Response: Capitalism and Socialism

In response to Justine Cozza's post on 4/11/12:

I think that the last sentence of this post - "We used work to survive, but now we work to get nice things and to keep up with always changing trends" - is worth taking another look at.  The unfortunate fact is that in capitalist society, we still do work to live.  Those who, whether through choice or necessity, do not or cannot work have little to no safety net; they typically either exist at the edge of society, often attempting to ignore their miserable situation with the help of alcohol or other substances, or simply die of starvation, exposure, or as victims of violence from others in similar desperate circumstances.  The conception of working to get nice things is very much an upper-and-middle-class idea, and is also ultimately untrue in a capitalist society.

If this idea were actually true, then the society would not be capitalist, but would instead be closer to a form of socialism.  Actual socialism usually appears to provide slightly more than the bare minimum for continued existence, but this varies depending upon the country in which it exists.  In a truly socialist society, work would actually be an option.  If someone chose not to work, they would have a very Spartan lifestyle, but they would not die or end up living an absolutely miserable life.  If they wished to enhance their quality of life (for example, by purchasing a musical instrument), they could then enter the workforce in order to gain money to fulfil that purpose.

Nothing Actually Goes Wrong

One of the ideas we discussed in class was the idea that evil can exist despite an omnipotent, omniscient, omnibenevolent God because it stems from humans giving in to temptation.  Thus, even though God does indeed have a flawless plan, humans mess with the plan by way of their weak willpower.  As valid as this idea may seem, however, upon closer inspection one can detect a very large hole in it - namely, that if something as simple as a human's inability to resist the urge to commit a sin can mess with God's plan, then God cannot possibly be omnipotent.  If he was, he could (and would, if he was also omnibenevolent) come up with a better, foolproof, humanproof plan.

Thus, we cannot attribute such terrible happenings as unjust wars, serial murders, animal abuse, or terrorist bombings to humanity's giving in to temptation.  Instead, we must accept that nothing actually goes wrong with God's plan.  Either one can take this as evidence of God's non-existence, God's lack of either omnipotence or omnibenevolence, or human fallibility.  Perhaps the apparent contradiction of the existence of evil and the existence of God is not actually a contradiction at all - we simply do not possess the capacity to understand how this can be so.  Which explanation we accept depends entirely upon the individual.