GMO conspiracy theories

Yes- all mutually beneficial as perceived by those engaged in the transaction. You are placing value judgements on these transaction that are particular to you.
Right. Because from the standpoint of economics, there's no such thing as being taken advantage of.... so lets all pretend it's true.
Trading territory for trinkets WAS seen as beneficial by both parties at the time.
But one party is clearly taking huge advantage of the other, and is wholly aware of that.
And if all you have to trade to stay alive is sex then there is at least an argument that trading it for money is beneficial -
Hypothetical scenario: Wealthy fiend with HIV pays 50 bucks, chump change to him, to sexually humiliate a homeless 18 year old. He gets to satisfy craven sexual urges for the cost of a single meal at a lackluster restaurant, she contracts an STD, gets pregnant, and is robbed of her sense of self worth for just enough money to scrape by in the short term, though with an illness that will cost her far more in the long term, as she, unlike him, is uninsured. Mutually beneficial?
and for some people it is positively advantageous.
For most its incredibly dangerous.

Actually they were quite brainwashing. Soap Operas spring to mind. You weren't a victim. :)
There's a hilarious, if not highly disturbing advertisement from the 50's, in the format of a public service announcement and with some government backing, which promotes the idea that a tidy yard and a freshly painted house would protect your property from a Nuclear blast. Of course, it was produced by a paint company.

Advertising is far more subtle these days in the way it applies influence. An example of that is this Metamucil add, which exudes a sense of frustration, hostility, and discomfort while portraying nothing that can really be directly associated with any of those feelings. This is achieved through body language, tone of voice, facial expression, and the choice of cuts/zooms... as well as volume, which when aired was always blaring above that of the actual program it interrupts. Aside from giving an otherwise mundane ad for a mundane product a more memorable emotional impact, I think the intention is to promote an uncomfortable sensation, the advertisements content leading to an association in the viewer of that discomfort with the bowels.
The 'haunted house' air freshener ads is another good example. I can't find them online, but there was a series of ads for either Febreeze or Lysol air-fresheners, usually shot in a blue-tinged light and beginning with four notes of their jingle being whistled, in which objects in the background are moving slightly/re-arranging themselves between cuts. The actual content of the ads never address these shifting picture-frames or roaming armchairs, they aren't part of the theme of the add in the slightest, and aren't even meant it seems to be 'noticed'. It's just a way to make a 20 second spot about a guy wandering his house comparing air-fresheners stick more than it would if that was all that was going on... a 'hidden' gimmick that still does the trick.
 
Right. Because from the standpoint of economics, there's no such thing as being taken advantage of.... so lets all pretend it's true.
But one party is clearly taking huge advantage of the other, and is wholly aware of that.

Yep... same as taking candy from a baby or selling 'toxic derivatives'. Psychopaths don't care because they are not bothered by who or how many get hurt pushed into poverty or suicide or starvation.

I wonder if the clean up paint up ad involved an early NIST input... they like those types of scientific proofs :)
 
There's a hilarious, if not highly disturbing advertisement from the 50's, in the format of a public service announcement and with some government backing, which promotes the idea that a tidy yard and a freshly painted house would protect your property from a Nuclear blast. Of course, it was produced by a paint company.

While that seems pretty silly, it is based on real science. White painted houses with less clutter would result in fewer fires. Those things probably seemed a lot more important when the nuclear threat was more prominent.
 
While that seems pretty silly, it is based on real science. White painted houses with less clutter would result in fewer fires.
The suggestion that painting your house and keeping a tidy lawn could save you and your property from a Nuclear blast, as this TV spot directly states, is ludicrous in the extreme. Nothing scientific about it. It's a fear-mongering ad to sell paint and demonize unkempt properties/their owners, ingeniously intent on seeing local groups of frightened citizens established to pressure such people into buying paint.
Those things probably seemed a lot more important when the nuclear threat was more prominent.
Undoubtedly.... but this is an example of legitimate concerns being blatantly exploited. Also, given the current rhetoric flying around between Israel/Iran/North Korea/China/Russia/America right now, I'm not so sure the nuclear threat was all that much more prominent then... simply had a fair deal more novelty.
 
The suggestion that painting your house and keeping a tidy lawn could save you and your property from a Nuclear blast, as this TV spot directly states, is ludicrous in the extreme. Nothing scientific about it. It's a fear-mongering ad to sell paint and demonize unkempt properties/their owners, intent on seeing local groups established to pressure such people into buying paint.

