Consumerism and War (was Re: Noam Chomsky, "Unrepentant Stalinist")
Gabrielle Rapagnetta
>Gabrielle Rapagnetta wrote:
>> The contradiction between the US and environmentalism lies within the
>> absurd production goals designed to compete with the Soviets. These
>> production goals, originally laid forth by the State for the wartime
>> economies, are the reason why consumerism is shoved in the face of
>> every single American, from cradle to grave.
>
Ed Faith:
>You must be referring to the Department of Consumption, based along
>Madison Avenue NY NY and called Madison Avenue for short, whose key role
>in polluting the rivers and lakes of the US and whose numerous links to
>the counterrevolutionary and antiprogressive military and death squads
>worldwide have been and continue to be scandalously underreported.
>Pinochet, for instance, is and has always been an agent of Madison
>Avenue and is in fact a familiar face to many Americans who have seen
>him appear throughout the sixties in magazine ads and television
>commercials.
Here's a brain teaser to wrap your free market mind around: The
tobacco industry in America pays advertising firms over $4 billion
each year. What product is that $4 billion buying?
If that one's too tough for you I suggest you simply walk through a
convenience store with a six year old child.
Or count the billboards on your way to work.
Or just continue to live in your fantasy world where all consumers
make educated decisions about their purchases.
For those who would seriously like to explore the relationship between
wartime production goals and present day consumerism the year to look
up is 1945. Coming out of World War II Labor Secretary Lewis
Schwellenbach said "American inventive genius and skill of
organization have made of this country the greatest productive machine
yet known. Our problem now is one of consumption. We can produce
plenty. What we must do is to make sure that we can consume plenty. We
can consume plenty only if our people have the purchasing power with
which to buy. The purchasing power requires that they have jobs in
order that they may earn the wages with which to make the purchases."
This sentiment was rather new in American culture. It was not until
after WWII that people began to put faith into the delusional idea
that mass consumerism would lead them to the "good life".
Keynesian controls (growth indices such as GDP) had proven themselves
successful but there was a lingering fear that the post-WWII economy
would fall into depression. So we end up with the Employment Act of
1946 and an economy in which production is hopelessly interwoven with
politics. The task of maintaining consumerism is handed over to
private interests where, by the year 2004, over $400 billion is spent
annually to spam every single American into blissful submission to
Walmart.
And to top it all off we have to listen to these laissez-faire,
war-mongering bozos endlessly bitch about present-day liberals, as if
they even had anything to do with this mess. (The Employment Act was
bipartisan, as was WWII and the Cold War).
Ed Faith
news:fhca90hv75o2p9nju...@4ax.com:
>
>>Gabrielle Rapagnetta wrote:
>>> The contradiction between the US and environmentalism lies within
>>> the absurd production goals designed to compete with the Soviets.
>>> These production goals, originally laid forth by the State for the
>>> wartime economies, are the reason why consumerism is shoved in the
>>> face of every single American, from cradle to grave.
>>
> Ed Faith:
>>You must be referring to the Department of Consumption, based along
>>Madison Avenue NY NY and called Madison Avenue for short, whose key
>>role in polluting the rivers and lakes of the US and whose numerous
>>links to the counterrevolutionary and antiprogressive military and
>>death squads worldwide have been and continue to be scandalously
>>underreported. Pinochet, for instance, is and has always been an agent
>>of Madison Avenue and is in fact a familiar face to many Americans who
>>have seen him appear throughout the sixties in magazine ads and
>>television commercials.
>
> Here's a brain teaser to wrap your free market mind around: The
> tobacco industry in America pays advertising firms over $4 billion
> each year. What product is that $4 billion buying?
The economic defeat of Soviet Union, of course. You already explained
this.
> If that one's too tough for you I suggest you simply walk through a
> convenience store with a six year old child.
>
> Or count the billboards on your way to work.
Those deluded fools who crowd into the stores think this is merely
sellers advertising their wares. Not so! As you have shown, it is in
fact part of a massive government program to defeat communism, thereby
crushing the hopes of the proletariat.
James A. Donald
On Sun, 02 May 2004 10:43:13 -0700, Gabrielle Rapagnetta
> Here's a brain teaser to wrap your free market mind around:
> The tobacco industry in America pays advertising firms over
> $4 billion each year. What product is that $4 billion
> buying?
Mostly market differentiation.
One might suppose that a packet of cigarettes with a cowboy on
the pack is sneakily suggesting that if you smoke, you will be
handsome and masculine like a cowboy, but what is a packet of
cigarettes with a camel on the pack suggesting?
> Or just continue to live in your fantasy world where all
> consumers make educated decisions about their purchases.
The purpose of market differentiation is to help the consumer
distinguish between one product and another, which helps him
make educated decisions. The camel is merely an icon.
Similarly, if you go in the supermarket, you will see the hair
dye packages have an image of hair on the cover, the toothpaste
packages an image of teeth, etc. This is not some sneakily
powerful persuasion. Most of it is just help in recognition.
Ninety percent of advertising is merely informative.
--digsig
James A. Donald
6YeGpsZR+nOTh/cGwvITnSR3TdzclVpR0+pr3YYQdkG
Y9svMa34pNdJ4bRcD9Ni5UZCBUXUTTzXwBMs4a+e
4VFak55fxVXlyDfmaky18b3ftDrOiNj5kuJFI3ONs
Gabrielle Rapagnetta
>Gabrielle Rapagnetta
>> Here's a brain teaser to wrap your free market mind around:
>> The tobacco industry in America pays advertising firms over
>> $4 billion each year. What product is that $4 billion
>> buying?
>
>Mostly market differentiation.
>
>One might suppose that a packet of cigarettes with a cowboy on
>the pack is sneakily suggesting that if you smoke, you will be
>handsome and masculine like a cowboy, but what is a packet of
>cigarettes with a camel on the pack suggesting?
Ah, so you believe that the purpose of this $4 billion is not to
create a demand for their product, but rather to service an
already-existing demand.
Internal memos from the tobacco industry as well as the marketing
industry prove your theory false. They are actively seeking to create
demand and sometimes to create entirely new markets. $400 billion
passes through the marketing industry each year to achieve this.
>> Or just continue to live in your fantasy world where all
>> consumers make educated decisions about their purchases.
>
>The purpose of market differentiation is to help the consumer
>distinguish between one product and another, which helps him
>make educated decisions. The camel is merely an icon.
What are the factors which make for an educated decision in
distinguishing Camels from Marlboros? Or Nike from Reebok? We've
seen these ads our entire lives. Every American should be a walking
encyclopedia of cigarette and tennis shoe information. Do you know a
single non-smoker who can tell you the difference between a Camel and
a Marlboro? Do you know anyone who can tell you what country their
Nikes were made in?
Put your theory to the test: Ask a friend to demonstrate what a
lifetime of ad agency 'education' has taught him. Ask him to name
even five ingredients that go into Wheaties breakfast cereal. We all
grew up watching the ads, right?
>Similarly, if you go in the supermarket, you will see the hair
>dye packages have an image of hair on the cover, the toothpaste
>packages an image of teeth, etc. This is not some sneakily
>powerful persuasion. [...
The marketing industry is paid for sneaky, powerful persuasion. They
say so themselves in their trade publications. Furthermore, your
theory does absolutely nothing to explain advertising aimed at
children.
>...] Most of it is just help in recognition.
>Ninety percent of advertising is merely informative.
This is the most absurd thing I've ever heard you say on Usenet. I'll
humor you, though: Does this "informative" advertising benefit the
consumer in any way?
maxpou...@post.com
> The tobacco industry in America pays advertising firms over
> $4 billion each year. What product is that $4 billion
> buying?
Altria (was Philip Morris) is the largest tobacco producer.
Most of what it sells is not tobacco.
Care for an Altoid while you look for those billboards?
maxpou...@post.com
> the pack is sneakily suggesting that if you smoke, you will be
> handsome and masculine like a cowboy,
That must explain how women are tricked into smoking.
[Removes tongue from cheek.]
G*rd*n
> > One might suppose that a packet of cigarettes with a cowboy on
> > the pack is sneakily suggesting that if you smoke, you will be
> > handsome and masculine like a cowboy,
> That must explain how women are tricked into smoking.
So, what do you all know about advertising?
--
(<><>) /*/
}"{ G*rd*n }"{ g...@panix.com }"{
{ http://www.etaoin.com | latest new material 1/19/03 <-adv't
James A. Donald
James A. Donald
> > One might suppose that a packet of cigarettes with a cowboy
> > on the pack is sneakily suggesting that if you smoke, you
> > will be handsome and masculine like a cowboy,
> That must explain how women are tricked into smoking.
The evil capitalist plot is to imply to the women, that if they
smoke the cigarette, the cowboy will ride them. :-)
I notice than men's magazines are full of images of attractive
women wearing very little, and women's magazines are also full
of images of attractive women wearing very little. I often see
a girl who has swiped a magazine of the racks studying, with
patient intensity, images of women wearing impractical
underwear and not much of it.
It appears to me, that most of the ad space in the entire
capitalist world has the nominal purpose be selling impractical
underwear to women. If Gabrielle Rapagnetta's theories are
correct, then most of our economy should be devoted to the
production and consumption of impractical women's underwear.
--digsig
James A. Donald
6YeGpsZR+nOTh/cGwvITnSR3TdzclVpR0+pr3YYQdkG
lvaWXXXcgJrajbJYlj3iEGGCbV8qBZi4AIeijked
44Nx3WHuT7bcVPGzMYHEHiXUmVUmfegkbHaM4j4mJ
James A. Donald
Gabrielle Rapagnetta
> >> Here's a brain teaser to wrap your free market mind
> >> around: The tobacco industry in America pays advertising
> >> firms over $4 billion each year. What product is that $4
> >> billion buying?
James A. Donald:
> >Mostly market differentiation. One might suppose that a
> >packet of cigarettes with a cowboy on the pack is sneakily
> >suggesting that if you smoke, you will be handsome and
> >masculine like a cowboy, but what is a packet of cigarettes
> >with a camel on the pack suggesting?
Gabrielle Rapagnetta
> Ah, so you believe that the purpose of this $4 billion is not
> to create a demand for their product, but rather to service
> an already-existing demand.
Not what I said.
You speak as if "the tobacco industry" was a single entity with
a single will. "big tobacco".
Your words, and the meaning you attribute to me, make no sense
in the context of many tobacco companies each one pursuing its
own particular good.
Not only did I not say the idea you attribute to me, it is an
idea that makes no sense, has no meaning, within the worldview
of the sane.
> The marketing industry is paid for sneaky, powerful
> persuasion.
Yet oddly, they put most of their resources into mere brand
recognition, which may not constitute "educating" the consumer
to your high standards, but seems most unlikely to have any
sneaky power.
--digsig
James A. Donald
6YeGpsZR+nOTh/cGwvITnSR3TdzclVpR0+pr3YYQdkG
ZXbYpdcd6jg402AxXx4saspbOsDVhHqXI6nOo9ei
4jwZQ4NkO0CvNOwQwGB/8w7+fRkO/TkRlcswFeIMF
G*rd*n
> ...
> after WWII that people began to put faith into the delusional idea
> that mass consumerism would lead them to the "good life".
I think consumerism is older than that. Marx doesn't call
it by that name in the _Communist_Manifesto_ (1848) but he's
clearly noticing the shift away from production for survival
toward production for fun and profit. You begin to see mass
market consumer advertising in the United States and the
advanced European countries toward the end of the 19th
century. However, the notion that the good life was
equivalent to having a lot of stuff was probably pretty old
and well-established even then. That advertising was simply
stroking an existing desire, and maybe adding a bit of
social cachet -- one could be like the fashionable upper
classes by having a lot of stuff.
It is clear that in order to maintain its social position (by
which I mean its political power and wealth, among other
things) the owning and ruling class has to maximize production,
which is what it is good at doing. Otherwise, the price
and repute of both capital and managerial expertise will fall.
In order to maintain demand for further production, the
outputs of former production have to go somewhere. Broad,
ever-expanding consumerism is one of the possible sinks, and
it is less destructive and socially disturbing (usually) than
others such as war and waste.
However, consumerism and war are not necessarily always
competitors. Consider the massive consumerist expansion of
the suburbs beginning after World War II and continuing into
the present. A good part of what helped get middle-class
people out of the cities and into suburban developments was
racism, not only their native, endemic racism, but the
exacerbated racism brought about by driving millions of (mostly)
Black people out of rural areas in the South into northern
cities where they became a deracinated, desperate underclass
of refugees -- a movement generated by the industrialization
of agriculture, but very nearly as radically violent as a
traditional war.
The resultant White flight to the suburbs required tremendous
expansion of housing, roads, infrastructure, automobiles,
trucks, construction machinery, and petroleum production.
The last-named depleted domestic reserves, and competition for
foreign oil has obviously now become an important motive for
carrying on wars all over the world. So in this particular
sequence of events consumerism, instead of drawing resources
away from war, actually has motivated if not necessitated war.
Ironically, the wars driven by consumerism have themselves
become a sort of consumer event, displayed on television and
paid for with votes and taxes, but otherwise not requiring
struggle and sacrifice, but celebration and further
consumption -- the biggest Superbowl of all.
Alex Russell
news:c76qtf$gvj$1...@panix3.panix.com...
> --
>
> (<><>) /*/
> }"{ G*rd*n }"{ g...@panix.com }"{
> { http://www.etaoin.com | latest new material 1/19/03 <-adv't
"The Affluent Society" by John Kenneth Galbraith covers this subject and was
written in 1958. Its been obvious to anyone who stops to think about it that
'western' society no longer has a 'production' problem. We can produce more
than we need. But society, government, and the economic system hasn't
adjusted much (other than cheap home electronics) due to this fact.
The job of advertising is to get you to buy things you don't need.
Advertising isn't required to get you to buy things you need. Advertising
can be useful when looking for information on somethng you want to purchase,
but most modern advertising aims at your emotions. I hope that anyone out
there reading this who is a parent actively teaches them how advertising
works, and how to ignore most of it.
There is nothing evil about advertising. Companies spend money on it because
they believe it works. If you don't like advertising don't buy the products.
--
Alex Russell
alexande...@telus.net
maxpou...@post.com
> > > One might suppose that a packet of cigarettes with a
> > > cowboy on the pack is sneakily suggesting that if you
> > > smoke, you will be handsome and masculine like a cowboy,
maxpou...@post.com:
> > That must explain how women are tricked into smoking.
G*rd*n:
> So, what do you all know about advertising?
The Edsel was one of the most heavily marketed cars of its day.
That did not stop it from being a bomb that almost destroyed
Ford Motor Company.
When the Edsel was heavily advertised, it did not sell. Now that
it is not backed by Madison Avenue, it is collectable.
maxpou...@post.com
> >> Here's a brain teaser to wrap your free market mind around:
> >> The tobacco industry in America pays advertising firms over
> >> $4 billion each year. What product is that $4 billion
> >> buying?
James A. Donald:
> >Mostly market differentiation.
> >
> >One might suppose that a packet of cigarettes with a
> >cowboy on the pack is sneakily suggesting that if you
> >smoke, you will be handsome and masculine like a cowboy,
> >but what is a packet of cigarettes with a camel on the
> >pack suggesting?
Gabrielle Rapagnetta:
> Ah, so you believe that the purpose of this $4 billion is
> not to create a demand for their product, but rather to
> service an already-existing demand.
>
> Internal memos from the tobacco industry as well as the
> marketing industry prove your theory false. They are
> actively seeking to create demand and sometimes to create
> entirely new markets.
