Capitalism: WTF?!

I’m a huge fan of the director Michael Moore. His work is provocative (in a good way), loud (so you can’t ignore it) and thoughtful (although his critics accuse him of being slapdash).

From Roger and Me to Sicko, I have always experienced his documentaries as a call to arms. But after watching his latest offering, Capitalism: A Love Story, I feel hopeless. Stumped. Defeated. Not because he didn’t provide a compelling narrative, Moore says he’s been trying to bring “the disastrous impact of corporate dominance on the everyday lives of Americans” to our attention for the last twenty-years, but because he basically proved that the 99% of the American population has no chance up against the 1%.

The level of corporate greed on display in the film is mind blowing. It starts out with a “leaked” memo from Citigroup to its stakeholders (and no I’m not talking about us the consumer) lamenting the current state of our democracy.

You see, for all our imperfections, these United States still affords every adult one vote. That one vote, when counted, can equal up to a tremendous sea change (i.e. President Barack Hussein Obama) and that is what the one-percenters are concerned about. What if the 99% wise up and start voting in a way that could really mess up their good thing? And they have a good thing.

One percent of the population in the U.S. holds more assets, monies and power than the rest of the population - combined. The folks over at Citigroup were concerned that we are no longer happy to believe the tired trope that if you work really hard (or if you want to do it easy and get a bunch of credit cards) you too can have access to the “good life.”

But after the financial free fall of 2008, Wall Street feared that we had caught on to their tricks and was about to derail their mission of economic world domination.

In his films I’m used to Moore presenting a glaring pile of bullshit behavior by some wrongdoer, and then close behind, a way to dismantle the machine is presented.

Comments [3]

yonks's picture

According to the Bank of

According to the Bank of France, the world economy (product and services) is 44 thousands billions of $  

And the market economy is 2024 thousands of billions

Its like a cow standing on the shoulders of a cat.

-Do not follow me, I'M LOST-

Yvonne's picture

About Capitalism

As long as Michael Moore makes people feel powerless then he is doing a great job, that's why he is popular enough to make 'eager' people feel more insightful than the whole population thus feel freer in some way yet depressed, and that's why he is not popular enough to make an actual difference with the way people think. Balance is the core of everything.

All this goes by with the simple fact that everyone misses the interconnectedness with the whole world, Including Michael Moore; he scratches the periphery of a surface by mentioning Saudi Arabia's monetary status in the US and ignores all the other signs and evidences.

That's why 'Hurt Locker' wins a zillion Oscars over 'Avatar' (even if Avatar has the perfect US typical savior): one beats the shit out of our brains that the US army is always right and rightful, and ignores all the political aspects and unfairness that been planted in the area, the other promotes resistance and the prevail of Mother Nature on all perversities planted in a sacred land (which is any occupied land directly or indirectly). 

That's why no one addresses what the hekk is Saudi Arabia doing along the US in the Middle East and the US itself and KSA itself, and what are the ideological goals of it all (and no it's not ONLY about Muslims Shia and Sunna as Mr. Obama likes to think and make us think)

That's why no one questions why Europeans are getting stupidly neutral by day (politically talking), why they turn a blind eye on everything, and why they still feel so ashamed of their history that they promise they won't do anything further than create some meaningful art every once and a long while.

That's why no one questions anything political that happens in Africa, and why countries that have any kind of benefit to the big players are always threatened by civil wars.  

That's why no one questions what is going on in the Middle East... Heart of all problems in the US and the world.

Not to mention Human Rights issues as racism, sexism etc…

This is just to complement your point of view, of course you don't have to agree. Where I come from, everyone loves the American dream, if Uncle Sam could copy your lifestyles and paste it in ours, we'd be very happy and act the same way you are now.

We're even copying anything and everything that Uncle Sam is allowing us to copy for now, Jerry Springer at best, so called freedom of speech the least. Wear Louis Vuitton; watch Desperate Housewives or Prison Break and keep up with MTV and you’re a perfect model of freaking modernism and democracy.. Add this to the tremendous poverty and very very… very inexistent laws and legislations, we become an even freakier picture than you are. Freaks until Hurt Locker becomes a good movie and millions of dead bodies don’t count in the Human Rights equation.

Consumerism, greed and brainwashing keep the US going from the inside, whilst an Ideological Lobby runs it from outside. What Ideology? that's what I call a subject I would "Like to know more about".

Thank you for what you wrote. Hope you don’t quit fighting.

 

Kelly McCartney's picture

I still need to watch the

I still need to watch the film, so I'm not gonna read the whole blog.

But thanks for writing it!

Won't you be my neighbor? @theKELword