Why is it ludicrous? Of course it's not going to stop your house being blasted to pieces, but outside of the blast destruction zone property damage also comes from fires started from the flash. White paint would reflect the heat. Less combustibles would mean less fire. It's a probably a pretty minor difference to the total damage though. But from a government bean-counting POV 1% fewer fires in a million homes might seem worth a PSA.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Effects_of_nuclear_explosions#Direct_effects

Nuclear weapons emit large amounts of thermal radiation as visible, infrared, and ultraviolet light. This is known as "Flash".[11] The chief hazards are burns and eye injuries. On clear days, these injuries can occur well beyond blast ranges, depending on weapon yield.[2] Fires may also be started by the initial thermal radiation, but the following high winds due to the blast wave may put out almost all such fires, unless the yield is very high, where the range of thermal effects vastly out ranges blast effects, like that observed in the multi-megaton range.[2] This is because the intensity of the blast effects drops off with the third power of distance from the explosion, while the intensity of radiation effects drops off with the second power of distance. This results in the range of thermal effects increasing markedly more than blast range as higher and higher device yields are detonated.
[...]
When thermal radiation strikes an object, part will be reflected, part transmitted, and the rest absorbed. The fraction that is absorbed depends on the nature and color of the material. A thin material may transmit a lot. A light colored object may reflect much of the incident radiation and thus escape damage like
anti-flash white paint. The absorbed thermal radiation raises the temperature of the surface and results in scorching, charring, and burning of wood, paper, fabrics, etc. If the material is a poor thermal conductor, the heat is confined to the surface of the material.

Actual ignition of materials depends on how long the thermal pulse lasts and the thickness and moisture content of the target. Near ground zero where the energy flux exceeds 125 J/cm2​, what can burn, will. Farther away, only the most easily ignited materials will flame. Incendiary effects are compounded by secondary fires started by the blast wave effects such as from upset stoves and furnaces.

In Hiroshima on August 6, 1945, a tremendous firestorm developed within 20 minutes after detonation and destroyed many more buildings and homes, built out of predominately 'flimsy' wooden materials.
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and they painted their bombers for the same reason:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anti-flash_white
Anti-flash white is a brilliant white color commonly seen on United States, British and Soviet nuclear bombers.[1] The purpose of the color was to reflect some of the thermal radiation from a nuclear explosion, protecting the aircraft and its occupants.
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But one party is clearly taking huge advantage of the other, and is wholly aware of that.

Hypothetical scenario: Wealthy fiend with HIV pays 50 bucks, chump change to him, to sexually humiliate a homeless 18 year old. He gets to satisfy craven sexual urges for the cost of a single meal at a lackluster restaurant, she contracts an STD, gets pregnant, and is robbed of her sense of self worth for just enough money to scrape by in the short term, though with an illness that will cost her far more in the long term, as she, unlike him, is uninsured. Mutually beneficial?

Value is all about perception.

Perhaps those who received the trinkets didn't even believe the "territory" was theirs to even sell...so they walked away thinking they got the better deal- trinkets for nothing.

Sure your hypothetical scenario tugs at the emotions- especially with your editorializing- but it is a transaction based on fraud and imperfect information. A worst case scenario.

The vast majority of transactions via capitalism end up with both parties satisfied with their mutual benefits.

Again, its not perfect and there are abuses...but it is the MOST efficient and effective method for the distribution and allocation of scarce resources that the World has ever seen.

Perhaps you can suggest a better method of resource allocation?
 
The vast majority of transactions via capitalism end up with both parties satisfied with their mutual benefits.
Most transactions which take place on the planet today no longer involve two parties. If I go to the mall and buy myself an Iphone 5, that transaction could be considered 'mutually beneficial' from the standpoint of myself and the clerk I'm handing my money too. He's got a job, I've got a new toy, everybody's happy right? But what about the young asian person slaving away in a factory-community building the chassis for mini-circuits at a paid rate of 25 cents an hour, while being housed with all the consideration one affords the average violent criminal? What about the African child being forced by armed militias to dig up Coltan, an element essential for the production of mini-circuits, for hours on end, using iron bars to smash up swaths of dry earth under an unforgiving sun for little to no pay at all? From an Economic standpoint Steve Jobs was an absolute hero, hailed as a revolutionary for his innovative and brilliant mind for business. Apple is portrayed in America as an example of capitalism at its best, all as it demands the subjugation and abuse of thousands of people in order to continue to provide yearly slight improvements on the same product at ridiculously low prices given the human cost of the product itself. I suppose this is when you tell me I'm "selfishly imposing my values on people from completely different cultures" again. Even worse, some people are directly effected by the transaction who weren't even involved in any aspect of the transaction or the creation of the product. Economists have a rather dreadful word for this: 'Externalities'. The Bhopal disaster, for example, would be an example of an 'externality' from the standpoint of economics.

but it is the MOST efficient and effective method for the distribution and allocation of scarce resources that the World has ever seen.
Really? On what are you basing that? Many Nomadic cultures seemed to have resource management all figured out more or less, creating entirely sustainable societies.

Perhaps you can suggest a better method of resource allocation?
A legal predilection for the service of needs rather than of greed would be a great place to start in my mind. At the moment corporate entities are legally obliged to act in self-interest alone. A global council randomly selected from intelligent citizens of any class applying legally binding moral oversight to modern corporate structures would be a really good start so far as I'm concerned. If regular citizens informed and intelligent enough to comprehend the issues presented them were able to inflict enforceable and considerable penalties on corporate structures who's actions directly result in violations of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, I think corporations would quickly, some of them even happily reign in their callous activities.