Documents also prove that people are actively seeking
to invent a perpetual motion machine. This does not mean that
producing a device that makes more energy than it consumes
is what they are in fact inventing.
People in the ad industry have a rather inflated and self
serving opinion of what they can do. Far left hacks like
yourself inflate their egos and line their pockets by helping
to dupe unsuspecting businessman into overpaying for their
services. Remember St. John's Wort? A few years ago, it was
everywhere. It was heavily promoted in various media. Sales
went through the roof. After people tried it and many found
that it did not work to their satisfaction, sales fell. More
advertising was like pushing a string.
maxpou...@post.com
> >...] Most of it is just help in recognition.
> >Ninety percent of advertising is merely informative.
Gabrielle Rapagnetta:
> This is the most absurd thing I've ever heard you say on
> Usenet. I'll humor you, though: Does this "informative"
> advertising benefit the consumer in any way?
Yes.
It tells you that a product that serves one of your desires
exists.
G*rd*n
> > > > One might suppose that a packet of cigarettes with a
> > > > cowboy on the pack is sneakily suggesting that if you
> > > > smoke, you will be handsome and masculine like a cowboy,
maxpou...@post.com:
> > > That must explain how women are tricked into smoking.
G*rd*n:
> > So, what do you all know about advertising?
> The Edsel was one of the most heavily marketed cars of its day.
> That did not stop it from being a bomb that almost destroyed
> Ford Motor Company.
>
> When the Edsel was heavily advertised, it did not sell. Now that
> it is not backed by Madison Avenue, it is collectable.
Since the days of the Edsel, millions of products have been
marketed. The Edsel is one; there are millions of others you
don't mention. Now we know how you think about statistics.
But we still don't know whether you know anything about
advertising.
James A. Donald
On 4 May 2004 09:07:00 -0400, g...@panix.com (G*rd*n) wrote:
> Since the days of the Edsel, millions of products have been
> marketed. The Edsel is one; there are millions of others you
> don't mention.
I have seen marketing from the inside. Marketing and product
design are not clever master manipulators, they are in the
dark, desperately wondering what will please a fickle god.
Employers have no idea whether a marketer is any good, and
marketers have no idea if they are any good.
The one rule that works is "can the consumer remember the
product's brand and what it does". Marketers that try for
something more clever generally fail, which was the point of
all those marketing insider jokes in the "Jack in the box"
series.
--digsig
James A. Donald
6YeGpsZR+nOTh/cGwvITnSR3TdzclVpR0+pr3YYQdkG
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G*rd*n
> > Since the days of the Edsel, millions of products have been
> > marketed. The Edsel is one; there are millions of others you
> > don't mention.
James A. Donald <jam...@echeque.com>:
> I have seen marketing from the inside. Marketing and product
> design are not clever master manipulators, they are in the
> dark, desperately wondering what will please a fickle god.
> Employers have no idea whether a marketer is any good, and
> marketers have no idea if they are any good.
>
> The one rule that works is "can the consumer remember the
> product's brand and what it does". Marketers that try for
> something more clever generally fail, which was the point of
> all those marketing insider jokes in the "Jack in the box"
> series.
When I read _Advertising_Age_ I read about campaigns whose
effects are carefully observed in terms of sales. It is
true that most fail, but it's also true that most of the
shots a hunter takes fail to hit anything, and most of the
time when a cat attempts to catch a mouse the mouse gets
away. But this doesn't mean mice never get caught, or that
hunters never bring home game, or that advertising always
fails to do anything.
There's another aspect of things which you are completely
overlooking, and that is the contribution of advertising
towards creating a culture of consumerism. Each ad not only
suggests that you should buy a particular thing, but that
you should buy things in general, buy a lot of them, and
keep them around where people can see them. Of course it's
difficult to quantify the effects of this sort of thing
objectively, because as far as I know nobody was divising
or running the required sociological tests over the years
when the shift towards lifestyle advertising occurred. But
the difference between advertising in magazines of the late
19th century, and of the mid-20th century, is remarkable,
considering that the technical capacity for present text
and images on the printed page wasn't all that different.
I don't think it's just some random development, even if it
was pretty much an ad-hoc, intuitive thing.
Josh Dougherty
This perhaps overlooks one of the most direct things that advertising
suggests, that is, you are inadequate. One of the biggest themes in
advertising is convincing people that they should be ashamed or embarrassed
about some imperfection, or that they are lower than others in their peer
group if they don't have X clothing or car...etc. IOW...the job of
avertisers and marketers is, largely, to turn a contented populace into an
insecure and unhappy one whose only hope for becoming complete and
respectable human beings is to forever chase their carrot on a stick.
maxpou...@post.com
> > The Edsel was one of the most heavily marketed cars of its day.
> > That did not stop it from being a bomb that almost destroyed
> > Ford Motor Company.
> >
> > When the Edsel was heavily advertised, it did not sell. Now that
> > it is not backed by Madison Avenue, it is collectable.
G*rd*n
> Since the days of the Edsel, millions of products have been
> marketed. The Edsel is one; there are millions of others you
> don't mention. Now we know how you think about statistics.
> But we still don't know whether you know anything about
> advertising.
If it is true that advertising coerces demand then take out a second
mortgage on your cubicle at the flophouse and start a business. Put
90% of your money into advertising. It won't matter what sort of
goods you acquire for resale with the remaining 10%, people will
pay any amount you demand for your products.
You'll make your next million. No, really – you'll make a mint.
Go ahead. Try it.
Joshua Holmes
: It appears to me, that most of the ad space in the entire
: capitalist world has the nominal purpose be selling impractical
: underwear to women. If Gabrielle Rapagnetta's theories are
: correct, then most of our economy should be devoted to the
: production and consumption of impractical women's underwear.
Surprisingly, much female underwear is inedible.
--
Joshua Holmes
jdho...@force.stwing.upenn.edu
Does a man tell you of sacrifice?
Beware, he intends to make you the bull.
James A. Donald
On Tue, 04 May 2004 06:07:50 GMT, "Alex Russell"
> "The Affluent Society" by John Kenneth Galbraith covers this
> subject and was written in 1958
"The Affluent society" like most of Galbraith's books, was a
defense of an idea that had recently become indefensible, When
Galbraith publishes a book arguing X, that was always clear
sign that X was an idea that had previously been popular among
the intellectuals, but had recently been overthrown by events.
Galbraith's books were and are popular precisely because they
were invariably defenses against reality. They were generally
written when events casting doubt on the beloved idea were
looming, and appeared just as those events decisively
discredited the beloved idea.
--digsig
James A. Donald
6YeGpsZR+nOTh/cGwvITnSR3TdzclVpR0+pr3YYQdkG
OyQtd15GibCB6gE2a6MiBVB6ydO2CXrpoduHXwh4
4xe5PkMBI5JQ6f7w83XzWiwVPDZPN+or3o73bxKBv
Jeffrey Turner
> --
> On Tue, 04 May 2004 06:07:50 GMT, "Alex Russell"
>
>>"The Affluent Society" by John Kenneth Galbraith covers this
>>subject and was written in 1958
>
>
> "The Affluent society" like most of Galbraith's books, was a
> defense of an idea that had recently become indefensible, When
> Galbraith publishes a book arguing X, that was always clear
> sign that X was an idea that had previously been popular among
> the intellectuals, but had recently been overthrown by events.
>
> Galbraith's books were and are popular precisely because they
> were invariably defenses against reality. They were generally
> written when events casting doubt on the beloved idea were
> looming, and appeared just as those events decisively
> discredited the beloved idea.
It was still about ten years before affluence was decisively on the
wane in the US. I wouldn't blame him for that.
--Jeff
--
Let me make the superstitions of a nation
and I care not who makes its laws or its
songs either. -- Mark Twain
The trouble with the world is that the
stupid are cocksure and the intelligent
are full of doubt. --Bertrand Russell
Those who do not learn from history are
doomed to repeat it. --George Santayana
Unthinking respect for authority is the
greatest enemy of truth. --Albert Einstein
Freedom's just another word for nothing
left to lose. --Kris Kristofferson
G*rd*n
"Alex Russell" <alexande...@telus.net>:
> "The Affluent Society" by John Kenneth Galbraith covers this subject and was
> written in 1958. Its been obvious to anyone who stops to think about it that
> 'western' society no longer has a 'production' problem. We can produce more
> than we need. But society, government, and the economic system hasn't
> adjusted much (other than cheap home electronics) due to this fact.
>
> The job of advertising is to get you to buy things you don't need.
>
> Advertising isn't required to get you to buy things you need. Advertising
> can be useful when looking for information on somethng you want to purchase,
> but most modern advertising aims at your emotions. I hope that anyone out
> there reading this who is a parent actively teaches them how advertising
> works, and how to ignore most of it.
It is my impression that _The_Affluent_Society_ suggested that
the lower orders could be better managed by and for the
capitalist ruling class through government programs encouraging
various sorts of subsidized consumption, thus producing at
least a more orderly society, and perhaps a happier one as
well, if consumption is happiness. In a sense, though, this
plan had already been put into practice or was about to be
put into practice, as for example with the building of the
Interstate Highway System and important tax breaks for mortgage
holders. The '50s and '60s were an era when a not particularly
well-paid White blue-collar worker daddy could buy a modest
house and a new car to get to his job in and still have
something left over for that famous six-pack. It was not
until something was to be done for the differently pigmented
that the arrangement broke down.
I don't agree that the government and so forth haven't adjusted
to new conditions. The government is usually quite concerned
when any falling-off of consumption is noticed.
Gabrielle Rapagnetta
>It appears to me, that most of the ad space in the entire
>capitalist world has the nominal purpose be selling impractical
>underwear to women.
It appears to me that women in impractical underwear have completely
distracted you from reality.
>If Gabrielle Rapagnetta's theories are
>correct, then most of our economy should be devoted to the
>production and consumption of impractical women's underwear.
I remember reading that the amount of money that passes through the
cosmetics industry each year is about twice the amount that is needed
to end world hunger.
When the demand created by Revlon and Victoria's Secret is greater
than the demand created by over a billion hungry people who need work,
quite obviously the free market is not functioning correctly. I think
the $400 billion that passes through the advertising industry annually
just might have something to do with that. Crazy, eh?
G*rd*n
"Josh Dougherty" <jdoc1...@comcast.net>:
> This perhaps overlooks one of the most direct things that advertising
> suggests, that is, you are inadequate. One of the biggest themes in
> advertising is convincing people that they should be ashamed or embarrassed
> about some imperfection, or that they are lower than others in their peer
> group if they don't have X clothing or car...etc. IOW...the job of
> avertisers and marketers is, largely, to turn a contented populace into an
> insecure and unhappy one whose only hope for becoming complete and
> respectable human beings is to forever chase their carrot on a stick.
I think there's much less of that than there used to be. As
any animal trainer will tell you, if you want to inculcate a
specific, positive response you want to encourage attraction
and aggression, not anxiety and avoidance. Getting the mark
to pull out the dinero and fork it over is a very specific
and positive response.
This has affected even ads directed towards the repulsive
body. Deodorant ads no longer dourly suggest that you will
offend because you smell, but have turned into playful skits
about whether wifie is cheerfully, agressively, saucily stealing
hubbie's Right Guard because it's so powerful and, well, you
know, women these days. Ha ha. Shampoo no longer gets dirty
hair clean but imbues your hair with some sort of an anti-
gravitational metallic gloss that causes it to float around
in slo-mo, especially if you're fond of balletic leaping.
And so on. At least, this is what I get from my rather
infrequent viewings of television.
Not that marketeers don't use the anxieties that are already
out there. People can't possibly worship evil as they do and
be happy or contented, and if anxiety will sell something,
those who want to sell whatever it is will use it. But it's
a lot harder to work with than happier emotions like greed.
Gabrielle Rapagnetta
The worldview of the sane would look at the overall effect of an
industry as well as the motives of competing individuals. If you
insist in only analyzing each tobacco company you find that they are
only paying an enormous sum to their ad agencies because their
competitors are doing the same. Peachy keen.
But when you look at what all competitors are doing collectively you
see that close to 10% of their revenues are dumped back into their
advertising campaigns. Same with the pharmaceutical industry, the
world's most-promoted industry. Cosmetics, too.
This is not a realistic business model for an industry healthy with
competition that wants to service an existing demand. It is only
realistic if demand is being created by these promotional expenditures
(or if the industry is a near-monolopy). This is confirmed by the
fact that the growth of the advertising industry outperforms GDP
growth. This is again confirmed by the ads themselves which
constantly present you with a societal standard which is pure fantasy,
suggesting that, although you may be a perfectly healthy human being,
you are somehow inadequate.
When Revlon escalates its competition with L'Oreal, the makeup-wearing
secretaries in Suite C escalate their glamor contest with the
secretaries in Suite D. When RJR Reynolds escalates its competition
with Philip Morris the net result is that more people start smoking.
This is a common cause-and-effect that is readily observed. This is
demand being created. In other words, a free market loophole.
This market distortion has the effect of over-emphasizing demands
which are ultimately worthless to society at the cost of neglecting
demands which are a real matter of life and death. The free market
cannot function properly unless this loophole is fixed. Consumers
need to make educated purchases. Investors need to make ethical
investments. Shy of these two phenomenas, the market requires
regulation.
G*rd*n
Gabrielle Rapagnetta <n0spam....@gmx.net>:
> I remember reading that the amount of money that passes through the
> cosmetics industry each year is about twice the amount that is needed
> to end world hunger.
>
> When the demand created by Revlon and Victoria's Secret is greater
> than the demand created by over a billion hungry people who need work,
> quite obviously the free market is not functioning correctly. I think
> the $400 billion that passes through the advertising industry annually
> just might have something to do with that. Crazy, eh?
Actually, the demand created by Revlon, etc., contributes to
feeding poor hungry people. Here's how: Revlon gets money
from people who would rather paint their faces, which is fun
and thus has immediate payoff value, than send the money to
someone who might give it to poor, hungry, remote children
they don't know, which isn't much fun actually and has only
very abstract payoff value. Revlon uses some of this money
to run their cosmetics factories. Cosmetics, especially the
packaging and shipping, is difficult to automate, and thus it
is the home of many un- and semi- skilled job slots. Also,
because of the chemicals involved, and the fact that it's
low-paid, it's an extremely shitty job as jobs go in America.
So many of those jobs are available for people from the Third
World, especially Latin America. These people _do_ send
money to poor, hungry, remote children because they _do_
know them. Next time you see a Revlon factory croaking
in the fogslime, remember that. (Or have they moved them
all to China now?)
However, I don't think inadequate food supply is really a
money problem; I think it is a political problem. If you took
away Revlon's advertising money and sent it in the direction
of Bangladesh or wherever, it is my strong intuition that very
little of it would actually get turned into food which was to
be actually eaten by poor people.
Woodard R. Springstube
news:c78i4j$aeq$1...@panix1.panix.com:
> g...@panix.com (G*rd*n) wrote:
>> > Since the days of the Edsel, millions of products have
>> > been marketed. The Edsel is one; there are millions of
>> > others you don't mention.
>
> James A. Donald <jam...@echeque.com>:
>> I have seen marketing from the inside. Marketing and
>> product design are not clever master manipulators, they
>> are in the dark, desperately wondering what will please a
>> fickle god. Employers have no idea whether a marketer is
>> any good, and marketers have no idea if they are any good.
>>
>> The one rule that works is "can the consumer remember the
>> product's brand and what it does". Marketers that try for
>> something more clever generally fail, which was the point
>> of all those marketing insider jokes in the "Jack in the
>> box" series.
