Let me copy pasta myself here to save time and just say - they are already murdering us in the millions, any harm that might come to them is an act of self defence.
Look around - the violence is already here, it has been inflicted on to the working class for centuries, killing hundreds of millions (at least, in all that time) for profit in war, with hunger and restricted access to water, with homelessness and poverty, with preventable disease, with climate change, with immoral laws and entire systems designed to keep large segments of the population as slave labour, which is what they used to gain their power and wealth to be in the position to impose all of this in the first place. And all that just off the top of my head, there is so much more violence that is inflicted on us daily, they’ve just got most people convinced that’s just life, when it really really isn’t. And those who actually benefit are never just going to give all of that up.
But they did though. Robert E Lee, Jefferson Davis, Alexander H Stephens, plus countless slaveowners all just… surrendered, and went back to owning the exact same plantations their slaveowning had provided the startup capital for.
Was it right? Hell no! Their plantations should have been given to their slaves. We would live in a better country if they had.
But it’s worth repeating that people who blew out their chest and blustered about how it was better to die than to lose this fight just went right back to comfortable lives after a heinous, sadistic, brutal form of capital exploitation was abolished right out from under them.
If you can abolish slavery without killing Dolly Sumner Lint or Jefferson Davis, then it stands to reason that even after sending Pinkertons, cops, and bootlickers to die by the thousands, these billionaires will surrender at the first sign of blood on their doorstep.
Meaning you can abolish capital without killing Jamie Johnson OR Jeff Bezos.
Which in turn means the killing of those particular people ends up peripheral at best.
They will not throw their bodies in front of the bullets aimed at their orphan killing machines.
As much closure as they would bring, as good as that would feel. It’s just not going to happen.
And then, at that point – when they have surrendered – it’s like torturing a serial killer. We gain nothing. It doesn’t bring anyone back to life. It doesn’t put the aerosolized carbon back underground or bring the temperature back to livable levels. All it does is introduce a little bit more pain to the world.
Again: at best.
At worst it could potentially set a precedent that anyone perceived as “aligned” with billionaires deserves the same death inflicted on those billionaires.
In other words, at worst, it could turn the person holding the guillotine into the de facto capitalist controlling all of the factories, all of the land, and all of the equipment single-handedly. Because who is going to stop them? Anyone who challenges that person can be easily labeled a “reactionary capitalist counter-revolutionary” and punished according to that label.
- AnarchoYeasty ( @AnarchoYeasty@beehaw.org ) English5•11 months ago
Perhaps because even after they lost the slaves they were still rich as fuck and powerful. And then they passed laws to still enslave black people and fuck them over so shit didn’t really change all that much. Think about how much better life would be today if every slave owner and klansman were put to death for their heinous crimes instead of slapped on the wrist and given back control of their slaves
I accidentally deleted my comment right after writing it. I’m going to write it again.
If you killed them, their property would have passed to their heirs.
Option 1: maybe you lack the tools to stop this inheritance. Maybe your only choice is to kill those heirs.
But to do so, you must now kill children. And crucially, you must now build your movement out of members who are okay with killing children.
Your new country will be a vicious, cold, brutal place.
Option 2: you figure out some way to take control of the legal system enough to strip their heirs of their wealth without killing those heirs.
Now, you’ve got a tool that can be wielded to separate people from their property without killing them. Which makes the first killing (the killing of the parents) optional.
Once again, to kill those parents, you must now build your movement out of members who are okay with killing when it has become optional.
The real solution with option 1 is to gain the power to make option 2 possible. The real solution with option 2 is to align yourself with those members of your movement who believe killing should be avoided whenever killing is optional.
I think the slaveowners of the south should have been stripped of their property. I think the plantations should have been given to the slaves as reparation.
I think klansmen should have been stripped of everything they owned.
But only use bullets when they show up with pitchforks to burn down one of these plantations newly transferred into black hands. Don’t go seeking out former slaveowners to kill. Just kill the ones currently trying to burn down the former plantation.
