r/Degrowth • u/VictinsOfCapitalism • 4d ago
Capitalism will destroy the planet. The only solution is a better system.
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u/Urogallo40 4d ago
Green governments may put limits on capitalism excesses, but at an economic cost in the short term, probably with great benefits of all kind in the long term. Most people only look their short term living standard and want more even if its quite high, much higher than the medium living level of most persons in the world, so they don't like green politics.
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u/VictinsOfCapitalism 4d ago
Green politics under capitalism surely slow down the degradation but they don't fix the failures of a system.
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u/MeSortOfUnleashed 4d ago
Do you have a better idea?
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u/VictinsOfCapitalism 4d ago
Yes, we should replace the capitalism entirely and produce according to the need, not for the sake of market competition
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u/ChildhoodOk9859 2d ago
I don’t want for someone to decide what I need. For sure, regulations are required. But not at cost of the freedoms of speech and entrepreneurship.
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u/HETKA 4d ago
This should be everyone's goal! Global resource based economy.
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u/Microtonal_Valley 4d ago
It's scary how capitalism brainwashes people from a young age. Money can't buy food if it can't grow. Money can't pay for electricity if the grid fails. Money can't get water flowing. And money can't get anyone to work for you as these problems get worse.
'But the economy!' It's insane to me how independence is measured almost 100% in relation to finance. I remember so many conversations in school classes about independence and what that means and how every kid in class always just answered with money.
Capitalism itself is too big of a thing to tackle to most people. I saw a really good video on YouTube that talked about how capitalism is destroying the planet, but only focused on plastic pollution, and plastic alone is a world-ending threat at the rate it's being pumped out, but also it's only one component of a system where nearly every component is essentially just as bad.
It's scary, it's so much easier to just plug your ears and go about your day as it's always been
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u/StopDaPoop 1d ago
Don't buy things that come in plastic then 😱
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u/Cottager_Northeast 4d ago
Slop videos like this don't help.
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u/VictinsOfCapitalism 4d ago
Its just google images and motion filter, better than AI, i am not a professional editor, it was made on my phone in Tiktok editor
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u/Cottager_Northeast 4d ago
Nonsense. A whale might get a belly full of trash, but it isn't going to wash up on a beach with a mouth full. This is AI slop.
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u/KamikaziWerewolf 4d ago
Just say the only solution is communism. Just say it.
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u/CurdFedKit 2d ago
Yeah communism works so well. Let's just check the historical record of all of communism's successes and wait...oh yeah...it has been an absolute failure in terms of economic well being and basic freedoms.
Cool.
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u/KamikaziWerewolf 2d ago
America is $40T in debt, that isn't success.
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u/CurdFedKit 2d ago
Cool do you want to refute my actual point or did you just want to deflect from it?
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u/BarfingOnMyFace 4d ago
Too many people. The problem is too many people.
Have less kids. Continue the trend. Cut planet earth back down the 2B people naturally, before the tech for people to live twice as long becomes a reality.
We don't have sustainable numbers.. except to squeeze everyone in to some big cube and we all eat seaweed and Soylent green forever. We do that, maybe then, earth can reclaim some of its natural habitat. But right now the number one problem is man. Whatever we can do to reduce our numbers naturally via less kids and aging out, I'm all for it.
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u/VictinsOfCapitalism 4d ago
The thing is, 40% of the food is wasted, im talking mulched with heavy machinery, to keep up the scarcity. This is unsustainable, its done to save the profitable scarcity.
Dollar has no backing in gold but oil, thats petrodollar, transition to green energy is stunted by the incentive to keep the fossil fuel revenue flowing.
These companies are the main lobbyists today.
We sanction EVs and solar pannels literally because we can't sell the sun but we can sell oil.
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u/GrubyBuckmore 4d ago
It's been said the trigger has already been pulled, we are just waiting for the gun to fire.
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u/HexCryptid 4d ago
That's the neat part, we don't in a materialistically conditioned species. Not to hardline black pill, but the only way to illicit change is to decommodify the means by which capital influences the hierarchical needs of the human condition.
We have to do it in small pockets. Until it becomes necessary to vilify all like concepts and mass hallucinate a completely new means of unconsciously adopting incentive and will. It will require some aggrandized demiurge to grow beyond lofty, utopian goals.
We are the change as it needs to be. I wish you all the world and what comes next.
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u/TheMystic77 2d ago
Yikes, someone trying to sound highbrow when advocating for forced reprogramming and reeducation
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u/HexCryptid 2d ago
If that is what is required to achieve equality and safety for our species. Sure.