>
> When I read _Advertising_Age_ I read about campaigns whose
> effects are carefully observed in terms of sales. It is
> true that most fail, but it's also true that most of the
> shots a hunter takes fail to hit anything, and most of the
> time when a cat attempts to catch a mouse the mouse gets
> away. But this doesn't mean mice never get caught, or that
> hunters never bring home game, or that advertising always
> fails to do anything.
>
Advertising Age is an insider magazine with a vested interest
in promoting the industry itself. I can tell you that most of
those numbers are not that reliable. Some company does an ad
campaign and sales go up. To claim that the ads made the
sales go up is a _post hoc_ fallacy. Besides, only certain
types of industries go big on advertising. Generally, they
are industries that compete in oligopoly and monopolistically
competitive industries. Those types of market structures seem
to involve non-price competition, and most of the advertising
is about stealing each others' customers. You can't prove
that an ad for a Chevy will make somebody go out and buy a car
if they weren't already in the market. By the same token,
most adults aren't going to start smoking or drinking beer
because of an ad. They might switch brands or try a different
brand because of an ad.
Josh Dougherty
> > ...
>
> "Josh Dougherty" <jdoc1...@comcast.net>:
> > This perhaps overlooks one of the most direct things that advertising
> > suggests, that is, you are inadequate. One of the biggest themes in
> > advertising is convincing people that they should be ashamed or
embarrassed
> > about some imperfection, or that they are lower than others in their
peer
> > group if they don't have X clothing or car...etc. IOW...the job of
> > avertisers and marketers is, largely, to turn a contented populace into
an
> > insecure and unhappy one whose only hope for becoming complete and
> > respectable human beings is to forever chase their carrot on a stick.
>
>
> I think there's much less of that than there used to be.
Well, I hope someone tells this to all those strangers that email me
constantly trying to convince me that my penis isn't big enough.
Mark F
>>> the job of avertisers and marketers is, largely, to turn
>>> a contented populace into an
>>> insecure and unhappy one whose only hope for becoming complete
>>> and respectable human beings is to forever chase their carrot
>>> on a stick.
>> I think there's much less of that than there used to be.
> Well, I hope someone tells this to all those strangers that
> email me constantly trying to convince me that my penis isn't
> big enough.
Poor chaps. They have about the same chance at getting rich as a
salesman attempting to sell Visine to the blind would.
-Mark
michael price
Which is not what he said.
>
> But when you look at what all competitors are doing collectively you
> see that close to 10% of their revenues are dumped back into their
> advertising campaigns. Same with the pharmaceutical industry, the
> world's most-promoted industry. Cosmetics, too.
>
> This is not a realistic business model for an industry healthy with
> competition that wants to service an existing demand.
Sure it is. Keeping your customers informed of what you offer
is a vital part of the raw materials to consumed good process. It
often makes up > 10% of the revenue. I'll bet it's more than that
for coffee.
maxpou...@post.com
> When Revlon escalates its competition with L'Oreal, the
> makeup-wearing secretaries in Suite C escalate their glamor
> contest with the secretaries in Suite D.
And yet, oddly, we do not see men flocking to the make-up
counter to buy cosmetics. This demonstrates that ads primarily
appeal to pre-existing personal desires rather than create
them out of thin air.
Gabrielle Rapagnetta:
> This market distortion has the effect of over-emphasizing
> demands which are ultimately worthless to society at the
> cost of neglecting demands which are a real matter of life
> and death. The free market cannot function properly unless
> this loophole is fixed.
Saying that ads are a loophole in the free market that needs
to be "fixed" is the same as saying that a free press is a
loophole in democracy that needs to be "fixed". They both
supposedly create artificial demand.
G*rd*n
> > > This perhaps overlooks one of the most direct things that advertising
> > > suggests, that is, you are inadequate. One of the biggest themes in
> > > advertising is convincing people that they should be ashamed or
> embarrassed
> > > about some imperfection, or that they are lower than others in their
> peer
> > > group if they don't have X clothing or car...etc. IOW...the job of
> > > avertisers and marketers is, largely, to turn a contented populace into
> an
> > > insecure and unhappy one whose only hope for becoming complete and
> > > respectable human beings is to forever chase their carrot on a stick.
"G*rd*n" <g...@panix.com> wrote in message
> > I think there's much less of that than there used to be.
"Josh Dougherty" <jdoc1...@comcast.net>:
> Well, I hope someone tells this to all those strangers that email me
> constantly trying to convince me that my penis isn't big enough.
Spam is pretty marginal. Its content probably reflects the
concerns of the senders more than anything else.
G*rd*n
> ...
> When Revlon escalates its competition with L'Oreal, the makeup-wearing
> secretaries in Suite C escalate their glamor contest with the
> secretaries in Suite D. When RJR Reynolds escalates its competition
> with Philip Morris the net result is that more people start smoking.
> This is a common cause-and-effect that is readily observed. This is
> demand being created. In other words, a free market loophole.
>
> This market distortion has the effect of over-emphasizing demands
> which are ultimately worthless to society at the cost of neglecting
It is not at all certain that either the demands or their
satisfaction are worthless to society (by which I take it
you mean the community of their occurrence). First of all,
worth is highly subjective once we get out of the biological
realm of basic life sustenance. Presumably, the fans of
cosmetics and tobacco derive some kind of enjoyment out of
what they consume, and enjoyment is value. Secondly -- and
this is a far more serious problem -- most of them believe
in work. As we have noted, industrial capitalism is capable
of producing far more than people need, so something must be
done with the surplus productive power to maintain demand
and thus the reason for working. Activities like cosmetics
and drug use help absorb this surplus while keeping the
general system going.
In effect, when you tell the secretaries in Suites C and D
to forget about cosmetics, and the smokers shivering in
front of the building to get unhooked, you're not only
telling them to give up something they enjoy, but ultimately
you're telling them to stop working. But most people don't
know what to do as an alternative. If they ever did, it was
wrung out of them while they were still children. In any
case there would be a lot of consequences to think about,
such as no longer being able to bully foreigners and poor
people, or rather, pay someone else to do it and watch
their cities burn on television. It is a big step to drop
off the map and start thinking and acting seriously about
your life. So people say to themselves that they have to
work, or that all good people work; and since they have to
work, they might as well get the mildly enjoyable junk that
working provides. After all, they've given up their lives
mostly to activities which mean nothing to them.
Making laws about advertising isn't going to change this
predicament. The cure can't be applied from the top down
because the top depends for its existence on there not
being a cure.
Patrick Powers
> Put your theory to the test: Ask a friend to demonstrate what a
> lifetime of ad agency 'education' has taught him. Ask him to name
> even five ingredients that go into Wheaties breakfast cereal. We all
> grew up watching the ads, right?
>
OK, I'll take a whack at that.
Wheat, sugar, high fructose corn syrup, water, non-nutritive crude
fiber, salt, natural and artificial flavors, artificial color,
emulsifiers, BHA and BHT added to preserve freshness.
Jeffrey Turner
> Sure it is. Keeping your customers informed of what you offer
> is a vital part of the raw materials to consumed good process. It
> often makes up > 10% of the revenue. I'll bet it's more than that
> for coffee.
The level of advertising will influence consumer demand. For instance,
if the advertising budget is increased then consumers may be persuaded
of the benefits of coffee. The outcome is the demand for coffee will
increase. The strength of the relationship will depend on the
advertising elasticity of demand for coffee (AED).
The increase in demand will cause the PRICE OF COFFEE TO INCREASE.
http://www.bized.ac.uk/virtual/vla/inter_market/hint_advert.htm
Jeffrey Turner
> Gabrielle Rapagnetta:
>
>>When Revlon escalates its competition with L'Oreal, the
>>makeup-wearing secretaries in Suite C escalate their glamor
>>contest with the secretaries in Suite D.
>
> And yet, oddly, we do not see men flocking to the make-up
> counter to buy cosmetics. This demonstrates that ads primarily
> appeal to pre-existing personal desires rather than create
> them out of thin air.
We see younger and younger girls doing that. Have six-year-old
girls always desired cosmetics? Why?
>>This market distortion has the effect of over-emphasizing
>>demands which are ultimately worthless to society at the
>>cost of neglecting demands which are a real matter of life
>>and death. The free market cannot function properly unless
>>this loophole is fixed.
>
> Saying that ads are a loophole in the free market that needs
> to be "fixed" is the same as saying that a free press is a
> loophole in democracy that needs to be "fixed". They both
> supposedly create artificial demand.
What?
--Jeff
Ed Faith
> michael price wrote:
>
>
>> Sure it is. Keeping your customers informed of what you offer is a
>> vital part of the raw materials to consumed good process. It often
>> makes up > 10% of the revenue. I'll bet it's more than that
>> for coffee.
>
>
> The level of advertising will influence consumer demand.
It is supposed to do that in an ideal world, where advertising does only
good. If a customer does not know about your product, then even though
he *would have* loved your product, he does not in fact demand it (being
ignorant of it). If you advertise, then you make people aware of your
product, and some of these people will be people who all along would
have loved your product and would have demanded it if only they had
known about it. So demand for your product will go up.
And it's win-win-win. You win because you sell more product. Your
customer wins because he's made aware of a product that he likes. Your
advertiser wins because he has your account. Even though advertising is
a cost (the fee paid to the advertising agency), it is not merely a
drain on the economy, since it returns the benefit of bringing buyers
and sellers together, and both sellers and buyers benefit.
In an ideal world, anyway.
> For instance,
> if the advertising budget is increased then consumers may be persuaded
> of the benefits of coffee. The outcome is the demand for coffee will
> increase. The strength of the relationship will depend on the
> advertising elasticity of demand for coffee (AED).
>
> The increase in demand will cause the PRICE OF COFFEE TO INCREASE.
Yes - in an ideal world. Probably also in the real world.
Ed Faith
> maxpou...@post.com wrote:
>
>> Gabrielle Rapagnetta:
>>
>>> When Revlon escalates its competition with L'Oreal, the
>>> makeup-wearing secretaries in Suite C escalate their glamor contest
>>> with the secretaries in Suite D.
>>
>>
>> And yet, oddly, we do not see men flocking to the make-up counter to
>> buy cosmetics. This demonstrates that ads primarily appeal to
>> pre-existing personal desires rather than create them out of thin air.
>
>
> We see younger and younger girls doing that. Have six-year-old
> girls always desired cosmetics? Why?
I don't know about cosmetics per se (lip stick, eye shadow), but barbies
seem to sell well to young girls, and I think dressing up the barbie in
different clothes to look nice - which is a kind of cosmetics - is a
part of that.
I read recently that young girls like to imitate their mothers. It was
in the news as some sort of "scientific study" though of course it's
only a reminder of what we already knew.
G*rd*n
> >>When Revlon escalates its competition with L'Oreal, the
> >>makeup-wearing secretaries in Suite C escalate their glamor
> >>contest with the secretaries in Suite D.
maxpou...@post.com wrote:
> > And yet, oddly, we do not see men flocking to the make-up
> > counter to buy cosmetics. This demonstrates that ads primarily
> > appeal to pre-existing personal desires rather than create
> > them out of thin air.
> We see younger and younger girls doing that. Have six-year-old
> girls always desired cosmetics? Why?
Sure, but they weren't allowed to use them. After all, adults
have to supply the money to buy them, so it's pretty easy to
cut off the supply. However, we now live in a world where
children are being sexualized (or their inherent sexuality is
being recognized, whatever). I'm not sure why this is, or
when it started, but it's clearly a thing adults are doing
with children rather than something children are doing
themselves.
James A. Donald
James A. Donald:
> > If Gabrielle Rapagnetta's theories are correct, then most
> > of our economy should be devoted to the production and
> > consumption of impractical women's underwear.
Gabrielle Rapagnetta
> I remember reading that the amount of money that passes
> through the cosmetics industry each year is about twice the
> amount that is needed to end world hunger.
No amount of outside money could end world hunger. Attempting
to remedy hunger in poor countries by transfers of wealth would
merely enrich those causing hunger, resulting in them acquiring
more weapons and causing more hunger.
--digsig
James A. Donald
6YeGpsZR+nOTh/cGwvITnSR3TdzclVpR0+pr3YYQdkG
L071RB30n9DZNEARj1NREKVsnSSZHuRYLgLmAQQJ
4NjVW5dhGV35ofH6nekNBtRtIP6XHEQU9HzdZhHzJ
James A. Donald
Gabrielle Rapagnetta
> > > > > The tobacco industry in America pays advertising
> > > > > firms over $4 billion each year. What product is
> > > > > that $4 billion buying?
James A. Donald:
> > > > Mostly market differentiation.
Gabrielle Rapagnetta
> > > Ah, so you believe that the purpose of this $4 billion is
> > > not to create a demand for their product, but rather to
> > > service an already-existing demand.
James A. Donald:
> > You speak as if "the tobacco industry" was a single entity
> > with a single will. "big tobacco".
> >
> > [....] Not only did I not say the idea you attribute to me,
> > it is
> >an idea that makes no sense, has no meaning, within the
> >worldview of the sane.
>
> The worldview of the sane would look at the overall effect of
> an industry as well as the motives of competing individuals.
But that was not the argument that you attributed to me. You
referred to "the purpose",. "The tobacco industry" is not an
entity capable of having a purpose.
The real question is the amount of power advertising has over
individuals. Does the devil of capitalism make them do it?
Now if the industry was single being, there could be no purpose
to that advertising other than to make the helpless consumer do
it. Given that there are many entities, there is an obvious
alternate purpose - to try and get consumers to be aware not
merely of the product, but of the particular company's
particular branded version of the product.
--digsig
James A. Donald
6YeGpsZR+nOTh/cGwvITnSR3TdzclVpR0+pr3YYQdkG
GDfA2sf4TzMG3r7GkJoJOR6ZyfFXuCt7QAFZv4nT
4tWr3SMq9/+COuyYIkKUAz+jqtWBLtQZulKa6hv6o
James A. Donald
"Alex Russell"
> > > "The Affluent Society" by John Kenneth Galbraith covers
> > > this subject and was written in 1958
James A. Donald:
> > "The Affluent society" like most of Galbraith's books, was
> > a defense of an idea that had recently become indefensible,
> > When Galbraith publishes a book arguing X, that was always
> > clear sign that X was an idea that had previously been
> > popular among the intellectuals, but had recently been
> > overthrown by events.
> >
> > Galbraith's books were and are popular precisely because
> > they were invariably defenses against reality. They were
> > generally written when events casting doubt on the beloved
> > idea were looming, and appeared just as those events
> > decisively discredited the beloved idea.
Jeffrey Turner
> It was still about ten years before affluence was decisively
> on the wane in the US. I wouldn't blame him for that.
The US was of course affluent, and has become more affluent.
Galbraith's claim was not that the US was affluent, but that
private wealth was unnecessary, ridiculous and unwanted.
"The Affluent society" complains about growth, and condemns it.
Supposedly we should all be happy on official rations and straw
mats, as if once men's most basic material desires are met,
they are fed, clothed and housed, then their fundamental
purposes in life have been fulfilled, and that any material
consumption beyond this base level is unnatural and is created
somehow by forces extrinsic to the individual and this
consumption is a historical aberration that is being fostered
by erroneous attitudes and insidious advertising.
The old argument was that socialism was good because it would
make us all affluent. The new argument was now that socialism
was good because it would make us all poor, and poverty is good
for the soul. No one today is likely to believe that the souls
of the subjects of the Soviets were improved by poverty.