At any rate, you must make a choice between aligning yourself with people who err on the side of killing (even when it’s no longer necessary), and aligning yourself with people who err on the side of sparing lives (even when it causes problems.)
You don’t want to alienate the latter. You don’t want to give power to the former.
Deciding whether or not to kill people is not about who deserves death: it’s about choosing your allies. And you don’t want your allies to be the ones erring on the side of unnecessary violence.
if every slave owner and klansman were put to death for their heinous crimes
Their property would have passed to their heirs.
If your only available tool was killing people, then maybe you could have followed it up by killing their children?
But then you have to contend with the fact that your movement (and the people you have handed weapons to) are now a very specific subset of communists – “communists who are okay with killing children.” You can’t build a country off of that!
If on the other hand you have some way of stopping slaveowners’ heirs from receiving their fortunes without killing those heirs, then you clearly have some tool that can void the property of the slaveowners themselves without killing them.
And once again, if you choose to kill the slaveowners despite possessing such a tool, then you wind up building your movement off of, “people who are fine with killing when it’s no longer necessary.” After that, it’s no surprise when that movement starts running over a bunch of members of Hungarian soviets – the very people the movement claims to protect – with tanks.
Yeah, I think their plantations should have been taken from them. Yeah, I think Klansmen should have been stripped of everything they owned.
But once you’re powerful enough to do that, you’re also powerful enough to do that without killing them.
If they throw their bodies in front of the Orphan Crushing Machine, don’t let that stop your bullets. But if they step aside, you have a choice: align yourself with people who kill when they don’t need to, or align yourself with people who avoid killing whenever possible.
One of those is better than the other.
- AnarchoYeasty ( @AnarchoYeasty@beehaw.org ) English2•11 months ago
Did the children abuse and own slaves? No? Then who the fuck said kill the kids too. Imagine fucking defending slave owners and saying they don’t deserve to be out to death. Imagine defending the most evil atrocities imaginable. Do you think the Nazis shouldn’t have been put to death? Because the slave owners did worse than the Nazis ever did.
Edit: also no one fucking stepped aside. They fought a fucking war over it remember. You don’t get to start a war to enslave humans and then cry peace I surrender when you start to actually suffer the consequences.
Try defending black people like you defend slave owners.
You replied to my accidentally deleted comment (which probably isn’t deleted on your instance.) I really wish Liftoff didn’t put the edit button right next to the delete button. But oh well.
Did the children abuse and own slaves? No? Then who the fuck said kill the kids too. Imagine fucking defending slave owners and saying they don’t deserve to be out to death. Imagine defending the most evil atrocities imaginable. Do you think the Nazis shouldn’t have been put to death? Because the slave owners did worse than the Nazis ever did.
Edit: also no one fucking stepped aside. They fought a fucking war over it remember. You don’t get to start a war to enslave humans and then cry peace I surrender when you start to actually suffer the consequences.
Try defending black people like you defend slave owners.
I believe in life sentences, not death sentences. I would have been fine if the Nazis had been thrown in prison to serve non-commutable life sentences for their crimes. I would have preferred it.
But the entire reason the Civil War didn’t stick was because slaveowners kept their property. Not because they kept their lives.
who the fuck said kill the kids too
Dude. Their kids grew up and enslaved black people using “prisons” and Jim Crow laws. And they were able to do this because they wielded the power they inherited from their slaveowning parents. If you leave the kids this power, then you’re going to need to kill them eventually for committing the same crimes.
Just take away their power! Imprison as many of the slaveowners if you can. And then leave it at that.
The South surrendered unconditionally. If I had a time machine, and could influence the North’s decisions, I would take their property because that would actually accomplish something. But I would not take any more lives than were absolutely necessary.
Because I don’t want to be on the side that kills more people than is necessary.
What an absurd sweeping generalization of incredibly complex events and context.
Just say you’re another bootlicker and get on with your life. Please oh PLEASE don’t hurt those that exclusively exist to make our lives worse keep us poor dumb and sick!!!
