The Cynical Psychology of Capitalism

[Ichingcarpenter]

About the article:
Two years ago, three psychologists and an economist published a long journal article on the dubious psychology that underlies American corporate capitalism. The original title of the piece began with the phrase, "A Taboo Topic," but the authors (myself among them) were warned by a sympathetic editor to be as unprovocative as possible to avoid being instantly written off as leftist ideologues. We deleted the phrase, thus assuring that the taboo against criticizing capitalism remained alive and well.

SNIP........



The Article:

Similarly, many forms of psychopathology are characterized by a preoccupation with the self and an inability to value the needs and wishes of others. This is evident, for example, in narcissism, sociopathy, and most other personality disorders. Psychological health, in contrast, includes a well-developed sense of empathy and the capacity to put other people's needs above one's own, while still caring for oneself. For most clinical approaches, movement in the direction of greater empathy and compassion, combined with a hefty dose of self-love, is a sign of significant progress.


When we apply this general perspective to capitalism's insistence that people are fundamentally selfish, the economic system comes out looking fatalistic, if not downright cynical. It assigns humanity to a low and easily attained level of moral, social, and emotional development and offers scant hope of collective improvement. Proponents of free enterprise argue that it is futile to attempt to alter our self-serving nature. Rather, the marketplace should organize itself based on the premise that everyone is out for her- or himself.

This brings us to the second key assumption we challenged in our article. The free market has as its primary goal the ongoing accumulation of wealth, which is supposed to provide the best opportunity available for attaining happiness. Yet there now exists a large body of cross-cultural research that shows that after people's survival needs are met—housing, food, clothing, and the like—the relationship between wealth and happiness is negligible. In fact, aspiring to be rich can be harmful. Cross-cultural studies also indicate that the adoption of materialistic values is associated with depression, anxiety, substance abuse, poor social skills, low self-esteem, psychosomatic symptoms (headaches, sore throats, etc.), and diminished life satisfaction. Materialistic values are also related to anti-social behaviors such as cheating and petty theft, racism, and environmental abuse. Materialistic individuals are less empathic and have shorter, more conflictual relationships with friends and lovers than their less materialistic peers. This is not good.

These developmental, clinical, and research-based insights might give us pause as to the psychological wisdom that underlies our nation's economic system. But even if we allow that there may be some validity to capitalism's model of the human psyche as selfish and materialistic, we still have to contend with its cynicism, which is built into the system.
The laws and regulations that form the structure of capitalism mandate selfish and materialistic behavior. For example, by law corporate CEOs have to put profit above all else, including the social good. The corporate culture that emerges from such a structure regards greedy behavior as heroic and compassion as foolish. It aggressively opposes the moral, social, and emotional development necessary to move beyond radical self-interest.

SNIP..........

http://www.tikkun.org/article.php/mar09_kanner

[azul]

1. Spiritual materialism has corrupted and conquered

the faith of man into worshiping the bloody golden cow.

The power of the love of money has been proven in battle, and the victorious tribes have been successful by breeding empathy out of their leaders and fighters.

Because of mankind's long and deadly struggle, now that the world has been subdued, it is epi-genetically ill-equipped emotionally and thus rationally to merge back to co-operative and respectful balanced behavior.

If we can agree that empathy is an essential part of being human and is necessary for further survival of life as we know it on this planet, do we now turn to science to help correct this destructive materialistic behavior, or will it take a miracle?

[WingDinger]

2. Yeah, but al the selfish fucks claim they give more charity!

[BobbyBoring]

8. They only do that

To try to square what they do with themselves. Seems to work for them though!

[bemildred]

3. The "free market" is a contra-factual abstraction.

There is no such thing, and if there ever were, it would rapidly become the "corrupt market" or the "manipulated market" or the "propaganda market", as one can easily observe. You cannot become filthy rich without much effort without profiting largely from large numbers of your fellow citizens. The ideal of the US management class is to make money from rents and automated services, not from manufactures or service to real persons by real persons.

It is blatant contra-factual dogma to assert that the sum of a large quantity of greed and narcissim has anything to do with the common good, it is like "War is Peace", Freedom is Slavery, Ignorance is Strength".

[loudsue]

5. Very well said, bemildred.

And it necessarily falls into corporate socialism, as we have seen.

[bemildred]

6. Which is essentially a way to put ones thumb on the scales when things don't work as proposed

by themselves. It takes force to maintain a distorted economy that favors the few.

[Ichingcarpenter]

4. Capitalism is the antithesis of what we are 'hard wired ' for

As Charles Darwin wrote: “All sentient beings developed through natural selection in such a way that pleasant sensations serve as their guide, and especially the pleasure derived from sociability and from loving our families.”

Sociability, and the empathy at the heart of it, drove evolution

Empathy is in our bones. For example, infants will cry at the tape-recorded sound of other infants crying but not at a recording of their own cries. And speaking of crying, as adults, our tear glands will automatically start producing tears when we hear the crying of others, even if we have no sense of tearing up ourselves.

Perhaps an even better name for ourselves would be Homo empathicus.

Capitalism is just the opposite and is a pathology
of an abhorrent human behavior.

"We cannot live only for ourselves. A thousand fibers connect us with our fellow men; and among those fibers, as sympathetic threads, our actions run as causes, and they come back to us as effects."

Herman Melville
US novelist & sailor (1819 - 1891)

[snagglepuss]

7. to read later

[handmade34]

9. rec

[classysassy]

10. The Death of Capitalism

Is just a matter of time,the serfs are at the moats and the Kings and Queens are mindful of their heads.