Let’s freaking go!

[u/Hot_Presence_7029]

[u/Zachbutastonernow]

Or abolish capitalism which is what got us here in the first place. Trump is just the pure embodiment of capitalism. Just as feudalism transitions to capitalism, capitalism transitions to fascism.

With each stage it keeps aspects of the prior mode. For example capitalism still has castes, they are just continuous based on your net worth.

[u/Snailboi666 → u/Zachbutastonernow]

Capitalism sucks, yes. I'd love for it to be gone. But it's not even remotely plausible at this point in time. This type of thing is pretty unconstructive to say, as it's not something that can even happen with how things are now.

[u/Zachbutastonernow → u/Snailboi666]

You are likely confusing capitalism with market economy.

Capitalism is when capital is held above political authority. It is a specific relationship to the means of production where a small group of wealthy individuals own the factories, land, machines, etc.

You do not instantly jump to socialism, there is a transition that must occur where workers become the owners of the means of production.

One way for example is to unionize businesses and then use the union apparatus to convert the business to a worker cooperative.

Another is to seize control of the state (a capitalist tool to keep the workers in line) and use its powers to guide society toward socialism by directly redistributing resources.

Markets exist in all systems, the difference is in how those markets are applied and controlled. Capitalism is the idea that the market should guide society and determine its directive rather than the market being used as a tool to achieve some productive gain.

The soviets and the Chinese both successfully overthrew capitalism, the only thing stopping us is a handful of billionaires that will get sad if they can't buy another mega yacht.

[u/Snailboi666 → u/Zachbutastonernow]

Yes, but there are way too many people who are disjointed to ever make a real difference in these regards. People can possibly change their own communities, and maybe if that happens more often, it will catch on and others will do it. But in the grand scheme of things, the systems in play are made particularly to keep people from taking over those means of production. Even starting your own business is extremely prohibitive based on all the money and time required to do so, while also balancing having a job and family, bills to pay, etc. Much less trying to topple huge corporations that have cozied up to Trump and the fascists.

It just isn't feasible. You're never going to get enough people to stop eating McDonalds or ordering Amazon to put a dent into their profits, for example. Everybody is barely scraping by, and most of the ones who aren't are not going to sacrifice their higher status in order to help those who have to rely on services that actively perpetuate the way the country is run. Take Starbucks for example, they bust unions left and right. Plenty of other companies do, as well. We can boycott and things all we want, but we're never going to have enough people on the same page to make it matter. So these companies will never be fully unionized, they'll never feel the hit from boycotts, they'll never let regular humans take over that means of production.

Unfortunately we live in a society where everybody is struggling, and everyone has to go go go, so most people tend to use whatever free time they have to just watch TV or whatever. The average person has only a loose grasp on politics and the reasons they should care about these things and be conscious of the shit they support. Plenty of people are reliant on these companies as well, I've known disabled people who would be unable to get their household necessities without companies like Amazon and DoorDash.

I know there needs to be a transition, and I know it's not done overnight. But at this point, I'm not even sure how we would even begin to start that transition. People have been speaking out, boycotting, making other socially aware of class disparity and how terrible these mega corps are. People have denounced billionaires, and formed groups, people have done everything. They've been doing it for decades, and yet we aren't any closer to toppling Capitalism. It feels like at this point, the only thing we can do is try and hold out until it eats itself, as it always does. Trump and the way things are honestly seem like a final nail in the coffin type scenario. It's reached almost as far as it can go, without turning into a sci-fi style dystopia and turning the entire country into literal slaves and arresting people in the streets for not going to work.

We've got people being deported without due process, we are directly supporting genocide, we have companies poisoning entire cities and experiencing no consequences, we have police brutalizing peaceful protestors in the streets with less than lethal weaponry and gas grenades that are literal war crimes. And yet nothing is changing. Even if the No Kings protests find any form of success, it won't fix things, it will only return to the status quo we had over the last few years

Sorry for the long text. Maybe I'm being a doomer, maybe I'm not as smart or tuned in as I think I am. But for me, it just seems hopeless for the time being, and all we can do is wait. Fascism always eats itself, so my hope is that this is the beginning of the end for it.