You sayin the French were fools? Fuck off with your neat little bow on top of a simple little “just threaten them and they will play nice”, life isn’t that simple, that’s not how this works, the civil war and what we have now is incomparable. These billionaires are international and actually play as a united team against us poors.
But yeah just a drop of blood and Bezos gives up his fortune and union breaking and insane net worth and lives a subservient life after that. Yeah that sounds realistic
I see. I said, “that’s just not going to happen.”
Which expressed certainty in something that is uncertain. My bad. It might happen. Billionaires might throw themselves in front of the Orphan Crushing Machine when we open fire on that thing. My words were poorly chosen.
However, we still don’t want to alienate people who believe in sparing life whenever possible. (Those are the people whose side we always want to be on.) And we also still don’t want to align with people who believe in taking life even when it’s unnecessary. (Those are the people whose side you never want to be on.)
Be mindful of the movement you are building. Be mindful of the allies you are choosing.
- zbyte64 ( @zbyte64@lemmy.blahaj.zone ) English1•11 months ago
Reconstruction was ended through assassination. This was hardly a resounding conclusion to slavery but a re-systemization of oppression. For starters, the slaves never received compensation, whole many of the previous slave owners did. Same goes for the GI Bill.
They can live, but it has to be on 60k a year, with all of their initial assets liquidated and used to support people in need.
yeah i’m fine with that but not murder like a lot of people here say they want
I think most of us start with the assumption that they’ll never give up their stranglehold willingly, and move on to more practical solutions.
They need to make the choice: pay a lot more taxes, or take the second option. I’m not threatening violence, but as our society gets more desperate the targets on their backs get larger.
There are 756 billionaires in the US and 330 million of us. Once that becomes clear to people things might change, one way or the other. All other “culture wars” are noise generated to distract from this one.
Shameless displays of excess wealth is increasingly being met with more and more cultural hostility, especially amongst younger people. Gen Zers are highly likely to view people who flaunt their wealth or indulge heavily in luxury goods as being tacky or just generally negatively. The hostility as the climate crisis increases will only increase as well.
Former tax professional here. The problem is that the billionaires aren’t really billionaires. Elon Musk does not have a quarter trillion dollars in his bank account. His net worth is calculated from what other people think his holdings are worth. He cannot be taxed on this.
Unless someone is game enough to pass legislation enabling taxation of “unrealised gains” (while not allowing credits/offsets for unrealised losses), billionaires will continue not paying their fair share of tax.
- AnarchoYeasty ( @AnarchoYeasty@beehaw.org ) 1•11 months ago
The end result of revolution is… For them to pay more taxes.
practical
Ah, teenagers
what other pressure do you have the ability to put on a billionaire that they wouldn’t find utterly laughable, if they even noticed it? but you can’t buy your way out of death. sure, if the threat to their lives were to become credible, they could leverage their wealth to protect against it, but being surrounded by bodyguards at all times, having every rooftop surveyed for snipers before you go out to get coffee - these are things that disrupt their overly-cruisy existences. and the more people there are gunning for them, figuratively or literally, the worse their lives get.
and sure, if you off them, their wealth will just default to someone else. but if billionaires start dying left and right, their inheritants might just start to find ways to make sure their fortune stays a little shy of that magical 9-digit mark.
This is the teenager equivalent of telling Santa you want a pony
Who is Santa in this analogy? And why is a teenager talking to Santa? I’m lost.
@Aesthesiaphilia @Narrrz @moosetwin @Track_Shovel holy shit like half of ur post history is “hAha TeEnAgErS LoL”
it is? I’ve been hacked!
Seriously, though, I’m not sure how you got to that conclusion, when I mainly shitpost and talk about restoration of disturbed lands.
B
Look I’m all for taxing the wealthy, but saying we should force billionaires, or really anyone for that matter, to give up everything more than $60k/year is fucking laughably insane.
Why, exactly? Only two years ago, 37.9 million people were below the poverty line, which is only $20k/yr. And that’s only counting the US. If we can do it, they can do it.
