused on preserving the institutions of currency and capitalism, and thus a small, unnecessary elite, enthroned at everyone's expense.

Realizing this, we must refocus our human society on these most essential topics, and abandon these institutions detrimental to ourselves, both as a society and individuals.

Now, what are we all being distracted from, exactly? This is an awful lot of effort society seems to be putting into keeping people ignorant of its own workings.

Turns out, what we don't know does hurt us.

Section Three - Planned Obsolescence

The second result of cyclical consumption is called "Planned Obsolescence".

Planned Obsolescence is a relatively simple concept. It's the artificial limiting of a product's potential lifespan or utility, for the purpose of selling more products to fulfill those roles. This can happen either intentionally, with a manufacturer consciously choosing to make sub-standard products that expire right after the warranty does, or unintentionally, as a side effect from the general drive for quantity over quality in a profit-based economy. Either way, the quality of products is far below what it could be.

The Fashion industry is probably the most obvious employer of this tactic, but it permeates the whole system. In the Fashion industry, artistic creation is exploited, sold for profit in large-scale corporate capitalism, and then constantly replaced by a "newer, hotter" version. So, the wealthy constantly put their money back into the system, keeping liquidity in the economy. Still, a "trickle-down" phenomenon does not occur in a significant way, because due to the corporate nature of that system, most of the wealth is kept amongst the owners of the given company: and they are, unfailingly and unsurprisingly, rather wealthy. This process is repeated in every economic sector, including markets that are comprised. Thus, wealth always concentrates itself with the greatest existing concentration wealth, despite the claims of "trickle-down" economics, and the needs of the working/under classes.

Now, the only significant defense a monetary system will have against this is competition between businesses. In theory, one business would take advantage of the sub-standard quality of another businesses' products, by creating better products. Unfortunately, there are several major problems with this 'defense'. First, it is generally unprofitable for a business to create high-quality products, as due to the nature of the inevitable unequal distribution of wealth in a capitalist system, only the very wealthy (an extremely small portion of the population, and thus market) will be able to afford those products. In addition, largely due to the corporate nature of business today, there are only a couple corporations that control the vast percentage of any given product-market. Thus, these few businesses can easily, and will always cooperate with each other to keep quality, and thus costs, low, instead of competing for the consumers' benefit as planned.

Finally, even in the most ideal competitive market, there is always a real-world ceiling on the quality of the products, because the businesses have an overriding drive to extract some profit from any sale: thus, the cost of any product or service in a capitalistic system will be more than what is required to create the product or service. Interestingly, this means that the sum total of all prices will always be higher than the actual monetary value of all the products and services being sold in a system. This creates perpetual debt, as everyone is always trying to profit off of someone else. Thus, at all times, everyone has debts to pay to everyone else. Remember this: it will be important later.

This is the fundamental drive of the profit system for working-class people: the drive to get rid of an unpayable debt. The only way this can be theoretically attained is the temporary siphoning off of the debt on somebody else. It's almost like a game of musical chairs: someone is always left 'out'. In this terrifyingly real game, 'out' means unemployed, broke, and unable to make ends meet. In reality, a whole lot of people are 'out' at once, in various degrees, because nobody can actually get rid of all their debt; more is always coming, because economic growth is continuing. Regardless, this competition naturally creates further division, which weakens labor and other anti-capitalist movements, thus perpetuating the system and its sick 'game'.


Section Four - An Abundance of Scarcity

 

The third result has been ironically identified as an "Abundance of Scarcity". 

This concept is, again, not a complicated one. It stems from the laws of supply and demand. If there is an abundance of something, the price of individual units drops. So, corporations will always seek to control market share both for the intrinsic value of doing so, and also for the power that is afforded by unilateral control over the supply of a resource. Essentially, if a company is the sole source of diamonds (as is De Beers and its subsidiaries in a large way), diamonds will be quite expensive (the average diamond wedding ring costing several month's income for an average American), despite the fact that diamonds are actually rather plentiful (dozens millions of carats are mined and produced annually, at the very least).
In cases where this can't be achieved, the main corporations of a given economic sector will unfailingly come to an agreement regarding this issue, just as they do with Planned Obsolescence, working together to both keep prices high and costs low.

So, just as there is a limit on quality, there is also a limit on quantity. This may seem to contradict the focus that capitalism places on quantity: but in truth, in capitalism rewards those who limit quantity from what it needs to be, and quality from what it could be. A sane system would produce what needs to be produced, and makes the highest quality products possible. Under this definition, Capitalism is insane, irrational, and obsolete.

