STOP MAKING CAPITALISM

By John Holloway

[This address at the World Social Forum in Porto Allegre, February 2005 is translated from the German on the World Wide Web, http://www.rosalux.de/cms/index.php?id-6665.]




We have different political perspectives. We have different ideals about political practice and organization and perhaps of the kind of society to be created. What do we have in common? Our NO against the existing society is our common passion. This is not slight or insignificant. Our NO is a rage, a raving anger, and a deep conviction uniting us: NO to neoliberalism, NO to imperialism, NO to war and NO to destruction of humanity. Our NO must be the starting point for alliances.

This is a very urgent NO. We are lemmings hastening off a cliff. Humanity is on a way that leads directly to its own self-destruction. The self-annihilation of humanity becomes more likely every day: through war, through destruction of the environment or through the misery, poverty, sickness and violence produced by neoliberalism. The only possibility that is left is to say NO and refuse: “NO, we will not take this path to our self-destruction”, simply NO, not “we should be slower or more careful or drive on the left side instead of the right.”

NO is also the secret of our strength. Those who rule always depend on those who are ruled. Capitalists could not make any profit without their workers. Generals could not wage any war without their soldiers. Presidents and premiers could not rule without their subjects. When the servant says NO to the master, the servant is not a servant and the master is not a master any more. Both begin to become persons. When soldiers say NO to their generals, soldiers are not soldiers and generals are not generals any more. When workers say NO to their capitalist bosses, workers are not workers and capitalists are not capitalists any more. All these people who would boss us around and tell us what we should do could realize they are dependent on us, not the other way around. We are stronger than we think. First of all, let us say NO: strike, mutiny, boycott, disobedience and refusal. The NO is what is common to us. The NO is urgent; the NO is the source of our strength.

We make capitalism. If capitalism exists today, it is because we create it today, not because it was created in the eighteenth or nineteenth century. If we do not create it tomorrow, it will not exist tomorrow. We tend very often to make others responsible – the imperialists, the Americans, Bush, and the capitalists. But when we make them responsible, we present ourselves in the role of the victim. If we are victims, we cannot change things and must ask someone to do it for us. Still they are not the ones who make capitalism; we are the ones who make it. If we have the strength to create I, we also have the strength to stop making it. We can only feel our strength when we are conscious of our responsibility.

The question of revolution is not: “How do we destroy capitalism?” but “How do we stop making capitalism?” This does not solve the problems but empowers us for another form of reflection on changing the world.

First of all, the time frame is changed. The question does not turn around building revolution in the future (the creation of alliances) but acting here and now to break capitalism and stop creating it.

Secondly, our attention is concentrated on refusal. Not losing time is important now. We must refuse and do everything so this refusal becomes effective. Our whole history is a history of refusals – a history of strikes, mutinies, boycotts and the refusal to pay debts and distancing ourselves from those who try to boss us around. These refusals were often (but not always) simply used as means for negotiating acceptance of better conditions – for example, strikes for higher wages. In the last years, there were a whole series of actions to lodge vetoes against neoliberal developments, often successfully and often in a very large framework (for example, Bolivia in October 2003). How can we make these refusals more effective? How can we refuse and prevent the destruction of humanity, not to negotiate better conditions?

Thirdly, we do not live in a world where there is one great refusal. Rather there are millions of refusals, millions of people who say or cry NO everyday, who say NO; we will not let capital determine our life. We will organize our life in a way we consider necessary or desirable. Sometimes those refusals are so small that even those who participate do not see them as refusals. They are frequently collective projects that seek an alternative way forward and sometimes are as vast as the Lakondian jungle, the Argentinean rebellion three years ago or the revolts in Bolivia. These refusals could be viewed as cracks or tears in the system of capitalist rule. Capitalism is a system of rule, not first of all an economic system. Through money, capitalists rule us and tell us what we have to do. Refusing to obey means breaking the rule of capital. Thus the question for us is how we multiply and extend these tears in the fabric of rule.

