} stupididy. Most people don't really know how to take care of themselves
} competantly. They haven't figured out how to secure a reliable food source
} very well. They haven't figured out how to shelter themselves very well, and
Most people weren't that bad at reliable food sources. There's two
versions of the "starvation vs. sweatshops" scenario. One is where
peasants move from successful farms -- e.g. doing as well as they had
been before, obviously not starving or there wouldn't be any people
there -- into the factories because they want the higher wages. I
ignore socialist arguments there.
But the other case is where they do have to choose between real
starvation and working, because they've been kicked off their land.
Lots of reasons and causes for that; one of the more egregious is when
the national government, with World Bank/IMF encouragement, builds a
dam. Lots of people get screwed then, and they don't often get real
benefit from the dam. [Source Thayer Scudder, Caltech's anthropology
prof and allegedly one of the world experts on the effect of large dams
on native peoples.] This is hardly a morally clear situation.
More ambiguous is when the land is still there, but because of Western
medical intervention there are more children, and the land can't feed
them all.
I'm not advocating socialism, or blanket non-interference, but I would
feel more comfortable if those who seem to be the righteous moral
defenders of capitalism would acknowledge these darkly grey areas. And
just because it's usually the post-colonial government wielding the
actual guns doesn't convince me that some multinationals wouldn't do so
if they could or had to. (British East India Company?)
} If you really want to help the poor, educate them. Private property is a
} fiction, used by the University of Capitalism to help develop responsibility
} in its students. The students must learn how to manage their own property.
The students Might learn more quickly if they had been left their
original private property in the first place.. "Do as I say, not as I
did."
Merry part,
-xx- Damien R. Sullivan X-) <*> http://www.ugcs.caltech.edu/~phoenix
She became a nun, a nun all dressed in white,
And he became a canted priest and prayed for her by night.