Moreover, money itself is artificially scarce. When a currency is abundant, all individual units of currency are worth less, and everyone suffers, particularly the poor. This is called inflation, for the amount of currency in use has been inflated, or increased, from what it was before, relatively speaking. The amount of value represented by all of the currency in an economy is essentially fixed, and is roughly based upon/correlates with the amount of "faith" people are willing to put in the currency. In modern economics, this "faith" is represented chiefly in how much people are willing to invest their currency in corporations and companies. But this is somewhat misleading, for only a fraction of the people in the economy will have wealth to spare in investing, and those who do will generally have an enormous amount of it. This is due to the wealth distribution gradient of Capitalism; for instance, in the United States the wealthiest 1% control 95% of the wealth in the economy. In addition, the amount of currency in an economy is controlled chiefly by the Central Bank of the given economy.Thus, in any monetary system, and particularly a capitalist system, although the economy is allegedly controlled by everyone, it is in fact directed by a tiny, super-rich elite. This is true in "Socialist" China, and in the Capitalist United States; in semi-socialist Europe and Japan, and indeed all across the world where a monetary system has been established. And that's pretty much everywhere.


In a monetary system, currency, and thus wealth, is hoarded by a small elite. The ramifications of this are enormous, for the vast majority are left to compete amongst themselves. This stops collaboration and communication that are necessary to a healthy, progressive society, and reinforces, out of artificially-created necessity, the selfish impulses and behavior characteristic of immaturity. In addition, those born into wealthy positions are also corrupted, though more subtly. People of wealth and privilege are indoctrinated to increase their wealth and power above most other concerns, and thus are also pressured into refraining from mature behavior. This causes society to be lead not by an "enlightened elite", as will sometimes be claimed. It is almost invariably directed by the immature and selfish, and thus society itself remains selfish and sick.



Section Five - The Profit Motive, and Other Consequences Thereof


The profit motive in its current context requires Cyclical Consumption and all it's consequences, and at the root of Capitalism is the profit motive. All three of these grievous issues enumerated prior are caused ultimately by the focus of human society on profit and individual gain: they are caused by our infatuation with capitalism. The Profit Motive also independently accounts for many other plagues on society.


First and perhaps foremost of these is crime. Criminal behavior is fostered, encouraged, and even endorsed by any monetary, and thus capitalist, system. With the perpetual scarcity of money and abundance of debt created by a monetary system, people of the lower economic tiers will be pressured to engage in criminal activity in order to survive in a world of scarcity, and all people in a monetary system will be tempted to participate in such activity in order to progress higher up the economic ladder. This is due to the competitive mentality promoted by capitalism, which ultimately finds root in the scarcity created by a monetary system in all things.

War is, in a different sense, a crime. It is murder, theft, and fraud on the grandest scale possible; it is the greatest of the many cons preformed throughout history. War between nations is unnecessary, and yet hundreds of millions have and continue to die in the practice of it. War is the result of the elite aggrandizing themselves further, by "investing" the lives of their soldiers in a cause. It is capitalism in its truest, dirtiest form.
Moreover, nations themselves are maintained by capitalism, for they are a useful means of division to further prevent productive, collaborative thought that would eventually eliminate capitalism.

Monetary economics also promotes focusing on short-term profits, another immature behavioral pattern. This is at the root of the inevitable "business cycle", a cycle of relative growth and recession characteristic of Capitalism in particular. Due to the decentralized nature of capitalism, although power is concentrated amongst a few people, it is very hard to promote cooperation amongst those few when it comes down to seeing through long-term goals. For although it is attainable enough to reach a tacit agreement on keeping product prices high, it seems that reaching long-term goals, like reducing carbon emissions from factories, that require multiple companies to cooperate and keep sacrificing profit for long periods of time, is usually too much to ask of the "invisible hand of the market". This is probably due to the fact that keeping a Status Quo is much easier for a capitalist system than introducing progressive reforms. This is another way the system remains at odds with fundamental facts about society and the environment, both fundmentally emergent beings.

