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should we have tried to get off big tech earlier?
(thelemmy.club)
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this post was submitted on 06 Nov 2026
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Change is inevitable.
If you live in a capitalist society, everything will eventually become monetized.
Tech isn't the problem; monetization is.
Monetization and commodification. Many things should be off limits to those cretins. Like healthcare and all types of insurance. (and food and shelter, but we've got to start with something, and healthcare is far more understandable to most)
Here's something that gets overlooked.
A big part of Ronald Reagan's 'deregulation' was letting third rate business people make lots of money. Toy companies could run half hour ads for products like Pokemon and Transformers. Federally insured S&Ls could make unlimited loans.
When you look at things being awful, it almost always comes back to Reagan.
The problem is not just monetization. Capitalism can function and provide reasonable prices, but that takes actual robust competition, and actual robust competition, requires lots of small players, not a few big monopolies.
So to OP's point, yes, it would have been better to get off big tech earlier. Supporting small companies over big companies is always an inherent good in a capitalist society.
Robust competition and regulation, or you get flour with plaster in to make it cheaper and whiter again
Yes, you absolutely still need regulation because there are numerous ways of unnoticeably cutting corners.
Capitalism provides none of that
Sweden is an example of an economy that has capitalistic elements with a strong safety net.
That is correct. It's still Capitalism with all of the gross exploitation, but the people get a bigger piece of the pie.
Explain your point or shut the fuck up with this low effort nonsense.
It doesn't even make grammatical sense given that I claimed capitalism can provide one thing (reasonable prices), and you responded with 'none of that' as if I listed a multitude of things.
Jesus Christ Lemmy is becoming as brain dead as Reddit.
You seem a bit angry. Maybe take a break from technology today.
Good advice, but my point stands. Post better.
You want me to write a dissertation on why Capitalism doesn't provide reasonable prices, cannot provide "actual robust competition", and cannot stop a few big monopolies?. Sorry, I'm not going to. Lenin was writing about this stuff 100 years ago.. The current state of Capitalism, that is Capitalism. That's how it functions. There isn't some idyllic form of Capitalism that we can work towards ... that has never existed ever.
People like to point to the 1950s and 1960s postwar US and the Nordics as examples of "how Capitalism should function". Postwar US was in a red scare, Communism spreading across Europe, fear of uprisings at home, and that fear forced progressive concessions. The one era of capitalism people romanticize is that one, and it was shaped by fear of Communism plus massive grassroots working-class movements.
Same thing in the Nordics. What is right next door? The Soviet Union, with a successful revolution that brought millions out of abject poverty and brought USSR from a feudal backwater to modern superpower within decades. The fear of that spreading caused Nordics and elsewhere to give more concessions to the working class. The form of Capitalism itself hasn't changed one single bit. There's still wars, worker exploitation, imperialism, global extraction and exploitation of the 3rd world (global south), etc.
I'm guessing you're American given your piss poor knowledge of world history.
Because no, the Nordic countries did not give worker concessions because the USSR next door.
First of all, the conditions of the USSR were not seen as good by basically anyone. Do you know how many mass purges happened in communist countries and how poor they were? It was not seen as a glowing ideal in Nordic countries. East Germany was not seen as paradise compared to West Germany by literally anyone.
Second of all, this ignore the enormous concessions, changes, and progress that Nordic countries made since ether fall of the Soviet Union.
Your analysis of capitalism is just black-pill edginess. Congrats on being a "nothing can ever be done to fix this" nihilist. Billionaires love people like you.
I responded in good faith. And you reply with this. Goodbye.
lol, yes "billionaires love me", as I'm actively fighting against them and organizing my community and the working class against them. Yep. You got my number. I find it fascinating that Libs would rather fight against Socialists like me than enact real change in the world....
EDIT: throwing in some reading:
ANTI-COMMUNIST MYTH NUMBER 5: EVERYBODY HATED SOCIALISM
ANTI-COMMUNIST MYTH NUMBER 6: LIFE UNDER SOCIALISM WAS TERRIBLE
Incompetent enemies can be more valuable than competent friends.
And you responded with made up bs about Nordic countries having to placate their population's desire for communism.
That's not why they moderated, and the fact that any capitalist system can be moderated and regulated to be somewhat effective disproves your black pilled nonsense about how capitalism is doomed to repeat America's specific flavour of unregulated, big-is-good, monopolistic, capitalism.
The part of capitalism where the owner sits back, the workers do the work, and the owner keeps the profits is not necessary. It is in fact fucked up.
You can have competition without that. (You can have other bad things too- it's not a magic cure-all for workers to own the business)