Something of a minor hero to me in this regard is Ray Anderson, CEO of a major carpeting company. His change of heart, and his decision to drive his corporation toward sustainability as rapidly as he could manage, is to me a distinct sign of how those who manage corporations, when considering the moral implications of their actions, can honestly see the harm that they're doing, and even try to improve. The quote of his I'll include is from a speech to civic and business leaders at North Carolina State University. In the footage of his speech, the most powerful aspect to me is how many members of his audience, 'captains of industry' themselves, begin to tear up or wear incredibly grave faces. A lot of these people realize they're doing wrong, and don't want to be.
Do I know you well enough to call you fellow plunderers? There is not an industrial company on earth, not an institution of any kind, not mine, not yours, not anyone's that is sustainable. I stand convicted by me, myself alone, not by anyone else, as a plunderer of the earth, but not by our civilisation's definition. By our civilisation's definition, I'm a captain of industry. In the eyes of many a kind of modern day hero. But really, really, the first industrial revolution is flawed, it is not working. It is unsustainable. It is the mistake and we must move on to another and better industrial revolution and get it right this time.
When I think of what could be I visualise an organisation of people committed to a purpose and the purpose is doing no harm. I see a company that has severed the umbilical cord to earth for its raw materials, taking raw materials that have already been extracted and using them over and over again, driving that process with renewable energy. It is our plan, it remains our plan to climb Mount Sustainability, that mountain that is higher than Everest, infinitely higher than Everest, far more difficult to scale. That point at the top symbolising zero footprint...
Drawing the metaphor of the early attempts to fly. The man going off of a very high cliff in his airplane, with the wings flapping, and the guys flapping the wings and the wind is in his face, and this poor fool thinks he's flying, but, in fact, he's in free fall, and he just doesn't know it yet because the ground is so far away, but, of course, the craft is doomed to crash. That's the way our civilization is, the very high cliff represents the virtually unlimited resources we seem to have when we began this journey. The craft isn't flying because it's not built according to the laws of aerodynamics and it's subject to the law of gravity. Our civilization is not flying because it's not built according to the laws of aerodynamics for civilizations that would fly. And, of course, the ground is still a long way away, but some people have seen that ground rushing up sooner than the rest of us have. The visionaries have seen it and have told us it's coming. There's not a single scientific, peer-reviewed paper published in the last 25 years that would contradict this scenario: every living system of earth is in decline, every life support system of earth is in decline, and these together constitute the biosphere, the biosphere that supports and nurtures all of life, and not just our life but perhaps 30 million other species that share this planet with us. The typical company of the 20th century: extractive, wasteful, abusive, linear in all of its processes, taking from the earth, making, wasting, sending its products back to the biosphere, waste to a landfill. I, myself, was amazed to learn just how much stuff the earth has to produce through our extraction process to produce a dollar of revenue for our company. When I learned, I was flabbergasted. We are leaving a terrible legacy of poison and diminishment of the environment for our grandchildren's grandchildren, generations not yet born. Some people have called that intergeneration tyranny, a form of taxation without representation, levied by us on generations yet to be. It's the wrong thing to do.
 
So I should give you the jewelry I make because you like it and expect that someone else will give me the food they grow?

Nomadic cultures engaged in TRADE. The native Americans traded for shells, flint and pipestone. Very few cultures can rely on only what is local to them. Most trade starts with 'luxury items', such as items desired for jewelry and 'war goods', such as flint, tin and such.

Trade is beneficial because it reduces the need to control all the sources of what you need.

I still want you to offer a 'better way' than capitalism.

Back to your I phone example. Did you know that folks line up to work at Foxcon? That their wages there are a lot more than they would get at home? That the work is easier?

What is happening in Bangladesh is horrible, and there is no excuse for it, however, living on a farm there is also very risky.

Each year in Bangladesh about 26,000 km2, (around 18%) of the country is flooded, killing over 5,000 people and destroying 7 million homes. During severe floods the affected area may exceed 75% of the country, as was seen in 1998.
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The problem there is the lack of regulation by the government. Capitalism NEEDS government regulation to work to the benefit of all. One of the problems with government ownership of business is that NO ONE is guarding the hen house.
 