--digsig
James A. Donald
6YeGpsZR+nOTh/cGwvITnSR3TdzclVpR0+pr3YYQdkG
mAcXqbT7m6C6ZH8AEFjfu6hfcj0r27L8tV4o3gA+
47ulNdLjTLTSwQHo7DtSbejKnL0DJbiC6i+M7+aDV
James A. Donald
On 4 May 2004 19:42:30 -0400, g...@panix.com (G*rd*n) wrote:
> It is my impression that _The_Affluent_Society_ suggested
> that the lower orders could be better managed by and for the
> capitalist ruling class through government programs
> encouraging various sorts of subsidized consumption, thus
> producing at least a more orderly society, and perhaps a
> happier one as well, if consumption is happiness.
The proposal was to restrict private consumption, which he
argued was excessive, It is often said that Galbraith's entire
career consisted of angling to get his wartime job back.
His wartime job was to use socialism to do what socialism does
so well: Reduce private consumption.
--digsig
James A. Donald
6YeGpsZR+nOTh/cGwvITnSR3TdzclVpR0+pr3YYQdkG
/3uY02hPSPOLH6zUd7aFIfn6vPi6zn5CCmP220UP
4auzC5PdkInqL6pvZy0AkvYGmTpSSBXGW7by3GbXF
zztop8970
"Jeffrey Turner" <jtu...@localnet.com> wrote in message
news:109hr6s...@corp.supernews.com...
> michael price wrote:
>
>
> > Sure it is. Keeping your customers informed of what you offer
> > is a vital part of the raw materials to consumed good process. It
> > often makes up > 10% of the revenue. I'll bet it's more than that
> > for coffee.
>
> The level of advertising will influence consumer demand. For instance,
> if the advertising budget is increased then consumers may be persuaded
> of the benefits of coffee. The outcome is the demand for coffee will
> increase. The strength of the relationship will depend on the
> advertising elasticity of demand for coffee (AED).
This is a technical DEFINITION of the concept of AED - not a statement that
there is a causal relationship between increased advertising and increased
demand. Indeed, the AED is not necessarily positive - it could be zero or
even negative.
IOW, this paragraph does *not*, as you apparently believe, state that if we
increase advertising we will see an increase in demand. It says that IF we
observe a change in demand following a corresponding change in advertising,
we may calculate the AED coefficient.
No one is denying that advertising works. Indeed, the example used by your
source shows one of the ways it could work - informational ads make more
people aware of the benefits of product X (coffee)- so they consume more, to
get the desired benefits. This is not demand creation, but demand
fulfillment.
Gabrielle Rapagnetta
>Gabrielle Rapagnetta wrote:
>> Put your theory to the test: Ask a friend to demonstrate what a
>> lifetime of ad agency 'education' has taught him. Ask him to name
>> even five ingredients that go into Wheaties breakfast cereal. We all
>> grew up watching the ads, right?
>>
>OK, I'll take a whack at that.
>
>Wheat, sugar, high fructose corn syrup, water, non-nutritive crude
>fiber, salt, natural and artificial flavors, artificial color,
>emulsifiers, BHA and BHT added to preserve freshness.
Close enough! Now did you learn that from the commercials or because
the FDA requires labeling laws?
Gabrielle Rapagnetta
>James A. Donald:
>> > If Gabrielle Rapagnetta's theories are correct, then most
>> > of our economy should be devoted to the production and
>> > consumption of impractical women's underwear.
>
>Gabrielle Rapagnetta
>> I remember reading that the amount of money that passes
>> through the cosmetics industry each year is about twice the
>> amount that is needed to end world hunger.
>
>No amount of outside money could end world hunger. Attempting
>to remedy hunger in poor countries by transfers of wealth would
>merely enrich those causing hunger, resulting in them acquiring
>more weapons and causing more hunger.
Yes, I'm aware of your beliefs.
Gabrielle Rapagnetta
>Gabrielle Rapagnetta:
>> ...
>> This sentiment was rather new in American culture. It was not until
>> after WWII that people began to put faith into the delusional idea
>> that mass consumerism would lead them to the "good life".
>> ...
>
>I think consumerism is older than that. Marx doesn't call
>it by that name in the _Communist_Manifesto_ (1848) but he's
>clearly noticing the shift away from production for survival
>toward production for fun and profit. You begin to see mass
>market consumer advertising in the United States and the
>advanced European countries toward the end of the 19th
>century. However, the notion that the good life was
>equivalent to having a lot of stuff was probably pretty old
>and well-established even then. That advertising was simply
>stroking an existing desire, and maybe adding a bit of
>social cachet -- one could be like the fashionable upper
>classes by having a lot of stuff.
I find frugality to be common factor in older Americans, both rich and
poor, suggesting that a radical change in consumer attitudes occurred
not too long ago. In the US the onset of mass production was
accompanied by the Great Depression which taught a lesson to just
about everybody who lived through it. Sure, the Sears & Roebucks
catalogs found their way out to remote farms, but I doubt those
farmers were ordering anything beyond their means -- probably just a
new rifle and a bra for the wife.
Coming out of WWII was a marked departure from those days. Consider
the Coleman Company. It is about a century old. In it's earlier days
there was a very real demand for those Coleman lanterns and camp
stoves. People didn't just use them on their weekend excursions with
the family. They were a necessity of life. During the Depression the
Canadian company stayed in business by making furnaces. After WWII,
however, that business meshed perfectly with the public works projects
in forests and parks. The emphasis that the State placed on outdoor
recreation translated to booming profits for Coleman and, voila,
suddenly they are not selling a product that is deemed necessary for
life, but rather necessary for the "good life". Today they make toys
for adults.
Coleman's business model did not respond to simple consumer demand,
but rather to the consequences of wartime production goals.
>It is clear that in order to maintain its social position (by
>which I mean its political power and wealth, among other
>things) the owning and ruling class has to maximize production,
>which is what it is good at doing. Otherwise, the price
>and repute of both capital and managerial expertise will fall.
>In order to maintain demand for further production, the
>outputs of former production have to go somewhere. Broad,
>ever-expanding consumerism is one of the possible sinks, and
>it is less destructive and socially disturbing (usually) than
>others such as war and waste.
>...
I'm not so sure that this sink is such a benign factor. When you
funnel excess demand into the mass consumerism sinkhole you are also
sinking the potential of the investors.
Instead of asking what trivialities an overworked/overpaid American
would rather spend their cash on, we should ask what an investor would
rather invest in if the sink weren't there.
I imagine that they would invest in hungry, homeless, jobless people
-- truly a demand in need of supply, truly a growth industry.
Jeffrey Turner
Barbie dolls have been aroung for fifty years. Mothers have worn
make-up as long as I can remember.
Ed Faith
> Ed Faith wrote:
>
>> Jeffrey Turner wrote:
>>
>>> maxpou...@post.com wrote:
>>>
>>>> Gabrielle Rapagnetta:
>>>>
>>>>> When Revlon escalates its competition with L'Oreal, the
>>>>> makeup-wearing secretaries in Suite C escalate their glamor contest
>>>>> with the secretaries in Suite D.
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> And yet, oddly, we do not see men flocking to the make-up counter to
>>>> buy cosmetics. This demonstrates that ads primarily appeal to
>>>> pre-existing personal desires rather than create them out of thin air.
>>>
>>>
>>> We see younger and younger girls doing that. Have six-year-old
>>> girls always desired cosmetics? Why?
>>
>>
>> I don't know about cosmetics per se (lip stick, eye shadow), but barbies
>> seem to sell well to young girls, and I think dressing up the barbie in
>> different clothes to look nice - which is a kind of cosmetics - is a
>> part of that.
>>
>> I read recently that young girls like to imitate their mothers. It was
>> in the news as some sort of "scientific study" though of course it's
>> only a reminder of what we already knew.
>
>
> Barbie dolls have been aroung for fifty years.
Exactly my point. Far from girls suddenly being interested in making the
body look nice, they've shown an interest for as long as they've had
Barbies.
> Mothers have worn
> make-up as long as I can remember.
And therefore it is likely that young girls have always desired
cosmetics - i.e., for as long as their mothers have worn them, and we
have an explanation as to why - because they generally like to imitate
their mothers. Which answers your two questions directly.
Ed Faith
I read an article on marketing a while ago that argues that the most
successful form of marketing is not manipulative, but rather attentive.
http://www.gladwell.com/1998/1998_07_06_a_spin.htm
From the article:
Much of the apparatus of modern-day marketing--the
computer databases, the psychographic profiles, the
mailing lists, the market differentiations, the focus
groups--can be seen, in some sense, as an attempt to
replicate the elegance and transparency of this model.
Marketers don't want to spin us. They want to hold us
perfectly still, so they can figure out who we are,
what we want, and how to reach us.
chris.holt
> In effect, when you tell the secretaries in Suites C and D
> to forget about cosmetics, and the smokers shivering in
> front of the building to get unhooked, you're not only
> telling them to give up something they enjoy, but ultimately
> you're telling them to stop working. But most people don't
> know what to do as an alternative. If they ever did, it was
> wrung out of them while they were still children. In any
> case there would be a lot of consequences to think about,
> such as no longer being able to bully foreigners and poor
> people, or rather, pay someone else to do it and watch
> their cities burn on television. It is a big step to drop
> off the map and start thinking and acting seriously about
> your life. So people say to themselves that they have to
> work, or that all good people work; and since they have to
> work, they might as well get the mildly enjoyable junk that
> working provides. After all, they've given up their lives
> mostly to activities which mean nothing to them.
Why am I having one of these Robert Sheckley moments?
--
chris.holt
> Gabrielle Rapagnetta
>>The worldview of the sane would look at the overall effect of
>>an industry as well as the motives of competing individuals.
> But that was not the argument that you attributed to me. You
> referred to "the purpose",. "The tobacco industry" is not an
> entity capable of having a purpose.
Hmm. So you think it inappropriate to refer to "purpose" when
dealing with an aggregate entity. For instance, an anthill
cannot have a purpose. Is that right? Would you extend this
to collections of human beings? Would you be unwilling to
talk about the purpose of an organisation, when many people
working there disagreed with its (possibly written, possibly
not) agenda?
More interestingly, and less politically, how would you deal
with emergent properties? Brains (which I assume you agree
have purpose) are composed of neurons (which I assume you
agree do not have purpose). If you accept that people have
purpose in this way, why should social structures not also
be described with similar terminology?
--
Ed Faith
> James A. Donald wrote:
>
>> Gabrielle Rapagnetta
>
>
>>> The worldview of the sane would look at the overall effect of an
>>> industry as well as the motives of competing individuals.
>
>
>> But that was not the argument that you attributed to me. You referred
>> to "the purpose",. "The tobacco industry" is not an entity capable of
>> having a purpose.
>
>
> Hmm. So you think it inappropriate to refer to "purpose" when
> dealing with an aggregate entity. For instance, an anthill
> cannot have a purpose. Is that right? Would you extend this
> to collections of human beings? Would you be unwilling to
> talk about the purpose of an organisation, when many people
> working there disagreed with its (possibly written, possibly
> not) agenda?
The problem is not that organized groups of animals or of people cannot
have purposes, the problem is that classes of people or of things do not
typically have purposes. An individual tobacco company is an organized
group of people, but the industry as a whole is a class of people rather
than an organized group.
> More interestingly, and less politically, how would you deal
> with emergent properties? Brains (which I assume you agree
> have purpose) are composed of neurons (which I assume you
> agree do not have purpose). If you accept that people have
> purpose in this way, why should social structures not also
> be described with similar terminology?
They should only be so described when something actually emerges.
Emergence happens when it really happens out there; it does not happen
whenever we come up with a label for a category (such as "the tobacco
industry").
Moreover, the purposefulness of entities like ant colonies is a greatly
limited version of the purposefulness of entities like individual human
beings, and in many ways human companies are much less intensely
"purpose-driven" than are ant colonies (since the degree of intra-colony
altruism among ants is nearly complete while the degree of intra-company
altruism among company employees is limited).
Finally, I am not sure that the purpose of a company really emerges. If
a man has a plan, and hires people in order to fulfill that plan, and
they hire people, then has the purpose of that company "emerged"? Not if
the purpose of the company is the purpose given to it by its founder.
Nor would I necessarily say that the purpose of a colony of ants
emerges. I would rather say, it has evolved. The parts (the ants) are
evolved in order to give the colony intelligent-like behavior. In
contrast, in the usual example of emergence, the individual parts have
not specifically been designed or evolved in order to bring about the
emergent behavior, but rather the emergent behavior emerges *despite*
the parts not having been specifically geared to produce that behavior.
Jeffrey Turner
> --
> "Alex Russell"
>
>>>>"The Affluent Society" by John Kenneth Galbraith covers
>>>>this subject and was written in 1958
>
>
> James A. Donald:
>
>>>"The Affluent society" like most of Galbraith's books, was
>>>a defense of an idea that had recently become indefensible,
>>>When Galbraith publishes a book arguing X, that was always
>>>clear sign that X was an idea that had previously been
>>>popular among the intellectuals, but had recently been
>>>overthrown by events.
>>>
>>>Galbraith's books were and are popular precisely because
>>>they were invariably defenses against reality. They were
>>>generally written when events casting doubt on the beloved
>>>idea were looming, and appeared just as those events
>>>decisively discredited the beloved idea.
>
>>It was still about ten years before affluence was decisively
>>on the wane in the US. I wouldn't blame him for that.
>
> The US was of course affluent, and has become more affluent.
> Galbraith's claim was not that the US was affluent, but that
> private wealth was unnecessary, ridiculous and unwanted.
>
> "The Affluent society" complains about growth, and condemns it.
> Supposedly we should all be happy on official rations and straw
> mats, as if once men's most basic material desires are met,
> they are fed, clothed and housed, then their fundamental
> purposes in life have been fulfilled, and that any material
> consumption beyond this base level is unnatural and is created
> somehow by forces extrinsic to the individual and this
> consumption is a historical aberration that is being fostered
> by erroneous attitudes and insidious advertising.
>
> The old argument was that socialism was good because it would
> make us all affluent. The new argument was now that socialism
> was good because it would make us all poor, and poverty is good
> for the soul. No one today is likely to believe that the souls
> of the subjects of the Soviets were improved by poverty.
Conventional wisdom has it that John Kenneth Galbraith's The Affluent
Society spawned the neoliberalism we see in Bill Clinton, Tony Blair,
and other world leaders. The economist's prose, lofty but still easily
manageable, laid down the gauntlet for the post-cold war class
struggle that was still far in the future in 1958. Galbraith saw the
widening gap between the richest and the poorest as an emergent threat
to economic stability, and proposed significant investment in parks,
transportation, education, and other public amenities--what we now
call infrastructure--to ameliorate these differences and postpone
depression and revolution indefinitely. Widely criticized by
conservatives and libertarians wary of public expenditures or
increased government influence, Galbraith still influences liberal and
neoliberal thinking. He has acknowledged that his work, like that of
most social scientists, contains flaws (like his dire prediction of an
out-of-control unemployment and inflation spiral that petered out in
the 1980's), but much of it remains fresh and true even today.
G*rd*n
> > It is my impression that _The_Affluent_Society_ suggested
> > that the lower orders could be better managed by and for the
> > capitalist ruling class through government programs
> > encouraging various sorts of subsidized consumption, thus
> > producing at least a more orderly society, and perhaps a
> > happier one as well, if consumption is happiness.
James A. Donald <jam...@echeque.com>:
> The proposal was to restrict private consumption, which he
> argued was excessive, It is often said that Galbraith's entire
> career consisted of angling to get his wartime job back.
>
> His wartime job was to use socialism to do what socialism does
> so well: Reduce private consumption.
Consumption was to be enhanced, not reduced. Possibly
Galbraith doubted that private citizens as such were up to
the heavy but necessary tasks of consuming which lay ahead
of them.
michael price
> >Gabrielle Rapagnetta:
> >> I remember reading that the amount of money that passes through the
> >> cosmetics industry each year is about twice the amount that is needed
> >> to end world hunger.