If those making over $60k currently cannot make it work when so many of their own countrymen have been doing so for their entire lives, perhaps we need to talk. If nothing else, I can give you financial advice.
Nice red herring. The argument was that demanding a billionaire give up all of their money and live on a relatively small salary is absurd, and nothing you said refutes that.
Sounded to me like what they meant was basically as a friendlier option than death. What’s absurd about it if you weren’t saying it’s too little to live on?
I want them to give up their wealth and power for the benefit of society. But they aren’t going to do that, are they?
A rare few do. They’re off limits.
They sure aren’t. They give up their wealth, but by doing so gain more power. They get to decide what is important for the world by dumping millions of dollars in their favourite charities. Charities that they conveniently get to put their names on to feel good about themselves.
So they’re not allowed to have the money…and they’re also not allowed to donate it? Am I clear? Because that seems stupid, tbh.
The world worked a little better when philanthropy was encouraged for the tax break. It always will. They get their cute little name on a plaque, whatever. The money goes where it’s needed.
This is not to say anyone needs to be able to make that much in the first place, but demonizing one for also getting rid of it is funny
The money goes where they want it to go, which is frequently not where it’s needed.
And you are correct, they should not have the money, since they didn’t earn it. They also shouldn’t get to decide where it goes, since they aren’t suited to make those decisions. It should be taken from them.
Behold, I am a pedant that agrees with you! However, I do believe that billionaires earned their money… in the same way that a plantation owner earned their terrifying hoard; using their complete moral depravity and means.
See you call that earning. I call it stealing. When something is earned, it would be wrong to take it from them.
Vikings earned their broadly spread genetics in much the same way, complete moral depravity and means. Just because something is stolen doesn’t make it unearned, and just because something is earned doesn’t entitle possession. Theft begets reprisal.
I believe they’re alluding to the wealthy funneling their money into foundations and other “charitable” endeavors as basically being a money wash that also comes with a lot of power to influence things. Their charity comes with strings and when you’re talking about the vast sums they wield, it has the ability to derail other charities or efforts that may have been more focused on the actual task/problem. If NPR decides not to run a story critical of Microsoft or the Gates’s because the Bill and Melinda Gates foundation are donors, does that charity still have a net positive effect?
If they still have billions to their name, they’re not as good or generous as they’ve made you think they are.
Most of these people only have billions in stocks. 2 things would happen if they sold these stocks: the stock prices would decrease (leading to them losing a lot more money than they would plan) and other people (with worse entintions) would buy the stocjs so they control the company and then push anti consumer changes
I personally am a pacifist, but the billionaires will not be missed if the general public decides to
I don’t advocate for it, I just won’t miss them
Keanu can stay though
Billionaires is a weird group of people to choose to speak up for.
…And?
Murder can be just without being legal.
The murder of billionaires, and CEOs of oil companies (along with all other oil executives) is morally justified, even if it’s not legal.
Yes. Your a naive fool.
Unironically choosing the lives of some of the most vile despicable people to have ever lived over the lives of 50,000x as many completely normal people.
I want to eradicate their genomes.
While I do agree with you, minor spelling mistake.
It’s them or us
murder is murder… but some murders are definitely less… crime-y than others
Self defence isn’t murder
They’re coming for you, whether you fight back or not.
coming for you? they’re eating you right now…
Exactly, we’re already just cogs in their money making system at best - some of us may die but it is a sacrifice they are willing to make…
So OP, I’m unsure how to ask this, but you wouldn’t happen to be… Say… A billionaire would you?
OP glow in da dark
Yes.
In Minecraft, of course.
Let the free market decide.
But the free market is rigged by the billionaires
Idk, its clear billionaire cage fights is not a niche market after recent internet antics.
I agree with this
It’s only murder if you subscribe to the “meat is murder” mantra…
I think meat is murder, but i still think we should kill billionaires.
The same way I wouldn’t kill a cow for a burger, but Id defend myself if some wild animal was trying to kill me.
Proof that people from off of Blahaj zone are weak
I am a starving child and this is the last post I will see before I die. Goodbye