Expressed differently, the revolution necessarily starts from the gaps: the expansion of the tears or cracks in the structure of capitalist rule. Each of these cracks is a place of refusal and also a place of creation, a place where we develop our own creative power and our own desire for self-determination. The negatives contain many positives, many different positives pressing experimentally in different directions. The positives are anticipations, not conceptual forms with pivotal points.

He utopian star of a different society exists for all of us but our ways of seeing this star and trying to reach it are different. These explorations are harmed when we attempt to channel them in one direction. Discussing and criticizing are vital. However the world we want to create is a world containing many different worlds. In speaking about alliances and cooperation, we should concentrate on the negative, on our refusal, on the practical orientation on how we can end the destruction: the Bush administration, the war, and environmental destruction, in a word the present creation of capitalism. Stop making capitalism. Create another world, a world of many worlds.

Capitalism has to be smashed if civilization is to continue. Individual actions like refusing to own a car or use credit cards may help a little, if only by boosting morale. But the solution must be social - the masses of people must be won over to the idea that capitalism causes suffering and misery and must be done away with.

Then why are so many people seeing psychiatrists and other psychotherapists? Why are there so many homeless people? Why are so many people living on credit cards and loans? Why were the residents of New Orleans left to fend for themselves? Why are there massive ghettos or barrios (or both) in every major city? Why are so many elderly people forced to choose between food or buying prescription medicine? Why are the ceos of insurance companies riding around in sports cars and sending their children to Harvard while some people die because they cannot afford any health care at all? Why are so many working class kids in the Army and Marine Corps, killing and getting killed so Bush and his buddies can make a killing on Mideastern oil? Why are thousands of hard working people being laid off from their jobs? Why are trust fund brats living in ten thousand dollar a month lofts while people with full time jobs sleep in their cars because they can't afford the rent for an apartment?

Capitalism is successful... if you're one of the 'people'.

With an income below 20k/yr you are not a person.

You are a statistic.

Sheepdip said: "Capitalism is successful... if you're one of the 'people'.

With an income below 20k/yr you are not a person.

You are a statistic."

Tell me, Sheepdip... WHO, EXACTLY, are 'the people' you refer to? Who are they?

And why, if you earn below $20,000 a year, are you not a person? According to whom? Who taught you that, Sheepdip? Do I start becoming a person at $21,000 a year?

In a system of capital the term 'sustainability' cannot be addressed.

Now the feeding frenzy of 'wealth' means cannibalizing the very structure of society, labor and resources of the world resulting in our plummeting standard of living, degradation of the environment, and the current slide into fascism as this system shows itself unable to provide the basic needs of the people and a need for permanent war to provide the constant influx of capital.

Denial w/o supporting data is opinion.

Capitalism is Cancer.

" Capitalism is Cancer."



And you're still an old bitter fool.

for the drill.

-"Now the feeding frenzy of 'wealth' means cannibalizing the very structure of society"

... Another crock. Lots of wind here, but no substance. Lets hear the details-

[Sheepdip]... :>)

Oh you don't believe that the reduction of social services like Medicare or Education or Public housing or the sale of American infrastructure (privatization) is something besides cannibalism?

Maybe you have another word for it.

Capitalism is Cancer.

another view

-Medicare hasn't been reduced-

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/11100952/

Bush is also seeking savings by trimming the growth of spending in Medicare, the government’s giant health care program for the elderly and disabled, by $35.9 billion over five years.

-Education: George Bush has increased funding for education by over 100% since the time he took office...-

And this is why my son’s high school has to drop classes ??? Maybe you’re referring to his faith based ‘no child left behind... funding for private schools?

-Public housing- ( and yes, the government *does* have the responsibility for the 'common defense and welfare' of its citizens...

-By eliminating any objective basis for determining appropriate funding levels, the bill would open the door to deep funding cuts in the voucher program.  With the voucher program converted to a block grant and a large proportion of PHAs operating under Moving to Work waivers, there would no longer be any objective basis for determining the amount of funding needed to serve a set number of families.  HUD and Congress would be able to make significant cuts in funding, while accurately asserting that PHAs could continue serving the same number of families — for example, by serving higher income families, shifting costs to tenants, or shifting funds to less expensive modes of assistance (such as a shallow downpayment assistance grant for a family making $35,000 per year, rather than a deep rental subsidy for a family struggling to get by on the minimum wage or a formerly homeless person with disabilities)-

http://www.cbpp.org/5-3-05hous.htm

denial is not a river.