S
o I should give you the jewelry I make because you like it and expect that someone else will give me the food they grow?
Huh? No. You should give me the jewelry you make if I give you food, or something else of value to you in exchange myself. If you made that jewelry out of the teeth of our mutual neighbor, I wouldn't give you fuck all, nor would anyone else, because nobody is going to trade for jewelry made of their neighbors teeth. Global capitalism allows us to be oblivious of, or indifferent to the fact that the products we're buying required the brutalization of people we'd consider our peers if they weren't so far out of sight and out of mind. The blood, sweat and general misery of subjugated children goes into most every new cellphone on the planet through rare elements like Coltan. In a fair-trade system, we'd pay an adequate amount for those cellphones, and the manufacturers of those cellphones would pay an adequate amount to those who gather the resources to assemble them. In our capitalist system, we pay ridiculously low prices for products which can be set at such prices exclusively because of the lack of fairness along the chain of production.
Capitalism NEEDS government regulation to work to the benefit of all.
I'd agree with that. The problem as I see it being global corporations quite apparently can't be sufficiently regulated by Governments anymore. The corporations in many cases have far more influence over Governments than Governments do over corporations, which is a situation bound for tragedy so far as I'm concerned.
Did you know that folks line up to work at Foxcon? That their wages there are a lot more than they would get at home? That the work is easier?
http://www.zdnet.com/cn/foxconn-rel...-after-suicide-specter-resurfaces-7000014748/
http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-505124_162-57520067/riots-suicides-and-more-in-foxconn-factories/
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/wor...st-at-Apple-manufacturer-Foxconn-factory.html
Around 150 Chinese workers at Foxconn, the world's largest electronics manufacturer, threatened to commit suicide by leaping from their factory roof in protest at their working conditions.
"We were put to work without any training, and paid piecemeal," said one of the protesting workers, who asked not to be named. "The assembly line ran very fast and after just one morning we all had blisters and the skin on our hand was black. The factory was also really choked with dust and no one could bear it," he said.

What a wonderful place of employment, that threatening suicide en-mass is the only thing employees can think of in order to improve working conditions.

What is happening in Bangladesh is horrible, and there is no excuse for it, however, living on a farm there is also very risky.
I'm not sure I see why this is pertinent.
 
I still want you to offer a 'better way' than capitalism.

The problem is Cairenn, we do not have capitalism... we have corporatism, where the cabal of global corporations and banksters are engaged in the rape of the world. They have fought for and obtained deregulation and are now immune to prosecution and above the law. They are intent on 'making profit at any cost'. It is enshrined in Company Law and if they do not act in the 'best interests of the company', then they are in breach of company law.

The problem there is the lack of regulation by the government. Capitalism NEEDS government regulation to work to the benefit of all. One of the problems with government ownership of business is that NO ONE is guarding the hen house.

Exactly, naked capitalism is all about making profit and there is no social regard. Once these corporations become so large that they have GDP's eqivalent to nations, competition (which is the natural regulator of capitalism), goes out of the window.
 
It is always interesting to place something like the Foxcon suicide rates in context.

he suicide rate at Foxconn during the suicide spate remained lower than that of the general Chinese population[8] as well as all 50 states in the United States.[9] Additionally the Foxconn deaths may have been a product of economic conditions external to the company. In China in 2010 there were several major strike actions at other high-profile manufacturers in China, and the Lewisian turning-point is a macro-economic factor that may provide context for the events
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I have a question for you, Where does that profit go?

I have a theory, I have never had time to confirm it, that the movement of folks retirement funds into IRAs (and thus the stock market) has had negative effects on business. I think it has pushed companies to maximize short term profits over longer term, more beneficial goals. Henry Ford was a capitalist, but he felt that he needed to pay his employees enough that they could buy the cars they made.

I forecast, (I am no expert here), that we are about to see that start to happen in China. China is wanting to increase their internal consumption, so wages may increase to allow that. In fact, a lot of production is moving to lower wage countries such as Bangladesh, Viet Nam and others.
 







If there's a real conspiracy at work, it's this one, IMO
It's in plain sight, and it's no secret
Most people can't wrap their head around for technical reasons
In fact, only few experts are really capable to demonstrate it



Now, more on topic


 
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I have a question for you, Where does that profit go?
204643-jobs_forbes.jpg
Net-worth of roughly 10 billion dollars.

coltan.jpg
Net worth of 0. And yet without the backbreaking work of this kid and countless kids just like him, Apple's business model would be entirely impossible to maintain. Fair deal? Mutual benefit? I don't see it.
 
204643-jobs_forbes.jpg
Net-worth of roughly 10 billion dollars.

coltan.jpg
Net worth of 0. And yet without the backbreaking work of this kid and countless kids just like him, Apple's business model would be entirely impossible to maintain. Fair deal? Mutual benefit? I don't see it.

Coltan mining:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/sustainable-business/blog/congo-child-labour-mobile-minerals

In unsafe mines deep underground in eastern Congo, children are working to extract minerals essential for the electronics industry. The profits from the minerals finance the bloodiest conflict since the second world war; the war has lasted nearly 20 years and has recently flared up again.

In that same 20-year period, the concept of corporate social responsibility in the west has evolved from companies giving employees a gym and having some photo opportunities for the chief executive, to addressing human rights throughout the supply chain, yet ICT companies such as Nokia, Samsung, HTC and Apple still cannot guarantee there will be no child labour used in the manufacturing of their products. There is now an increased focus on the supply chain as a crucial element if a company wants to call itself socially responsible.