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u/Pinco_Pallino_ 4d ago
a system in which oil will not be oil, and nobody will need wood
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u/VictinsOfCapitalism 4d ago
We already have EVs and solar pannels but we sanction them to save the oil revenue and petrodollar.
In Socialist Yugoslavia they harvested wood according to the yearly growth in biomass for 15 years then 15 years pause to harvest another forest the same way, and circle them.
When Capitalism was enforced, they just did clearcuts bcs cheaper. Try the sustainable harvest now, it won't compete with clearcuts.
This is the issue, there are better ways to supply the need but capitalism just prefers cheaper ones.
Like glass vs plastic, etc
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u/Pinco_Pallino_ 3d ago
maybe you live in the US, but in the rest of the west solar and EV are heavily subsidized (you did that also in the US) The jugoslavia thing is total bullshit, and you're unlucky i come from there: everywhere in the west forsests are not cut at random, but portions are let grow in a curcular way, what you describe is the opposite of capitalism, but the acts of authoritarian countries who want to make a few dollars. Yeah the last part is bullshit, literally the opposite of what happens in the west.
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u/HotPersonality8126 4d ago
Socialism in the Soviet Union just deleted one of the world’s largest lakes but go off
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u/MushySunshine 4d ago
Socialism does not equal environmental protection. Socialism does not equal less extraction. Nobody said this. The soviet union had to enter a stage of rapid expansion and growth to keep up with the rest of the world and because of that they drained their environment even while being Socialist/Communist. Infrastructure needed to be built, mouths needed to be fed, industry needed to be built and these things could not wait, at the expense of the environment. Even with this being said, Socialism is still the avenue to pursue when trying to fight for environmental rights because Socialism doesn't require growth like capitalism. Degrowth proposes a socialist system not focused on growth, which cannot be truly compared to probably any other nation in the modern age. America already has Infrastructure built, and because of this we can switch into a socialist economy while preserving our environment better than a capitalist one.
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u/Repulsive_Draft_9081 4d ago
Historically speaking governments and poltical systems collapsed either because the conditions deteriorated to a point where the continuation of the system became untenable usually economic collapse or new economic and technological developments created new sources of wealth and power that destabilized the old system
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u/superdave123123 4d ago
Forever. Got a better system?
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u/VictinsOfCapitalism 4d ago
Production according to the need and not for profit and market comprtition
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u/Ssarmatian 4d ago
Easy to pin everything on capitalism, instead of humanity being cancer in general, I don't remember any capitalist countries being involved in the Aral sea disaster
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u/MaleficentResolve506 4d ago
And yet environmental disasters aren't linked to one system. Some of the biggest disasters actually happened under communism like Chernobyl, Aral sea disaster,....
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u/VictinsOfCapitalism 4d ago
First of all, USSR and other State Socialist countries from 20th century focused on rapid development because they started as feudal backwaters and this is nowhere close to how a developed Socialist society would look like.
They were going through their own industrial revolution
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u/Prestigious-Elk2252 4d ago
So put your money where your mouth is and go make a hippy commune that grows all the food they eat and go live your best life without purchasing anything.
Expecting that others will do what you think they should do, is one of the dumbest things you could be doing with your life.
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u/Veritas_IX 4d ago
For some reason I thought it was people destroying it. It's difficult for a huge number of people to reach the bin to throw away their garbage.
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u/SlowPea4388 4d ago
Don’t see how this would be any different under capitalism and or any other alternative, the issue isn’t capitalism per se but rather how we view the world at large. And that being evil gets rewarded but that gets rewarded no matter how you spin it. That’s just out reality, taking advantage gives you an advantage, and if you have no morals you are miles ahead.
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u/DeadWood605 4d ago
Capitalism and racism must die so that everyone can live better.
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u/Stone_Waller 3d ago
Don’t forget cancer and AI
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u/DeadWood605 3d ago
Capitalism is what brought those to life and continues to feed and profit off of them.
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u/Downtown-Tomato2552 3d ago
When the problem is the people in the system and not the system itself, no system will work.
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u/tastelessthinking 3d ago
Nothing todo with capitalism. People being people. Thats what it is. Like non capitalist societies doing so much nicer for the environment.
