this post was submitted on 07 Apr 2025
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philosophy

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Other philosophy communities have only interpreted the world in various ways. The point, however, is to change it. [ x ]

"I thunk it so I dunk it." - Descartes

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Dark Mirror Ideologies (www.fortressofdoors.com)
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[–] BeamBrain@hexbear.net 4 points 2 weeks ago* (last edited 2 weeks ago)

Dark Marxists would accept everything Karl Marx says about the evolution of human society and the socio-economic forces at work (labor theory of value, surplus value, tendency of the rate of profit to fall, etc.). Dark Marxists would also accept that Capitalism is but one stage of social evolution along the inevitable path to Socialism and finally Communism, but also that the exploitation of workers at the hands of capital is good, actually. Therefore, Dark Marxists should dedicate themselves to holding back the irresistible march of history like Norse Gods striving in vain to delay the coming of Ragnarok.

Dark Capitalists would agree that free markets, capital formation, free trade, and light regulation foster economic dynamism, innovation, and competitive market forces that in turn drive economic growth, increased living standards, and technological progress, but also that economic growth, increased living standards, and technological progress are bad, actually. Therefore, Dark Capitalists should impede markets, discourage capital formation, restrict trade, and intentionally burden the economy with regulations. Dark Capitalists do this not because it will help workers or achieve a more equal society, but because it will hurt economic growth and make everyone poorer.

Lotta things wrong with this.

[CW: Colonial violence, slavery]

  1. No Marxist worth their salt claims that communism is inevitable. The possibilities are outlined by Rosa Luxemburg - "socialism or barbarism."
  2. We can reasonably infer that capital agrees that these are the alternatives because, when threatened with socialism, it does not hesitate for a moment to descend headlong into barbarism. Capital enabled the rise of the Nazis, Suharto, Syngman Rhee, Pinochet, the Contras, and countless other horrific fascists, who combined butchered millions in the name of preserving the reign of capital. Even today, as capital's endless need for growth threatens to destroy the biosphere by boiling the planet, it continues to violently suppress labor at every turn - and if it wins, its final reward is the annihilation of civilization and a dead Earth. None of this is speculation on my part. Fossil companies learned through their own studies more than half a century ago that global warming is real, and their response was to spend massive amounts of money telling people otherwise. What is this, if not "holding back the irresistible march of history like Norse Gods striving in vain to delay the coming of Ragnarok"?
  3. Communists have no intrinsic motivation to oppose increased living standards and technological progress, and in fact, socialism has a strong and consistent record of increasing one or both everywhere that it is implemented.
  4. There is ample, obvious evidence that capitalists consider the exploitation of workers to be a good thing - that being that they constantly do it and commit horrific crimes (see #2) to further enable doing it. They have a strong intrinsic motivation to do so - it's how they make their money. Capitalism made (and continues to make) enormous profits through colonialism and imperialism, using entire continents as sources of expendable slave labor. Britain destroyed India's industries and forced its workers to farm cash crops for exports while its people starved. Spain worked six million native South Americans to death in its silver mines. The phrase "Banana Republic" refers specifically to US puppet governments set up in Latin America to force them to export cheap fruit. The Transatlantic slave trade needs no elaboration. Even today, African child slaves mine cobalt and harvest cocoa at the behest of foreign corporations. If capitalists say that they don't consider exploiting workers a good thing, should we believe their words, or should we believe their actions?