Tuesday, December 12, 2006

Celebrating Capitalism

Should Capitalism have its own holiday? A day of unabashed spending and exploitation. Well why not. After all workers have MayDay, and Culture Jammers have Don't Buy Anything Day, and well groundhogs have Groundhog day.

So why not a day to celebrate Capitalism. I remember this was attempted locally back in 2001. And all four members of the University of Alberta Ayn Rand Objectivist club showed up. But it looks like some folks are trying again.

Celebrate Capitalism (tm) - International Capitalism Day 2007

National Day of Capitalism

Of course it would help if they maybe communicated with each other. No wait that would mean cooperation the very anathema of competition, the underpining of all capitalist ideology. Of course as wannabe captialists they are not asking taxpayers to recgonize the day officially because well that would be a contradiction. After all the real motto of the day should be We Owe We Owe Off To Work We Go.

Weber - Protestant Ethic and Spirit of Capitalism

In fact, the summum bonum of this ethic, the earning of more and more money, combined with the strict avoidance of all spontaneous enjoyment of life, is above all completely devoid of any eudaemonistic, not to say hedonistic, admixture. It is thought of so purely as an end in itself, that from the point of view of the happiness of, or utility to, the single individual, it appears entirely transcendental and absolutely irrational.Man is dominated by the making of money, by acquisition as the ultimate purpose of his life. Economic acquisition is no longer subordinated to man as the means for the satisfaction of his material needs. This reversal of what we should call the natural relationship, so irrational from a naive point of view, is evidently as definitely a leading principle of capitalism as it is foreign to all peoples not under capitalistic influence.


Hey I remember when Hippies were opposed to mindless materialism and capitalism, my how times have changes.



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And controversy abounds. When is Capitalism Day?

November 25?

As Capitalism Day (the first Sunday of December each year) is shortly after Thanksgiving Day and straight after Christmas Shopping Day, this is a nice tie in (pardon the pun) to Christmas and all that Christmas represents.

Or is it December 1?

Which is my birthday and of course World Aids Day. The latter may be the reason Celebrate Capitalism day got less notice and folks thought of moving it.


Or is it December 25?

X-Mas: Not just for Jesus - The Stanford Daily Online

Maybe Capitalism Day really is celebrated every New Years Eve

How about on Earth Day?

Or in June? This would make sense considering its the month of the Birth of the chronicler of Capitalism; Adam Smith.

Of course it could be February 2 the birthday of the Bitch Goddess of Capitalism Ayn Rand.

Heck why not make it September 29 on Von Mises birthday. After all the Austrian School calims to be the last best hope for victory against the ravages of working class power.

Finally when Prodos called his first International Walk for Capitalism, the turn out in Canada was overwhelming as reported here....wow a whole 30 folks marched in Kingston to support Captialism, they were followed by Top Hatted protestors, but lookee who was out supporting the Glorious Capitalist Revolution....

Canadian Walk for Capitalism
Bill Hall of the local CKWS News, Youth for Liberty member Adam Daifallah and Paul Quick (one of the counter-demonstrators) take advantage of a photo-op during the Walk for Capitalism in Kingston, Ontario, Canada.


After all the debate on dates to celebrate Capitalism why bother? We live in a capitalist society, which through our mass consumption celebrates it every day.
No need for a special day for Capitalism, every day is a celebration of capitalism.


What we really need to celebrate is life after capitalism.

Capitalism: See what people are saying right now on Technorati

Capitalism and Freedom - Factbites




See

Capitalism



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3 comments:

Anonymous said...

And a happy capitalism day to you too, Eugene.

But how to celebrate? How about offering to work for half wages, to celebrate my own exploitation. Hoorah! I {heart} Capitalism.

EUGENE PLAWIUK said...

Half your wages you greedy parasite, give us all your wages and work for free.

Larry Gambone said...

I want to start a movement called "Feed the Starving Little Billionaires". We will go around collecting money and send it to a selected poster-child billionaire who is in need. The same folks who belong to my "War Is Good For Business" society could be recruited no doubt.