Capitalism: The Boogeyman of Leftism
Karaçam
Introduction
This paper is about a myth, a boogeyman that has been concocted by leftists1 around the concept of “capitalism”.2 This myth veils the real reason (modern technology) for the problems that we face today (the destruction of Nature; the misery of modern life; the great dangers looming over us such as artificial intelligence, biotechnology, nuclear weapons, etc.). This boogeyman, by masking the real reason that creates (or at least aggravates) these problems, prevents us from seeing the real culprit and from contemplating an adequate solution to our modern predicaments. We will try to show that “capitalism” is only a result or another consequence of technological development. Focusing on “capitalism” and portraying it as the main culprit obfuscate the deeper inherent problems our technological society has –and will continue to have– regardless of its economic system.
During our discussion, we will compare “capitalism” and “socialism.”3 We should emphasize that, while doing this, we don’t say that one is better than the other. To our value system, both of these economic systems are bad. They appeared as alternative economic systems for the incipient industrial societies from the 17th and 18th centuries. Since we regard wild Nature as the most valuable thing and the techno-industrial society is the greatest danger wild Nature faces, it should be obvious that we see both “capitalism” and “socialism” as abhorrent. We only analyze these two systems to show whether focusing on attacking “capitalism” to protect wild Nature is a good strategy or not, whether the root cause of the problem is “capitalism” or not, and whether we really have a choice between “capitalism” and an alternative economic system given the continued existence of the technological system.
According to leftists, “capitalism” is responsible for all the evil things in the world: all the injustices, poverty, wars, destruction of the environment, the unhappiness of people, COVID-19, etc, etc. However, leftists hardly ever clearly define what “capitalism” is. We can only somewhat discern what they mean by it by all the “vile” things they attribute to it: They most frequently complain about the profit motive. Because the corporations operate in a “free market” with the sole purpose of making profits, they don’t care about the welfare, health, or happiness of the people; they don’t care about the inequalities, injustices, exploitation, and destruction of the environment that their profit-oriented activities inevitably bring. For this reason, according to leftists, capitalism cannot solve the problems that humanity faces. They also complain about the hierarchical nature of capitalism. Leftists claim that in “capitalism”, one class of people who owns the capital (productive forces) accumulates virtually all the material wealth the society produces, and exploits people who don’t have capital. They say that people at the top concentrate in their hands more and more portion of the social wealth, and leave the rest of the population in misery. According to leftists, because class divisions are inherent in “capitalism” and because it fosters competition and exploitation in all the domains imaginable, it also creates other hierarchical divisions such as the division between sexes (patriarchy), between races (racism), between the developed and underdeveloped nations (imperialism), etc. Therefore, leftists suggest, we should destroy “capitalism” and create an alternative economic system in which the sole purpose would not be to make profits but to satisfy the “real” needs of the people according to a global rational plan. With such an economic system at hand, we would eliminate class, sex, and national divisions; wars would be a thing of the past; and we would satisfy the basic needs of all people while ending the destruction of the environment.
Leftists create a boogeyman with their narrative about “capitalism.” This boogeyman is useful to them for several things. By focusing on this boogeyman, they can divert attention from the real and underlying cause (technological development) of some of the problems that they complain about. Leftists should divert attention from the technology problem and focus the blame on something else because technological development has a central role in leftist ideology: Technological development would eliminate poverty from the face of the world, free people from material hardships, and would create the conditions of a perfect, harmonious, and collective human society. The masses would be enlightened by the technologies of communication and transportation. Modern technology would harmonize all cultures, and humanity would live ever happily in universal brotherhood. Modern technology has all these potentials, but “capitalism” prevents humanity from using these potentials of technology. According to leftists, under the conditions of “capitalism,” technology is being used for the sole purpose of profits without any concern for the welfare of people and society and all the damages that are being inflicted on the environment. For this reason, according to leftists, humanity cannot benefit from the “progressive” and “egalitarian” potentials of modern technology. Modern technology is good or neutral in itself, they say; it only creates bad results because it is in evil hands.
