3 replies to this topic

[Forever21]

http://www.libertarianism.org/

http://www.cato-at-l...rtarianism-org/

Edited by Forever21, 04 November 2011 - 08:38 AM.

[niner]

Finally, a place where we can all go to answer questions like: "Why Do Intellectuals Oppose Capitalism?" A quotation from the essay:

Intellectuals now expect to be the most highly valued people in a society, those with the most prestige and power, those with the greatest rewards. Intellectuals feel entitled to this. But, by and large, a capitalist society does not honor its intellectuals. Ludwig von Mises explains the special resentment of intellectuals, in contrast to workers, by saying they mix socially with successful capitalists and so have them as a salient comparison group and are humiliated by their lesser status. However, even those intellectuals who do not mix socially are similarly resentful, while merely mixing is not enough—the sports and dancing instructors who cater to the rich and have affairs with them are not noticeably anti-capitalist.

[firespin]

Finally, a place where we can all go to answer questions like: "Why Do Intellectuals Oppose Capitalism?" A quotation from the essay:

Intellectuals now expect to be the most highly valued people in a society, those with the most prestige and power, those with the greatest rewards. Intellectuals feel entitled to this. But, by and large, a capitalist society does not honor its intellectuals. Ludwig von Mises explains the special resentment of intellectuals, in contrast to workers, by saying they mix socially with successful capitalists and so have them as a salient comparison group and are humiliated by their lesser status. However, even those intellectuals who do not mix socially are similarly resentful, while merely mixing is not enough—the sports and dancing instructors who cater to the rich and have affairs with them are not noticeably anti-capitalist.

From the same article:

By intellectuals, I do not mean all people of intelligence or of a certain level of education, but those who, in their vocation, deal with ideas as expressed in words, shaping the word flow others receive. These wordsmiths include poets, novelists, literary critics, newspaper and magazine journalists, and many professors.

Going by my experience at the university I went to there is some truth to this. For example a professor I had for Writing Literature would assign the class to read and discus poems that she personally picked that would be about how living in society is a struggle, anti-commercialism, and a couple that praised Marx.

Edited by firespin, 06 November 2011 - 07:32 AM.

[niner]

Aside from a couple of aged 60's hairballs who might still be hanging on, I think we'd be hard pressed to find many people in America today who are "opposed to Capitalism". Hell, even the "Red Chinese" are in favor of Capitalism. I think that the guy who wrote that article has a curiously self serving definition of "Capitalism", probably something along the lines of utterly unregulated free market economics.