Finally, one of the greatest consequences of a monetary system is the perpetual necessity of employment. A capitalist system that employs fewer people is one that will collapse sooner. This is due to the fact that people need to feel invested in a society, and this is provided by employment. This is also the reason why the U.S. Government is so keen to provide people with homes, even to the extent of assisting in creating huge economic recessions such as the one we are seeing now: being a homeowner promotes loyalty to the economic system, because you are now invested in that system. A 10% unemployment rate is generally acceptable for a modern economy: not stellar, but somewhat sustainable. The U.S. has currently hit 17.5% unemployment, and it continues to rise. This obviously does not bode well for the nation, for a system that does not provide for the basic bare necessities of life for a significant percentage of its population will be undone by said percentage. This will lead to increased welfare to combat the rise of unemployment. In turn, this will cause the still-employed masses to be squeezed for money, because the rich, vastly more powerful elites will be extremely reluctant to let go of their money. This will in turn cause exponentially expanding, cyclical poverty, and eventually an uprising or revolution in order to deal with the problems that the establishment will not be able or willing to solve. A new elite will likely lead the revolution, and establish themselves at the head of a much less free, totalitarian state that will do what democracy under capitalism could not: provide for the basic needs of its citizens.

The nightmare scenario is made infuriating when you realize that people do not need to be employed, in the traditional sense of the word, in the first place. Most jobs today are meaningless: service jobs, transportation jobs, and production jobs could all be automated to a much larger extent than they are even now. As for command jobs, such as CEOs, Senators, and the like: they would be unnecessary in certain alternative-model systems, where everyone can participate equally in decision-making as is relevant to their lives, as they are essentially the unnecessary by-products of a self-sustaining capitalist-monetary system.

Section Six - Modern Currency


Wealth is represented by currency. Currency, in of itself, is supposed to be worthless; this way, its value comes solely from the wealth that it is supposed to represent. The first currency was created in Lydia, around 500 B.C.E. Gold, however much it is glorified, is generally useless. Barring some relatively new industrial applications of the metal, it is generally not useful for any practical purposes. Silver and Diamonds, being more useful, were relegated to subservient roles in currency. Sometimes used by societies without access to scarcer mediums such as gold, diamonds, and silver, sea-shells and the like were generally avoided by economies with alternatives due to the fact that shells were simply so plentiful; something already established to be detrimental to a currency's appeal in a monetary system. But, since all of these mediums had some value intrinsic to them, eventually paper or cotton money was invented to support and eventually replace these other mediums. Today, all U.S. currency is "fiat", meaning that the value it has is entirely based upon what the economy as a whole says it is worth. For example, when a company raises its prices, it is "voting" to devalue U.S. currency. This has the effect of giving those with more invested capital and property, and thus the wealthy, more say in how the economy is run. This is inherently, and obviously, unfair.

Moreover, the monetary system's method of distributing value not only delivers power and control of all economies under the system directly to the elite, it disassociates value from resources to attribute it to currency simply by the nature of the system. This has vast implications on people's mentalities. Instead of asking, "Do we have the resources to solve this problem?", instead it is asked "Do we have the money to solve this problem?". Because money is an artificially scarce resource, and due to the profit motive's effect of causing selfish behavior even in the face of long-term self-interest, many societal problems will go unsolved. This helps to maintain the status quo, and thus the established institutions dependent on capitalism to remain relevant.

But perhaps most appalling is that current US Currency is, in fact, debt. All U.S. currency goes through the Central Bank of the United States, the Federal Reserve. However, the Federal Reserve is technically a private corporation, and this has, again, broad ramifications for the economy.

Let's say, hypothetically, the United States Government wants to create 1 Trillion dollars, as was done in the bailout. It has to go to the Federal Reserve and ask them to buy 1 Trillion in government bonds (Treasury notes). The Federal Reserve then accepts the money, and gives back 1 Trillion dollars in Federal Reserve Notes, the currency we use on a day-to-day basis, and refer to as "U.S. Currency". The government then deposits the currency in various banks, and the banks invest their money in other corporations. The corporations use that to pay their expenses, such as workers' wages. The workers then use their wages to buy products from the corporations, who use that to pay their workers' wages, and voila! Money has now been added to the economy.

Unfortunately, you can't create value out of nothing. When the Federal Reserve "buys" the bonds from the government, it is actually loaning money to the government, taking the Treasury Notes as a "down payment", of sorts. There is an interest rate attached to the whole transaction.

Which begs the question: where does the money to pay the interest come from? The fact is, it doesn't exist. All the money there is in the whole economy was created by this method! There are only two ways for the government to raise the money to pay for this. One is to raise taxes. This doesn't really help matters, as all the money that people are going to have is going to be less than the debt attached to that money. The second is for the government to borrow even more money. Which it does, especially in wartime. Seeing as the same small elite control both the government, the Federal Reserve, and the corporations, and war is an excellent way to aggrandize the Federal Reserve (Because more money must be borrowed due to war expenses) and the corporations (Because the government contracts out all its' manufacturing and even some soldiering jobs to them), it should come as no surprise that the U.S. has been at war, somewhere, constantly, since the Second World War. That's 64 years of war, and the taxpayers, the common man, gets to foot the bill both through direct taxes and inflation.

