193 Comments

because people are asking:

degrowth is basically utopian collectivist command and control systems to dismantle free market capitalism in the name of pursuing some hazy concept of human well being (as defined by experts and technocrats).

it's the venn intersect of "benign despotism" "happy clappy gaia worship" and "economics denial."

"Degrowth is an academic and social movement critical of the hegemony of economic growth perpetuated by capitalism, and calls for an equitable and democratically-led downscaling of production and consumption in industrialised countries as a means to achieve environmental sustainability, social justice and well-being"

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Degrowth

Expand full comment

Thanks for the definition. In that case. the graduates will probably be put in cabinet level positions in most Western governments

Expand full comment

Too late! These will be foisted on private businesses. "Where is your degrowth manager?", "Next door to the DEI office."

Expand full comment

the degrowth manager will be the fattest person in the office. just like the diversity manager is the least diverse.

makes perfect sense!

Expand full comment

Just another wing of the HR Office.

Expand full comment

The ratio between supervisory and producing personnel is always highest where the intellectuals are in power. In a Communist country it takes half the population to supervise the other half.

Eric Hoffer

Expand full comment

Right before the door to the department of silly walks.

Expand full comment

Better a Department of Silly Walks than a Department of Degrowth. CEO: "I've brought in Moonflower, our VP of Degrowth to show us how we can DECREASE our bottom line by 15%!". Board of Directors: "Here, here!".

Expand full comment

Shareholders: Where, where???

Expand full comment

"It's not particularly silly, is it?

I mean, the Social Well Being Leg isn't silly at all and the Ecological Well Being Leg merely does a forward Aerial Push Back Zero Day Again alternate step."

Expand full comment

Aim way higher. It's the Banksters who used Covid-19 and fake emergencies in order to skirt constitutional rights to implement unfettered capitalism to destroy our economies and open them up to a Chicago School Cartel psychopathic feeding frenzy.

https://www.developmenteducationreview.com/issue/issue-8/shock-doctrine-rise-disaster-capitalism

Expand full comment

LIKE! Still blocked from likes. The whole aim of practical politics is to keep the populace alarmed (and hence clamorous to be led to safety) by menacing it with an endless series of hobgoblins, all of them imaginary.

H. L. Mencken

Expand full comment

Mencken was a genuine genius.

Expand full comment

I'll second the motion!

Expand full comment

I updated my software, finally, on ipad and could like again after that!

Expand full comment

Thanks! That appears to be the choice I am left with.

Expand full comment

pro tip: banksters use "unfettered capitalism" and "communism" to the same purpose: sheer self interest.

Expand full comment

sadly, Naomi Klein was a complete NPC for the "covid" psyop.

Expand full comment

As your (likely) socialist dream girl exclaimed (many times), a crisis too good to go to waste. You know, hilarious Hillary. Target rich environment.

And your Canuck economy seems to be imploding under the girth of Trudeau (a slogan for right minded canucks, eh hoser- take your Trudeau and go, go, go- far away to socialism done right fantasyland.

Socialism is superior to all other idiotologies, 1 billion and counting dead valued slaves, oops, citizens.

A Keynesian Heaven. Take R. reich with, please!

Expand full comment

Just look for the nicest corner office with the best view. 😁

Expand full comment

"upper management written all over them"...

Expand full comment

"It's not just about me and my dream of doing nothing. It's about all of us."

- Peter Gibbons

Expand full comment

We should be holding the current cabinet ministers accountable for their Covid-19 disaster capitalism which enabled the violent assault, permanent injury, firing and pensions theft of hundreds of thousands of Canadians using a fake emergency.

Expand full comment

what are you going to do; fight totalitarianism with totalitarianism?

Expand full comment

Is Angie an ai bot, cause she/he/it sure ain’t got no sentient intelligent.

He’s your beloved emperor Trudeau,. Don’t blame crony capitalism .Your socialist dream come to fruition. Enjoy the rotting

Expand full comment

Lol!

And the Left calls me a right-wing, fascist Trump supporter!

