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Capitalism: A real love story and how it got me blocked on Facebook

By: The Right Scoop (Diary)  |  October 15th, 2009 at 11:35 PM  | 

RESIZE: AAA

I have had a friend on Facebook, who I’ll call Lefty Lucy, who blocked me today for my ‘controversial’ views. One quick note is that we’ve gone to the same church before, so we believe in the same Jesus, which is awesome. Now the back story is that Lefty Lucy went to see the latest Moore fabrication and loved it. Well, I felt the need to share with Lucy how the mortgage crisis really started, regarding govt intervention and social engineering, and I put out the premise that the hard Left is trying to overwhelm our economy by creating more dependency on the govt than we can afford (yes, I know Republicans spent too much too, but I was trying to make a point). I also pointed out that capitalism is the best chance for a man to better his circumstances and that is what the hard Left is attacking. Well I woke up this morning and it had all been deleted. Ok. Then I checked my inbox:

I just thought I should let you know that I am praying for you to lose everything you have by forces which you cannot control. This is for the sake of your soul’s conversion to Christ. Fair warning.

Blessings of the poor,
Lefty Lucy

Well that was news to me, because I do know Jesus and love Him very much. But I do defend capitalism, and apparently that’s where we separate. So I wrote back:

I certainly appreciate the sentiment Lucy. And correct me if I am wrong, but are you suggesting that I am not a christian because I think capitalism is the best chance for a man to better his circumstances?
And here’s the long reply:
You are wrong. It is because you are willing to judge, condemn, slander, and ignore the reality of the suffering of other people, the poor, in order to protect and maintain that belief. Which means that you have lost your sense of God in the worship of a golden calf, quite literally, the idol of capitalism. You cannot let other people suffer and die at the hands of a system, ignore their voices but rather twist their stories to blame them for their circumstances under some bullshit concept of “personal responsibility” simply because you want to believe it is the right one, or more accurately, because it has worked out well for you so far, and claim to know the living God. This is exactly like the Pharisees, like Saul. There is a lot in the Bible where Jesus is speaking directly to people with ignorant, self-righteous, and destructive attitudes such as yours. The bulk of his teaching is devoted to it actually. It’s really hard to miss. You should read the Gospels. He doesn’t go light on them, friend. “It is harder for a rich man to enter in the Kingdom of Heaven than it is for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle.” Hard to spin that one in your favor, I’m afraid. The point is not to get rich, and getting rich will not make a man happy. Getting rich does not effectively “better” anyone’s circumstances. Therefore, because one percent of the population gets rich, and the rest of us are working our asses off at two or three jobs and can barely pay our rent/mortgage or feed ourselves…um, no, that’s not a better life. The majority of the population can’t meet the basic needs in order to even begin thinking about life, liberty, or the pursuit of happiness. Capitalism is an individualist system, breaking apart communities so the masses, separated from one another, can be stomped on. WAKE UP. Capitalism isn’t working in the real world. Forget about your test tube theories of “it would work if only…” and look around and outside of yourself for God’s sake. Or maybe you can’t. I have tried to talk to you about this before and you have shown that you have no intention of giving up your idols for the sake of Christ. I have dealt with many different kinds of addicts, and this is one of the worst addictions I think I have ever seen. How lost can one soul be? I am just giving you over to His care. And so yes I hope to God you lose everything that you have, so that you will see from the eyes of the least of these. It is the only thing that will save you from yourself I think, give you the freedom from having to look for evil and blame in other human beings, and instead allow you to see the face of God. This I pray for you.

Well I was going to respond, but before I could even put together a reasonable reply I was blocked on Facebook by this friend. To be honest, I wasn’t even sure where to start before I found out I couldn’t. So instead of responding to what appears to be a grave misunderstanding of capitalism, I decided to post this for your entertainment. Feel free to comment on how you would reply to this. I think it would be quite interesting to see where you would start.