It gets worse. According to current banking regulations, the Federal Reserve can create an additional $900 Billion on top of the original $1 Trillion, if it so chooses. The $900 Billion is then distributed to various banks by the Federal Reserve, and loaned and invested out to corporations and individuals. This creates even more debt out of thin air. To make matters worse, 90% of the $900 Billion can again be created out of thin air, if the banks request the Federal Reserve to do it. That's another $810 Billion+ in debt created, and the cycle can continue until only a cent remains of the newly created money.

Thus, it should again come as no surprise that the current amount of debt in the U.S. economy, public and private, is about $52 Trillion, while the total amount of currency in the economy can be generously estimated at around $15 Trillion.

There will always be debt as long as there is money, and thus there will always be huge amounts of coercion, control, competition, and corruption as long as we maintain a monetary system. In fact, if everyone, including the government, could pay off their debts tomorrow, there would be no money left in circulation. As Marriner Eccies, former Governor of the Federal Reserve, said, "If there were no debts in our system, there would be no money".

Of course, that can't happen, because there will always be more debt than means to pay off that debt in a monetary system. This is the driving mechanism of capitalism; everyone always needs more money than exists to pay off imaginary debts.

Yeah. That makes sense.

Section Seven - Closing Thoughts on Capitalism


Organizing society around the profit motive, as capitalism does, creates problems. Problems like crime, corruption, greed, exploitation, near-universal psychological trauma, technological and economic stagnation, rampant scarcity, constant economic/social exclusion due to debt, and ultimately stagnation of societal development.

No wonder the establishment tries to blind us with religion and materialism and patriotism: this is a mess! The only way you can possibly keep the status quo is to first stop people from realizing what a crappy deal the current system is.

Thus, the institutions of class, politics, and religion. All of these are created to preserve the "ultimate insitution", the underlying system of capitalism. So, in a sense, the old saying is right: money really is the "root of all evil". And as a wise man once said, "You can't regulate evil". People are quite innovative: as long as their incentives are to aggrandize themselves materially while disregarding any cost to society, their fellows, the environment, and even themselves, they will find ways to subvert any regulations. The only way to create a sane, sustainable society, is to use incentives to promote these goals. Capitalism and Monetary systems cannot, and do not, do this, as is now evident.

It follows, then, that we must find another way to organize our society superior to our current capitalist catastrophe.

Section Eight- The Constant Social Endorsement of Capitalism


Now, how does this system perpetuate itself in society?

...The rich men telling you their money means something, of course.

It's through all of the intellectual warriors who tell you that society cannot exist without money: that there would be no incentive, that society would collapse, that people would be lazy and do nothing and we'd all starve.
That we'd lose our freedoms.
That it's disloyal to even think about that.
That it's just too idealistic, and we have to deal with the "reality" of the "necessity" of a monetary system.

But, the facts remain. No large-scale society has been without currency. They also have always had war, poverty, and social stagnation in irrelevantly varying degrees of counter-productivity. Correlation does not imply causation, but I believe I have already given extraordinary amounts of evidence to back up that relatively extraordinary claim.
There are also many, many proposed alternatives to capitalism that could work. Sadly, due to this widespread, point-blank rejection of alternatives to money and capitalism, they have been marginalized and ignored in the popular mind.

But even this continual campaign of misinformation is not enough to preserve the system: other mechanisms are in place, the removal of which will cause global collapse.

Section Nine - Capitalism's Enclosing Self-Destruction


Most successful, long-lived societies since the Renaissance, and even before, have had a sizable class of middling wealth, large enough to provide them with a vested interest in society, but small enough to keep them out of the ruling elite, thus concentrating wealth and power to a mostly hereditary, oligarchic group. Interestingly, in the decline of many societies comes the elimination of this class by the ruling elite's machinations for their own short-term profit, thus bringing the system down upon itself.

We see this pattern emerging in the United States today, where the middle class continues to shrink, the wealthiest 1% have more wealth than the bottom 95%, and the disparity between rich and poor continues to grow. Seeing the US as a dying economic power also accounts for the relatively recent development of US currency being, essentially, debt.