Debunk Dr. Ian F. Akyildiz who admits his Artificial intelligence nanotechnology biosensors are in the Covid-19 "vaccines." Stop obfuscating.

https://rumble.com/v50u6qe-june-10-2024.html

Expand full comment

That is funny, your first paragraph, irony. However, Trump and 99% of his supporters - yup me proudly - abhor nazism, communism, socialism, ideologies of misery, death and destruction.

And, for your personal edification -and leftist friends-, fascism is a very left wing ideology, not true conservatism in microscope. Psychopathic political sibling of socialism and communism.

Anyhoo, if would take time to read a previous response you might calm yourself and find that I had agreed regarding Covid punctures.

Expand full comment

Ah, so rich with multi syllabic terms from the thesaurus. I do not dance around subjects, I do agree with that human tagging program. I did not need to read from a hypocritical charlatan who enriched himself by prostituting his beloved unassailable “god” - my science. Very fauci like. Now he develops a pseudo conscience knowing the truth is coming out. Cry his crocodile tears to his executioner.

Don’t be so facile. One of my responses state clearly my agreement with you on this topic.

Expand full comment

With that definition they are mini-me Bidenbamas.

“You didn’t build that!”. But you can froth it.

Expand full comment

Right...because the current cabinet ministers who allowed Covid-19 did such a fantastic job under "free-market" (corporate raiders) capitalism.

The pandemic is how stupid everybody is.

The bad cat is a corporate apologist.

Expand full comment

"free-market" (corporate raiders) capitalism."

See, this is where I think we're talking past one another.

If it's _free-market_ then it can't also be the case that Corporations can raid it. That's precisely NOT a "free-market" economy.

It can be Free or at the whim of Corporations. But it can't be both.

Expand full comment

The bad cat is cheering for more shock therapy in order to establish precisely the disaster capitalism which was the Covid-19 military operation. Don't fall for it.

Expand full comment

I've had several employees over the years that could teach a master class in degrowing a business. Like the idiot I am, I fired them all. A couple were so upset they issued death threats. If only I had known how right they were all along!

Expand full comment

and people PAY TUITION for that ? well, they deserve the baristas carrier then, unless (as others noticed) they will get on permanent bureaucracy 'nomenklatura' rolls and will spend their time leeching life from productive people

Expand full comment

so basically the antithesis of a healthy society...purposeless on purpose.

Expand full comment

Covid-19 is an example of what happens under "free-markets" which are unregulated.

https://www.developmenteducationreview.com/issue/issue-8/shock-doctrine-rise-disaster-capitalism

Expand full comment

WRONG

Covid 19 is what happens when the management personnel, goals, and even ideology of Big Government and Big Corporations become entwined and interchangeable.

Call it what you want…crony capitalism, public/private partnerships, fascism or whatever…… what it boils down to is corruption with little accountability from anywhere.

The Covid 19 mess is the perfect example, it has it all…. Corrupt government bureaucrats who have managed to build little kingdoms for themselves and their friends, government bureaucrats and scientists who received “bonuses” (kickbacks) from the pharmaceutical companies, government bureaucrats who were helping ECOHEALTH executives to write grant proposals at taxpayer expense, government agencies providing technical expertise to the pharmaceutical companies, pharmaceutical companies buying off the media, whatever (if any) military/intelligence involvement, the merry-go-round of employment between the government “regulators” and private companies, etc.

The list of abuses and illegality goes on and on, and that’s just what we know about.…..

And it had absolutely nothing whatsoever to do with “free market capitalism “.

Expand full comment

Thank you Mark

Expand full comment

"Covid 19 is what happens when the management personnel, goals, and even ideology of Big Government and Big Corporations become entwined and interchangeable."

"Ooooooo - That's a BINGO!"

https://youtu.be/Zk5Il6KQrd8?si=2FiTnJgZ_jKdZ3p0

Expand full comment

Thanks for making my argument for me. This corruption is precisely what unfettered "free-market" capitalism looks like.

