The world is sick, capitalism is the disease, socialism is the cure.
The world is sick, capitalism is the disease, socialism is the cure.
The pandemic presents an opportunity. It does so by making humanity conscious of itself in its threefold character: biological, political, and ethical.
• Humanity as a species, biologically
• Humanity as a sovereign, politically
• Humanity as a quality of sharing, caring mutuality and friendship
This threefold character can be equated with the True, the Good and the Beautiful. These characteristics can also be articulated in the form of demands. These demands are shared by vast numbers of people across the globe.
They can unite our common struggle to liberate humanity and transform the world. They are:
• Health
• Peace
• Energy
They can be elaborated in the following manner:
We demand Health for all people including:
• clean air
• clean water
• nutritious food
• safe shelter
• free medical care
• emancipation of labor, including industrial, agricultural and household labor
We demand Peace for all in the following manner:
• introduce an immediate global cease-fire
• abolish and dismantle all nuclear weapons
• ban the export of weapons from anywhere to anywhere
• bring the troops home-no soldiers outside their home territory
• establish public service, not military service-immediate conversion of armies into conservation corps
We demand Energy for all in the following manner:
• end fossil fuel use within ten years
• commit to sun, wind and water-based systems, in short, clean energy
• provide electricity to everyone
• emancipate labor, unleash the energy-producing power of human and animal labor
These demands will be opposed by some people. Their arguments will boil down to one: Property. To combat this argument we must insist that there are three kinds of property:
• Private Property
• Public Property
• Personal Property
We must further insist that these types be defined in the following manner:
• Private Property is that which is stockpiled for the purpose of its own infinite increase. This necessitates the plundering of the Health, Peace and Energy of the world.
• Public Property is that which is shared in common by all humanity and is held in perpetuity to improve the Health, Peace and Energy of the world.
• Personal Property is what each person needs in order to be healthy, at peace and full of energy. This includes an adequate amount of all those necessities listed in the forgoing demand for Health. But it also includes the capacity for sharing, for interdependence and the freedom to participate, to contribute, to give.
It must be acknowledged that current regimes will not accept these demands. They will not because they cannot.
They cannot because the capitalist system would cease to function and current regimes are, with a couple notable exceptions, devoted to serving the capitalist system.
Nevertheless, the regime’s refusal is not an argument. It is nothing more than the dogmatic assertion of the ancient maxim: Might Makes Right. This dismal verdict, however, is not a just one. Moreover, it does not convince and for two reasons: 1. the intrinsic practicality of our demands for Health, Peace and Energy, and, 2. Nature itself is proving who is mighty and who is not. Indeed, the capitalists may bring an end to humanity with their insatiable appetite for Private Property, but that is not preordained nor is it inevitable.
Will we seize this opportunity or will we miss it?