You simply cannot form a society on the basis of something as fundamentally destructive as greed, and expect it to sustain itself. Capitalism, being based on profit, actually creates and encourages massive amounts of criminal activity. Sooner or later, the ruling elite will "forget themselves", and move to aggrandize themselves at any cost, without any attention paid to the well-being of the system that sustains them. By the time those in power realize their collective mistakes, if they even do, it is always far too late to do anything. Such is the fate of any system that puts individual profit, power, and aggrandizement over the basic interests of the society itself.

Including ours.

Under the combined stress of the elites' unfettered self-aggrandizement, constant economic growth and thus cyclical consumption, and the usurping of human labor by machine technology, Capitalism cannot survive. It is an obsolete system, unfit for the modern world, its challenges, its resources, and its opportunities.

Fortunately, it's just a tool. Capitalism is merely a means by which to organize ourselves: if we replace it with something more suitable, not only will we continue to survive, but we will thrive on a scale never before seen in human history. Because the only sophisticated system we have ever tried is Capitalism.

And it's time to move on.


Section Ten - Forming A New Society


Those last few sentences may have led you to protest:

"But Communism was tried in Russia, and China! It failed utterly, and led to huge steps backwards in economic and political freedoms and prosperity!"

But this is not true.

The USSR and China, and all their subsidiary puppet-nations, were mercantile-totalitarian states. They were not communist states.
First of all, Communism is a stateless society. A communist nation is an oxymoron in of itself. Second, all of these "Communist nations" used and use currency (the Soviet Ruble, Chinese Renminbi); a, and perhaps the, quintessential hallmark of modern capitalism. Third, their economies were organized in the same totalitarian, dictatorial/oligarchic way that a corporation is. In fact, the only significant difference between those economies and the American economy is the amount of freedom and choice people had/have in using their money, in company with how centralized, planned, and state-controlled the economy is/was.

Don't be afraid of change.

What if we lived in a world that was completely unified: without any nations at all. In this world, all manufactured goods were centrally produced entirely by machines, and managed by a central "nervous system" of a computer mainframe, which would assist teams of human technicians that maintain the system. These production-machines would rarely break down, because there would be no repair industry to profit from them doing so, but when they did, human technicians would work to fix the problem immediately.

These technicians would be all-volunteer teams, working perhaps ten to twenty hour weeks. They would constitute perhaps a gross maximum of 10% of the world population upon the inception of such a system, and that number will steadily decline with time; the rest of the world's population would be free from any kind of traditional labor.

In this world, no money would be used either. With all consumer goods manufactured in abundance and excellent quality, it would be like putting a price on air. Food, water, and shelter would be seen as human rights, and provided on request, along with a dizzying array of manufactured goods. Still, nobody would feel the need to stockpile or accumulate products, because there would be no point. Wealth would disappear as a measure of status, when everyone has the same amount of wealth. All the same, some limits would be placed at least initially, like, only twenty Laptops to a given individual. These would disappear over time, in all likelihood, as the leftover associations of status with wealth ebb away.

Everyone would be equal, and able to participate in the system to the degree that it concerned them. This means that economic decisions on what to produce would be made by the society as a whole, and individual's choices on what to consume would be almost entirely up to the individual. Human liberties to thought, speech, life, personal property, etc., would be preserved. Democracy would finally be established, with what laws that remain to be enacted proposed and voted upon by citizens, without representatives or other.

Without money, crime would fall exponentially, to merely insignificant levels: who would steal in a world of abundance? Police forces would probably fall into irrelevance, and armies into total abolition along with their nations. What little serious crime is left can be managed by society in a constructive manner; instead of prisons, mental hospitals would be built to better understand and hopefully help these individuals.

Education would be refocused onto a grounding in the scientific method, and branch out into generalist education. People would not be bred and trained for jobs, but given opportunities to participate in what interests them as a human being, whether it be art, or engineering, or science, or philosophy. Involuntary religious, political, and ideological associations would be abolished. Constructive debate on all issues of philosophy, sociology, science, etc., would be encouraged everywhere. These debates would drive society forward, in all fields.

And this is just a taster of what this system entails. It's called Participatory Society and Resource-Based Economics, and it is probably the best socio-economic system we can implement right now. It is, essentially, an update of Communism for the opportunities, technologies, and values of the modern era. And, when a better system is developed, this system will freely become the next. This is most unlike capitalism, which will require a struggle to replace.

All suffer under capitalism. From the neuroses it imparts on the richest Richelius, the poorest paupers, and everyone in between, to the false chains of labor it requires everyone to bind themselves with; from the wars it starts, to the lives it finishes, Capitalism is a parasite on every man, woman, and child of the world.

This isn't utopia, or idealism. This is what we could be doing right now, but aren't.

Let's get to it.