> >>
> >> than the demand created by over a billion hungry people who need work,
> >> quite obviously the free market is not functioning correctly. I think
> >> the $400 billion that passes through the advertising industry annually
> >> just might have something to do with that. Crazy, eh?
> >
> >
> (G*rd*n) wrote:
> >Actually, the demand created by Revlon, etc., contributes to
> >feeding poor hungry people. Here's how: Revlon gets money
> >from people who would rather paint their faces, which is fun
> >and thus has immediate payoff value, than send the money to
> >someone who might give it to poor, hungry, remote children
> >they don't know, which isn't much fun actually and has only
> >very abstract payoff value. Revlon uses some of this money
> >to run their cosmetics factories. Cosmetics, especially the
> >packaging and shipping, is difficult to automate, and thus it
> >is the home of many un- and semi- skilled job slots. Also,
> >because of the chemicals involved, and the fact that it's
> >low-paid, it's an extremely shitty job as jobs go in America.
> >So many of those jobs are available for people from the Third
> >World, especially Latin America. These people _do_ send
> >money to poor, hungry, remote children because they _do_
> >know them. Next time you see a Revlon factory croaking
> >in the fogslime, remember that. (Or have they moved them
> >all to China now?)
>
> Sure, nobody is denying that there is a nominal trickle-down effect.
> This flow of capital to developing countries is minimized, however.
By what?
> And if the national debt of the country in question exceeds the amount
> of capital paying off the workers then those funds just trickle right
> back out again.
>
And that would happen whether or not westerners paint their faces.
The difference is that at least the workers have a job in the meantime.
The national debt is a creation of the State not trade.
> That's a common gripe about globalization, but it is not the argument
> I'm making here. These industries (may I call them vice industries?)
> are growing. In other words they are attracting investors more easily
> than an entire nation of hungry, homeless, jobless people.
You are comparing apples and oranges, nations attracting investors
is a different thing than industries doing so. Industries can move
(as the Yanks are finding out).
Yes, and why is that? It's because to demand you have to supply.
Now why can't 3rd world people supply? It's not because their
countries are too capitalist.
>
> I have never really understood why Americans ask why they are losing
> jobs to developing countries. That's a given.
That depends on whether you mean net jobs or just individual jobs.
I think it's normal that countries "lose jobs" to less developed
countries in areas that don't require much development and replace
them with jobs that do.
> Instead we should be asking why we are NOT losing investors.
>
> Sure, Revlon contributes loaves of bread to hungry people. But what
> would Revlon's investors have contributed if Revlon were not a
> growing, profitable industry? Probably not a loaf of bread, but
> rather an entire bakery.
Why would they do that? What is it about not making profit that
makes people want to build bakeries for 3rd world people? Investment
is not a zero sum game.
>
> >However, I don't think inadequate food supply is really a
> >money problem; I think it is a political problem. If you took
> >away Revlon's advertising money and sent it in the direction
> >of Bangladesh or wherever, it is my strong intuition that very
> >little of it would actually get turned into food which was to
> >be actually eaten by poor people.
>
> The advertising money is chump change. I'm talking about taking away
> their growth and letting supply and demand actually function properly.
By which you mean we supply what you demand we supply.
michael price
While I'd like to believe that spammers are all impotent, small dicked
bald men I just don't buy it (and if I did I wouldn't tell you I did ;> ).
The things I usually see spammed are things that people would be reluctant
to inquire about publically and so are suitable for an anonymous purchase.
This desire for anonimity also protects the spammer from the inevitable
desire for a refund when the creams don't magically produce 3 more inchs.
James A. Donald
James A. Donald <jam...@echeque.com>:
> > I have seen marketing from the inside. Marketing and
> > product design are not clever master manipulators, they
> > are in the dark, desperately wondering what will please a
> > fickle god. Employers have no idea whether a marketer is
> > any good, and marketers have no idea if they are any good.
> >
> > The one rule that works is "can the consumer remember the
> > product's brand and what it does". Marketers that try for
> > something more clever generally fail, which was the point
> > of all those marketing insider jokes in the "Jack in the
> > box" series.
G*rd*n:
> When I read _Advertising_Age_ I read about campaigns whose
> effects are carefully observed in terms of sales. It is true
> that most fail, but it's also true that most of the shots a
> hunter takes fail to hit anything, and most of the time when
> a cat attempts to catch a mouse the mouse gets away. But
> this doesn't mean mice never get caught, or that hunters
> never bring home game, or that advertising always fails to do
> anything.
Advertising does quite a lot. If no one knows what you are
selling, no one will buy it.
This, however, is not the same thing as forcing people to buy
stuff against their will.
--digsig
James A. Donald
6YeGpsZR+nOTh/cGwvITnSR3TdzclVpR0+pr3YYQdkG
QonZLLfrXf+RCDQDCgn18+0zzhfXpcJ2i5jti9gD
4n8UjS3KIfnGVkc/SikYlDr0j0s5HZL1D5Jc02lrr
James A. Donald
James A. Donald
> : It appears to me, that most of the ad space in the entire
> : capitalist world has the nominal purpose of selling
> : impractical underwear to women. If Gabrielle Rapagnetta's
> : devoted to the production and consumption of impractical
> : women's underwear.
Joshua Holmes
> Surprisingly, much female underwear is inedible.
If Gabrielle Rapagnetta's theories are correct, we should be
eating what the advertisers suggest we eat.
--digsig
James A. Donald
6YeGpsZR+nOTh/cGwvITnSR3TdzclVpR0+pr3YYQdkG
oV+lV0AFPUIG15zCjY50gv844qFOMwscYLGOUKLe
4iXrdm5asUFABhBknSKc8cnY2JTifOySohCieUR2X
James A. Donald
On 5 May 2004 10:56:05 -0400, g...@panix.com (G*rd*n) wrote:
> Sure, but they weren't allowed to use them. After all,
> adults have to supply the money to buy them, so it's pretty
> easy to cut off the supply. However, we now live in a world
> where children are being sexualized (or their inherent
> sexuality is being recognized, whatever). I'm not sure why
> this is, or when it started, but it's clearly a thing adults
> are doing with children rather than something children are
> doing themselves.
Oh come on.
The joke and the stereotype is that little ann, the pre-teen is
allowed to choose her own clothes, gets her navel pierced,
chooses clothes appropriate to a twenty dollar whore, parents
throw fit, retract the privilege of choosing own clothes.
Until the victorians started making a big deal out of
childhood, children always dressed as smaller versions of
adults. It did not mean they were prematurely sexualized, just
that they were playing at being adults. Little ann in her porn
star costume no more intends to have sex, than little johnny in
his cowboy costume intends to actually shoot someone.
--digsig
James A. Donald
6YeGpsZR+nOTh/cGwvITnSR3TdzclVpR0+pr3YYQdkG
IMuhXL/XDd0jXbsfJCro9jiufJL3t00cdy90ktBu
41SffwabmD6leEIkTj21hVeHtunT62qBNLWyMDCeO
James A. Donald
James A. Donald:
> > "The tobacco industry" is not an entity capable of having a
> > purpose.
"chris.holt"
> Hmm. So you think it inappropriate to refer to "purpose"
> when dealing with an aggregate entity.
Except to the deranged, "the tobacco industry" is not an
aggregate entity.
Philip Morris is an aggregate entity. IBM is an aggregate
entity.
> For instance, an anthill cannot have a purpose. Is that
> right?
The ant colony that lives in the anthill can certainly have a
purpose, just as a pack of wolves can have a purpose, and very
often it obviously does.
A set of ant colonies, or the set of cats that live in around
my block, cannot have a purpose.
You are stating a paranoid delusion as if it was an
uncontroversial fact that no one could seriously doubt. The
fact that your beliefs differ from those of many others is not
in itself evidence of loss of contact with reality, but the
fact that you are, in this posting (as in so many others)
unaware that your beliefs differ from those of many others is
evidence of loss of contact with reality.
--digsig
James A. Donald
6YeGpsZR+nOTh/cGwvITnSR3TdzclVpR0+pr3YYQdkG
rgIrwaIGRAN8jGmxRRw04XgziqPlvK06AAL7e8Jl
4kZ6efGyC5TPs22yLLukDfGL4rrdFzoFJAHMjbn6x
James A. Donald
On Wed, 05 May 2004 18:56:42 -0400, Jeffrey Turner
> Conventional wisdom has it that John Kenneth Galbraith's The
> Affluent Society spawned the neoliberalism we see in Bill
> Clinton, Tony Blair, and other world leaders.
Conventional wisdom argues no such thing. To a few deranged
Marxists vainly lusting for Pol Pot's killing fields, the
difference between what Galbraith argued and what Clinton
argued may seem small -- but to the same people, the difference
between what Lenin argued and what Clinton argued also seems
small.
Galbraith spent his whole life arguing, first for the
continuation of wartime command socialism, and then for its
resumption. He also endorsed the economic order of various
socialist tyrannies.
Wartime command socialism was swiftly abandoned in the US. In
germany, england, australia, and a few other countries it was
continued to 1948-49, with disastrous consequences, forever
discrediting the position that Galbraith continued to argue
for.
--digsig
James A. Donald
6YeGpsZR+nOTh/cGwvITnSR3TdzclVpR0+pr3YYQdkG
EeM446CpS4vekA6mwMIuz3i234wsTv1CGN4jA12u
4IQn8xknttR+2LHn9h2+kpe8KxsTzit6s/Flr+w/C
James A. Donald
James A. Donald <jam...@echeque.com>:
> > The proposal was to restrict private consumption, which he
> > argued was excessive, It is often said that Galbraith's
> > entire career consisted of angling to get his wartime job
> > back.
> >
> > His wartime job was to use socialism to do what socialism
> > does so well: Reduce private consumption.
G*rd*n
> Consumption was to be enhanced, not reduced.
The proposition that Galbraith is some kind of moderate left
liberal of the Clinton/Gore brand is as deranged as the
proposition that Chomsky is some kind of anarchist. Anyone who
believes it, is apt to believe that Stalin was soft on the
kulaks.
Galbraith was a "moderate" in the sense that he wanted
austerity, command, and control characteristic of World War II,
rather than austerity, command and control characteristic of
the Khmer Rouge, but that is still not very moderate, except to
those who think that Stalin was a softie.
--digsig
James A. Donald
6YeGpsZR+nOTh/cGwvITnSR3TdzclVpR0+pr3YYQdkG
EXMjFh54+VT6eso23nffr0KcXkYsjtoZgnDfilpV
4HOCrfsQIBaTIkw/jtS0NhzyRauETmXRu+yP+CDB5
Gabrielle Rapagnetta
>> Sure, nobody is denying that there is a nominal trickle-down effect.
>> This flow of capital to developing countries is minimized, however.
>
> By what?
Armies, mostly. Observe Aristide's fate when he tried to raise the
minimum wage in Haiti.
>> And if the national debt of the country in question exceeds the amount
>> of capital paying off the workers then those funds just trickle right
>> back out again.
>>
> And that would happen whether or not westerners paint their faces.
>The difference is that at least the workers have a job in the meantime.
>The national debt is a creation of the State not trade.
Ah, you're a proponent of transgenerational indentured servitude, I
see. Another free marketeer shows his true colors.
>> That's a common gripe about globalization, but it is not the argument
>> I'm making here. These industries (may I call them vice industries?)
>> are growing. In other words they are attracting investors more easily
>> than an entire nation of hungry, homeless, jobless people.
>
> You are comparing apples and oranges, nations attracting investors
>is a different thing than industries doing so. Industries can move
>(as the Yanks are finding out).
I think you've missed my point.
I'll sum it up for you:
The apple people: Tremendous demand for a wide assortment of products
needed to survive (food, shelter, infrastructure) for which there is a
lack of supply solely due to the fact that there is a lack of
investors.
The orange people; Tremendous supply of trivial crap (and growing!)
for which an equal demand must be created and maintained.
Right now the investors are going with the orange people for the most
part. I am suggesting that without $400 billion flowing through the
advertising industry annually that the demand for these trivial
products would decline and production, along with its investors, would
go to the apple people who actually have real needs and could provide
industries with growing markets.
> Yes, and why is that? It's because to demand you have to supply.
>Now why can't 3rd world people supply? It's not because their
>countries are too capitalist.
I've got no clue what you are trying to say here.
[...]
>> Sure, Revlon contributes loaves of bread to hungry people. But what
>> would Revlon's investors have contributed if Revlon were not a
>> growing, profitable industry? Probably not a loaf of bread, but
>> rather an entire bakery.
>
> Why would they do that? What is it about not making profit that
>makes people want to build bakeries for 3rd world people? Investment
>is not a zero sum game.
Perhaps if you didn't view hungry, homeless, jobless people as
potential slaves you might be able to look at them as a potential
growth market.
>> >However, I don't think inadequate food supply is really a
>> >money problem; I think it is a political problem. If you took
>> >away Revlon's advertising money and sent it in the direction
>> >of Bangladesh or wherever, it is my strong intuition that very
>> >little of it would actually get turned into food which was to
>> >be actually eaten by poor people.
>>
>> The advertising money is chump change. I'm talking about taking away
>> their growth and letting supply and demand actually function properly.
>
> By which you mean we supply what you demand we supply.
I mean no such thing. Produce whatever useless, crappy widget you
feel like. Just don't spam an entire nation with your
TV/radio/newspaper/billboards/op-eds/hired 'scientists'/email ads
trying to convince us we need what you're selling. That's market
distortion. Without that distortion the developing nations of the
world would actually develop. And Westerners might even start raising
their own children. There's a crazy thought...
James A. Donald
> > > Sure, nobody is denying that there is a nominal
> > > trickle-down effect. This flow of capital to developing
> > > countries is minimized, however.
michael price wrote:
> > By what?
Gabrielle Rapagnetta wrote:
> Armies, mostly. Observe Aristide's fate when he tried to
> raise the minimum wage in Haiti.
Gee, I though we observed Aristide's fate when he had his
political opponents tortured to death and silenced all
opposition.
Haiti is not poor because of the minimum wage law. It is poor
because of kleptocracy.
--digsig
James A. Donald
6YeGpsZR+nOTh/cGwvITnSR3TdzclVpR0+pr3YYQdkG
vZ1M3hphJPtZsa5POW77455K4ziFQDbwMwjQm7QP
4eonyb69lej7OlCgXVHhrVRca39HO/CkoqfYI8fE9
James A. Donald
On Wed, 05 May 2004 22:50:16 -0700, Gabrielle Rapagnetta
> The apple people: Tremendous demand for a wide assortment of
> products needed to survive (food, shelter, infrastructure)
> for which there is a lack of supply solely due to the fact
> that there is a lack of investors.
>
> The orange people; Tremendous supply of trivial crap (and
> growing!) for which an equal demand must be created and
> maintained.
>
> Right now the investors are going with the orange people for
> the most part.
But why? After these evil investors have supposedly invested in
armies to force the apple people to accept low wages, should
not they be investing where the low wages are?
Instead we see the people in low wage countries sneaking their
savings out to invest in high wage countries
The reason that those people are poor is because people like
you have power over them, power maintained, as Aristide's power
was maintained, by terror and murder.
--digsig
James A. Donald
6YeGpsZR+nOTh/cGwvITnSR3TdzclVpR0+pr3YYQdkG
S8H9sukYoKt2mJHjmMTFIoDa/LcTbQp/SRV7eKob
4qsEkw+KrZOaKixCihW49wHaSsnA3mRn0Y1BGgXDP
G*rd*n
> > > The proposal was to restrict private consumption, which he
> > > argued was excessive, It is often said that Galbraith's
> > > entire career consisted of angling to get his wartime job
> > > back.