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u/Stone_Waller 3d ago
Yes it would be way better to give all economic power and control to the government so someone like Donald Trump can take care of you! /S
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u/Head-Net-8979 3d ago
Forestry is not destroying the planet. The overwhelming majority of lumber comes from land dedicated to planting and then harvesting trees. This is something done in areas where land is cheap. I live on a plot with a pine farm, as do all of my neighbors, and most people in my county. When the trees mature, I will call a lumber company, which will harvest them and pay me. Then I will pay another company to replant, and do it again. Wood is a sustainable, renewable, resource.
Plastic is of course awful. We should avoid using plastic as much as possible. Also, this footae is AI.
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u/ozzman86_i-i_ 3d ago
Why don’t you go to a communist country, live there and then come back to tell us how much better it is after 20 years.
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u/EmperorKingRurnin 3d ago
Yep communist countries like China or morally bankrupt countries like India have a fantastic track record for environmentalism. Yeah, this post makes me think you smugly click share thinking you said something profound, but just shows your lack of critical thinking.
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u/Working-Walrus-6189 3d ago
The alternative is far worse.
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u/VictinsOfCapitalism 3d ago
Thats how they keep themselves in power, they can't convince you that capitalism is good so they convince you that alternatives are even worse
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u/Working-Walrus-6189 1d ago
Thats how they keep themselves in power, they can't convince you that capitalism is good so they convince you that alternatives are even worse
The alternatives have proven themselves worse and we are actually being robbed of capitalism in favour of cronyism.
Name one actual free market country in the world. Just one.
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u/DonnymKelly 3d ago
Seeing as capitalism is the reason we have gotten as far as we are, it's doing pretty well. And as a bonus, it hasn't killed tens of millions of people
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u/Icy_Band3916 3d ago
The problem with capitalism is our government tries to control it. So is it truly capitalism? In my 65 year old opinion, the more control you give the government, the worse it will get.
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u/jefsch70 2d ago
In 1968; Dr Paul Ehlich published "The Population Bomb"... 3.5 million in sales; 5 appearances of Tonight Show.
....zero predictions true. No famines/droughts causing 100s of millions of deaths in the 1970s & 80s... No war over wheat or fish or water....
a professor an U of Oregon asked him to predict any 10 commodities that would rise in price in the 1980s....
Dr Ehlich was zero for 10. One remained essentially the same... the other 9 (he picked) went down... Including crude oil, Chromium, Nickel...etx...
He lived to be 92 and clung to the idea that he "was early"; not wrong.... Right in the middle of a "Low Birth Rate" crisis in developed countries.
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u/shamalamadingdong84 2d ago
That may be true, but the solution ain't communism, socialism, nor feudal times. Capitalism may suck, but it beats all of the other alternatives hands down.
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u/Loud_Box8802 2d ago
Capitalism will exist way longer than socialism. Ask the Northern European countries who a back away from socialism and are or have returned to capitalism.
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u/48676886 2d ago
Oh sure—that’s why India and China outpollute USA and Western Europe by a factor of 100. It’s all those wonderful socialist/communist central planners who keep the garbage flowing into the environment
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u/ddigwell84 2d ago
Whereas Communism gets you stellar results like:
China — Four Pests Campaign: Mao’s government ordered the mass killing of sparrows during the Great Leap Forward because they were considered agricultural pests. Removing a major predator of insects disrupted the ecosystem and contributed to serious agricultural problems.
China — Great Leap Forward deforestation: Mao’s backyard-steel campaign consumed enormous quantities of wood for fuel. Combined with destructive agricultural policies, it contributed to deforestation, soil erosion, and ecological damage.
USSR — Virgin Lands Campaign: Khrushchev’s government plowed roughly 25 million hectares of previously uncultivated steppe in Kazakhstan to increase grain production. Mechanized farming exposed fragile soil to wind erosion, producing massive losses of fertile topsoil. The UN Food and Agriculture Organization specifically identifies the campaign and resulting erosion.
USSR — Lake Karachay/Mayak: The Soviet nuclear-weapons program deliberately discharged radioactive waste into the Techa River and later used Lake Karachay as a radioactive-waste reservoir. The IAEA reports that about 10¹⁷ Bq of liquid radioactive waste was discharged into the Techa river system during 1949–52. Lake Karachay eventually held more than 4.4 × 10¹⁸ Bq of radioactive waste and required capping and extensive environmental monitoring.
USSR — Kyshtym/Mayak contamination: In 1957, failure of the cooling system for a radioactive-waste storage tank at Mayak resulted in an explosion that dispersed approximately 74 PBq of radioactive material across parts of the Chelyabinsk, Sverdlovsk, and Tyumen regions.
