YouTube Remonetizes Steven Crowder

[Cordel One]

Capitalism is an economic mode of production under which a relative handful of individuals own the means of production and use them to accumulate wealth. As such, individuals who profit from environmentally damaging industries are incentivised to continue to damage the environment and to cover up the fact that they are damaging the environment.

That is not what capitalism is and you do not understand what capitalism means. Capitalism is, and I quote, "an economic and political system in which a country's trade and industry are controlled by private owners for profit, rather than by the state." Capitalism says nothing about a "relative handful of individuals" or whatever nonsense the left cooks up. The florist down the street is as much a capitalist as the Fortune 500 CEO.

Your premise is incorrect as well. As people become more aware of environmental harm and resources like oil begin to grow scarce, businesses will adapt to cater to more environmentally-conscious markets. They are only incentivised if it is profitable, and environmental exploitation isn't necessarily profitable.

It's profitable to cut corners for short-term benefit and exploit people for their labor, so that's what capitalists do.

Actually the worse polluters are the Chinese Communists.

Didn't you just admit the Chinese were state-capitalists? You really know nothing about leftism if you think the PRC is communist.

[-Ra-]

That is not what capitalism is and you do not understand what capitalism means. Capitalism is, and I quote, "an economic and political system in which a country's trade and industry are controlled by private owners for profit, rather than by the state." Capitalism says nothing about a "relative handful of individuals" or whatever nonsense the left cooks up. The florist down the street is as much a capitalist as the Fortune 500 CEO.

Your premise is incorrect as well. As people become more aware of environmental harm and resources like oil begin to grow scarce, businesses will adapt to cater to more environmentally-conscious markets. They are only incentivised if it is profitable, and environmental exploitation isn't necessarily profitable.

Didn't you just admit the Chinese were state-capitalists? You really know nothing about leftism if you thing the PRC is communist.

State capitalism is not capitalism, and China is communist in pretty much everything except finance and economics.

[Liriena]

Oh, another thing, -Ra-: trying to "own" a leftist by invoking the works of Adam Smith is a bit like trying to own an astronomer by invoking Ptolemy. Everyone has read Adam Smith in high school or in their earliest college classes. Chances are, any Marxist you come across will now the works of Adam Smith and other early economists, and probably better than you at that. Because Marxists, generally speaking, aren't willfully ignorant. They don't just read Marx and Marx alone and call it a day.

Most Marxists probably haven't read anything and just wear a shirt and get told what it means by a classmate.

Dude, please, stop bullshitting. Marxists are infamous within the left for being huge nerds whose whole thing is gatekeeping everyone else by demanding that everyone reads at least ten thousand pages of economic and social theory before you can join the conversation. I have never spoken to a Marxist who wasn't well-read to the point of being overwhelming and borderline insufferable.

[The Emerald Legion]

China isn't capitalist.

Then why do you get most of your consumer products manufactured there? Seems like a serious conflict of interest for western capitalism to rely so heavily on a rival economic system to supply for its own people's demands.

I totally agree that it is. Of course, it's cheaper to buy things from tyrants who work their people to death in sweatshops for little to no recompense.

[Liriena]

Then why do you get most of your consumer products manufactured there? Seems like a serious conflict of interest for western capitalism to rely so heavily on a rival economic system to supply for its own people's demands.

China is more reliant on the US than the US ever is on China lol.

That doesn't address my point.

You are embarrassingly bad at this.

[Des-Bal]

Several states have anti-"ethnic intimidation" laws. However, I believe I may have been overextending the law a bit in my analysis. The most strict of these don't seem to cover what Crowder did, and I don't think it should. He didn't burn a cross or anything. He insulted Maza, who then got mad and threatened YT to punish Crowder for it.

So, if I may revise my above statement slightly, I think Crowder was an ass. I still keep my point that certain aspects of hate speech constitute criminal incitements to violence against a group.

Crowder, however, was not committing a criminal act, and his speech does not qualify as that sort of speech that would legally be called hate speech.

For a quick summary, if you're interested, I was using this wikipedia page. There are certain instances in several states in the US where hate speech is not protected. These are broadly called "Intimidating Speech Exceptions".

There are no states in the US where hate speech is not protected. Hate speech is protected by the constitution, when a state makes a law that violates the constitution that law is invalid and if challenged will be struck down. The "ethnic intimidation laws" you're talking about deal with violence and the threat of violence and fall within well established exceptions. They are NOT hate speech laws.

"I will break your neck" is not protected speech.
"I will break your neck because you are black" is not protected speech but the fact that it's racist is irrelevant to that determination.

Statutes have the power to determine whether or not one or both are illegal and if one should be punished more harshly than the other.

[Necroghastia]

tfw the people who want equal rights for minorities and don't think that an insanely small fraction of the populace should hoard the vast majority of the world's wealth are the selfish ones

The left doesn't want equal rights for minorities. This is just a front. The left just wants social control.

Put your money where your mouth is for once and prove it.