COMMENTS

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  • DONTTREADONME

    1st I would get rid of the bs term and use asterisks.

    now some points
    -I do not know who said it but do not cut off your nose to spite your face.
    -Something Jesus taught about that speck in your brothers eye when you do not see the log in your own..
    -Pride of the one who prays for all to see versus the one who prays to God in private

    The poor and destitue are one thing, but the knowledge that man like the animal is capable of becoming dependent especially when one has no God or faith, for it is written that ask of God and God will provide, or something like that…

    Obviously, you know you are right when they project shortcomings on to you. Now go in peace, and remind of her or what Jesus has taught us, I think Mathew or Mark may be a place to start.

    Sorry I am preaching, I actually just picked up the Bible last night and started reading, to rest my soul.

  • bobbymike

    America is OBESITY!! Even the poor can buy more food than they need, where else on planet earth is that possible?

  • http://hillbillypolitics.com Steph C

    They simply want to control the capital and who makes it. What they are is anti-free market and pro-corporatism. Corporatism, itself, is socialism in a microcosm and the bigger it gets the more socialistic it gets.

    The bailouts were for the economy but to shore up corporatism and disabling free market competition.

    The left picks and chooses which parts of the whole system suits their needs and ditches the rest. We see the same thing happening in Russia. Now that they’ve allowed a little capitalism in to shore up their economy, they’re walking it backward to gain more control.

    No, I’m not an economist. Far from it but in watching the machinations of Congress and the Obama administration you kind of get a picture of what’s going on.

    • http://impudent.blognation.us/blog kyle8

      Remember that Mussolini was the foremost socialist living in western Europe. He published the most important Marxist newspaper.

      When he started his fascist party he remained wedded to Marxism but was convinced that it could not work in the way Marx envisioned.

      He therefore formed an alliance with big business, labor unions, and the government. The big corporations gained huge advantages over the smaller competitor and the unions were happy since most small business was non unionized.

      The middle class had to pay crushing taxes but were bought off with social programs like unemployment insurance, medical care and pensions.

      The current left wing follows fascism in every way except the extreme nationalism. They even prefer the same anti-free speech tactics against their opponents favored by brown-shirts.

      • http://hillbillypolitics.com Steph C

        ‘were’ should have been ‘weren’t’

  • kyoufuu

    is that they cannot separate the system from the people who take advantage of it. You should tell your friend that there are plenty of people who have become rich through capitalism who also make it their life’s work to help the poor and less fortunate. The leftists always point to people like Bernie Madoff when looking for their capitalist villain, but disregard the plethora of charities established by millionaires.

    Human beings possess God given talents, along with free will. What she’s trying to say is that it’s better to negate those talents and that free will in the interest of “fairness” and “helping others” than it is to accept that some people will fail to do what is right and good. This premise is difficult to accept, Jesus did not call for us to force our will upon others, and striking down our capitalist system to create one whereby men and women are forced to share the fruits of their labor with others would be doing just that.

    I also find it very disconcerting that she would pray for you to lose everything you have. It belies an intellectual and spiritual immaturity, as it indicates a belief that all those who are poor are that way because of misfortune rather than their own actions. I don’t think Jesus would be happy with anyone praying that such misery fall upon anyone, much less someone who once held the title “friend.”

  • Finrod

    The very fact that she’s wishing ill upon you proves that she is not on the side of good. I would also point out to her that she is in blatant violation of the Tenth Commandment to not covet your neighbor’s stuff; every single word of her rant against ‘the rich’ is filled with covetousness.

    • http://www.therightscoop.com therightscoop

      If she really thought that I weren’t saved, then I can understand praying for someone in that manner, as sometimes losing everything can be the only thing that can lead a man to God. And God is THE most important.

      But outside of that, I find little defensible.

  • 6eorge Jetson

    versus that of the average soul elsewhere. I suppose if it’s so bad here, Lefty Lucy and others in her ilk in your church should take up a collection to send our poor off to one of the enchanted countries where there is no capitalism.

    Oh, and I couldn’t help but notice Lefty Lucy wanted you to join the ranks of the poor. Growing the constituency of the Left. And the line “give you the freedom from having to look for evil and blame in other human beings”.