Those who don't know history are doomed to repeat it.

https://www.developmenteducationreview.com/issue/issue-8/shock-doctrine-rise-disaster-capitalism

Expand full comment

I checked out the site that you linked.

The Centre for Global Education:

Educating for a Just and Sustainable World.

The group appears to be a globalist, left leaning organization based in Ireland.

Of course they hate capitalism, most socialists do….

You might want to check out something a little less biased.

Expand full comment

How's this for "unbiased?"

https://rumble.com/v50u6qe-june-10-2024.html

Expand full comment

Capitalism doesn't thrive under these conditions at all. It shrivels up and dies.

And what you're talking about isn't really capitalism, or even economics at all. It's Social Engineering.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cloward%E2%80%93Piven_strategy

Now - if that urges people to choose poorly in the marketplace, that's not because it's Good for Capitalism. It happens because it's Good for Grifters and Influence Peddlers which, again, is not what "unfettered" means. That's precisely the opposite of what that word means.

Expand full comment

Naomi Klein also wrote an entire book because she was salty at being mistaken for Naomi Wolf and her conspiracy-minded audacity to question the very disaster capitalism Klein herself had written about previously.

Expand full comment

That's what I also believed initially. Now, it seems likely that just like the Frontline Doctors and the bad cat....Naomi Wolf is controlled opposition making sure you never find out about what the Covid-19 fraud really enabled.

https://rumble.com/v50u6qe-june-10-2024.html

Expand full comment

Do you know anything about capitalism?

Because what you’re describing isn’t it…..

Expand full comment

You'll forgive her as we haven't seen anything resembling a free market in a very, very long time, but I agree she's conflating it with what The Blob has served up in its place since.

Expand full comment

Yeah, we need to all have the same definitions of words - like "unfettered" and "free" - or we can't even pretend to be having a conversation.

Expand full comment

Then, why did governments force the closure of hundreds of thousands of small businesses which eviscerated the livelihoods of regular citizens making it impossible for them to feed their children?

Expand full comment

There was absolutely NOTHING “Free Market” about big gov tyrannist response to Fauci’s lab created virus.

It was specifically engineered and strategically released in hopes of destroying free market capitalism and free will completely. All the suckers prostrating themselves to big gov almost pushed it all the way.

A virus cannot make or break policy (jeez!) it was a manufactured tool for their Marxist dream of destroying faith, hope, self-directed life and liberty.

The goal was to eradicate capitalism and coerce allegiance to Karl Marx.

Considering what imbecilic bovines our country creates, next creation might do the trick:(. Sheeple unite. Orwell warned ya.

Expand full comment

Pure Wall Street-CIA-DARPA-Five Eyes COINTELPRO surveillance under the skin via the Internet of Bio-Nano Things and nanotechnology biosensors (Artificial Intelligence. )

https://rumble.com/v50u6qe-june-10-2024.html

https://rumble.com/v50u6qe-june-10-2024.html

Expand full comment

I agree on that, Angie. But, that does not correlate to capitalism any more than Bernard and fauxcahontas correlate to “equity driven social democratic (ha, is that a word, oh well) party.

Big gov, Wall Street, fda, fbi, etc are all autocratic incestuous whores who are attempting to squeeze us dry. Canada, with your imperious child leader same boat. Last I checked, y’all brag about faux moral superiority of social Marxism. Does not appear your special northern blend of “horrific inhumane system is better than free market capitalism which has brought a higher standard of living to all tha in history. Socialism loves spreadibg mass misery and murder to all - but equitably so, yeah for equality 🤫

The jab, yup garbage, that is no example of true capitalism.

Expand full comment

Pfizer, Moderna, J&J, Astrazenaca, Telus, EA, VanCity, Bayer, Lockheed Martin, Raytheon, L3 Harris, the BIS, the IMF, the WEF, the WTOand the IEEE (International Standards for Electronics and Electrical Engineers), InQTel and a long list of other CORPORATE MULTINATIONALS are precisely what unfettered capitalism looks like.

The Left calls me a right-wing fascist and Trump supporter for my Covid-19 non-compliance.