> > >
> > > His wartime job was to use socialism to do what socialism
> > > does so well: Reduce private consumption.
G*rd*n
> > Consumption was to be enhanced, not reduced.
James A. Donald <jam...@echeque.com>:
> The proposition that Galbraith is some kind of moderate left
> liberal of the Clinton/Gore brand is as deranged as the
> proposition that Chomsky is some kind of anarchist. Anyone who
> believes it, is apt to believe that Stalin was soft on the
> kulaks.
>
> Galbraith was a "moderate" in the sense that he wanted
> austerity, command, and control characteristic of World War II,
> rather than austerity, command and control characteristic of
> the Khmer Rouge, but that is still not very moderate, except to
> those who think that Stalin was a softie.
I have not read the book in a long time, but what you write
doesn't make much sense to me. In order to keep capitalism
going, demand has to be increased or at least maintained.
The question then arises, can this be done best by laissez-faire,
governance, or something in between? If aggregate demand were
to be merely restrained, capitalism (as people knew it in 1958
or whenever _The_Affluent_Society_ was written) would collapse
or at least go through a very severe wringer. I am not so
sure the question has been solved even yet, but in a way it
seems moot because it has become obvious that the various
states will always have a variety of wars, real and threatened,
to waste their money on. I don't think that was forseen by
Galbraith; he probably thought war was abnormal.
James A. Donald
James A., Donald
> > Galbraith was a "moderate" in the sense that he wanted
> > austerity, command, and control characteristic of World War
> > II, rather than austerity, command and control
> > characteristic of the Khmer Rouge, but that is still not
> > very moderate, except to those who think that Stalin was a
> > softie.
On 6 May 2004 10:43:55 -0400, g...@panix.com (G*rd*n) wrote:
> I have not read the book in a long time, but what you write
> doesn't make much sense to me. In order to keep capitalism
> going, demand has to be increased or at least maintained.
Well if you are not demanding enough, you can give me your
excess.
Galbraith was presenting a rationalization for smashing
capitalism, not a recommendation for sustaining it..
When it became obvious that socialism was only good for
producing poverty, socialists started to argue that poverty was
good for us, and in the affluent society, Galbraith was
defending that position, arguing that aflluence should be
smashed by state violence, not that it should be sustatined.
--digsig
James A. Donald
6YeGpsZR+nOTh/cGwvITnSR3TdzclVpR0+pr3YYQdkG
PWfbbmQAg1hXc3j+xU8oErGTPLJjXPfSyawlMKmX
4CeNC8/PSnUcVPheoncMjurHIC4W6fyGfG7gqaPDN
Ed Faith
> --
> James A., Donald
>
>>>Galbraith was a "moderate" in the sense that he wanted
>>>austerity, command, and control characteristic of World War
>>>II, rather than austerity, command and control
>>>characteristic of the Khmer Rouge, but that is still not
>>>very moderate, except to those who think that Stalin was a
>>>softie.
>
>
> On 6 May 2004 10:43:55 -0400, g...@panix.com (G*rd*n) wrote:
>
>>I have not read the book in a long time, but what you write
>>doesn't make much sense to me. In order to keep capitalism
>>going, demand has to be increased or at least maintained.
>
>
> Well if you are not demanding enough, you can give me your
> excess.
>
> Galbraith was presenting a rationalization for smashing
> capitalism, not a recommendation for sustaining it..
Obviously. If Galbraith is pro-capitalism why is it that
anti-capitalists love to refer to him and pro-capitalists have nothing
good to say about him? That evidence is of course indirect, but anyone
familiar with the economic defense of capitalism only has to open up one
of Galbraith's books to verify that Galbraith is no friend of capitalism.
Gabrielle Rapagnetta
> Gabrielle Rapagnetta
>> The apple people: Tremendous demand for a wide assortment of
>> products needed to survive (food, shelter, infrastructure)
>> for which there is a lack of supply solely due to the fact
>> that there is a lack of investors.
>>
>> The orange people; Tremendous supply of trivial crap (and
>> growing!) for which an equal demand must be created and
>> maintained.
>>
>> Right now the investors are going with the orange people for
>> the most part.
>
>But why? After these evil investors have supposedly invested in
>armies to force the apple people to accept low wages, should
>not they be investing where the low wages are?
According to the theories of you neoliberal clowns, yes. In reality,
not so much.
For the record, I did not call investors evil -- you did. I am
suggesting that if consumption in the richer countries declined that
the poorer countries would make up the demand -- in a much more
meaningful and stable way.
>Instead we see the people in low wage countries sneaking their
>savings out to invest in high wage countries
We see the richest fifth of the world's citizens responsible for 86%
of the world's consumption. The bottom fifth is consumes 1.4% (and
this number is dropping, despite you yammering on about the success of
your favored financial schemes).
You are sadly detached from reality if you believe that any
significant amount of low wage earners are saving and investing. Half
the world is making less than $2 a day, but somehow you believe that
they are investing in America. What a crackpot world you live in.
>The reason that those people are poor is because people like
>you have power over them, power maintained, as Aristide's power
>was maintained, by terror and murder.
Your 'ad nauseam' tactic of pushing these ridiculous lies gets too
tiresome for me. What we need here is a Usenet-trained monkey to
post counter-lies to each of your posts.
chris.holt
> chris.holt wrote:
>> James A. Donald wrote:
>>> But that was not the argument that you attributed to me. You
>>> referred to "the purpose",. "The tobacco industry" is not an entity
>>> capable of having a purpose.
>> Hmm. So you think it inappropriate to refer to "purpose" when
>> dealing with an aggregate entity. For instance, an anthill
>> cannot have a purpose. Is that right? Would you extend this
>> to collections of human beings? Would you be unwilling to
>> talk about the purpose of an organisation, when many people
>> working there disagreed with its (possibly written, possibly
>> not) agenda?
> The problem is not that organized groups of animals or of people cannot
> have purposes, ...
Well, it seems that for some people it is. All I'm trying
to do here is help us define the boundaries of those
collections which may be deemed to have 'purpose' and
those which may not. FWIW, I'm not into teleology myself,
so that kind of thing doesn't apply. I'm just interested
(here) in word/concept usage.
> ... the problem is that classes of people or of things do not
> typically have purposes. An individual tobacco company is an organized
> group of people, but the industry as a whole is a class of people rather
> than an organized group.
I'm not sure I believe that. Well, to be more positive/negative,
I'm pretty sure I don't believe that. An individual company
(tobacco or otherwise) consists of lots of components, once
it gets big enough. The idea that all the people in all those
components share any kind of a goal is laughable. Middle
management would happily see the company as a whole go down
the tubes if they themselves ended up better off. Low income
employees would happily trash their superiors because they
think they're sadistic bastards. This isn't always true, of
course; and in good companies this kind of attitude is rare.
But to deny that this is (frighteningly) widespread is to
put one's head in the sand, and say that 'Dilbert' doesn't
exist.
>> More interestingly, and less politically, how would you deal
>> with emergent properties? Brains (which I assume you agree
>> have purpose) are composed of neurons (which I assume you
>> agree do not have purpose). If you accept that people have
>> purpose in this way, why should social structures not also
>> be described with similar terminology?
> They should only be so described when something actually emerges.
> Emergence happens when it really happens out there; it does not happen
> whenever we come up with a label for a category (such as "the tobacco
> industry").
I don't argue with that. I do suggest that when you see
common patterns of behaviour, and that these have an impact
on the relationship between the entities in question (here,
the tobacco companies) and their environment (here, people
dealing with those companies, either as private individuals
or as regulatory institutions) *then* it makes sense to talk
about emergent properties.
> Moreover, the purposefulness of entities like ant colonies is a greatly
> limited version of the purposefulness of entities like individual human
> beings, and in many ways human companies are much less intensely
> "purpose-driven" than are ant colonies (since the degree of intra-colony
> altruism among ants is nearly complete while the degree of intra-company
> altruism among company employees is limited).
I'm not sure why you place such an emphasis on altruism here.
It seems that you're anthropomorphizing: an ant doesn't see
itself as altruistic (as far as we know); it just does what
it does. The whole point of emergent properties is that they
*don't* depend on the conscious awareness of components leading
to those goals.
> Finally, I am not sure that the purpose of a company really emerges. If
> a man has a plan, and hires people in order to fulfill that plan, and
> they hire people, then has the purpose of that company "emerged"? Not if
> the purpose of the company is the purpose given to it by its founder.
Sorry, I don't see where you're going here. I'm not talking
about awareness of purposes; so maybe we're talking at
cross-purposes (as it were :-).
> Nor would I necessarily say that the purpose of a colony of ants
> emerges. I would rather say, it has evolved.
As far as I'm concerned, that's a distinction without a difference.
The whole discussion (I thought) depended on whether we should use
the word 'purpose' for collective entities, the components of which
didn't didn't themselves have that 'purpose'. As soon as you talk
about evolution, you're talking about how that 'purpose' evolved;
but that's not the same thing. It's a bit like saying that when
I'm typing on my keyboard to talk to you, my purpose in doing so
evolved from our developing opposable thumbs. It's true that
I couldn't have done so without that evolution, but it's not
helpful in our understanding of why I typed what I did.
> The parts (the ants) are
> evolved in order to give the colony intelligent-like behavior. In
> contrast, in the usual example of emergence, the individual parts have
> not specifically been designed or evolved in order to bring about the
> emergent behavior, but rather the emergent behavior emerges *despite*
> the parts not having been specifically geared to produce that behavior.
I'm not sure what you intend by 'despite' here. I assume you're
thinking of cellular automata or boids or various other ALife
ecologies, but I don't see where you're going.
--
Ed Faith
> Ed Faith wrote:
>
>> chris.holt wrote:
>>
>>> James A. Donald wrote:
>
>
>>>> But that was not the argument that you attributed to me. You
>>>> referred to "the purpose",. "The tobacco industry" is not an entity
>>>> capable of having a purpose.
>
>
>>> Hmm. So you think it inappropriate to refer to "purpose" when
>>> dealing with an aggregate entity. For instance, an anthill
>>> cannot have a purpose. Is that right? Would you extend this
>>> to collections of human beings? Would you be unwilling to
>>> talk about the purpose of an organisation, when many people
>>> working there disagreed with its (possibly written, possibly
>>> not) agenda?
>
>
>> The problem is not that organized groups of animals or of people
>> cannot have purposes, ...
>
>
> Well, it seems that for some people it is.
You're mistaken in your interpretation.
> All I'm trying
> to do here is help us define the boundaries of those
> collections which may be deemed to have 'purpose' and
> those which may not. FWIW, I'm not into teleology myself,
> so that kind of thing doesn't apply. I'm just interested
> (here) in word/concept usage.
But it's not a question of concepts, but of facts. It is not a question
of definition nor of openion but of fact whether the people who make up
"the tobacco industry" constitute an entity capable of having a purpose.
That depends on how they are organized.
>> ... the problem is that classes of people or of things do not
>> typically have purposes. An individual tobacco company is an organized
>> group of people, but the industry as a whole is a class of people
>> rather than an organized group.
>
>
> I'm not sure I believe that. Well, to be more positive/negative,
> I'm pretty sure I don't believe that. An individual company
> (tobacco or otherwise) consists of lots of components, once
> it gets big enough. The idea that all the people in all those
> components share any kind of a goal is laughable. Middle
> management would happily see the company as a whole go down
> the tubes if they themselves ended up better off. Low income
> employees would happily trash their superiors because they
> think they're sadistic bastards. This isn't always true, of
> course; and in good companies this kind of attitude is rare.
> But to deny that this is (frighteningly) widespread is to
> put one's head in the sand, and say that 'Dilbert' doesn't
> exist.
I don't know what you are going on about. Just previously you seemed to
imply that even unorganized groups of people can easily have a purpose;
now you seem to deny it. It seems as though you are just being
contradictory for the sake of being contradictory. It's boring. For what
it's worth, to say that a company has a purpose is not to say that every
employee has that purpose in mind, so your objection, while describing a
true situation in itself, fails as a response to the claim that
companies have a purpose. Similarly, individual cells have no conception
of the body's whole purpose, therefore they do not have that purpose in
mind. So each person having the company's purpose in mind is not required.
G*rd*n
> > > Galbraith was a "moderate" in the sense that he wanted
> > > austerity, command, and control characteristic of World War
> > > II, rather than austerity, command and control
> > > characteristic of the Khmer Rouge, but that is still not
> > > very moderate, except to those who think that Stalin was a
> > > softie.
g...@panix.com (G*rd*n) wrote:
> > I have not read the book in a long time, but what you write
> > doesn't make much sense to me. In order to keep capitalism
> > going, demand has to be increased or at least maintained.
James A. Donald <jam...@echeque.com>:
> Well if you are not demanding enough, you can give me your
> excess.
I'd rather work less and spend more time and energy doing
the things I like doing. You can see how that attitude
would be undesirable from the capitalists' point of view,
as well as from the point of view of those who propose
to tax them and their customers, a set which I believe
included Mr. Galbraith.
James A. Donald <jam...@echeque.com>:
> Galbraith was presenting a rationalization for smashing
> capitalism, not a recommendation for sustaining it..
>
> When it became obvious that socialism was only good for
> producing poverty, socialists started to argue that poverty was
> good for us, and in the affluent society, Galbraith was
> defending that position, arguing that aflluence should be
> smashed by state violence, not that it should be sustatined.
I believe he wanted a different _kind_ of affluence. But
affluence and yet more affluence there must be. That is, if
capitalism is to be continued.
Gabrielle Rapagnetta
>chris.holt wrote:
>> All I'm trying
>> to do here is help us define the boundaries of those
>> collections which may be deemed to have 'purpose' and
>> those which may not. FWIW, I'm not into teleology myself,
>> so that kind of thing doesn't apply. I'm just interested
>> (here) in word/concept usage.
>
>But it's not a question of concepts, but of facts. It is not a question
>of definition nor of openion but of fact whether the people who make up
>"the tobacco industry" constitute an entity capable of having a purpose.
>That depends on how they are organized.
I sit in utter amazement that you are still trying to deny that the
corporations of any particular industry can and do act in concert with
each other with collective purpose.
You free market yahoos should go read what your neoliberal puppet
masters have to say about the subject:
http://www.cato.org/dailys/07-14-01.html
In the meantime I'll prepare myself for the inevitable, tiresome
comeback: "Oh, but cartels are inherently unstable." yada yada
G*rd*n
> Obviously. If Galbraith is pro-capitalism why is it that
> anti-capitalists love to refer to him and pro-capitalists have nothing
You are using circular definitions, that's why.
If, as James says, socialism produces poverty, then
socialists need not concern themselves with affluence.
If affluence is a problem, it is a problem for those
who have chosen actually-existing capitalism, with or
without Welfare icing on the cake, because that is
where the supposed affluence shows up.
People advocating capitalism with Welfare are still
pro-capitalists. The true lover of capitalism, I
imagine, notices and tries to fix its defects, rather
than merely worshiping its image and claiming
perfection for it.
G*rd*n
Gabrielle Rapagnetta <n0spam....@gmx.net>:
> Sure, nobody is denying that there is a nominal trickle-down effect.
> This flow of capital to developing countries is minimized, however.
> And if the national debt of the country in question exceeds the amount
> of capital paying off the workers then those funds just trickle right
> back out again.
>
> That's a common gripe about globalization, but it is not the argument
> I'm making here. These industries (may I call them vice industries?)