Scorpio is perfectly happy with a society in which older people have to choose between food and medicine, in which job stress leads people to mental health clinics, in which masses of homeless people sleep in the streets and people of color as well as so-called white trash live in slums, and in which people get laid off from jobs which they have had for years or decades lose them so the boss can make higher profits employing slave labor overseas. That says as much about Scorpio as it says about capitalism or socialism. He also shows his ignorance by asserting that hardly anyone with a full time job can't affford an apartment; apparantly he does not read newspapers or magazines. He just cruises the internet looking for opportunities to make an ass out of himself. As for his comfort with spoiled brats living in lofts while workers sleep in their cars, that really says it all - about him.

They show you are a sicko.

They show you are uninformed.

They show that your values are crap.

They show you are a fascist.

They show you would feel at home in Pinochet's Chile or the Bush White House.

They show you are a misanthrope with no compassion for other human beings.

They show you have the type of pathology described by Theodore Adorno in his famous book The Authoritarian Personality.

Honest to God, Meyer... You're just another broken record, endlessly repeating the same old drivel.

Having spent years on these IMC sites I am beginning to believe that todays Leftists have devolved into a cult of political mantras, leaving no room whatsoever for rational debate. You're even more uselss than I thought you were.

Who cares what the Fuck Scorpio thinks or believes?

Only the other halfwits here who like the bosses because they

A) are being paid by them to crap here with this Nazi shit

B) or are the bosses.

Did you know that most of the ruling class never eared all that money but inherited it?

They live on the dividends of this wealth and have never had to hold a job to eat?

That they never had to work when they were sick with the flu so their kids could eat?

Never had to decide whether they should spend that last money on rent or something to eat.

These are the same fucks who brought us 'cost benefit analysis' which showed a bottom line on injury and death.

Bought off our representatives to keep from being taxed a portion of their unhidden assets.

Love to discuss this F2F.

you care Scorpio because you have made a comment of the article. if you dont why post your opinion. you think you can change our minds? I doubt.

Check what century you are living in, Scorpio. The US ruling class is now made up of billionaires, not millionaires. Millionaires tend to be corporate executives, landlords, owners of profitable medium sized businesses, and physicians. They are far more priveleged than the masses of people, but most of them make a living serving their masters in the ruling class.

By the way, by millionaires do you mean people whose total worth is a million dollars? That would include many people who simply own a home in places like California, where property values are insanely inflated and will probably crash sooner or later.

the claim has been made that the average "millionaire":

>>Has a median household annual income of $131,000

>>Owns a home valued at about $320,000

that adds up to a net worth of $451,000, not including debt. D'oh!!!

What a steaming pile of propaganda about the rich. It's written to make the rich seem "normal" when they're really unusual.

>* "About 80[%] of [the millionaires] are first-generation affluent." Less that 20% of them inherited their wealth and most of these inherited less than 10% of their current wealth.

If they have an average net worth of $3.7 million, and half of them inherited more than 10% of their wealth, the median inheritance is $370,000. (According to this site: http://www.osjspm.org/101_wealth.htm people with a net worth in that range are in the top 30% of the US.)

I posit that, half or more of the millionaires probably inherited their wealth in the form of a house, other real estate, or a business.

In short, if you start with nothing, the odds of becoming a "millionaire" are pretty slim. If you accumulate capital into assets like a house or business, lifting your family into the top 1/3 of the wealthy, one of your kids will have a much better chance of becoming millionaires.

I can't see this working unless you have two or three generations of family who want to get rich, and general 60+ year long-term goals for capital accumulation. Also, in this scenario, only one person becomes wealthy; but the process can be accelerated by mobilizing capital across the family.