Expand full comment

Trust me - I have a whole Haberdashery full of Shiny Hats, for every style, for every season. And I don't doubt that that conglomerate is uninterested in our well-being. I don't trust them at all.

But help us out - where does this tie into "unfettered" and "free-market" Capitalism again?

When BigGov is in bed with BigIndustry, the politics is fascist and the Economy is Socialist. People might have some choices but you're long since left Unfettered in the rear-view mirror.

Expand full comment

Debunk Dr. Ian F. Akyildiz who admits his Artificial Intelligence nanotechnology biosensors are in the Covid-19 mRNA "vaccines" and connect us to the Internet of Bio-Nano Things.

https://rumble.com/v50u6qe-june-10-2024.html

Expand full comment

If that was not so damned laughable it might be a little scary. Yeah for 1 world order. The author opines, as long as it is My Order.

Sheesh

Expand full comment

Technology like BioNanoThings isn't inherently evil.

In fact, I'd kinda like to know if all the sudden my Calcium shoots up before I go out and do yardwork so I don't have a heart attack, and seek treatment. It's a just a tool.

Consider a Hammer: If you use it to drive nails, or break rocks, then is the Hammer itself some sort of Good? Nope. It just applies the Conversation of Momentum for Inelastic Collisions and moves on to other collisions.

Or if, on the other hand, you use it to break the bedroom window of that Foursquare at the end of the cul-de-sac, or on your neighbor's head, then is the Hammer Evil? Nope.

Cain and Abel isn't a story about a rock. Rocks are decidedly neutral.

Expand full comment

Nanotechnology Biosensors embedded in masks, tests and jabs for surveillance under the skin via the Internet of Bio-Nano Things and the WBAN are de facto crimes of warrantless search and seizure of our biometrics contrary to Sections 184(1) and 430(5) of the Criminal Code of Canada.

Expand full comment

It's much easier to summarise than that. It's the same idea that Pol Pot had for Kampuchea (Cambodia).

Expand full comment

because Misery loves company

Expand full comment

Cliff notes: “you’ll own nothing and you’ll be happy.” No?

Expand full comment

So, instead of people working to rise above poverty, the government will mandate poverty for everyone. Except the leaders, of course

Expand full comment

Well that's what wikipedia says...

Expand full comment

Yes. It’s sclerotic hierarchy

Expand full comment

I read the definition with dismay, which these loons think is the opposite of last June. Me-ouch!

Expand full comment

*Paul Ehrlich has entered the chat, has Southside handed over again and again, continues to build coalitions of rich bored shiftless useless morons*

Expand full comment

Free-market capitalism is unregulated, unfettered capitalism which extorts cirizens/countries that have been intentionally sabotaged, traumatized, fired, beaten, tortured, raped and starved so that the full-blown psychopaths of the Chicago School Cartel (corporate raiders) can swoop in and use extortion to dismantle price controls, strong unions, public institutions, social safety nets, regulatory agencies and public resources leaving an empty shell of misery in its wake. The Covid-19 military operation used the shock therapy of a fake pandemic (disaster capitalism) to enable the elimination of hundreds of thousands of Canadians from government payrolls, benefits and pensions. This outright pension theft and evisceration of government workers from their jobs creates a perfect solution for Amazon to buy Canada Post without the large workforce and expensive pensions.

https://www.developmenteducationreview.com/issue/issue-8/shock-doctrine-rise-disaster-capitalism

Expand full comment

You do know that no one actually believes that anymore. Government is so glued to Big Business that anything one does must be approved by the other.

Expand full comment

That's where using the Criminal Code and laying numerous criminal charges against government directors for their crimes of warrantless search and seizure of our biometrics with nanotechnology biosensors embedded in masks, tests and jabs via the Internet of Bio-Nano Things and the WBAN (Wireless Body Area Network IEEE802.15.6 in the Terahertz Band) comes in handy.

Expand full comment

Who writes those criminal codes? Who enforces them? The GUBM'NT. You are asking one criminal to make sure the other criminal doesn't commit crimes ..... right.