> are growing. In other words they are attracting investors more easily
> than an entire nation of hungry, homeless, jobless people.
>
> I have never really understood why Americans ask why they are losing
> jobs to developing countries. That's a given. Instead we should be
> asking why we are NOT losing investors.
If jobs are actually being moved overseas, that means capital
is being moved overseas, unless the capital is being developed
in the countries to which the jobs are moving. I suspect
that there is a good deal of both going on, if, as we hear,
the workers are paid little and the profits are high.
Gabrielle Rapagnetta <n0spam....@gmx.net>:
> Sure, Revlon contributes loaves of bread to hungry people. But what
> would Revlon's investors have contributed if Revlon were not a
> growing, profitable industry? Probably not a loaf of bread, but
> rather an entire bakery.
Why would they do this?
(G*rd*n) wrote:
> >However, I don't think inadequate food supply is really a
> >money problem; I think it is a political problem. If you took
> >away Revlon's advertising money and sent it in the direction
> >of Bangladesh or wherever, it is my strong intuition that very
> >little of it would actually get turned into food which was to
> >be actually eaten by poor people.
Gabrielle Rapagnetta <n0spam....@gmx.net>:
> The advertising money is chump change. I'm talking about taking away
> their growth and letting supply and demand actually function properly.
Whose growth?
Jeffrey Turner
> chris.holt wrote:
>> James A. Donald wrote:
>>> Gabrielle Rapagnetta
>>
>>
>>>> The worldview of the sane would look at the overall effect of an
>>>> industry as well as the motives of competing individuals.
>>
>>> But that was not the argument that you attributed to me. You
>>> referred to "the purpose",. "The tobacco industry" is not an entity
>>> capable of having a purpose.
>>
>> Hmm. So you think it inappropriate to refer to "purpose" when
>> dealing with an aggregate entity. For instance, an anthill
>> cannot have a purpose. Is that right? Would you extend this
>> to collections of human beings? Would you be unwilling to
>> talk about the purpose of an organisation, when many people
>> working there disagreed with its (possibly written, possibly
>> not) agenda?
>
> The problem is not that organized groups of animals or of people cannot
> have purposes, the problem is that classes of people or of things do not
> typically have purposes. An individual tobacco company is an organized
> group of people, but the industry as a whole is a class of people rather
> than an organized group.
"Men of the same profession never meet together except to defraud the
general public." --Adam Smith
Gabrielle Rapagnetta
>> Sure, nobody is denying that there is a nominal trickle-down effect.
>> This flow of capital to developing countries is minimized, however.
>> And if the national debt of the country in question exceeds the amount
>> of capital paying off the workers then those funds just trickle right
>> back out again.
>>
>> That's a common gripe about globalization, but it is not the argument
>> I'm making here. These industries (may I call them vice industries?)
>> are growing. In other words they are attracting investors more easily
>> than an entire nation of hungry, homeless, jobless people.
>>
>> I have never really understood why Americans ask why they are losing
>> jobs to developing countries. That's a given. Instead we should be
>> asking why we are NOT losing investors.
>
>If jobs are actually being moved overseas, that means capital
>is being moved overseas, unless the capital is being developed
>in the countries to which the jobs are moving. I suspect
>that there is a good deal of both going on, if, as we hear,
>the workers are paid little and the profits are high.
The capital you are talking about is a very small amount compared to
the potential capital that investors have to offer.
It is also often questionable whether that capital is doing a damn
thing for development. Many nations are not seeing any jobs or
capital come to their countries at all.
>Gabrielle Rapagnetta:
>> Sure, Revlon contributes loaves of bread to hungry people. But what
>> would Revlon's investors have contributed if Revlon were not a
>> growing, profitable industry? Probably not a loaf of bread, but
>> rather an entire bakery.
>
>Why would they do this?
Because they would be forced to seek alternative growth markets.
Developing nations could be a growth market if 90% of consumption was
not entirely based within the Western nations.
These Western nations (the US at the very least) have exceeded their
capacity to consume what they produce. Rather than pay Madison Avenue
to pump up the economy by creating phony, fleeting demand, why not
simply stop buying crap and let this capital follow its natural
tendency to flow into the developing nations?
If the neoliberal model is to stand a remote chance of success this
will need to happen one way or another.
>(G*rd*n) wrote:
>> >However, I don't think inadequate food supply is really a
>> >money problem; I think it is a political problem. If you took
>> >away Revlon's advertising money and sent it in the direction
>> >of Bangladesh or wherever, it is my strong intuition that very
>> >little of it would actually get turned into food which was to
>> >be actually eaten by poor people.
>
>Gabrielle Rapagnetta:
>> The advertising money is chump change. I'm talking about taking away
>> their growth and letting supply and demand actually function properly.
>
>Whose growth?
The growth of the vice industries -- the industries paying ridiculous
amounts of money to bolster demand for their products. If ad execs
were to walk off the job tomorrow it would quickly become obvious
which industries I'm talking about.
iHĞ
<n0spam....@gmx.net> wrote:
>We see the richest fifth of the world's citizens responsible for 86%
>of the world's consumption. The bottom fifth is consumes 1.4% (and
>this number is dropping, despite you yammering on about the success of
>your favored financial schemes).
>
>You are sadly detached from reality if you believe that any
>significant amount of low wage earners are saving and investing. Half
>the world is making less than $2 a day, but somehow you believe that
>they are investing in America. What a crackpot world you live in.
...and if capitalism is so fucking wonderful, why is it reliant on the
assumption that everyone living under it will attempt to escape the
condition of the majority by striving to become rich?
--
iHĞ
Woodard R. Springstube
news:v5jl909ie4sc18cth...@4ax.com:
If socialism and government control are so wonderful, why do so
many people try to get to capitalist countries? Capitalism
doesn't guarantee wealth for everybody, but it gives
opportunities to the vast majority. Socialism, otoh, promises
to make everybody healthy, wealthy, and wise, and delivers that
to the party elite while the rest of the population slave for
subsistence with no chance to better themselves; because, that
would mess up the five-year plan.
James A. Donald
/James A. Donald:
> > After these evil investors have supposedly invested in
> > armies to force the apple people to accept low wages,
> > should not they be investing where the low wages are?
Gabrielle Rapagnetta
> According to the theories of you neoliberal clowns, yes. In
> reality, not so much.
And your explanation of this strange phenomenom is?
> We see the richest fifth of the world's citizens responsible
> for 86% of the world's consumption.
The reason being that they are responsible for a bit more than
86% of the world's production.
And the reason for their high productivity is that people are
able to produce more in those places where their capital, and
their lives, are less apt to be stolen by people like yourself,
by people like Aristide.
James A. Donald:
> >The reason that those people are poor is because people like
> >you have power over them, power maintained, as Aristide's
> >power was maintained, by terror and murder.
Gabrielle Rapagnetta
> Your 'ad nauseam' tactic of pushing these ridiculous lies
> gets too tiresome for me. What we need here is a
> Usenet-trained monkey to post counter-lies to each of your
> posts.
If your account of the world was true, Haiti would be rich and
Hong Kong would be poor. My account of the world explains the
wealth of nations. Your account of the world only explains why
people like yourself are so immensely morally superior to
people like me that people like yourself are entitled to rob
and kill people like me.
--digsig
James A. Donald
6YeGpsZR+nOTh/cGwvITnSR3TdzclVpR0+pr3YYQdkG
HloAAj0cnVEmklFGhgGgDXF7KJH2i+MKny3shL7g
4AKs44Kt5gp0YVvtmclWzxVkVHRvT4ow6Me6E1XnY
James A. Donald
Ed Faith wrote:
> > ... the problem is that classes of people or of things do
> > not typically have purposes. An individual tobacco company
> > is an organized group of people, but the industry as a
> > whole is a class of people rather than an organized group.
"chris.holt"
> I'm not sure I believe that. Well, to be more
> positive/negative, I'm pretty sure I don't believe that
How about "the Jews" then?
You are a paranoid conspiracy theorist.
--digsig
James A. Donald
6YeGpsZR+nOTh/cGwvITnSR3TdzclVpR0+pr3YYQdkG
7GwoZvdRykElvOYmpDsXfkSD+zo0L+we48TQOWdv
42Ee9f7KzqblXS+CCWI9sNF3PX08C64a8M4CAVfJd
James A. Donald
Gabrielle Rapagnetta
> I sit in utter amazement that you are still trying to deny
> that the corporations of any particular industry can and do
> act in concert with each other with collective purpose.
It is hard enough to get single corporation to act with
collective purpose - which is one of the many reasons I would
not recommend investing in Hewlet Packard.
The US government encourages the formation of binding export
cartels, and attempts to enforce the decisions of those cartels
upon their members, with conspicuous lack of success for the
most part. Those cartels are legally existent, but their
actual existence is so faint and shadowy that I doubt that that
most of them can be said to have collective purpose.
--digsig
James A. Donald
6YeGpsZR+nOTh/cGwvITnSR3TdzclVpR0+pr3YYQdkG
YfjN3521zwhD2UCcgKhZHz/t9ybszuC2g4CumWr1
4rY5SZwk9Poz6qMRNrbFKatsXgoKOZz0EjHc0zr2f
James A. Donald
Ed Faith
> > Obviously. If Galbraith is pro-capitalism why is it that
> > anti-capitalists love to refer to him and pro-capitalists
> > have nothing good to say about him? ...
G*rd*n
> You are using circular definitions, that's why.
>
> If, as James says, socialism produces poverty, then
> socialists need not concern themselves with affluence.
Galbraith's concern was to justify the destruction of
affluence, to justify doing permanently what was done in World
War II temporarily.
> People advocating capitalism with Welfare are still
> pro-capitalists.
Galbraith did not advocate what I would call capitalism with
welfare. Nor did he advocate what Clinton or Kerry would call
capitalism with welfare Anyone who calls what Galbraith was
advocating "capitalism" is far out from the mainstream.
To call what Galbraith was advocating "capitalism", is rather
like calling what Tony Blair advocates "socialism". What
Galbraith advocated was roughly what Attlee attempted to
implement in the first few years of his government. That
program, Attlee's program, was ditched because it made people
poor, to which the intellectuals replied that poverty was good
for the soul.
--digsig
James A. Donald
6YeGpsZR+nOTh/cGwvITnSR3TdzclVpR0+pr3YYQdkG
tjW6jcp+U5ppoMZNTPqebz18uQcm2BLUwhS9zHzH
4dqxg6Iehk4iwcP4Ofhbf6RUBAe5zkHczIKI5WCbS
Woodard R. Springstube
news:93sl90pktu6mtnmak...@4ax.com:
What these left-wing folks don't realize is that a cartel is
an inherently unstable entity. Almost always, there will be
one or more members who stand to gain more by cheating on the
agreements than they do by abiding by the rules of the cartel.
About the only long-lasting cartel that I know of is the
diamond cartel, run by deBeers, and it is finally beginning to
lose some of its power.
Another thing that the lefties ignore is the fact that
companies in the same industry will usually have some common
interests that they will individually try to further without
the need for some "vast, right-wing conspiracy." Maybe it is
because the left has historically been, themselves, so
conspiratorial that they see conspirators under their beds.
Joshua Holmes
: If Gabrielle Rapagnetta's theories are correct, we should be
: eating what the advertisers suggest we eat.
I'm sorry, I lost the conversation after we started talking about
female underwear.
BTW, this Coke is delicious.
--
Joshua Holmes
jdho...@force.stwing.upenn.edu
Does a man tell you of sacrifice?
Beware, he intends to make you the bull.
Gabrielle Rapagnetta
>> Gabrielle Rapagnetta
>>> I sit in utter amazement that you are still trying to deny
>>> that the corporations of any particular industry can and
>>> do act in concert with each other with collective purpose.
>>
>> It is hard enough to get single corporation to act with
>> collective purpose - which is one of the many reasons I
>> would not recommend investing in Hewlet Packard.
"Woodard R. Springstube" wrote:
>What these left-wing folks don't realize is that a cartel is
>an inherently unstable entity.
>> Gabrielle Rapagnetta:
[this is the part James snipped]
>>>In the meantime I'll prepare myself for the inevitable, tiresome
>>>comeback: "Oh, but cartels are inherently unstable." yada yada
You chimps are so predictable.
Would anybody else like to make an ass of themselves before I bombard
Usenet with examples of industries acting collectively?
Ed Faith
> Ed Faith <e...@lucesolare.com>:
>
>>Obviously. If Galbraith is pro-capitalism why is it that
>>anti-capitalists love to refer to him and pro-capitalists have nothing
>>good to say about him? ...
>
>
>
> You are using circular definitions, that's why.
Cryptic.
> If, as James says, socialism produces poverty, then
> socialists need not concern themselves with affluence.
> If affluence is a problem, it is a problem for those
> who have chosen actually-existing capitalism, with or
> without Welfare icing on the cake, because that is
> where the supposed affluence shows up.
I find it hard to take this seriously. If Galbraith is a socialist, and
if capitalism creates affluence, then it would make perfect sense for
Galbraith to write a book about capitalist affluence and to treat it as
a problem. So your argument that socialists need not concern themselves
with affluence (i.e., the affluence of despised capitalism) doesn't
persuade.
> People advocating capitalism with Welfare are still
> pro-capitalists. The true lover of capitalism, I
> imagine, notices and tries to fix its defects, rather
> than merely worshiping its image and claiming
> perfection for it.
Not so, since capitalism is a particular system, and if you "fix its
defects" as you say, you turn it into a different system, demonstrating,
not love for the old system (the "defects" being an essential part of
the old system) but rather love for the new system.
Here is a specific way to see the problem with your argument: Marx tried
to fix the defects of capitalism, the (in his eyes) very large defects
of it, leaving in place only that which was good about it. We know that
he was a great appreciator of the achievements of capitalism, so one
could argue that in that sense he "loved" it. And yet, Marx was a
Marxist (the first Marxist), and we would hardly call him pro-capitalist.
Anyway, Galbraith was hardly a mere welfare-statist.
Gabrielle Rapagnetta
>> > After these evil investors have supposedly invested in
>> > armies to force the apple people to accept low wages,
>> > should not they be investing where the low wages are?
>
>Gabrielle Rapagnetta
>> According to the theories of you neoliberal clowns, yes. In
>> reality, not so much.
>
>And your explanation of this strange phenomenom is?
It's the topic of this thread. I've explained it several times now.
Feigning incoherence will not work with me. Go back and reread if you
need to.
>> We see the richest fifth of the world's citizens responsible
>> for 86% of the world's consumption.
>
>The reason being that they are responsible for a bit more than
>86% of the world's production.
Now you suggest that 4/5th's of the world's population do not work.
Your crackpot theories just get crazier and crazier.
Here's a dose of reality for you:
The 200 wealthiest individuals in the world are worth over $1
trillion.
The 2.5 billion poorest people are worth this same amount.
Who works harder? 2.5 billion people or 200? Who produces more?
>And the reason for their high productivity is that people are
>able to produce more in those places where their capital, and
>their lives, are less apt to be stolen by people like yourself,
>by people like Aristide.
What is it with you and Aristide that you can't even mention his name
without lying? I spent a month asking you what he did, specifically,
to "steal" wealth. You were unable to answer and have been repeating
the same, tired lie ever since.
So you want to talk about stealing wealth, eh? Go ahead and name one
single socialist who is collecting interest payments from a developing
nation.
Ed Faith
> On Thu, 06 May 2004 12:09:45 -0700, Gabrielle Rapagnetta
> <n0spam....@gmx.net> wrote:
>
>
>>We see the richest fifth of the world's citizens responsible for 86%
>>of the world's consumption. The bottom fifth is consumes 1.4% (and
>>this number is dropping, despite you yammering on about the success of
>>your favored financial schemes).
