I go to Bennington, so I see a lot of them: heck several of my friends are them.
The anti-globalization protesters can be divided into two catergories:
First, the stupid. These are the ones who are opposed to the idea of globalization in general.
Second, the smart but guilty by association. These guys aren't opposed to all globalization, they're opposed to the abuses of power that global cororations tend to do. However they are often surrounded by a lot of the stupid ones at all of those rallies.
The thing I don't get about corporations is this: How can a corporation be greedy if it isn't even a person? What's it going to gain? A faster car? A bigger house? Trophie wives (my personal favorite)?
He is one rat-bastard of a man, I must concur. Maybe the next set of presidential candidates will integrate "elimination of the man, and his dirty tactics" as part of their platform? Keep hope alive!
LOL. Reminds me of The Onion story about 'The Man' taking offense to allegations by the Black Panthers.'I'm not trying to 'keep them down' he says', etc.
I think the protesting of these sorts of events (Gx, WTO, etc) is to provide an alternative take on things. Like, if you left it up to AOL-Time-Warner-Turner and MSNBC et al to slag those in economic power, and their abuses of that power it's just never going to happen.
Myself, I view it as an extreme, and as such not markedly better or viable as 'Pro-third world labour' or 'Make a quick buck at the expense of others' points of view. But the two extremes create a moderate middle ground where sane people who have a concern for their fellow humans and the world they live in can coexist.Imagine if ALL you ever heard was right-wing bullshit? Or left wing bullshit? Imagine if all the post on this board echoed the sentiments of roger_rightwing? Or some peace-loving, rabbit-food eating, sandal wearing hippie? It would get tiresome pretty fast.But between those two extremes a middle emerges.
The two extremes balance each other out. Hearing differing, opposing points of view is a Good Thing (tm). Your awareness of the 'other side' of the issues has increased markedly since these full scale protests began.
The thing I don't get about corporations is this: How can a corporation be greedy if it isn't even a person? What's it going to gain? A faster car? A bigger house? Trophie wives (my personal favorite)?
The corporation isn't going to gain any of those things. It passes those gains through to the owners. The owners hire employees, like the CEO et. al., who also get to enjoy all that stuff.
In return, the owners and employees get shielded by the corporate form of ownership from all sorts of potential liabilities caused by corporate wrongdoing.
People disagree whether this sort of setup is good or bad or neutral.
I think it has both advantages and disadvantages compared to the alternatives, and that in general it works pretty well, but that it requires government regulation (to prevent externalities like pollution and slave labor markets) in order to work optimally.
When dealing with international trade, some folks think that doing business with countries that allow pollution and slave labor is generally bad, and specifically, bad for working folks worldwide.
Others think that we should take advantage of the great deals now available from slave labor working in factories that spew sulfur dioxide while also trying to get them to maybe someday improve things.
Others think we should invest heavily in industry in countries that allow slave labor and unabated pollution so that we can buy faster cars and bigger houses here at home.
I just don't get it. What exactly are they protesting?
Nothing. 'Protesting' is their fig leaf. They are just troublemakers. What they really want is to annoy as many people as they can and go berserk and destroy what taxpayers dearly paid for. For fun. Their fun.
I think these 'people' should be called to account for what they do. They should be identified, with cameras, and recorded doing the damage, and then hauled into court and made to pay for what they destroyed. Every last cent! And jailtime if appropriate. That will soon put and end to it.
If they are masked, doing their violence and damage, all bets are off, they will have forfeited the soft approach and then these corruptors of our society can, and should, be shot on sight.
There are plenty of articles out there you can read to learn alternative view points.
--
Bigger isn't better. Having a country like China / Taiwan manufacture goods in unbelievable quantities for mass consumption in countries like the US isn't good. Only the larger corporations with significant capital reserves can get into the game. This forces any kind of competition out the door. Local industries die out as they can't compete. The relatively poorer countries end up giving incentives to companies like FoxConn who exploit their labor in terms of living conditions, salaries, etc. For example: 12 hour mandatory overtime per week; several hundred thousand workers housed in dormitories in the factory complexes away from their families, military style punishment, etc. It is not just manufactured goods that play this game of volume & cost, it holds good for the services industry like information technology.
On the other side, the consumers tend to believe that goods & services are cheap (thanks to volume / artificial currency value manipulation). Local labour is hard to come by and expensive. Locally manufactured goods cannot compete on pricing with the bulk manufactured goods. Local industry on the consumer side dies out eventually as well. People start losing their jobs. Special interest groups lobby the governments for laws favorable for more of the same while screwing up the local economy.
At the end of the day, you have a corporate map of the world that determines where goods are made and where goods are consumed. There will be few conglomerates ruling the roost while the rest decay.
How exactly is this good? Self sustenance is necessary for a healthy economy.
--
Have a look at http://youtu.be/nLRQvK2-iqQ to get George Carlin's view on consumerism. You could read "The world is flat" by Thomas Friedman if you can get over your blind hatred for him. There are some actual figures (with references) in there that provide good insight.