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Most transactions which take place on the planet today no longer involve two parties.

I don't agree. It took a series of transactions to get to your iphone. Between employer and employee. between company and parts supplier. between distribution and transportation etc...all mutually beneficial transactions.

You whinge about the dreaded Foxcon throwing around the words "slavery" and "subjugation" as if you know and yet those employees agreed to the wages and conditions prior to taking the job. It was perceived as mutually beneficial. That their perception changed is not a fault of capitalism. Abuse of labor is not mutually exclusive to capitalism. ...and yet, the employees were far from subjugated slaves- thats just biased inflammatory rhetoric for histrionics:

...and you are imposing your bias on them- telling them how miserable they are, how they are enslaved and subjugated when the majority of them do NOT feel the same as you.

http://www.fairlabor.org/sites/default/files/documents/reports/foxconn_investigation_report.pdf

a survey of 30,000 Foxconn employees said:

When asked in the survey how they feel about
working hours, 48% thought that their working hours
were reasonable, and another 33.8% stated that they
would like to work more hours and make more money.
17.7% of the respondents felt that they worked too
much.
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What would they have done if there was no Foxconn? Would the alternative be any better? Clearly they left the village for a reason.


As for externalities-- actually bhopal was a "negative" externality (there are positive ones too). Its a fancy name for "shit happens"- Industrial accidents are not mutually exclusive to capitalism.



Really? On what are you basing that? Many Nomadic cultures seemed to have resource management all figured out more or less, creating entirely sustainable societies.

Based on the greatest number of people to own and accumulate those scarce resources. Market driven ideas have been a catalyst for an absolutely unprecedented development of society.

A legal predilection for the service of needs rather than of greed would be a great place to start in my mind. At the moment corporate entities are legally obliged to act in self-interest alone. A global council randomly selected from intelligent citizens of any class applying legally binding moral oversight to modern corporate structures would be a really good start so far as I'm concerned. If regular citizens informed and intelligent enough to comprehend the issues presented them were able to inflict enforceable and considerable penalties on corporate structures who's actions directly result in violations of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, I think corporations would quickly, some of them even happily reign in their callous activities.

The desire to "make a profit" is not simply a manifestation of "greed"- but a necessity. If you cannot capture "rent" as economists put it- your business will cease to exist. Its a fundamental point. You will not be able to hire more workers, invest in equipment, offset inflation...and if you are public- reward your shareholders. If your company closes everybody loses.

You do not need layer of bureaucratic "councils" to morally dictate what companies is right and wrong. Capitalism is merely a reflection of the society in which it operates- if society wants companies to act a certain way they can force companies through owning shares, creating the proper costs to guide behavior, regulation etc.



Capitalism is an imperfect system. It is only as good as the human input allows. Humans are flawed.

Not every corporation is "evil" simply because it is engaged in capitalism:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/sustainable-business/blog/patagonia-campaign-responsible-capitalism
 
I forecast, (I am no expert here), that we are about to see that start to happen in China. China is wanting to increase their internal consumption, so wages may increase to allow that. In fact, a lot of production is moving to lower wage countries such as Bangladesh, Viet Nam and others.

Thats exactly right....why is that?

Because as people become more well off they have the wherewithal to actually start to demand a better set of circumstances. If you are completely focused on mere subsistence you cannot afford the luxury of demanding better wages or better environmental conditions. As more people in China become more wealthy they will (and have) start demanding more rights across the board. The rise of China's middle class- even in their bastardized attempt at capitalism- is astounding.
 
Thats exactly right....why is that?

Because as people become more well off they have the wherewithal to actually start to demand a better set of circumstances. If you are completely focused on mere subsistence you cannot afford the luxury of demanding better wages or better environmental conditions. As more people in China become more wealthy they will (and have) start demanding more rights across the board. The rise of China's middle class- even in their bastardized attempt at capitalism- is astounding.

You keep using the word capitalism... it is not... it is corporatism and they are psychopaths who care not one jot for anyone but themselves.

You whinge about the dreaded Foxcon throwing around the words "slavery" and "subjugation" as if you know and yet those employees agreed to the wages and conditions prior to taking the job

Like those well cared for pyramid builders were not slaves either... guess it depends on your definition of what a slave is.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2012/apr/23/bad-apple-employ-more-us-workers
Last year, Apple built up cash reserves of $100bn – more than the US government. Indeed, it was so much money that the company was stumped how to dispose of it. Tim Cook, who is now CEO of Apple, announced a few weeks ago that he would begin buying back shares and paying dividends to investors. Among other people who benefited from this arrangement was Cook himself, who was awarded $376.3m in Apple stock when he took over last year. That pile of shares is now valued at around $634m. The people who win from the made-in-China model are big investors and top executives.In the case of Apple, outsourcing manufacturing is not about keeping costs to customers down – they are still paying huge prices for the latest handset or tablet computer. Nor is it about the company's survival: it would still do tremendously well were it to bring those factories back home. No, in the case of Apple, moving jobs offshore has become a way of directing ever more money to those at the top of American society.