Basically, the first generation to try to get rich are like the "field slaves" of capitalism. If they "uncle tom" enough, they might become the "house slaves". There, they can pretend to own the house and pretend to be the "master". (That's the pro-capitalist middle class in America -- house slaves who think they are masters.) Then, some of them may eventually have children who become "masters" of some sort.

The problem with the system is that it runs on enslavement.

Yeah, I really believe that one, just like I believe in the story of Jonah and the Whale. Of course he may have been a National Socialist (a Nazi and a defender of capitalism). In that case, I don't know why he would be saying that he "used" to be one.

You won't have any Aston Martin because I don't think Matchbox makes that model. Besides, in thirty years autos might be banned in an attempt to prevent the final disintegration of the Ozone Layer.

If you are in the parking lot of a supermarket you will be carrying out a giant bag of cheetos to munch on as you watch that night's episode of Yesterday's Stars, which will feature your favorites - Jessica Simpson and Hilary Duff, discussing how they both regretted marrying Tom Cruise in 20010 and 20012, respectively.

" I'm done-"

No shit?

You were done at the beginning. Now you're well into the overdone if not burnt to a crisp condition.

Don't let the door bump your burnt butt on the way out.

***

"Winston's job was to rectify the original figures by making them agree with the later ones. As for the third message, it referred to a very simple error which could be set right in a couple of minutes. As short a time ago as February, the Ministry of Plenty had issued a promise (a 'categorical pledge' were the official words) that there would be no reduction of the chocolate ration during 1984. Actually, as Winston was aware, the chocolate ration was to be reduced from thirty grammes to twenty at the end of the present week. All that was needed was to substitute for the original promise a warning that it would probably be necessary to reduce the ration at some time in April. "

http://www.online-literature.com/orwell/1984/4/

Scoripio (if that's your real name), I've never been a big-S Socialist. For a former Socialist (if that's really the truth) you're not very good at discerning between the different flavors of anti-capitalism.

I'm a little-s socialist. I think the main focus of social organizing should be social welfare. I'm also a little-a anarchist, and think the state is generally an oppressive force that creates war.

You missed the one glaring error in my argument, too. I assumed that the average net worth was also the median net worth. Not that it invalidated my argument... which wasn't really an argument because I don't disagree with your list of stats. I just "clarified" a little bit.

Your story (if it's true) is not the average story of the "average" affluent person who will become a millionaire. Just read the stats you threw out. They don't say that most millionaires inherited no money, started out in the working class, or something like that.

Also, incidentally, I got my ideas about intergenerational and family capital accumulation from something I read a long time ago by the Black capitalist, Tony Brown. It's not some leftist explanation: it's part of a capitalist's explanation about why whites are wealthier than blacks in America.

You are a house slave. How do you know I'm not also a house slave? After all, I'm obviously affected by the rhetoric in your list of factoids about millionaires. I'm in that strata of society who can even discern differences in the levels of wealth in the upper middle classes. The majority of working people can't and don't discern between someone with 3.7 million dollars, and someone with, say, 7.2 million dollars. You're all equally rich, in the same way that a tall tree a mile away and another a mile-and-a-half away appear very distant.

One thing you have right is that I don't understand how capitalism and markets work. If I had, I'd have been denouncing Enron and energy market deregulation.

Scorpio knows how capitalism works. It rips people off and screws workers over. That's why he likes it.

That is why Martin Luther King, Leo Tolstoy, Albert Einstein, and Dorothy Day were all against capitalism. And why Al Capone, Francisco Franco, Papa Doc Duvalier, Baby Doc Duvalier, Ricard Nixon and Tom Delay have all spoken out enthusiastically in favor of capitalism.

I am Elmer J. Fudd, millionaire; I own a mansion and a yacht.

Capitalism is simple. To get rich like me, you can do two things. You can hire someone to work for you, and charge a third party more for that work than you pay to the worker. You can also have the worker make things, and take those things and sell them. You can also own some kind of private property, and rent it out at a price higher than what you paid for it. Eventually, you may become wealthy enough that the main thing you rent out is money, in the form of loans.

An articlle listed the best paid jobs in America.