Expand full comment

I testified under oath in the Provincial Court of Vancouver against my former boss, the Director of Mail Operations (Canada Post) for the City of Vancouver after laying 30+ criminal charges against her for administering the Corporation's mandatory mask, test and jab policies. This case is being heard in secret courts paid for by the taxpayers yet which refuse our access.

Expand full comment

It has become very clear who the psychopath is. Sorry, with the above rant, more appropriately sociopath.

Buy your Che t-shirt now before your communist heaven implodes

Expand full comment

No I just don't want to be connected to the Internet of Bio-Nano Things and controlled with Artificial Intelligence by corporate psychopaths in the military-industrial-pharma complex.

https://rumble.com/v50u6qe-june-10-2024.html

Expand full comment

what we're trying to accomplish here is get us back to what The Framers intended.

I'm just fine if your country tries to do the same thing that didn't work before.

don't wait up for us to save you

Expand full comment

I think The Framers is a concept not well understood even by many born on this soil.

Expand full comment

Never truer words

Expand full comment

Soooo... You're say that True Capitalism™ has never been tried?

Expand full comment

My guess is that there is a collectivist worm in Angie's apple. That's why she hasn't sprung it yet.

Expand full comment

I don't buy into to the fake 2-party paradigm which is perpetuated by the corporate media to keep us divided and conquered. The battle is the common people vs the corporations and their "free-market" predatory economic system.

Expand full comment

I don't buy into it either. But neither do I buy into fake two-party government vs. corporation paradigm, where we just need give power to a bunch of selfless right-thinking leaders who will protect us and look out for our best interests. You have yet to say exactly HOW you propose to bring Big Business to heel. If it's by using Big Government, then you are just substituting the grey wolf for the black wolf - you are still going to be eaten, just by a different entity.

Expand full comment

Actually I did state that I laid 30+ criminal charges in the Provincial Court of Vancouver against my former boss, the Director of Mail Operations for the City of Vancouver (Canada Post.) To be clear, I used the Criminal Code of Canada against the Crown Corporation, Canada Post, the Government of Canada, the Vancouver Police Department, the RCMP, CSIS, Telus, VanCity, EA, Phyton Biotech and Pfizer.

Expand full comment

"I don't buy into to the fake 2-party paradigm"

Same. Uniparty delenda est!

But there's a pretty fine line between Preying on your, you know - Customers - and just trying to convince them that they really would be better off if they just bought the stuff.

Expand full comment

To be charitable to Angie, isn't what she's trying to describe what is called corporate capitalism, rather than the free market model (the latter being the one everyone likes until they start getting big and then want to use governement to squash competitors, regulations, et cetera)?

Expand full comment

Yes, I think she is.

And I get what you're saying about how 'everyone likes until they start getting big' is the part that perverts the Creative Destruction. El Gato has written about this a couple times at least. Joseph Schumpter is kind of a big deal.

It evolves into Regulatory Capture where the corporations can wield significant influence over the rules, which taints the objectivity of regulators and legislators, aka Public Choice Theory. #TeamSnoutsInTrough

I'd assert that the greatest perversion of markets is the exploitation of the loopholes or the creation of Black Markets to bypass those restrictions. Then Pricing fails to recognize actual Supply-Demand signals, next thing you know Dogs and Cats are Sleeping Together and the economy is pretty much on the downslide.

Expand full comment

One thing all economic theories have in common is that they assume to achive a steady state (even capitalist schools of economy does this), in a chaotic system (life, the universe and everything).

We therefore invent (f.e.) tax-funded state-run infrastructure (power production/distribution) under one theory (Wigfors school of economy) which works perfectly in one nation (Sweden) but not well at all in another one (USSR).

Then technology changes. Also, ideology. We therefore sell the state-run system to private operators who act as proxies for the state (neoliberalism, what used to be called tax-farming).

We then play the ideological blame-game.

To the state, it makes sense to sell. Now, the cost of operation is on the corporations but the state doesn't haver to lower taxes (these are instead reinvested in "green alternatives").