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You keep using the word capitalism... it is not... it is corporatism and they are psychopaths who care not one jot for anyone but themselves.


Like those well cared for pyramid builders were not slaves either... guess it depends on your definition of what a slave is.

Nice Oxy- way ruin the conversation with irrational ranting.


I guess you missed the article Mick posted yesterday on the pyramid builders:

http://science.nbcnews.com/_news/201...lite=obnetwork
 
We can look back on factory conditions in the US of 80-100+ years ago. I forecast some major changes in Bangladesh coming.

The rise of the internet and cell phones is going to shorten the period of 'exploitation' a lot.

I have a feeling that we are going to see a rise of more small artisan type businesses in the US. If I was advising folks that is what I would encourage. Look at the rise of craft breweries and artisanal food prodcuts, from bread to cheese to meats. Ten years ago, it was rare to find a soapmaker at a show, now there are usually 3 or more. (I notice that because of an allergy to coconut oil products. I have to buy handmade soaps that do not have them).
 
No, in the case of Apple, moving jobs offshore has become a way of directing ever more money to those at the top of American society.

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...and apparently to their Chinese partners and their employees....

What would all those Foxconn employees do if Apple decided to bring all their manufacturing in-house in the US?


Own any Apple shares Oxy?
 
as a part of that community(both food and craft), i just gotta point out, the hilarious osha violating amounts of toxic/mutagenic/carcinogenic 'natural' oils people put in their soaps/candles/etc at huge concentration with no idea what they are working with, then pass it off as a healthy natural product... not sure if it makes me smile or cry.
 
Industrial accidents are not mutually exclusive to capitalism.
Modern-day capitalism in the form that it's taking creates an environment where corporations, in spite of having all the legal rights of a person, freely evade almost all responsibility for their actions in a way a person never could. Bhopal was a catastrophe of truly staggering proportions, one that continues to heavily impede the lives of thousands, if not millions. To call it an 'externality' would be a gross misnomer if the term itself wasn't all about unaccountably. Bhopal wasn't just an 'accident'. It was the direct result of the negligence of Union Carbide. Leaks and accidents had been occurring quite frequently in the build-up to the major disaster, many workers were poisoned or killed, both Indian and American authorities warned Union Carbide of the potential for a major catastrophe, and nothing of significance was done by them. In any other situation, that would be criminally negligent manslaughter/homicide, and on a massive scale, resulting in the severest charges. Union Carbide got away with a settlement of 470 million dollars. India had asked for 3 billion. Neither comes remotely close to covering the health/clean-up costs. Just another externality though. As you said, shit happens, right?
The death of one man is a tragedy, the death of millions is a statistic. - Joseph Stalin
if society wants companies to act a certain way they can force companies through owning shares,
Again, people should just 'vote with their dollars', as if everyone's got them.

Capitalism is an imperfect system.
No. Capitalism is just an idea around which a highly twisted system is being built.

[Capitalism is]"..the astonishing belief that the nastiest motives of the nastiest men somehow or other work for the best results in the best of all possible worlds.” -John Maynard Keynes
 
Nice Oxy- way ruin the conversation with irrational ranting.


I guess you missed the article Mick posted yesterday on the pyramid builders:

http://science.nbcnews.com/_news/201...lite=obnetwork

No, how is that ruining anything... I was simply interested in your definition of slavery and how it relates to the treatment of the people by global corporations who profiteer from it.

I have already seen Mick's post... I think it could easily be related to modern day slavery like Coltan mining or Foxconn. Interesting though that Apple are finally bringing some manufacturing jobs back to the U.S, I suggest due to people kicking up the dust about their profiteering... much like Starbucks finally paying tax in U.K due to public pressure.

I am all for making healthy profits... just not profiteering at an obscene level at the expense of people who are unfortunate enough to have to work like slaves or die of starvation. Spread it around a bit... some in China and in U.S or even elsewhere. Cairenn's quote from Ford about his workers being able to afford his cars was very good IMO.
 
The melt down at Fukushima was of 3 reactors and yet there was less radiation released.
You realize the situation in Fukushima is ongoing, right? That though they have the reactors 'under control' in the sense that a massive radioactive plume of instant death isn't immediately pending, they're still having to dump massive amounts of water into them, much of that water is still finding its way out into the Ocean, and TEPCO is struggling desperately to find storage space for the millions upon millions of liters of highly radioactive water the process is producing? That severe, crisis-level leaks are occurring at this very moment? The fallout of Fukushima remains inestimable, as the event is not yet under control.

That was because they were built by business with government oversight (they should have been build differently).
Tepco, the corporation in question, had a lush history of lying to officials about their safety records in the build up to the Fukushima incident, and have lied frequently in regard to all sorts of aspects of their management of the crisis. We really have no solid idea yet of just how bad Fukushima was, and is going to be. We've only got the word of a company known for lies and the word of a government known for concealment to really go on. A lot of independent experts are suggesting Fukushima could be much worse than Chernobyl in the long run.
 