Comments
<strong>I just don't get it. What exactly are they protesting?</strong><hr></blockquote>
Everybody needs something to bitch about!!
<img src="graemlins/lol.gif" border="0" alt="[Laughing]" />
The anti-globalization protesters can be divided into two catergories:
First, the stupid. These are the ones who are opposed to the idea of globalization in general.
Second, the smart but guilty by association. These guys aren't opposed to all globalization, they're opposed to the abuses of power that global cororations tend to do. However they are often surrounded by a lot of the stupid ones at all of those rallies.
The thing I don't get about corporations is this: How can a corporation be greedy if it isn't even a person? What's it going to gain? A faster car? A bigger house? Trophie wives (my personal favorite)?
I think the protesting of these sorts of events (Gx, WTO, etc) is to provide an alternative take on things. Like, if you left it up to AOL-Time-Warner-Turner and MSNBC et al to slag those in economic power, and their abuses of that power it's just never going to happen.
Myself, I view it as an extreme, and as such not markedly better or viable as 'Pro-third world labour' or 'Make a quick buck at the expense of others' points of view. But the two extremes create a moderate middle ground where sane people who have a concern for their fellow humans and the world they live in can coexist.Imagine if ALL you ever heard was right-wing bullshit? Or left wing bullshit? Imagine if all the post on this board echoed the sentiments of roger_rightwing? Or some peace-loving, rabbit-food eating, sandal wearing hippie? It would get tiresome pretty fast.But between those two extremes a middle emerges.
The two extremes balance each other out. Hearing differing, opposing points of view is a Good Thing (tm). Your awareness of the 'other side' of the issues has increased markedly since these full scale protests began.
[ 03-19-2002: Message edited by: stimuli ]</p>
The thing I don't get about corporations is this: How can a corporation be greedy if it isn't even a person? What's it going to gain? A faster car? A bigger house? Trophie wives (my personal favorite)?
The corporation isn't going to gain any of those things. It passes those gains through to the owners. The owners hire employees, like the CEO et. al., who also get to enjoy all that stuff.
In return, the owners and employees get shielded by the corporate form of ownership from all sorts of potential liabilities caused by corporate wrongdoing.
People disagree whether this sort of setup is good or bad or neutral.
I think it has both advantages and disadvantages compared to the alternatives, and that in general it works pretty well, but that it requires government regulation (to prevent externalities like pollution and slave labor markets) in order to work optimally.
When dealing with international trade, some folks think that doing business with countries that allow pollution and slave labor is generally bad, and specifically, bad for working folks worldwide.
Others think that we should take advantage of the great deals now available from slave labor working in factories that spew sulfur dioxide while also trying to get them to maybe someday improve things.
Others think we should invest heavily in industry in countries that allow slave labor and unabated pollution so that we can buy faster cars and bigger houses here at home.
I just don't get it. What exactly are they protesting?
Nothing. 'Protesting' is their fig leaf. They are just troublemakers. What they really want is to annoy as many people as they can and go berserk and destroy what taxpayers dearly paid for. For fun. Their fun.
I think these 'people' should be called to account for what they do. They should be identified, with cameras, and recorded doing the damage, and then hauled into court and made to pay for what they destroyed. Every last cent! And jailtime if appropriate. That will soon put and end to it.
If they are masked, doing their violence and damage, all bets are off, they will have forfeited the soft approach and then these corruptors of our society can, and should, be shot on sight.
--
Bigger isn't better. Having a country like China / Taiwan manufacture goods in unbelievable quantities for mass consumption in countries like the US isn't good. Only the larger corporations with significant capital reserves can get into the game. This forces any kind of competition out the door. Local industries die out as they can't compete. The relatively poorer countries end up giving incentives to companies like FoxConn who exploit their labor in terms of living conditions, salaries, etc. For example: 12 hour mandatory overtime per week; several hundred thousand workers housed in dormitories in the factory complexes away from their families, military style punishment, etc. It is not just manufactured goods that play this game of volume & cost, it holds good for the services industry like information technology.
On the other side, the consumers tend to believe that goods & services are cheap (thanks to volume / artificial currency value manipulation). Local labour is hard to come by and expensive. Locally manufactured goods cannot compete on pricing with the bulk manufactured goods. Local industry on the consumer side dies out eventually as well. People start losing their jobs. Special interest groups lobby the governments for laws favorable for more of the same while screwing up the local economy.
At the end of the day, you have a corporate map of the world that determines where goods are made and where goods are consumed. There will be few conglomerates ruling the roost while the rest decay.
How exactly is this good? Self sustenance is necessary for a healthy economy.
--
Have a look at http://youtu.be/nLRQvK2-iqQ to get George Carlin's view on consumerism. You could read "The world is flat" by Thomas Friedman if you can get over your blind hatred for him. There are some actual figures (with references) in there that provide good insight.