>>
>>You are sadly detached from reality if you believe that any
>>significant amount of low wage earners are saving and investing. Half
>>the world is making less than $2 a day, but somehow you believe that
>>they are investing in America. What a crackpot world you live in.
Actually that's exactly what a lot of immigrants seem to be doing. They
gather up quite a significant sum - not just singly but whole families
(which is how they get past the money problem that you seem to find
insurmountable) - and part of this goes to the process of getting into
the US in the first place, and the rest goes into the establishment of a
business. You can see a lot of small businesses that are owned and
operated by immigrant families. These are not, from the accounts that I
have read and heard, typically rich people, at least not when they get here.
> ...and if capitalism is so fucking wonderful, why is it reliant on the
> assumption that everyone living under it will attempt to escape the
> condition of the majority by striving to become rich?
Is there some sort of question in there? For one thing, capitalism
doesn't actually rely on any such thing. For another, what "majority"
are you talking about? The majority of people living inside an economy
that has long been capitalist are already rich compared to worldwide
averages.
Dan Clore
> Gabrielle Rapagnetta <n0spam....@gmx.net> wrote in message news:<jc7b90pi55ehe5g5m...@4ax.com>...
>
>>Put your theory to the test: Ask a friend to demonstrate what a
>>lifetime of ad agency 'education' has taught him. Ask him to name
>>even five ingredients that go into Wheaties breakfast cereal. We all
>>grew up watching the ads, right?
>>
> OK, I'll take a whack at that.
>
> Wheat, sugar, high fructose corn syrup, water, non-nutritive crude
> fiber, salt, natural and artificial flavors, artificial color,
> emulsifiers, BHA and BHT added to preserve freshness.
I was going to say vitamins C, B-1, B-2, B-3, B-6, and B-12,
since they add them to all breakfast cereals.
--
Dan Clore
Now available: _The Unspeakable and Others_
http://www.wildsidepress.com/index2.htm
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1587154838/thedanclorenecro
Lord Weÿrdgliffe & Necronomicon Page:
http://www.geocities.com/SoHo/9879/
News & Views for Anarchists & Activists:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/smygo
"It's a political statement -- or, rather, an
*anti*-political statement. The symbol for *anarchy*!"
-- Batman, explaining the circle-A graffiti, in
_Detective Comics_ #608
Dan Clore
> "G*rd*n" <g...@panix.com> wrote in message
> news:c78i4j$aeq$1...@panix1.panix.com...
>>g...@panix.com (G*rd*n) wrote:
> This perhaps overlooks one of the most direct things that advertising
> suggests, that is, you are inadequate. One of the biggest themes in
> advertising is convincing people that they should be ashamed or embarrassed
> about some imperfection, or that they are lower than others in their peer
> group if they don't have X clothing or car...etc. IOW...the job of
> avertisers and marketers is, largely, to turn a contented populace into an
> insecure and unhappy one whose only hope for becoming complete and
> respectable human beings is to forever chase their carrot on a stick.
I think you're on to something here, Josh. If we could just
invent a product that would help* all these people who are
made to feel inadequate by advertising, I'll bet we could
make millions on it.
*Or, at least, that we could convince these losers would
help them.
--
Dan Clore
Now available: _The Unspeakable and Others_
http://www.wildsidepress.com/index2.htm
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1587154838/thedanclorenecro
Lord We˙rdgliffe & Necronomicon Page:
Ed Faith
> "Men of the same profession never meet together except to defraud the
> general public." --Adam Smith
Actually I find variations of this attributed to both Adam Smith and
Mark Twain. I was unable to find it occurring in any known work; if it
is there it is probably worded a bit differently. Until a specific
published work is produced I will have to take any attribution with a
grain of salt.
As to the thought - of course I don't doubt that many capitalists would
love nothing better than to conspire with their competitors against the
public, but desire and success are two different things.
Woodard R. Springstube
Leftie, you can bring up examples of cartels, but you cannot
cite any example of a *long-lasting* cartel except for the
deBeers diamond cartel. Maybe in your conspiratorial
fantasies, you can claim some sort of conspiratorial
organization that uses mind control to make people buy stuff
that they don't want. Of course, all firms want to sell more
goods at higher prices, but there are limits on what they can
do. In the U.S., if you get proof of a cartel, then you
should pass that evidence on the the Anti-Trust Division of
the Justice Department or file suit yourself in Federal Court.
Furthermore, there is no mind control that advertising is able
to accomplish. If I don't want something, then I don't buy
it, and no commercial or ad can get me to want it. You need a
new tinfoil hat if commercials cause you to buy stuff you
don't want. The whole thing about the left's aversion to
advertising is based in the left's basic misanthropy. The
left sees ordinary people as mindless puppets of the
capitalist slave masters, puppets who buy stuff because they
are too stupid to know better. So the "enlightened" left has
to save people by taking away all choices and giving the
mindless, stupid, ignorant masses only what the left thinks
that they need. What a crock!
I have lost patience with all of the socialist scum who tell
us that Pol Pot and Joe Stalin weren't socialists, their
brutality wasn't real socialism (whatever that is--it seems to
be whatever the Marxist propagandists need at the moment), and
it will be all different under your enlightened rule. But, if
you and your fellow socialists get the power to establish a
fully socialist system, my prediction is that it will turn
into the same old thing: Famine for the masses, killing
fields, gulags, and the party members living like nobility
with all the trappings of nobility except the titles.
James A. Donald
James A. Donald:
> > > > After these evil investors have supposedly invested in
> > > > armies to force the apple people to accept low wages,
> > > > should not they be investing where the low wages are?
Gabrielle Rapagnetta
> > > According to the theories of you neoliberal clowns, yes.
> > > In reality, not so much.
James A. Donald:
> > And your explanation of this strange phenomenom is?
Gabrielle Rapagnetta
> It's the topic of this thread. I've explained it several
> times now.
It is not the topic of the thread, and I have seen no such
explanation.
James A. Donald:
> > The reason being that [people in wealthy nations] are
> > responsible for a bit more than 86% of the world's
> > production.
Gabrielle Rapagnetta
> Now you suggest that 4/5th's of the world's population do not
> work. Your crackpot theories just get crazier and crazier.
Work is not production. Labor is not value, not does value
reflect labor. A man with a digging stick cultivating coffee
in the hot sun produces very little, even if he works twelve
hours a day.
> So you want to talk about stealing wealth, eh? Go ahead and
> name one single socialist who is collecting interest payments
> from a developing nation.
The man who made the interest payments made a loan. Castro
made no loan, yet he lives in a chain of palaces, and the high
members of the communist party in Cuba use planes as though
they were taxis.
--digsig
James A. Donald
6YeGpsZR+nOTh/cGwvITnSR3TdzclVpR0+pr3YYQdkG
eK9LT304yUle2qG6s+o42UwumvuTO6UoS/rZsRtp
4ehCTaJFFnIZu/IInIPGOwSfrfjkXXqUq0n0EYneg
G*rd*n
> >>Obviously. If Galbraith is pro-capitalism why is it that
> >>anti-capitalists love to refer to him and pro-capitalists have nothing
> >>good to say about him? ...
G*rd*n wrote:
> > You are using circular definitions, that's why.
Ed Faith <e...@lucesolare.com>:
> Cryptic.
There have been a lot of people who wanted to preserve capitalism
while expending a significant amount of tax money on the care
and management of the lower orders, a scheme known as "Welfare"
or "Social Democracy". These people tend to like Galbraith.
I assume you are aware of this; so you must be categorizing
these people, who I regard as pro-capitalist, as anti-capitalists,
on the basis of their approval of ideas like Galbraith's. "Anti-
capitalist" in your vocabulary means "having ideas like Galbraith's",
and vice versa. But my definition of capitalism is different:
it is the private (and, so far, minority) ownership and control
of the means of production. Using my definition, we find that
there are pro-capitalists who like Galbraith and others who
don't.
G*rd*n wrote:
> > If, as James says, socialism produces poverty, then
> > socialists need not concern themselves with affluence.
> > If affluence is a problem, it is a problem for those
> > who have chosen actually-existing capitalism, with or
> > without Welfare icing on the cake, because that is
> > where the supposed affluence shows up.
Ed Faith <e...@lucesolare.com>:
> I find it hard to take this seriously. If Galbraith is a socialist, and
> if capitalism creates affluence, then it would make perfect sense for
> Galbraith to write a book about capitalist affluence and to treat it as
> a problem. So your argument that socialists need not concern themselves
> with affluence (i.e., the affluence of despised capitalism) doesn't
> persuade.
The solution to the problem of capitalist affluence for these
socialists would not be the diversion of capitalist tax money
into Welfare and public works projects, but the institution
of outright "socialism", whatever the socialists meant by
that -- certainly not Welfare.
G*rd*n wrote:
> > People advocating capitalism with Welfare are still
> > pro-capitalists. The true lover of capitalism, I
> > imagine, notices and tries to fix its defects, rather
> > than merely worshiping its image and claiming
> > perfection for it.
Ed Faith <e...@lucesolare.com>:
> Not so, since capitalism is a particular system, and if you "fix its
> defects" as you say, you turn it into a different system, demonstrating,
> not love for the old system (the "defects" being an essential part of
> the old system) but rather love for the new system.
That sounds like religious fanaticism: if any word of the
True Faith be impugned, then the whole edifice must fall.
But historically there have been many kinds of capitalism (as
I define it), with varying degrees of government and other
interventions. A favorite kind of provision has been the
mitigation of its rigors for some set of losers. The means
of production are still (mostly) privately owned and controlled,
so this is still capitalism. It is evidently possible to have
a lot of Welfare and still have the means of production almost
entirely in the control of a small elite, because this is what
we observe in history.
Ed Faith <e...@lucesolare.com>:
> Here is a specific way to see the problem with your argument: Marx tried
> to fix the defects of capitalism, the (in his eyes) very large defects
> of it, leaving in place only that which was good about it. We know that
> he was a great appreciator of the achievements of capitalism, so one
> could argue that in that sense he "loved" it. And yet, Marx was a
> Marxist (the first Marxist), and we would hardly call him pro-capitalist.
>
> Anyway, Galbraith was hardly a mere welfare-statist.
Marx certainly appreciated the powers of capitalism, but
nevertheless he wanted to wipe it out, and also believed that
it was historically doomed anyway. Galbraith neither wished
to wipe it out nor believed that it is doomed (as far as I
know). He observed the problem (noticed by Marx) that the
dynamics of capitalism produces an exponential growth of
production and productive power, something capitalism must
deal with somehow if it is to be preserved in its existing
form -- that is, an arrangement where the means of production
are owned and controlled by a powerful elite. In Galbraith's
view, if I am recalling correctly, the Welfare side was to be
more aggressive, a kind of entrepreneurism of the Welfare
bureaucracy. The aim, however, was to keep the system going,
not to overthrow it.
James A. Donald
On 7 May 2004 10:51:59 -0400, g...@panix.com (G*rd*n) wrote:
> There have been a lot of people who wanted to preserve
> capitalism while expending a significant amount of tax money
> on the care and management of the lower orders, a scheme
> known as "Welfare" or "Social Democracy". These people tend
> to like Galbraith.
I do not think so.
Galbraith favored a centrally planned economy for the US, and
for India. His recommendations were followed in India, with
entirely predictable results.
The old Indian economy is not what welfare statists claim they
want, and in fact, these days it is not what they want.
> The solution to the problem of capitalist affluence for these
> socialists would not be the diversion of capitalist tax money
> into Welfare and public works projects, but the institution
> of outright "socialism", whatever the socialists meant by
> that -- certainly not Welfare.
Galbraith was not an advocate of welfare, but of corporatism,
of central planning on the fascist, rather than communist,
model. Many people you would regard as left wing pro
capitalists were sympathetic to this program -- but then many
of the same people were sympathetic to Ho Chi Minh and Hitler.
--digsig
James A. Donald
6YeGpsZR+nOTh/cGwvITnSR3TdzclVpR0+pr3YYQdkG
uyV5AUCFV7vg5wk95E/izDA/02/suENNkrQtDHSM
4xs5/B0syx3xVMI9hXBn1UifJ82FQsV0XDt9q0/CG
G*rd*n
G*rd*n wrote:
> >It is clear that in order to maintain its social position (by
> >which I mean its political power and wealth, among other
> >things) the owning and ruling class has to maximize production,
> >which is what it is good at doing. Otherwise, the price
> >and repute of both capital and managerial expertise will fall.
> >In order to maintain demand for further production, the
> >outputs of former production have to go somewhere. Broad,
> >ever-expanding consumerism is one of the possible sinks, and
> >it is less destructive and socially disturbing (usually) than
> >others such as war and waste.
> >...
Gabrielle Rapagnetta:
> I'm not so sure that this sink is such a benign factor. When you
> funnel excess demand into the mass consumerism sinkhole you are also
> sinking the potential of the investors.
That's highly desirable. If there were no sinks for produced
wealth, it might begin to be converted into savings, into
capital, and by the laws of supply and demand the price of
capital would fall -- that is, it would be more and more
difficult to get return on investment. Moreover people with
a lot of money in the bank might stop working, or they might
acquire so much stuff they got tired of stuff and stopped
buying. The defect of consumerism is that it doesn't get rid
of _enough_ production, so war and waste are still necessary.
Gabrielle Rapagnetta:
> Instead of asking what trivialities an overworked/overpaid American
> would rather spend their cash on, we should ask what an investor would
> rather invest in if the sink weren't there.
>
> I imagine that they would invest in hungry, homeless, jobless people
> -- truly a demand in need of supply, truly a growth industry.
Causing the sink of consumerism and makework to disappear
overnight would be such a radical change in culture, economy
and politics that it's really hard to predict what would
happen. Many people would regard it as a major disaster --
a depression -- and demand that the government immediately
act to restore the status quo ante. At least, this is what
I get out of Depression-era literature.
Ed Faith
> Ed Faith <e...@lucesolare.com>:
>
>>>>Obviously. If Galbraith is pro-capitalism why is it that
>>>>anti-capitalists love to refer to him and pro-capitalists have nothing
>>>>good to say about him? ...
>
>
> G*rd*n wrote:
>
>>>You are using circular definitions, that's why.
>
>
> Ed Faith <e...@lucesolare.com>:
>
>>Cryptic.
>
>
>
> There have been a lot of people who wanted to preserve capitalism
> while expending a significant amount of tax money on the care
> and management of the lower orders, a scheme known as "Welfare"
> or "Social Democracy".
I am not here arguing against welfare, I am arguing against Galbraith,
whose views I believe you greatly misrepresent. His works such as The
New Industrial State were not about welfare, they were not about getting
money to poor people who were falling through the cracks.
> G*rd*n wrote:
>
>>>People advocating capitalism with Welfare are still
>>>pro-capitalists. The true lover of capitalism, I
>>>imagine, notices and tries to fix its defects, rather
>>>than merely worshiping its image and claiming
>>>perfection for it.
>
>
> Ed Faith <e...@lucesolare.com>:
>
>>Not so, since capitalism is a particular system, and if you "fix its
>>defects" as you say, you turn it into a different system, demonstrating,
>>not love for the old system (the "defects" being an essential part of
>>the old system) but rather love for the new system.
>
>
>
> That sounds like religious fanaticism: if any word of the
> True Faith be impugned, then the whole edifice must fall.
Perhaps you have simply not read enough of Galbraith. He is not merely a
welfarist. I do not accuse every welfarist of the hostility to
capitalism that I accuse Galbraith of.