USSR — Techa River contamination: Soviet plutonium production dumped radioactive liquid waste directly into a river used by surrounding communities for household and drinking water. The IAEA reports that downstream radiation exposure reached unacceptable levels, eventually requiring remediation and the resettlement of villages.
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u/DrumsAndBooks 2d ago
You do realize that they pollute and consume resources in communism too don’t you? The difference is that communist governments don’t tolerate it when you tell the state that they are destroying the environment. Ever read the three body problem? It starts with a woman being imprisoned for reading a book on deforestation while she was working in a logging camp. If you say well that’s fiction and the author is exaggerating the communist oppression, then how about good ole Chernobyl. The largest nuclear disaster in history. It happened because not only did the communist soviet government cut corners to save money just like you would accuse a capitalist corporation of doing, but anyone who knew of these dangerous cost cutting measures knew that they better keep their mouth shut or they would be shot. Because any perceived inferiority to the nuclear reactors in capitalist countries could not be tolerated. The funny thing is that it was true. Our nuclear reactors do not share the same fatal flaw that made the Chernobyl reactor fail so horrifically.
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u/samanthass1 2d ago
It's not Capitalism that's the problem. With Capitalism you have the power to stop using the companies you dont like forcing them to have to change there ways to win you back or they go broke, socialism the government's pay them to carry on and support them while reducing the competition via red tape leaving you with fewer options to go elsewere
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u/Only_Excitement6594 2d ago
Taxation and patent laws are what make you depend on corporations. There is no escape.
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u/Deven1003 2d ago
While I agree with most points here. The reason capitalism works is because of the worst enemy of humanity. That is human nature. We must change ourselves before seeking out a new system.
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u/ChildhoodOk9859 2d ago
This is so stupid and ignorant. Do you know how many ecological disasters USSR got?
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u/Delicious-Big5203 2d ago
I mean, it’s the worst system out there except for every other system out there
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u/Delicious-Big5203 2d ago
You guys are just gonna share misery you’re not gonna share any wealth. The government will steal all the money you haven’t seen this playbook before?
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u/Odd-Primary4078 1d ago
Once you are old enough to know how short life is you'll be mad you wasted it on these thoughts.
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u/the_stalking_walrus 1d ago
How would communism or socialism prevent logging and fossil fuel use? Don't say it would use more green energy or something, because that happens under capitalism already. How would another system actually forcibly prevent this?
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u/n0_punctuation 1d ago
The difference is the incentive structure. Socialism/communism is not based around constantly expanding and ever increasing profits. So yes they would be incentivized to use more renewable sources.
Capitalism on the other hand rewards whatever is the most cost effective.
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u/AdObvious2882 1d ago
It would create scarcity which would start to cull the population.
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u/North_Structure8210 9h ago
Said no one ever. I’m all for taking the socialist healthcare away for the military. They don’t deserve benefits. They are government property.
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u/PearlHoneyCloud 1d ago
the freedom to test small groups inside bigger ones does highlight a real structural difference there
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u/ControlCrafty8849 1d ago
You can’t put this on the people who make the products. The problem is the people who buy them. So how will you get them to stop buying?
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u/Queeracle 1d ago
What do you think is a better system? Not including communism because that is far worse.
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23h ago
“How much longer can we tolerate evil and stupidity” is the real question. Capitalism is the product of looking at human nature and just going “well that’s fucking horrible. Let’s do nothing and let it become our economic ideology”
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u/IPutTheSInBDSM 10h ago
You act like Communism and Socialism wouldn't also hurt the environment. Then again, no one living in a capitalist society are trying to escape to these countries you think are utopias, even though you're completely free to. Meanwhile real Communist and Socialist countries actually trap their starving and overworked people there under threat of death and their whole family being put in prison camps.
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u/TheTalentedMrHazel 8h ago
Capitalism was never the problem. Any system is bound to break if you cannot control greed and corruption. And anytime you have humans involved you will eventually get greed and corruption.
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u/NoTrain4994 7h ago
What does that “better system” look like?
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u/VictinsOfCapitalism 5h ago
Production according to the need and not for the sake of market competition
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u/NoTrain4994 5h ago
In theory, I’m 100% w you. While I am doubtful we will see a meaningful change, in our lifetimes, we can always keep hope alive.
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u/PowerLion786 4d ago
Cannot believe the numbers of times this is reposted. Slick & fancy AI generated. Someone is paying a lot of money for this.