To the capitalist corporation, it makes sense too. They get to run something they never would have risked investing hundreds of billions in, with a pay-off window of decades, in in the first place, and at 1/100 the cost of building it.

But to the citizen-customer?

Some things are best run privately, some not. Some times, which is which changes. Both back and forth.

Fun thought-exercise: imagine if the US scrapped its national military, instead handing that off to the states: each state get to maintain its own military force, which only act in concert if some foreign power invades (as if...).

Would that be capitalist or communist, ideologically speaking? I think neither. Just wanted to ramble a bit to argue the point that ideologies aren't very clear-cut, or static, or even above and beyond the culture what implements an idea.

Perhaps the thunderstorm is affecting my thinking?

Expand full comment

"Would that be capitalist or communist, ideologically speaking? I think neither.'

Not all things fall into those categories.

So, if the US disbands the Military at the Federal level, and leaves that to The States... remind me again how that's not still the Government deciding how the $ gets spent?

Expand full comment

If you would like to debate or discuss something, make a real reply instead.

Expand full comment

Go ahead and deconstruct the teachings of Dr. Ian F. Akyildiz whose patents for nanotechnology biosensors in Covid-19 "vaccines" were frozen by the CIA for 7 years.

Expand full comment

This is not a response to my comment.

Expand full comment

Yes, regulated capitalism using the Keynesian compromise established under the New Deal put in place by FDR.

Also, subsidized education, free health care, strong unions, public utilities/resources in combination with lots of mom and pop small businesses.

No monopolies/lawless multinational corporations.

Expand full comment

Free, Free, FREE! subsidize, Subsidize, SUBSIDIZE! More big, Big, BIG, government! The Keynesian compromise is what brought us to this point in the first place. You ultimately serve the master that PAYS YOU, and that will be the uber-powerful government.

Expand full comment

See, _this_ part

"Also, subsidized education, free health care, strong unions, public utilities/resources"

Is just the sort of thing that absolutely kills this part

"lots of mom and pop small businesses."

That is, the "in combination with" part cannot survive if they have to prop up The State. In that case, Small Mom and Pop Shops essentially are the government.

Expand full comment

'Keynesian Compromise' doesn't sound like the sort of unfettered, free market economy The Founders envisioned.

What sorts of Regulations do you deem necessary?

Expand full comment

Thanks for the enlightening explanation.

Expand full comment

I like to buy my clothes from charity shops (in the UK - I believe you call them thrift shops in the US). This has simply been a personal preference, mainly because I personally resent forking out good money for bad quality clothing, and I can find much more natural fabrics (pure cotton, linen, wool, silk) in this older unfashionable clothing, since most modern stuff appears to be poly-something…. As I said, personal preference, no moral high ground implied. However, lately I keep coming across multiple exhortations to buy second hand to “save the planet”. Oh dear. If everyone did this, I would have stiff competition for my predeliction for natural fabrics ;) And more to the point, if everyone buys second hand, where is the supply of stuff going to come from? “Degrowth” would mean a finite supply of ever decreasing stuff.

Expand full comment

I love my degree in "nothingness"...it costs nothing, is worth nothing, means nothing and it fits right in with 95% of the regular degrees that are passed out.

Expand full comment

What the F is degrowth? Shrinkage?

Expand full comment

Can you fail out of a degrowth program by being too productive?

Expand full comment

The study of cold water shrinkage 🧐

Expand full comment

It's significant.

Expand full comment

"Tell 'em Jerry!"

Expand full comment

🤣

Expand full comment

like when you get in cold water mr. Swabbie?!....:)

shrinkage happens

Expand full comment

Ya, but i usually get in hot water. Particularly with my wife.

Expand full comment

That pesky turtling effect in cold weather. Makes it hard (sic) to get a grasp on things out in the deep woods when you have to micturate.

Expand full comment

Lolol

Expand full comment

Whatever the definition, it's something the Left majors in.

Expand full comment

Farts, bovine farts, to degreen the world

Expand full comment

*shakes steak knife in The Willster's direction, mutttters with mouth full of sirloin in clearly enthusiastic manner*

Expand full comment

Yes...it's the opposite of government.