Just another externality though. As you said, shit happens, right? .

It does. Accidents suck. Its not capitalism's fault that accidents happen.

The accountability has more to due to with civil society than capitalism.

If it was a state-owned factory/company do you think the accountability would have been any different?
 
You realize the situation in Fukushima is ongoing, right? That though they have the reactors 'under control' in the sense that a massive radioactive plume of instant death isn't immediately pending, they're still having to dump massive amounts of water into them, much of that water is still finding its way out into the Ocean, and TEPCO is struggling desperately to find storage space for the millions upon millions of liters of highly radioactive water the process is producing? That severe, crisis-level leaks are occurring at this very moment? The fallout of Fukushima remains inestimable, as the event is not yet under control.

Tepco, the corporation in question, had a lush history of lying to officials about their safety records in the build up to the Fukushima incident, and have lied frequently in regard to all sorts of aspects of their management of the crisis. We really have no solid idea yet of just how bad Fukushima was, and is going to be. We've only got the word of a company known for lies and the word of a government known for concealment to really go on. A lot of independent experts are suggesting Fukushima could be much worse than Chernobyl in the long run.

Not only that... but what genius decides to build a nuclear reactor on a fault line...:confused:
 
No, how is that ruining anything... I was simply interested in your definition of slavery and how it relates to the treatment of the people by global corporations who profiteer from it..

you ruined it by your nonsensical insults and ranting.
 
It does. Accidents suck. Its not capitalism's fault that accidents happen.

The accountability has more to due to with civil society than capitalism.

It it was a state-owned factory/company do you think the accountability would have been any different?

Or do you think if Union Carbide conducted itself like that in the U.S, it would have escaped so lightly?
 
The melt down at Fukishima was of 3 reactors and yet there was less radiation released. That was because they were built by business with government oversight (they should have been build differently)

http://fukushima-diary.com/2012/08/8560000-bqm2-in-fukushima-3-times-worse-than-chernobyl/
According to the report of Forestry Agency, Fukushima ground contamination is up to 3 times worse than Chernobyl.
Not to mention that Fukushima is still leaking btw, in the ocean...

http://www.washingtonsblog.com/2013...or-is-the-the-reactor-wholly-uncontained.html


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_nuclear_reactors#Japan
More than 50 nuclear reactors...
On an Island...Near a seismic fault...
It doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure how dangerous this is
 
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not at all...again, that is more about civil society than economic system.

Or maybe it is about criminal negligence re safety to get extra profits because they know they can get away with it if it all goes wrong.

http://www.theecologist.org/News/news_analysis/268581/somalia_used_as_toxic_dumping_ground.html

[h=2]Pirates ruled Somalia’s waves last year, but a greater crime is still being perpetrated by the multinational companies using the mainland as a toxic dumping ground. Chris Milton reports[/h] The pirates of Somalia became bandits of international notoriety during 2008, hijacking ever more prolific targets, including arms ships, oil tankers and cruise liners, and extracting huge ransoms from their owners.
National governments and NGOs decried their actions as an affront to international maritime law, but few examined the pirates’ claim that a far greater crime continues in Somalia: the illegal dumping of toxic waste.

For more than 10 years, environmental and human rights organisations have called on the international community to act to stop this dumping, but successive wars have ensured the crisis has only deepened. Now, as Ethiopian troops withdraw from Somalia and the piracy becomes more subdued, there is hope the issue can be properly investigated and resolved.


It also prompted a large investigation in Italy, a former colonial power in Somalia. This concluded that around 35 million tonnes of waste had been exported to Somalia for only $6.6 billion, leading the environmental group Legambiente to assert Somalia’s inland waste dumps are ‘among the largest in the world’.
The Boxing Day tsunami of 2004 served to reinvigorate interest in the continued dumping of hazardous waste in Somalia. Rusting tanks of unidentifiable ooze were washed up on to beaches; villagers began to die of unexplained illnesses and coastal ecosystems collapsed.


Content from External Source
 
http://fukushima-diary.com/2012/08/8560000-bqm2-in-fukushima-3-times-worse-than-chernobyl/
According to the report of Forestry Agency, Fukushima ground contamination is up to 3 times worse than Chernobyl.
Not to mention that Fukushima is still leaking btw, in the ocean...

I thought I should point this out, but there is some problems with scales in this link.