Leftists cannot give up technology due to their psychological condition as well.4 Leftists, because of their psychological condition (feelings of inferiority and oversocialization are the two main psychological tendencies of leftists), want collective power. Modern technology is the best instrument to attain collective power. Without modern technology, you cannot create crowded mass organizations and lead those masses through modern indoctrination and manipulation technologies. Modern technology gives enormous means to achieve power over people. On the other hand, technology is essential for building a socialist brave new world. Building a socialist utopia would require enormous amounts of brainwashing, propaganda, discipline, and physical suppression of those people that do not consent to this type of society. Collective conditioning and physical coercion of the masses can only be done effectively by using modern technological means. Besides, the great majority of people revere modern technology. Since leftists try to establish a mass movement, they perhaps cannot reject modern technology from a strategic point of view as well. They don’t want to alienate the masses of people from their ideology.
The psychology of leftists makes it extremely hard for them to reject modern technology because modern technology and the associated ideas of progress (the welfare of humanity, creating better conditions for humans by the enlightened values of equality, security, peace, education, etc.) is the nec plus ultra of the current social system. Due to their oversocialization and inferiority complex, they cannot bear to be seen as reactionary barbarians who reject those values. They need to feel embraced by the social collective; they need social approval to balance the negative emotions created by their oversocialization and inferiority complex.
The story about “capitalism” presents a very effective tool to express social problems in the framework of personalized hatred, and this has some utility in several respects. It makes it possible to attribute all the blame to wealthy people, owners of capital, the upper classes, the “one percent,” etc. “The downtrodden,” “the oppressed,” and “the lower classes” are forced to live an awful life solely because of these "bad" people. They are poor, unhappy, unsatisfied, and unsuccessful because of the people who oppress them. The environment is being destroyed, there is still hunger in the world, wars are still going on, and some countries are underdeveloped because the “elites” only care about themselves and their profits. So “ordinary” people are “good,” and they are “victims” of some “bad” people. Thereby, the narrative around "capitalism" becomes a convenient tool to vent frustrations, usually generated by some impersonal structural reasons, to some “villains.” That soothes the inferiority complex that is so prevalent in modern conditions, both in leftists themselves and in public in general. Besides, it is much easier for most people to “understand” the issues when they are portrayed in a framework where “bad” people are culprits and good people are “victims” than in a more complex framework where people are cogs in a giant social system that works mechanistically.
Most importantly, the boogeyman about capitalism deflects attention from the real and most vital aspects of the system, from its real functioning and essence. It focuses attention on its secondary characteristics that don’t necessarily define its nature. Therefore, it acts as a defense mechanism for the techno-industrial system. It creates the illusion that there really is a critique of the existing social system, that this critique really portrays the system’s functioning and proposes a real alternative to it. On the other hand, the critique of capitalism points out some defects in the system’s functioning, defects (excessive inequality in wealth, excessive poverty that squanders some people’s potential, etc.) that, if the system finds some solutions to them, it will function more effectively. By doing this, it helps the system to correct itself. These are the reasons why we ever more frequently see the critique of capitalism on the system’s propaganda apparatus.
Leftism describes “capitalism” as a social system that has been intentionally designed and created by a certain social class (bourgeoisie, capital-owning or ruling class, economic elites, etc.). And it claims that this social class is now consciously perpetuating “capitalism” to the detriment of the other classes in society. Therefore, it must be possible for the exploited classes to destroy “capitalism” and build another social system in its place just like the present ruling classes have done with “capitalism.” Socialist leftists assume that it is possible to control consciously the development of a society; a social class, a certain segment of the society (the proletariat, the working class, etc.), or any indefinite collective “we” can create a desired social system based on a desired goal. This cannot be done, however, because human societies are complex systems. Complex systems are composed of many components that interact with each other. It is impossible to know the exact relations among these components and the consequences that would result from interfering with them. For this reason, we cannot design on paper a plan of an ideal society and successfully implement this plan in real life. Consciously controlling the development of a society is impossible. On the other hand and related to this, it wasn’t the bourgeoisie, ruling classes, or any other “vile” people who created “capitalism”. Because nobody can create consciously a certain type of social system. Societies evolve following mechanical, unconscious, and uncontrollable processes. The phenomena that are regarded as the main features of “capitalism” have evolved spontaneously without conscious design during the development of human societies. They are the results of the changes that occurred in the infrastructural components of human societies which in turn caused changes in structural and superstructural components.