As for your last point, Churchill once said that the inherent vice of capitalism is that it distributes benefits unequally. The inherent virtue of socialism is that it distributes miseries equally. Equality matters for shit if everyone is equally poor off.

Churchill was an asshat, do you think I or anyone should care about a random quote from him?

There are people in this world that realise that wealth inequality is inevitable and in some cases is good. Those people seek to improve the material conditions of all people in society and recognise that a rising tide lifts all boats. Then there are people who are selfish and feel entitled to money or property which is not theirs. These people should grow up.

Oh god, you're one of those people that still believes in trickle down? Come on, at least try to think these things through.

[-Ra-]

What does a CEO do that "earns" an order of magnitude more money than the people who are the boots on the ground?

Because it's about experience and risk. Any slob can work in an Amazon factory, but it takes a special kind of skill to be a titan of industry like Jeff Bezos. This is why Jeff Bezos is much better compensated than the average slob. This is also why surgeons are paid more than slobs working in Target, because a surgeon requires much more training and much more skill.

[The Emerald Legion]

Most Marxists probably haven't read anything and just wear a shirt and get told what it means by a classmate.

Dude, please, stop bullshitting. Marxists are infamous within the left for being huge nerds whose whole thing is gatekeeping everyone else by demanding that everyone reads at least ten thousand pages of economic and social theory before you can join the conversation. I have never spoken to a Marxist who wasn't well-read to the point of being overwhelming and borderline insufferable.

Funny. Most of the ones I meet are idiot teenagers. Then again I live in redneck swampland.

[Cordel One]

Didn't you just admit the Chinese were state-capitalists? You really know nothing about leftism if you thing the PRC is communist.

State capitalism is not capitalism, and China is communist in pretty much everything except finance and economics.

...except for the authoritarian state, the capitalist system, the wealth gap, the lack of control by workers, the- oh wait that contradicts every part of the communist ideology.

[The Emerald Legion]

State capitalism is not capitalism, and China is communist in pretty much everything except finance and economics.

...except for the authoritarian state, the capitalist system, the wealth gap, the lack of control by workers, the- oh wait that contradicts every part of the communist ideology.

You mean the things that have defined every communist group to last more than a week on the world stage?

[-Ra-]

China is more reliant on the US than the US ever is on China lol.

That doesn't address my point.

You are embarrassingly bad at this.

It seems like the free market country is much less reliant on the communist country than the other way around...

I wonder why that is?

[Liriena]

Then why do you get most of your consumer products manufactured there? Seems like a serious conflict of interest for western capitalism to rely so heavily on a rival economic system to supply for its own people's demands.

I totally agree that it is. Of course, it's cheaper to buy things from tyrants who work their people to death in sweatshops for little to no recompense.

Geesh, it sounds like your favourite economic system has some sort of inherent incentive to seek out the lowest labour costs possible, regardless of the ethics of it.

[Cordel One]

What does a CEO do that "earns" an order of magnitude more money than the people who are the boots on the ground?

Because it's about experience and risk. Any slob can work in an Amazon factory, but it takes a special kind of skill to be a titan of industry like Jeff Bezos. This is why Jeff Bezos is much better compensated than the average slob. This is also why surgeons are paid more than slobs working in Target, because a surgeon requires much more training and much more skill.

It takes luck and parasitism, not skill.

[-Ra-]

State capitalism is not capitalism, and China is communist in pretty much everything except finance and economics.

...except for the authoritarian state, the capitalist system, the wealth gap, the lack of control by workers, the- oh wait that contradicts every part of the communist ideology.

State capitalism isn't a capitalist system. In China, it has more in common with Marxian economics than free market capitalism.

But you can believe whatever you'd like.

[Liriena]

Dude, please, stop bullshitting. Marxists are infamous within the left for being huge nerds whose whole thing is gatekeeping everyone else by demanding that everyone reads at least ten thousand pages of economic and social theory before you can join the conversation. I have never spoken to a Marxist who wasn't well-read to the point of being overwhelming and borderline insufferable.

Funny. Most of the ones I meet are idiot teenagers.

I'm gonna say the b-word

[Liriena]

That doesn't address my point.

You are embarrassingly bad at this.

It seems like the free market country is much less reliant on the communist country than the other way around...

I wonder why that is?

That doesn't address my point.

[-Ra-]

Because it's about experience and risk. Any slob can work in an Amazon factory, but it takes a special kind of skill to be a titan of industry like Jeff Bezos. This is why Jeff Bezos is much better compensated than the average slob. This is also why surgeons are paid more than slobs working in Target, because a surgeon requires much more training and much more skill.

It takes luck and parasitism, not skill.

Amazon is as successful as it is because of Bezos's leadership, and Amazon is a net benefit to society that provides goods cheaply, quickly and efficiently. I'll wait for you to start a Fortune 500 company or study for twelve years to become a surgeon.

But obviously you're not incentivised to do anything of substance with your life, so what's the point?

[-Ra-]

It seems like the free market country is much less reliant on the communist country than the other way around...

I wonder why that is?