In Namiemachi Futabagun, they measured 8,560,000 Bq/m2 of Cs-134/137. (litter interception and soil) The sample was taken on 10/25/2011. It’s about 9km from Fukushima plant.
Date : 10/25/2011
Location : Namiemachi Futabagun Fukushima
Cs-134 : 3,970,000 Bq/m2
Cs-137 : 4,590,000 Bq/m2
Total : 8,560,000 Bq/m2
Atmospheric dose : 43.00 μSv/h
In Belarus, the place where is more contaminated than 1,480,000Bq/Kg (cesium137) was defined as mandatory evacuation area.
Content from External Source
A Bq/Kg does not equal Bq/m2. Are you telling me a square meter of earth weights approximately 1 kilogram? That is laughable. Since the author of this blog cannot see the difference, once can easily discredit anything said there quickly. Doses in Belarus/Ukraine are far far higher than in any area of Japan in the exclusion zones.
 
I thought I should point this out, but there is some problems with scales in this link.

In Namiemachi Futabagun, they measured 8,560,000 Bq/m2 of Cs-134/137. (litter interception and soil) The sample was taken on 10/25/2011. It’s about 9km from Fukushima plant.
Date : 10/25/2011
Location : Namiemachi Futabagun Fukushima
Cs-134 : 3,970,000 Bq/m2
Cs-137 : 4,590,000 Bq/m2
Total : 8,560,000 Bq/m2
Atmospheric dose : 43.00 μSv/h
In Belarus, the place where is more contaminated than 1,480,000Bq/Kg (cesium137) was defined as mandatory evacuation area.
Content from External Source
A Bq/Kg does not equal Bq/m2. Are you telling me a square meter of earth weights approximately 1 kilogram? That is laughable. Since the author of this blog cannot see the difference, once can easily discredit anything said there quickly.

So you think Fukushima is not worse than Chernobyle or just that this article is not accurate enough?
 
So you think Fukushima is not worse than Chernobyle or just that this article is not accurate enough?

Absolutely. Chernobyl was magnitudes worse than Fukushima. I can go on and on about this in another thread if you like. But to put it clearly; my area has a radnet monitoring station. When I was speaking with the operator about Fukushima fallout in 2011; he noted that the concentrations that hit my home-town were on many orders of magnitude far less than chernobyl.

I could link you to dozens of well cited peer-reviewed publications that concur the same facts.

Fukushima was a small release compared to Chernobyl. This is old news. Are you suggesting that it is worse?
 
Absolutely. Chernobyl was magnitudes worse than Fukushima.

Fukushima was a small release compared to Chernobyl. This is old news. Are you suggesting that it is worse?
Again with the 100% false notion that the Fukushima crisis is somehow 'over'. We have no idea whether the effects are going to be worse than Chernobyl in the long run, especially considering the crisis has not yet been ended by any stretch of the imagination.
 
Absolutely. Chernobyl was magnitudes worse than Fukushima. I can go on and on about this in another thread if you like. But to put it clearly; my area has a radnet monitoring station. When I was speaking with the operator about Fukushima fallout in 2011; he noted that the concentrations that hit my home-town were on many orders of magnitude far less than chernobyl.

I could link you to dozens of well cited peer-reviewed publications that concur the same facts.

Fukushima was a small release compared to Chernobyl. This is old news. Are you suggesting that it is worse?

It is the largest nuclear disaster since the Chernobyl disaster of 1986 and only the second disaster (along with Chernobyl) to measure Level 7 on the International Nuclear Event Scale.[7]
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fukushima_Daiichi_nuclear_disaster

I'm suggesting that it is still leaking in the ocean not in a remote forest
But I'm no expert on nuclear disaster

Now I don't know what is the exact magnitude of the event, but I wouldn't imply that it is a minor disaster

Sure if you could expand on it in a new thread, that would be useful
Something like "fukushima facts"
Because there are tons of sources, some saying it was not that bad, and others discribing it as 10 times Chernobyle...
I know that conspiracy sites like infowars play on the Fukushima disaster like "west coast is full of radioctive fallout"



This picture for instance, pretty impressive, and spread everywhere
Looks like a sea monster
But how reliable it is ?
No idea
 
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Again with the 100% false notion that the Fukushima crisis is somehow 'over'.

I never said that, Mr. Strawman-my-position. Even so it has a long way to come before it hits a level on par. And you have to take into consideration the pathways for contamination spread and how the nucleides will respond when they integrate with the natural chemistry of the world. Its complicated to measure contamination as it spreads; so it's not a simple thing.
 
It is the largest nuclear disaster since the Chernobyl disaster of 1986 and only the second disaster (along with Chernobyl) to measure Level 7 on the International Nuclear Event Scale.[7]
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fukushima_Daiichi_nuclear_disaster

I'm suggesting that it is still leaking in the ocean not in a remote forest
But I'm no expert on nuclear disaster

I'm not arguing that its is not under control as far as releases go; but then again neither is Chernobyl. I mean, when the wind blows and fires start in that area; you have further spread of radionucleides.

Also, Chernobyl is not the worst nuclear accident ever either.

But when it comes to a highly complicated subject as nuclear physics, its easy to see why the public is so polarized and easily scared by fearmongers on youtube or enenews (or the like). So far we do not know the total source term of Fukushima, much study is needed to be done.
 
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