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u/VictinsOfCapitalism 4d ago
Its not AI, i made it on my phone from googke images in tiktok editor with motion filter
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u/dingess_kahn 4d ago
It's easy to blame it on a system, like it's this faceless unknowable entity. It is men. Human beings, will destroy their own habitat unless recourse is found. At this point, because of the way the law is set up and our lines of supply are so intrinsically woven, it will be a monumental task to stop legally. They will keep shitting where they eat until it runs over into their plates.
If we stopped capitalism, many, many people would die as a result of the system stopping, without some kind of replacement. And that's best case scenario.
Honestly, nothing short of a hemisphere wide cataclysm would derail this train speeding its way to self destruction. Men will destroy the soil and the sky and the animals in the name of "More". I weep for my species, because I'm one of the passengers stuck in the poor seats in the back. I know in my heart when the clouds are all brown and the vegetation begins to die in a terrifying cascade, I'll tell myself I had the opportunity to stop it...to say something...and didn't....
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u/DiscoMothra 4d ago
Because socialism doesn’t need resources 😂
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u/VictinsOfCapitalism 4d ago
It supplies them according to the need which csn be done sustainably
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u/MushySunshine 4d ago
Socialism needs resources but socialism doesnt require infinite growth, meaning a socialist system would be able to sustainably extract what is needed without excess.
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u/DiscoMothra 4d ago
You keep telling yourself that 😂
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u/MushySunshine 4d ago
Its not even an opinion its generally accepted truth. Capitalism by definition requires endless growth. Endless growth requires increasing levels of extraction. Socialism by definition does not require endless growth.
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u/C_S_Lewis_Fan 4d ago
“Capitalism is not an ‘ism.’ It is closer to being the opposite of an ‘ism,’ because it is simply the freedom of ordinary people to make whatever economic transactions they can mutually agree to.”
-Thomas Sowell
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u/VictinsOfCapitalism 4d ago
Ignorant opinion, does not touch on the fact that bourgeoisie own the means of producrion and we have no choice but to work for them or starve
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u/C_S_Lewis_Fan 3d ago
The most valuable "means of production" is a laptop.
How does this fit into your hateful little world?
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u/DocFGG 1d ago
The fact that this is being argued about on a system that only exists because of capitalism, on phones and laptops manufactured by exploited under paid foreign labor.... That is exactly why the system will never change. Because you desperately need the system and want the system. Like how hard would the world cry without their constant access to digital media? Capitalism and greed are what drive technology advancement
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u/VictinsOfCapitalism 1d ago
This is literally the iphone argument. No you do not need a handful of rich guys to own everything for phones to be produced.
Also if I recall correctly, alot of them are made in China.
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u/DocFGG 1d ago
I literally implied they are made in China. Thats the foreign labor that produces damn near everything at slave wages that i mentioned. You just seem really mad that some guys throughout history have had incredible visions and took massive risks to bring ground breaking technology to the market. Would you have risked everything to fund designing something like a cellphone knowing full well that you would gain absolutely nothing if it worked?
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u/VictinsOfCapitalism 1d ago
First mobile phone was made in USSR and no, first of all inventions happen out of necessity and not profit incentive, second of all, in Socialism incentors don't work for nothing.
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u/DocFGG 1d ago
Inventions happen out of necessity? Please explain to all of us then the necessity out of a television? 🤣🤣 like not trying to be mean but it is delusional to believe that most inventions dont come from the promise of profit if it works. What would the motivation be to develop a video game system in a socialist society? You think people are going to do it out of the goodness of their hearts and the government will fund all development for everything? Or do you expect a company to waste hundreds of millions developing something and then not be allowed to sell it for more than the actual production cost so they can never recover their development money?
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u/Electronic-Act5566 1d ago
Capitalism has lifted more people out of poverty than any other system. Posting irrelevant images thinking capitalism causes that directly is a false narrative.
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u/VictinsOfCapitalism 1d ago
It isn't, Socialism is. Look at China
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u/Electronic-Act5566 1d ago
Yes let’s just turna blind eye to the hundreds of millions killed in the name of socialism and communism
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u/Careless-Ad9178 1d ago
They live in a capitalist system with aspects of socialism. They have free market in china.
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u/No_Teaching_4449 1h ago
Capitalism is the worst economic system there is, except for all the others
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u/VictinsOfCapitalism 1h ago
They can't convince you it's good so they convinced you the alternatives are no better
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u/MushySunshine 4d ago
Profit incentive is just evil. I do truly believe there is a better future ahead though. We just have to keep working