    MMM, isn’t that precisely what Lefty Lucy is doing?

  • marshmom

    And if she is so against Capitalism, which by the way has made the poor in our country ten times better off than even “middle class” in other countries, she should give up everything that has to do with it. If she sells things at her job, she should quit.
    If she uses a toilet, she should stop. If she wears make-up, she should stop buying it. If she likes to watch television, she needs to get rid of it.
    If she and all others did this, they would put even more people out of work and onto the street.
    Capitalism isn’t perfect, but nothing ever is. You can’t blame the system for a few faulty people. By the way, politicians are some of the most despicable, underhanded people I’ve ever seen and they aren’t running businesses–they’re “helping poor people”. HA! Yeah right.

  • Jack_Savage

    And it is paraphrasing Milton Friedman, who I would turn to if I were you:

    Nowhere on this earth have people improved their lives as much as they have in capitalist systems. The poor in America are filthy rich by the standards of the rest of the world because of capitalism. Hundred of millions of people enjoy the benefit of life-saving drugs, medical procedures, machinery and equipment, all because of capitalism. We produce the food and grain that feeds the world, all because of capitalism. We supply mosquito nets in Africa, humanitarian aid in Indonesia, and have torn down walls in Berlin because of capitalism.

    Most of all, capitalism enables us frail humans to fully grasp and enjoy that which God Almighty has given us, and which no man should be allowed to take – our freedom. The collectivist systems which, in your view, take care of their population most effectively require their people give up this God-given freedom first. We surely have the freedom to fail, and some do, but we also have the freedom to succeed and improve and grow like no other people on earth.

    Jesus said, “The poor will always be with us”, and as usual, He is right. The reason I am able to give money to our church and to others to help alleviate suffering is because of capitalism and the freedom it brings. I hope you will awaken one day to have a choice between guaranteed subsistance while living in bondage, and the thrilling uncertainty that comes with freedom, and then maybe you will know why I have chosen the latter over the former.

  • Jack_Savage

    She missed the point of the rich man’s experience with Jesus entirely, and takes the quote completely out of context (as is typical of those with a superficial understanding of the Gospels) to attempt to prove her point.

  • aesthete

    Hopefully she will come to her senses and seek reconciliation; politics is no reason to destroy a friendship, especially when it was as cordially discussed as it appears to have been. That said, I would reply with something using the following points (not necessarily in that order):

    1: Is there a (non-capitalist) country that Lucy can point to where the poor were qualitatively better off than those of a free-market country? If she brings up that they’re different countries, etc., ask her what she thinks of the stark differences between East and West Germany, North and South Korea, and Hong Kong/Japan and China, which gave us as close (and disturbing) a natural experiment as we’re likely to get.

    2: Ask her what her definition of capitalism is. Most opponents of capitalism really have no idea what it is and what it entails. If that’s the case with her, explaining capitalism to her without using the term “capitalism” might help (leftists seem to dislike the word, for some reason).

    3: Ask her what she liked about the movie, and what she disliked. Most people don’t like being told why something is bad right off the bat, and an actual dialogue can sometimes turn up interesting clues as to why they believe what they believe.

    4: I would then ask her what, specifically, she thinks that the government could do for the poor which would actually lower the unemployment rate which hasn’t been tried before. Chances are, she hasn’t really thought that through.

    5: I would also encourage her to read mailloux’s truly excellent examination of the moral bankruptcy of socialism/welfare state-ism:

    I highly doubt that any of that will persuade her (in the unlikely event that she decides that your friendship is worth more than an ideological squabble), but hey, you never know :)

  • aesthete

    http://www.redstate.com/mailloux/2009/10/15/the-progressive-gospel

  • bk

    to ask her whether she thought Michael Moore made money from ticket and DVD sales. After she replies “well of course DUH” then you could say, “Ah so is capitalism evil when HE is the one taking advantage of it?”

    Your ‘friend’ would probably be just as mad, but it would have saved you a lot of time. :-)