That doesn't address my point.

You don't have a point.

[Outer Acharet]

Several states have anti-"ethnic intimidation" laws. However, I believe I may have been overextending the law a bit in my analysis. The most strict of these don't seem to cover what Crowder did, and I don't think it should. He didn't burn a cross or anything. He insulted Maza, who then got mad and threatened YT to punish Crowder for it.

So, if I may revise my above statement slightly, I think Crowder was an ass. I still keep my point that certain aspects of hate speech constitute criminal incitements to violence against a group.

Crowder, however, was not committing a criminal act, and his speech does not qualify as that sort of speech that would legally be called hate speech.

For a quick summary, if you're interested, I was using this wikipedia page. There are certain instances in several states in the US where hate speech is not protected. These are broadly called "Intimidating Speech Exceptions".

There are no states in the US where hate speech is not protected. Hate speech is protected by the constitution, when a state makes a law that violates the constitution that law is invalid and if challenged will be struck down. The "ethnic intimidation laws" you're talking about deal with violence and the threat of violence and fall within well established exceptions. They are NOT hate speech laws.

"I will break your neck" is not protected speech.
"I will break your neck because you are black" is not protected speech but the fact that it's racist is irrelevant to that determination.

Statutes have the power to determine whether or not one or both are illegal and if one should be punished more harshly than the other.

Aight, makes sense to me

EDIT: I do think that those "ethnic intimidation" things still are criminalizing an extreme form of hate speech. I mean, I can say "I really, really fucking hate black people", and it's hate speech, but not criminal by these states' laws. I can say "I wanna go lynch a black dude because he's black" and these laws criminalize both the aspect of that that is an incitement to violence and the aspect of it that is racially motivated. That's the "ethnic intimidation" thing, if I read it correctly.

And in practice we have these states enforcing these laws to criminalize things like driving over a BLM mural as "ethnic intimidation" so it seems to me they're de facto criminalizing hate speech.

[Liriena]

You assume people are one dimensional and uninformed because the thought that people who disagree with your ideas might be smarter than you is scary. You understand on some level that your beliefs are indefensible, it's why your approach to free speech is defined by fear.

Nah

[Liriena]

That doesn't address my point.

You don't have a point.

That doesn't address my point.

[Liriena]

Capitalism is an economic mode of production. Capitalism has nothing to do with environmentalism. Do you think people would be more environmentally conscious if we were under communism? Do I have to remind you that the world’s greatest polluters are the Chinese Communists? What does a system where individual people have a freedom to spend money as they please have to do with the state of the environment, whose major polluters are illiberal states like China?

You just don’t know what capitalism is. As more people become environmentally concious, the markets will respond to that demand. See Tesla, for instance.

Capitalism is an economic mode of production under which a relative handful of individuals own the means of production and use them to accumulate wealth. As such, individuals who profit from environmentally damaging industries are incentivised to continue to damage the environment and to cover up the fact that they are damaging the environment.

---

What is the point here? Free trade between China and the West has greatly boosted net incomes in China and resulted in a market boom the likes of which has never been seen. If you are trying to suggest that Western countries are to blame for pollution in China, then you would be dead wrong, as China's greatest polluters are Chinese-government owned industries.


This is false. The upper echelons of the Communist Party have realised, correctly, the communist and Marxian economics is utter hogwash and have since abandoned it in favour of state capitalism. State capitalism is not capitalism, however, as capitalism posits that the means of production should be owned by private individuals. Since the state is not a private individual, state-corporate ownership is not capitalism.

Nevertheless, China is still built on socialist and communist principles, and although they have abandoned much of Marxian economics, there is still strong state planning which oppresses economic and therefore social freedom.

It should probably tell you something about the efficacy of communism if every attempt to implement it has resulted in state capitalism.

"ACKSHUALLY the worse polluters are the Chinese communists capitalists"

Way to kick your own argument in the face, chief.

You can tell -Ra- realizes how much he fucked up here, because now he's devolved into irrelevant answers to tangential minutiae.

[-Ra-]

You don't have a point.

That doesn't address my point.

You don't have a point.

[Liriena]

That doesn't address my point.

You don't have a point.

Except I do, but you've been ignoring for a while now.

You undermined your own original argument.

Thereby contradicting your original claim that China is communist.

Des-Bal accidentally fucked you over.

But what's even better is that you've repeatedly undermined the very foundations of your argument: if you were trying to argue that there is no relationship between capitalism and environmental problems because capitalism is just a mode of production (and I'm going to spare you an explanation of what's wrong with the way in which you interpret what that means), your decision to point the finger at China as a "communist" counter-example undermines your starting premise. After all, communism is just another mode of production. And now, by your own admission, it's not even communist to begin with, but state capitalist.

Your argument is riddled with contradictions. It's an omnishambles of illogic.

By your own original logic, it doesn't matter what China is economically. Your argument doesn't depend on that. Your choice to litigate the Chinese mode of production is just pointless pedantry which undermines the credibility of your entire argumentation.