Expand full comment

If it was about shrinking governments I would be be for it.

Expand full comment

That's a good point. Does "degrowth" also apply to governments?

Expand full comment

you know the answer.

you ever seen the government ever come in under budget and actually accomplish anything?

Expand full comment

Yes, political campaigns, but that's because the candidate who loses or drops out gets to keep any unspent funds.

Expand full comment

They are conditions which enable corporate raiders to swoop in and further gut our living standards via "free-market" capitalism which requires fake emergencies like Covid-19 to suspend the constitutional rights and ram through destabilizing Chicago School Cartel economic policies.

https://www.developmenteducationreview.com/issue/issue-8/shock-doctrine-rise-disaster-capitalism

Expand full comment

Again - if you have "fake emergencies like Covid-19 that "suspend the constitutional rights" of people then you don't have "free-market" anything.

Expand full comment

Lolol. How much time would guess you went around with this nonsense?

I'd rather be mowing the grass, with tweezers, one blade at a time...

Expand full comment

She seems sincere so I guess I was hoping she could make that last step.

She doesn't trust government. That's a good start. But she's angry right now. I hope we see her here again down the road. I think she's close.

Expand full comment

Oh good.

Expand full comment

funny that you would need to go to University to study that

Is there a course required in underwater basket weaving? or is that too strenuous?

Expand full comment

They had to drop it. To many students drown.

Expand full comment

swimming and weaving is soooooo hard.

Expand full comment

The only thing which grows under Leftwing despotism is the number of intellectuals needed to explain how great it is.

Expand full comment

The great economist Schumpeter predicted the decline of capitalism would be due to enemies whose very existence depended on the productivity of the capitalist system. Specifically, poor societies cannot afford an intelligentsia--only the bounties of capitalism can. Indeed, the more the productive the system, the larger the intelligentsia it can support. Yet this very class created by capitalism is its mortal enemy.

Hence the irony of the intelligentsia flogging "degrowth"--Degrowth will kill academia and the intelligentsia. But unfortunately, they will have succeeded in killing capitalism. Like a parasite killing the host on which it lives.

Expand full comment

A large part of this ideology is articulated by, if not derived from, Neal Stephenson's novel Anathem. It is not so obscure in the corporate upper crust - it is the inspiration/incitement for Jeff Bezos' funding the project known as the "Clock of the Long Now."

The setting is that industrial society undergoes a controlled demolition, with only governments and scientist-monks retaining any access to complex technology. The scientist-monks sequester themselves away to let the common man live in the decaying refuse of a grander civilization. Then there's some stuff about dimension travel. Honestly The Diamond Age is better.

Expand full comment

To use one of my Dad’s favorites , that’s hoisting yourself on your own petard!

Expand full comment

hahahahahahaaa

Expand full comment

did you mean "degrownup" degree?

Expand full comment

*golf clap*

Expand full comment

It's awful. Shun me!...:)

Expand full comment

*directs Shun in general Ryanly direction*

Expand full comment

The De-Growth major would be really popular any work place he goes, right? “Hi gang. Say Hi to Todd. He is our new de-growth manager. He will be working night and day alongside everyone figuring out ways to get you all fired.” “Hi Todd” says no one collectively.

Expand full comment

De-growth, de-population, de-industrialization, de-prosperity, de-life. What a concept.

Expand full comment

de-mons

Expand full comment

time to detonate

Expand full comment

At first, I thought it was another term for depopulation. OR rather "fun sizing the world."

Expand full comment

These kids. Someone please tell them that before we had the Industrial Revolution, we had trazillions of little guys with stalls in bazaars from time immemorial, trying to buy up the stalls on every side of them to make superstores in the bazaars, though on somewhat of a growth-hopeful scale.

Expand full comment

thanks for the warning ! Spain is now on the bottom, or very close, to countries I want to go to

Expand full comment

wtf is degrowth ?

Expand full comment

First lesson to all these miserabes: degrowth starts at home.

Expand full comment